3rd Rock from the Sun

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3rd Rock from the Sun
Title Shot
Genre	Situation comedy
Creator(s)	Bonnie Turner and Terry Turner
Starring	John Lithgow Kristen Johnston French Stewart Joseph Gordon-Levitt Jane Curtin Simbi Khali Elmarie Wendel Wayne Knight
Country of origin	United States
No. of episodes	139
Production
Running time	about 21:00 (per episode)
Broadcast
Original channel	NBC
Original run	January 9, 1996 – May 22, 2001
Links
IMDb profile

3rd Rock from the Sun was a popular American television sitcom that ran from 1996 until 2001. The show was about a "family" of four extraterrestrials who landed on Earth to observe human beings, while pretending (usually awkwardly) to be humans. The show broke ground by introducing predominantly European humour in its writing to a North American audience and was the first television show to create a 3D episode using advanced cinema techniques of the time.

The show aired in the United States on NBC. In Britain, the show is either broadcast on ITV4 or Paramount Comedy 1 and in Australia, on the Seven Network and now on Pay-TV channel Fox Classics. In Indonesia the show aired on Jak-TV, a local television station in Jakarta.

Contents 1 Plot 1.1 Sources of humor 1.2 Typical episode themes 1.3 Common mythology 1.4 Relationships with humans 1.5 The 3-D episode 1.6 Plot twists 1.7 Season 2 1.8 Season 3 1.9 Season 4 1.10 Season 5 1.11 Season 6 2 Comic style 2.1 Common sources of humor 3 Awards 4 Series finale 5 Cast 6 DVD releases 7 Other media 8 External links

[edit] Plot

The first episode depicts the Solomon family teleporting into the seats of a Nash Rambler. The first discovery they all make is that none of them can swivel their heads 180 degrees and thus cannot lick their backs, apparently a common practice on their home planet. Therafter they rather quickly find places for themselves in human society — they rent a loft apartment in Rutherford, Ohio, a fictional suburb said to be between Columbus and Cleveland, finding that money and identification has been provided for them by their superiors (who are frequently invoked as having a shadowy influence on Earth authorities, shielding the Solomons from the worst effects of their irresponsible actions). Dick Solomon (played by John Lithgow), the High Commander and leader of the expedition, becomes the family provider and takes a position as a physics professor at Pendelton State University. Information officer Tommy (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) has been given the body of a teenager and is forced to enroll in high school (later University), leaving security officer Sally (Kristen Johnston) and communications officer Harry (French Stewart) to spend their lives as thirty somethings hanging out at home and bouncing through short-term jobs. The family often communicate with their offworld (and usually unseen) boss, "The Big Giant Head", (BGH) who apparently only got the job by kissing "The Big Giant Butt". When in human form, "The Big Giant Head" (William Shatner) is an arrogant, alcoholic sexual predator. His orders are received by Harry, who unexpectedly (and often in inconvenient circumstances) stands erect, his arms stiff (acting perhaps as the antenna), and proclaims: "Incoming message from the Big Giant Head" (originally, Harry did not have a purpose on the mission at all, but it was later revealed that he has a transmitter implanted in his brain which allows contact with the BGH. To make himself seem important, he subquently described himself as the "communications officer").

[edit] Sources of humor

The show derived much humor from the contrast between the outward appearance adopted by each of the aliens and his or her actual, internal nature. Dick, far from being a wise and fatherly figurehead, is arrogant, self-absorbed, petulant, faddish, and often downright foolish. Inside Sally's glamorous form lives the weapons and security officer: uncouth, swaggering, and macho. The oldest of the group was morphed into teenager Tommy, his former wisdom at odds with the strange and often humiliating life in which his teenage persona and raging hormones casts him. Only the oddball of the group, Harry, seems comfortable with Earth — yet he is the most obviously weird of them all, particularly when his built-in "radio" function takes unexpected control over his body, relaying orders from the aliens' homeworld in an odd, booming voice (Harry's title is never made explicit, but the other characters often refer to him as "Communicator" or "Transmitter", despite the fact that he almost always receives rather than transmits messages).

[edit] Typical episode themes

Almost all the episodes revolve around the Solomons' difficulty integrating themselves into Earth culture and understanding human customs — often their view of Earth realities is distorted by the fact that almost all of their experience of Earth comes through the media rather than firsthand experience, especially watching television. Details about their alien nature are rarely given and inconsistent, except to reinforce the idea that their former lives were almost barren of emotion and most of the relationships humans have with each other. Their original forms, for example, are described as asexual, with reproduction a matter of sending packets of genetic material to each other in the mail. Lying is almost impossible in their society because of the "Truth Belt". Leaders like The Big Giant Head are unelected and assumed infallible (in fact, it is stated that politicians on their planet are chosen by seeing which one can outrun the "giant fireball"). The upshot is that living in an Earth culture provides the Solomons with an almost intolerable degree of emotional stimulation and conflict, which they are very ill equipped to handle.

[edit] Common mythology

Occasionally references would be made to specific features of the aliens' abilities and of the aliens' experiences on their own world, which built up a common mythology for the show. The theme of the idiot savant repeatedly resurfaces, since each member of the family makes up for their extreme naïveté with some special skill owing to their alien nature.

Though Dick's understanding of physics is weaker than his "son" Tommy's, it is implied that even his basic scientific knowledge makes advanced Earth physics appear rudimentary, leading to his becoming enormously respected in his field despite his childish behavior (a famous clip from the show has him reading a passage from A Brief History of Time and laughing hysterically at Stephen Hawking's description of virtual particles). Even so, he is often shown as the member of the family with the least to recommend him in terms of ability, leading them to question his right to his command. Sally, for instance, is depicted as not only having an attractive body (she is often described as being "Amazonian") but being amazingly physically strong and fit, able to fight and defeat large groups of men much larger than she (even when doing so is unnecessary and culturally inappropriate).

Tommy, similarly, has been trained with the ability of near-instant recall and has an encyclopedic knowledge about Earth society, which unfortunately seems useless in terms of helping him make appropriate decisions, but ensures that he remains a straight-A student and that in much of his dialogue he finds himself inadvertently quoting passages from literature or film at length.

Harry is most fascinating, since his behavior is bizarre, unstable and borderline mentally retarded even for a Solomon (a condition, it is implied, engendered by the chip in his brain that allows him to communicate with the home planet), yet somehow this mental condition gives him an inexplicable sex appeal for women and makes him the only Solomon with any talent in the arts — Harry often seems to have a knack for all fine arts, including music and theater, but is consistently shown as being an incredibly talented painter, especially as a portraitist and caricaturist, though his inability to verbally articulate his artistic ideas – or, in fact, any ideas at all – in an intelligent fashion sinks his efforts at making a living through his talent.

One of Dick's driving motivations becomes his desire to master drawing, acting, music, or other pursuits --all of which he fails at miserably -- due to his lack of understanding of how the clearly less intelligent Harry could possibly possess talents he does not.

[edit] Relationships with humans

Each alien became involved in various relationships with humans throughout the course of the series, primarily focusing on Dick's infatuation – at first met with disgust and then, finally, reciprocation – with anthropology professor Mary Albright (Jane Curtin), who shares an office with him (unusual for professors in two almost wholly unrelated departments, though this could be explained by repeated statements that the college is underfunded and of low quality). Much is often made of Mary's angst, insecurity, and neuroses brought on by a lifetime of studying the human condition as well as an unstable relationship with her parents, and the cheerful, childlike naivete displayed by Dick, the primary factor in him that attracts her.

Sally similarly acquires a long-term boyfriend, Don Leslie Orville (Wayne Knight), an overweight and incompetent police officer who becomes attracted to her after several incidents in which he is forced to confront or arrest the Solomons for various crimes. The two generally have conversations while speaking in a manner similar to an old 1930s crime drama.

Tommy manages an on-again/off-again relationship with August (Shay Astar), a reserved "ice queen" teenager. Harry is shown as being something of a ladies' man and heartbreaker, carrying on a series of emotionally fraught one-night stands despite his lack of any obvious ability at seduction. Some humor comes from the fact that at some point in the show most of the character relationships have been "mixed up" — a strange attraction is briefly shown between Mary and Tommy due to their similar passion for the social sciences and the study of humanity, in which Tommy disturbingly chooses to "step aside" and let Dick pursue her instead. Nina (Simbi Khali), Dick's assistant who primarily serves as his straight man and comic foil, is seen briefly having a fling with Harry. The Solomons' landlady, who is at first merely a source of comic relief, her own bizarre foibles and imperceptivity causing her to be a terrible role model for proper human behavior to the Solomons, ends up becoming an important character who eats Thanksgiving dinner with them annually and whose daughter, Vicki (played by Jan Hooks), becomes one of Harry's love interests.

[edit] The 3-D episode

The show famously peaked in popularity around the time that it released a special 3-D episode in its second season, which is often regarded as the most classic and memorable season in the show's six year run. It was immediately regarded as a masterful work and has become a staple of classic television. The episode promotion heavily relied on goggles that could be purchased from soft drink bottles prior to the airing of the episode. The episode contained an ordinary main plot shot with normal cameras interspersed with cinematic 3-D interludes (directed by filmmaker Phil Joanou) that relied heavily on CGI and nontraditional camera angles, each one representing an internal dream sequence each of the Solomons have as they one by one succumb to nervous breakdowns over the stress of their lives — Dick conflicted over his desire to be truly human and his fear of losing Mary, Sally over her desire for a life of glamour and power leading to a growing belief she is an unsuitable match for Don, Tommy over his realization that none of his intelligence or knowledge has allowed him any real understanding of humanity, and Harry's visions being typically bizarre and incomprehensible but focusing on the lack of respect shown to him and sense of who he is or what his purpose is even relative to the other Solomons. It is perhaps noteworthy that his dream was less frightening and unsettling than those of the others.

[edit] Plot twists

As time went on the show began to intersperse concrete references to the aliens' nature and their homeworld which played a role in affecting the show's plot. They usually described their original bodies as "gelatinous purple tubes" that lacked sex organs or most of the forms of physical definition that humans possess. For instance, individuals in their species are so near-identical to each other that the Solomons were unaware of the concept of race or ethnicity and had never invented one for themselves, leading to them to attempt to "choose" one (a source of humor since the Solomons all appear quite white), eventually deciding that they are Jewish because of their surname, which they had taken from a trucking company. Occasionally the Solomons would encounter or think they encountered other extraterrestrials — Dick once becomes frantic when he misidentifies snowflakes as "brain-sucking parasites" (which Harry calls "Albino Brain Chiggers" in a fit of hysteria), for instance, but the most long-lasting such gag was the Solomons' belief that Jell-O is an offshoot of a hostile amorphous carnivorous species they have often encountered, prompting them to go into hysterics whenever they see it served and attempt to destroy it. The name of the Solomons' home planet (if it indeed has one) is never revealed throughout the course of the series, in the show's dialogue it is referred to as simply "The Home Planet." It is located in a Barred Spiral galaxy on the Cepheus-Draco border.

Major twists in the plot, such as the various season finales, tended to involve contact with the Solomons' home planet, involving their superiors' ongoing disapproval at the Solomons' antics and their becoming a "laughing stock" among their peers. The first season finale, for instance, featured a message that the Solomons' mission was a failure and demanding that Dick be recalled and replaced with a more competent commander. The newcomer, also played by Lithgow and showing off Lithgow's ability to act against himself in a classic evil twin plot, proved to be a criminal who falsified the message in order to gain control of the Solomons' mission and use his technology to conquer the planet. After the Solomons dispatched him with the help of another alien agent who turns out to be Dennis Rodman (capitalizing on the joke comparing Rodman to an alien commonly made in sitcoms at the time), a genuine message came from the home planet allowing Dick to stay but ordering that he take a wife, as his romance with Dr. Albright was the apparent source of much of his emotional instability. Dick's wife, Janet, the Big Giant Head's niece played by Roseanne Barr, acted as a foil for the other characters, being a newcomer even less versed in the ways of humanity than they, as well as an ironic take on her portrayal as the title character in Roseanne, portraying a "perfect", subservient woman. However, after Dick explained to her that marriage was really about two people who truly love each who want to live together for the rest of their lives, Janet happily dropped the facade of being the perfect wife.

[edit] Season 2

Often regarded as the "classic" season of the show, the second season saw the Solomon family undergo many random struggles in order to further develop their skills at being human beings. With the season starting off with the memorable Evil Dick two-part episode, the season quickly began producing episodes that began to stretch the limits of the show's humour. John Lithgow and Kristen Johnston won Emmys for their work on this season, which produced many of their most memorable performances over the show's run. The 3D episode masterpiece was also included as the finale of the second season, which also ended on another cliffhanger.

Two of the most popular sequences in the show's history occurred during the second season, with both involving French Stewart as Harry Solomon. The first is of Harry spitting baby food onto the camera lens representing the point of view of the mischievous child he and Tommy Joseph Gordon-Levitt are babysitting and spoon feeding. The second sequence is during the classic Thanksgiving episode, where after the dinner, Harry and Vicki Dubcek, played by Jan Hooks, use food suggestively to sexually arouse one another after it is made obvious to the audience that there is sexual chemistry between the pair. At the end of the "battle" he places a half eaten turkey carcass on his head before the pair finally have sex on the downstairs kitchen table. Another memorable sequence is of Dick looking after Mary's beloved fish and reading them a bedtime story from Tales Of The Calypso. He places a black beanie over his head and perfectly imitates the mannerisms and distinct voice of Jacques Cousteau, humourously accenting several of the words with a thick French accent to gain laughs.

[edit] Season 3

The third season of the show, sometimes regarded by some as its best, features another special double episode where a group of scheming Venutians come to Earth in order to take its supply of products back to their home planet for both luxurious and research purposes. They take the guise of gorgeous and sexy women. The men of Rutherford (including Tom, Harry and Dick) fall head over heels for them and can't see through their scheming, leaving only Sally able to figure it out. The episode featured well publicized guest star Cindy Crawford as Mascha, a Venutian who ends up falling in love with Harry's goofy and innocent charm. The episode was also memorable for being shot at Dodgers Stadium as the Venutian's evil plan will culminate at that year's Super Bowl.

This season also saw the final appearance of Phil Hartman on the show as Vicki's psychotic ex-boyfriend, Randy, who said "OH YEAH" frequently at the end of most of his sentences as a gesture of determination, triumph or reinforcement of point. Another memorable cameo included John Cleese as Liam Neesam, a brilliant biology professor who turns out to be an alien hell bent on destroying the Earth in order to get a "better view" of the solar system. He relents after Dick proves to him that humans can be remarkable after all, making Dick responsible for saving the planet because he alone shows promise in the species' evolution of intelligence. Dick wisely decided not to inform Liam that he was not, in fact, human. Neesam would later return in the sixth season to fulfil his purpose of turning the Earth into a de-evolved human race of apes and making it a theme park called "Planet Monkey World". He all but fails after Dick transforms him ironically into a monkey.

[edit] Season 4

One of the better loved seasons of the show, the fourth season saw The Big Giant Head make his first appearance, played by William Shatner. His desire to review the team's results and performance is soon forgotten, as the newly corporeal alien is quickly distracted by all the vices his new flesh affords. However, he took advantage of Vicki Dubchek while she had been arguing with Harry over having a child and slept with her. The next day, the Big Giant Head left after Vicki discovered she was pregnant. Because of his alien biology, the child was born within a day, which is where the season ended on its usual cliffhanger.

During his first appearance (part one of the fourth-season finale), The Big Giant Head tells Dick of a bad experience he had once on an airplane, and Dick exclaims that the same thing happened to him some time earlier. This is a fictional crossover to the Twilight Zone episode "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet". Shatner appeared in the original television version; Lithgow appeared in the movie remake some 30 years later.

This was actually the second reference to the Twilight Zone incident. In episode 12 of the first season, Frozen Dick, Dick and Mary are seated in a plane which is about to take-off for Chicago. Suddenly, Dick goes berserk, looks out the window and shouts "Oh my God! Out there! There's something on the wing!". Mary's assurance that "it's an engine" doesn't seem to calm him down. They end up driving, of course.

[edit] Season 5

The beginning of the fifth season saw Vicki finally give birth to hers and The Big Giant Head's child. Due to being developed in the womb and born within one day and whether it would have an abnormal appearance, much of the comedy at the beginning of the season was sourced from the Solomons misconceiving Mary's comments about the baby (e.g. "It's got Vicki's eyes", to which the aliens responded with alarm at the fact they thought the baby had stolen Vicki's eyes) The Solomons were introduced to the child, which Vicki named Eric Travis. The child appeared totally human, but Vicki wanted to spread the news that he was half-alien, so the Solomons first tried to kidnap the child, but then tried to kill the reporter Vicki had called in. They were happy to find out the reporter didn't believe Eric Travis was half alien after which Vicki left for Orlando.

The Big Giant Head would return twice in the fifth season: the first was to take Vicki and Eric back with him, revealing that he and the Solomons were aliens. When Vicki found this out, she happily screamed, "I'm gonna be queen of the freakin' universe!" The next time he returned, The Big Giant Head and Vicki had grown tired of each other. Vicki tried to kill Harry's new girlfriend in order to get him back and The Big Giant Head became clingy towards Dick, not allowing himself a moment without him. This was due to the reveal that he was Dick's father, making Dick's full name Dick Head.

[edit] Season 6

In the sixth and final season, viewers didn't tune in nearly as much as in the preceding years due to poor storylines and a newly assigned timeslot. Joseph Gordon-Levitt left the series as well this season as a primary character and, instead, became a recurring character only appearing in about half the season's episodes. Storylines acknowledging the aliens' origins were largely jettisoned, with the Solomons merely being portrayed as incredibly eccentric humans.

The season however featured one of the more moving and memorable finales in modern sitcoms, with the alien's mission anthem given treatment by the Solomons as they are transported back to the Home Planet. John Lithgow's touching performance in the episode garnered him his final Primetime Emmy nomination for Lead Actor in a Comedy one last time as Dick Solomon, a performance many regard as one that should have garnered him the coveted award.

[edit] Comic style

Third Rock uses comic elements which are strikingly unusual^{[citation needed]} in modern North American television comedy, yet drawn from established sources. Clowning techniques , all with a long pedigree in European theatre^{[citation needed]}, are employed throughout the several seasons of the show. Mime, slapstick, speaking in rhyme and role reversals are employed, giving this science fiction comedy a solid anchoring in more venerable clown traditions, such as the Commedia dell'arte. (One of the show's most famous moments is when Dick's evil twin traps him in an "invisible box" that Dick tests with his hands and finds to be seamless, leading him to the agonized cry, "My God! He's turned me into a mime!") In the well established style of clown parody, the aliens repeatedly ape the behavior patterns, mannerisms and speech style of humans in various walks of life and much humor is derived from their ability to be more like their target human than the original.

Indeed, this "Zelig"-like quality the family often exhibit is used to great effect in the series, such as in the episode Dick the mouth Solomon in which Sally and Tommy meet a Mafia-style mobster and almost immediately take on the roles of gangster's moll (Sally) and young wiseguy (Tommy). And in Dick Solomon of the Indiana Solomons, Harry mimics "Uncle Abe" to perfection, right down to the cigar, physical mannerisms, and speech patterns.

Relationships between the characters are similarly familiar from theatrical and circus comedy performed in Europe during the past few centuries. Usually, whenever Don and Sally are in the same room and speaking to one another, their conversations revert to a rather silly, pseudo-film noir dialogue.

[edit] Common sources of humor

• The aliens experiencing human emotions, such as rejection, jealousy, and infatuation, for the first time and reacting in an unduly flamboyant manner.
• The aliens inability to actually remember their own anthem
• The aliens' inability to define the word "alien" in context (as in "illegal alien").
• The aliens interpreting figures of speech literally (example: an episode where Dick performs an experiment to see what happens when the "spit hits the fan" by literally spitting into a fan)
• Conversely, the aliens misusing figures of speech, often by unintentionally altering a word so the expression sounds vulgar or peculiar. (for example, in the episode "Dick the Vote", Sally tells Officer Don that Harry "threw his head into the race")
• The aliens' inability to differentiate between what is said and what is meant (missing sarcasm, for instance).
• The aliens' inability to distinguish fiction from reality when discussing Earth society and culture.
• The aliens' inappropriately mixing levels of social interaction, acting inappropriately formal in intimate moments, or vice versa.
• The aliens' interaction with science fiction and fictional depictions of the idea of aliens -- Harry becoming offended at what he considers to be negative, anthropocentric depictions of alien life at a Star Trek convention, for example. Once, Dick walked in on Tommy watching Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, at which point both started laughing and Tommy said "This is what they think space is like", to which Dick replied "If it was that exciting, I never would have left!"
• The aliens' naivete allowing them to make offensive generalizations about Earth culture that, ironically, prove for them to be true — Sally discovering that sexual wiles can act as a form of mind control over men, Tommy discovering that high school popularity is a simple inverse correlation with intelligence, Dick discovering that any responsibility can be avoided by lying, etc.
• The aliens' being taken by total surprise by regular, everyday occurrences, thanks to their recent arrival on Earth -- becoming sick, having to pay income tax, being summoned for jury duty, the end of the school year, etc.
• A running gag in which Vicki Dubcek keeps mistaking Dr. Mary Albright for being a medical doctor due to her title.
• The aliens' naive nature causing others in their lives to make wild misapprehensions about the nature of their abnormalities — repeated speculation among his colleagues that Dick is a foreign immigrant or a drug abuser, or by Tommy's teachers that he is a victim of child abuse; an episode where Sally's masculine behavior fools a gay man into believing she is a transsexual, etc.
• The aliens misusing Earth appliances or household items (a form of prop comedy), a recurring gag being Harry taking upon himself the task of testing whether devices or substances are dangerous by using them to harm himself (testing whether bleach is toxic by ingesting it, pressing a hot iron against his chest, etc.).
• The aliens have a re-occurring fear, brought up by screaming and huddling, of gelatin dessert, having in the past dealt with a carnivorous alien beast that looks like it.
• Parodied references to famous scenes from films - eg the Daughter/Sister routine from ChinaTown is parodied.

[edit] Awards

In 1997, 3rd Rock won the most Emmy Awards (5 from 8 nominations) for a television series:

• Outstanding Lead Actor — Comedy Series — John Lithgow
• Outstanding Supporting Actress — Comedy Series — Kristen Johnston
• Outstanding Costume Design — Series — "A Nightmare on Dick Street" — Marguerite Derricks
• Outstanding Choreography — "A Nightmare on Dick Street"
• Outstanding Sound Mixing — Comedy Series — "A Nightmare on Dick Street"

John Lithgow received an Emmy Award nomination for "Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series" for each year the show was broadcast, winning in 1996, 1997, and 1999. Accepting the 1999 award he said "Many wonderful things have happened to me in my life, but the two best are '3rd Rock' and my family."

[edit] Series finale

After Mary sees Dick change Liam (a malevolent alien played by John Cleese) into a chimpanzee, Dick reveals his true identity to Mary. After an initial shock, Mary considers the past five years of their relationship, realizes how much sense it makes, and shortly thereafter comes to fully accept Dick and the family. Unfortunately, Liam complains about Dick's transgression to the Big Giant Head, who orders Dick and the family back to their home planet for taking unauthorized hostile action against a fellow alien. When Mary finds out, she agrees to accompany them back to their homeworld, and so the five set about planning a going-away party. Sally herself hurries to bring an amicable end to her relationship with Don, which she accomplishes by putting him through a crash personality alteration course which improves him to the point that he becomes a completely different person--one so different from the one he used to be that he and Sally no longer have any kind of rapport, making their parting one of respect and camraderie rather than one of lost love. Harry himself says goodbye to the woman he loved--Mrs. Dubcek, whom he reveals he has been having an affair with for an undetermined amount of time.

The Solomons throw a party in their attic to say goodbye to all of their friends, culminating with a performance of "Fly Me to the Moon" by a confused Elvis Costello, whom Harry apparently abducted from a previous gig. Afterwards, the family and Mary head to their favorite spot in the Rambler ready to be beamed aboard the mothership, but at the last minute, Mary realizes that her home is Earth, and as much as she loves Dick, she couldn't live in an alien environment. Dick escorts her out of the Rambler and performs a brainwashing technique on her, one that erases her memories of him but leaves the feelings associated with her love still in her mind. Harry leaves his coat behind for Mary to lay on until she regains consciousness following the beam-up, and Dick places the keys to the rambler in her unconscious hand. The family re-assembles in the Rambler one last time, tearfully singing their national anthem as they're beamed away.

A cliff-hanger was filmed, albeit unaired, to leave open the possibility for the series to return; in this version, only aired occasionally in syndication, the episode continues after the family is beamed away. The brainwashed Mary wakes up, sees the Rambler and feels the key in her hand, and in a state of delirium, enters the car and puts the key in the ignition. Suddenly, a naked Dick appears in the passenger seat, screams, "Alien abduction! Alien abduction!" and then beams himself--and Mary--aboard the mothership.

[edit] Cast

• John Lithgow as High Commander Dick Solomon. He is head of the expedition to Earth but is often the most child-like member of the group. Much of the behavioural or societal-based troubles faced by the crew in their mission whilst on Earth are frequently sourced out of some juvenile act perpetrated by Dick, troubles which in turn are forced to be overcome by the entire troupe with a great deal of reluctance.
• Kristen Johnston as Security Officer Lieutenant Sally Solomon (Dick's "sister", but sometimes introduced as Tommy's sister earlier in the series, and, on one occasion, claimed to be his "mother", although never Dick's "daughter" and certainly not his spouse -- failure to clarify the exact relationship between Tommy, Harry and Sally led to humorous confusion whenever either Harry or Sally attempted to act as Tommy's guardian). Sally was chosen to be "the woman" because she apparently lost some sort of contest; while the alien species is described as asexual, Sally seems to have a harder time trying to figure out womanhood than the others do manhood. She filed a request to be made male early in the mission, though later decided she liked being a woman.
• French Stewart as Communicator Harry Solomon (Dick and Sally's "brother", and either Tommy's "brother" or "uncle")
• Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Information Officer Tommy Solomon (Dick's "son", yet the oldest member of the aliens). Gordon-Levitt left the series (after the fifth season concluded) as a primary character, only appearing as a recurring character in about half the episodes of season six.
• Jane Curtin as Dr. Mary Albright (at times, Dick's girlfriend)
• Simbi Khali as Nina Campbell (Dick and Mary's administrative assistant) (Only appears in the opening credits seasons 3 - 6).
• Elmarie Wendel as Mrs. Mamie Dubcek (the Solomons' loose, carefree landlady) (Only appears in the opening credits seasons 3 - 6).
• Wayne Knight as Police Officer Don Leslie Orville (at times, Sally's boyfriend) (Only appears in the opening credits seasons 3 - 6).
• Shay Astar as August Leffler, Tommy's girlfriend (seasons 1 - 4)
• Larisa Oleynik as Alissa Strudwick, Tommy's girlfriend (seasons 4 - 6)
• Ron West as Vincent Strudwick, Alissa's father and rival to Dick (seasons 4 - 6)

In addition to the recurring characters, numerous other actors had recurring or cameo roles on the series such as Harry Morgan (Professor Sutler), Mike Ditka (Coach Mafferty), Cindy Crawford (Mascha), Angie Everhart (Chloe), and Greg Gumbel (himself). James Earl Jones provided narration for the series.

The names of the male Solomons are a play on the expression "every Tom, Dick and Harry". Officer Don realizes this, but is assured that this is a coincidence, and "not a calculated attempt to appear normal", as Harry says. Sally's name is also implicitly chosen because of its commonplace nature as well, and was possibly chosen to match Harry's name in a reference to the film When Harry Met Sally. As for the name "Solomon", they say that they took it off a truck that was driving by.

[edit] DVD releases

All six seasons of 3rd Rock from the Sun have been released on DVD by Anchor Bay Entertainment in the US, and Network DVD in the UK.

Cover Art	Season	Release Date
		Region 1	Region 2	Region 4
	1	July 6, 2005	May 17, 2004	November 9, 2005
	2	October 25, 2005	June 21, 2004	November 9, 2005
	3	February 21, 2006	August 30, 2004	February 8, 2006
	4	May 2, 2006	October 25, 2004	July 6, 2006
	5	August 15, 2006	January 24, 2005	February 7, 2007
	6	November 14, 2006	January 24, 2005	February 7, 2007
	Complete Box Set (Seasons 1-6)	TBA	October 25, 2004	TBA

[edit] Other media

A tie-in book, 3rd Rock from the Sun: The Official Report, was released in 1997. Its pages are printed in black and white; however, there are several glossy coloured pictures in the centre pages featuring various cast members on the show.

The book is essentially a report of their findings during their stay on Earth (although in Dick Solomon's foreword, he states that the report has been requested too early). Primarily a source of humour, the book includes such features as "What to do if you encounter Jell-O", a fan biography of Katie Couric written by Harry, and Sally's version of a Cosmo quiz. Portions of the book are included in the Booklets inside each season set of the series

Despite the report's being set within the fictional world of 3rd Rock, there is a foreword written by Lithgow himself in which he explains how he was "abducted" by the 3rd Rock producers and forced to work on their production. There is a post-it note attached to the foreword, apparently written by Dick Solomon, stating that he doesn't know why the foreword is there, but that Lithgow is an Earth actor who appeared in "some helicopter movie". A black and white picture of the 3rd Rock cast and crew is also included at the end of the book.

The sitcom gets its title from the well known Jimi Hendrix song, "Third Stone From the Sun".

[edit] External links

• Episode guide
• Anchor Bay official website for the 3rd Rock releases on DVD
• 3rd Rock from the Sun at the Internet Movie Database