''Space Force'' is an American

workplace comedy Office humor, also often called workplace comedy, is humor within the workplace, in particular, office, environment. It is a subject that receives significant attention from students of industrial and organizational psychology and of the sociolog ...

streaming television Streaming television is the digital distribution of television content, such as TV shows, as streaming media delivered over the Internet. Streaming television stands in contrast to dedicated terrestrial television delivered by over-the-air a ...

series created by

Greg Daniels Gregory Martin Daniels (born June 13, 1963) is an American screenwriter, television producer, and director. He has worked on several television series, including writing for ''Saturday Night Live'' and ''The Simpsons'', adapting ''The Office (Am ...

and

Steve Carell Steven John Carell (; born August 16, 1962) is an American actor and comedian. He played Michael Scott in ''The Office'' (2005–2011; 2013), NBC’s adaptation of the British series created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, where Ca ...

for

Netflix Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a fi ...

. It centers on a group of people tasked with establishing the sixth branch of the

United States Armed Forces The United States Armed Forces are the military forces of the United States. The armed forces consists of six service branches: the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force, Space Force, and Coast Guard. The president of the United States is ...

, the

United States Space Force The United States Space Force (USSF) is the space service branch of the U.S. Armed Forces, one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and the world's only independent space force. Along with its sister branch, the U.S. Air Force, the Space ...

. It stars

John Malkovich John Malkovich (born December 9, 1953) is an American actor. He is the recipient of several accolades, including a Primetime Emmy Award, in addition to nominations for two Academy Awards, a British Academy Film Award, two Screen Actors Guild Aw ...

, Ben Schwartz, Diana Silvers,

Lisa Kudrow Lisa Valerie Kudrow ( ; born July 30, 1963) is an American actress, producer, and screenwriter. She rose to fame for her role as Phoebe Buffay in the sitcom ''Friends'' (1994–2004), which has since been named one of the greatest television cha ...

, Tawny Newsome and Jimmy O. Yang. It premiered on Netflix on May 29, 2020, to mixed reviews. In November 2020, it was renewed for a second season which premiered on February 18, 2022, to positive reviews. In April 2022, the series was canceled after two seasons.

Premise

''Space Force'' is a

drama Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance: a play, opera, mime, ballet, etc., performed in a theatre, or on radio or television.Elam (1980, 98). Considered as a genre of poetry in general, the dramatic mode has b ...

series that centers on a group of people tasked with establishing the sixth branch of the

, the

. Season One follows the efforts of General Mark Naird (Carell) to get "boots on the moon" by 2024, per the president's orders.

Cast and characters

Main

General A general officer is an officer of high rank in the armies, and in some nations' air forces, space forces, and marines or naval infantry. In some usages the term "general officer" refers to a rank above colonel."general, adj. and n.". OED ...

Mark R. Naird, the Space Force's first

Chief of Space Operations The chief of space operations (CSO) is the service chief of the United States Space Force. The CSO is the principal military adviser to the secretary of the Air Force for Space Force operations and, as a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, a m ...

as Dr. Adrian Mallory, Space Force chief scientist * Ben Schwartz as F. Tony Scarapiducci, Space Force social media director * Diana Silvers as Erin Naird, Mark's teenage daughter * Tawny Newsome as Captain Angela Ali, a Space Force helicopter pilot, and later, astronaut. In the final minutes of the last episode of season 2, she is promoted to Major. * Jimmy O. Yang as Dr. Chan Kaifang, Dr. Mallory's lead assistant (season 2; recurring season 1) *

Don Lake Donald Lake (born November 26, 1956) is a Canadian actor, writer, and television producer. He is frequently cast by director Christopher Guest, and is also a close friend and the collaborative partner of Bonnie Hunt. He had a role in '' The Bo ...

Brigadier General Brigadier general or Brigade general is a military rank used in many countries. It is the lowest ranking general officer in some countries. The rank is usually above a colonel, and below a major general or divisional general. When appointed ...

Bradley Gregory, Naird's adjutant (season 2; recurring season 1)

Recurring

Military

Noah Emmerich Noah Nicholas Emmerich (born February 27, 1965) is an American actor and director who is best known for his roles in films such as '' Beautiful Girls'' (1996), '' The Truman Show'' (1998), ''Frequency'' (2000), ''Miracle'' (2004), '' Little Child ...

as General Kick Grabaston, Chief of Staff of the United States Air Force * Alex Sparrow as Captain Yuri "Bobby" Telatovich, a

Russian Space Forces The Russian Space Forces ( rus, Космические войска России, Kosmicheskie voyska Rossii, KV) are a branch of the Russian Aerospace Forces, that provides aerospace warning, air and space sovereignty, and other related protect ...

liaison with the Space Force, spy, and illegitimate son of

Vladimir Putin Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin; (born 7 October 1952) is a Russian politician and former intelligence officer who holds the office of president of Russia. Putin has served continuously as president or prime minister since 1999: as prime min ...

* Roy Wood Jr. as Colonel Bert Mellows,

U.S. Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cl ...

liaison to the Space Force *

Jane Lynch Jane Marie Lynch (born July 14, 1960) is an American actress, comedian and author. She is known for starring as Sue Sylvester in the musical comedy series '' Glee'' (2009–2015), which earned her a Primetime Emmy Award. Lynch also gained recog ...

as Admiral Mayweather, Chief of Naval Operations *

Diedrich Bader Karl Diedrich Bader (born December 24, 1966) is an American actor and comedian who is best known for his comedy roles. He has appeared as a series regular in television sitcoms ''The Drew Carey Show'', '' American Housewife'', and '' Outsourced' ...

as General Rongley,

Chief of Staff of the United States Army The chief of staff of the Army (CSA) is a statutory position in the United States Army held by a general officer. As the highest-ranking officer assigned to serve in the Department of the Army, the chief is the principal military advisor and ...

Patrick Warburton Patrick Warburton (born November 14, 1964) is an American actor. On television, he has played David Puddy on '' Seinfeld'', the title character on ''The Tick'', Jeb Denton on ''Less Than Perfect'', Jeff Bingham on '' Rules of Engagement'' and L ...

as General Dabney Stramm, Commandant of the Marine Corps * Larry Joe Campbell as Admiral Louis Biffoont,

Commandant of the Coast Guard The commandant of the Coast Guard is the service chief and highest-ranking member of the United States Coast Guard. The commandant is an admiral, appointed for a four-year term by the president of the United States upon confirmation by the Unit ...

* Spencer House as Duncan Tabner, a Space Force security guard from Alabama * Jamison Webb as Major Lee Baxter * Brandon Molale as Captain Clarke Luffinch, USAF

Politicians

* Dan Bakkedahl as John Blandsmith, Secretary of Defense (Season 1) * Ginger Gonzaga as Anabela Ysidro-Campos, credited and referred to as "the Angry Young Congresswoman" and also known as AYC, a parody of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez *

Concetta Tomei Concetta Tomei (born December 30, 1945) is an American theatre, film and television character actress, best known for her roles as Major Lila Garreau on the ABC series ''China Beach'' (1988–1991) and as Lynda Hansen on the NBC series ''Provi ...

as Representative Pitosi, a parody of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi * Alan Blumenfeld as Senator Schugler, a parody of

Senate Majority Leader The positions of majority leader and minority leader are held by two United States senators and members of the party leadership of the United States Senate. They serve as the chief spokespersons for their respective political parties holding t ...

Chuck Schumer Charles Ellis Schumer ( ; born November 23, 1950) is an American politician serving as Senate Majority Leader since January 20, 2021. A member of the Democratic Party, Schumer is in his fourth Senate term, having held his seat since 1999, an ...

* Tim Meadows as Secretary of Defense (Season 2)

Scientists

* Jessica St. Clair as Kelly King, structural engineer and civil contractor * Thomas Ohrstrom as Dr. Vandeveld * Nancy Lantis as Dr. Wolf * Punam Patel as Dr. Ranatunga * JayR Tinaco as Dr. Xyler

Family

* Fred Willard as Fred Naird, Mark's father (season 1) *

as Maggie Naird, Mark's wife

Other

* Chris Gethard as Eddie Broser * Landon Ashworth as Gabe Eli * Owen Daniels as Obie Hanrahan *

Aparna Nancherla Aparna Nancherla (born August 22, 1982) is an American comedian and actress of Indian descent. She has appeared on '' Inside Amy Schumer'' and has written for ''Late Night with Seth Meyers'' and '' Totally Biased with W. Kamau Bell''. Nancherla ...

as Pella Bhat * Hector Duran as Julio Díaz-José * Carolyn Wilson as Louise Papaleo * Vivis Colombetti as Hilde * Amanda Lund as Anna * Marc Sully Saint-Fleur as Jean Baptiste Bosou * Scott Michael Morgan as Emmett Bunyan

Guest

* Rahul Nath as Dr. Chandreshekar * Tommy Cook as Representative Bob White * Asif Ali as Captain Dave Powers, USSF * Michael Hitchcock as Jerome Lalosz * Alice Wetterlund as Major Jane Pike, USSF * Punkie Johnson as Staff Sergeant Kiki Rhodes, USSF * Kaitlin Olson as Edison Jaymes, "an

Elizabeth Holmes Elizabeth Anne Holmes (born February 3, 1984) is an American convicted fraudster and former biotechnology entrepreneur. In 2003, Holmes founded and was the chief executive officer (CEO) of Theranos, a now-defunct health technology company th ...

-esque tech wiz" *

Janina Gavankar Janina Zione Gavankar (; born November 29, 1980) is an American actress and musician. She is trained as a pianist, vocalist, orchestral percussionist and majored in theatre at the University of Illinois Chicago. Her roles include Shiva on ''The ...

as Hannah Howard, Jaymes' social media manager * Bruce Locke as General Tsengjun, a Chinese general in the People's Liberation Army * Kelvin Han Yee as General Gao Xiaoling, a Chinese general in the People's Liberation Army and the commander of

People's Liberation Army Strategic Support Force The People's Liberation Army Strategic Support Force (PLASSF; ) is the space, cyber, political, and electronic warfare force and the 5th branch of the People's Liberation Army (PLA).

* Megan Grano as Reporter No. 2 (Meredith) * Jessica McKenna as Participant No. 2 *

Patton Oswalt Patton Peter Oswalt (born January 27, 1969) is an American stand-up comedian, actor and writer. He is known as Spence Olchin in the sitcom ''The King of Queens'' (1998–2007) and for narrating the sitcom '' The Goldbergs'' (2013–present) as ...

as Captain Lancaster, an astronaut stationed in space (season 2) * Terry Crews as General Aggroad, the new Air Force Chief of Staff (season 2) *

Tim Chiou Tim Chiou (born November 23, 1979) is an American actor who has played a number of television and film roles. He most notably played the reoccurring role of the venture capitalist Ed Chen on Season 4 of HBO's ''Silicon Valley''. Education Chiou ...

as Chinese astronaut Dr. Lim (season 2)

Episodes

Season 1 (2020)

Season 2 (2022)

Production

Development

On January 16, 2019, it was announced that

had given the production a series order for a ten-episode first season. The series is co-created by

and

and is executive produced by Daniels, Carell, and Howard Klein through

3 Arts Entertainment 3 Arts Entertainment is an American talent management and television/film production company founded by Erwin Stoff, Michael Rotenberg and Howard Klein in 1991. The company has gone on to produce TV shows such as '' King of the Hill'', ''The Of ...

. On November 13, 2020, the series was renewed for a second season, produced in

Vancouver Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...

to lower the show's budget. Producer Daniels explained that they would refocus the tone and emphases of the show for the second season and that they had brought veteran comedy director

Ken Kwapis Kenneth William Kwapis (born August 17, 1957) is an American film and television director, screenwriter, and author. He specialized in the single-camera sitcom in the 1990s and 2000s and has directed feature films such as '' Sesame Street Presen ...

in to help achieve that goal. On April 29, 2022, Netflix canceled the series after two seasons.

Casting

Alongside the initial series order announcement, it was confirmed that Carell would star in the series. On September 26, 2019, it was announced that

, Ben Schwartz, Diana Silvers and Tawny Newsome had joined that series as main cast and Jimmy O. Yang, Alex Sparrow and

as recurring cast. In October 2019,

, Fred Willard and Jessica St. Clair joined the cast in recurring roles. In April 2020, it was announced

had joined the cast in a recurring role. In May 2020, it was reported that

and Roy Wood Jr. were cast in recurring roles. The series features the last television performance by Willard, who died on May 15, 2020, two weeks before the show's release.

Filming

Principal photography for the first season commenced in

Los Angeles, California Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

, on October 1, 2019, and ended on January 10, 2020. Most exterior shots of the fictional Space Force base were shot on the campus of

California State University, Dominguez Hills California State University, Dominguez Hills (CSUDH, CSU Dominguez Hills, or Cal State Dominguez Hills) is a public university in Carson, California. It was founded in 1960 and is part of the California State University (CSU) system. In 2020, ...

. Filming for season 2 began in late May 2021 in

and wrapped in late June 2021.

Release

The series was released on Netflix on May 29, 2020. At their Q2 report meeting in July 2020, Netflix reported the series had been viewed by about 40 million households since its release. In August 2020, it was estimated that 8.3% of subscribers had watched the series over its first month. The second season premiered on February 18, 2022. The second season featured on Netflix 's global top 10s for 1 week recording 12.32 million hours watched globally.

Reception

Audience viewership

At their Q2 report meeting in July 2020, Netflix reported the series had been viewed by about 40 million households since its release. In August 2020, it was estimated that 8.3% of subscribers had watched the series over its first month. The second season featured on Netflix 's global top 10s for 1 week recording 12.32 million hours watched globally.

Critical response

Season 1

On review aggregator

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

, the first season of the series has an approval rating of 38% based on 96 reviews, with an average rating of 5.80/10. The site's critics consensus reads: "An all-star cast and blockbuster-worthy special effects aren't enough to keep ''Space Force''s uneven blend of earnestness and satire from spinning quickly out of comedic orbit." On

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

, it has a weighted average score of 49 out of 100, based on 40 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".

Richard Roeper Richard E. Roeper (born October 17, 1959) is an American columnist and film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times''. He co-hosted the television series '' At the Movies'' with Roger Ebert from 2000 to 2008, serving as the late Gene Siskel's success ...

of the ''

Chicago Sun-Times The ''Chicago Sun-Times'' is a daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of Chicago Public Media, and has the second largest circulation among Chicago newspapers, after the ''Chicago ...

'' praised Carell, for his "impeccable comedic timing and his uncanny ability to play yet another character who's often an insufferable buffoon with not a speck of self-awareness" but criticized the hit-and-miss humor, and unrealized potential, saying "Don’t get me wrong; I enjoyed ''Space Force''... It’s just with all the credentials of the main contributors, we hoped for greatness and got ... pretty good." Caroline Framke of ''

Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...

'' wrote: "For all the heft behind it, ''Space Force'' should be an easy win. Ten episodes later, it's safer to say that ''Space Force'' is really just okay." Nick Allen, writing for '' RogerEbert.com'' says, "''Space Force'' has the supporting characters to color its cringe-worthy absurdity," praising its cast but calling out on the story's incompetence. ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' gave the first season of the series only 2 out of 5 saying, "Above all, despite occasional laughs to be gleaned from the twist that Malkovich can give the most unpromising of lines, ''Space Force'' is not funny, which makes it hard to class as a comedy." Joshua Rivera from ''

The Verge ''The Verge'' is an American technology news website operated by Vox Media, publishing news, feature stories, guidebooks, product reviews, consumer electronics news, and podcasts. The website launched on November 1, 2011, and uses Vox Media ...

'' gave ''Space Force'' a disappointing review stating that "the show falls apart before it even gets going", chiefly because it strays away from the sharp political satire that shows such as '' Veep'' had nailed and instead "adheres to the conventions of the workplace comedy."

Season 2

On review aggregator

, the second season of the series has an approval rating of 90% based on 10 reviews, with an average rating of 7.1/10. On

, it has a weighted average score of 61 out of 100 based on 4 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Nick Allen of '' RogerEbert.com'' said "''Space Force'' is good, or good enough, with what matters most to it." ''

'' Caroline Framke opined that "The result isn’t half as sleek or ambitious as the initial season, but the show at least seems much more comfortable in its own skin."

Accolades

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Space Force (TV series) 2020 American television series debuts 2022 American television series endings 2020s American LGBT-related comedy television series 2020s American workplace comedy television series English-language Netflix original programming Gay-related television shows Fiction about the People's Liberation Army Television shows about the United States Space Force Television series by 3 Arts Entertainment Television shows set in Colorado Television shows filmed in Los Angeles Television shows filmed in Vancouver Television series created by Greg Daniels