Fun
Frisky
Nostalgic
Intense
Adventurous
Choked Up
Curious
Romantic
Weird
When we talk about streaming culture, we’re usually enthusing about what’s new, but one of the best things about streaming is how it’s made old and obscure cult hits available to a new generation. Presenting Cult Corner: your weekly look into hidden gems and long-lost curiosities that you can find on streaming.
Galavant’s story is a sad one, one that would surely benefit from a rousing musical number and perfectly-timed accompanying choreography. Months before the CW’s adorkable Crazy Ex-Girlfriend was charming critics, ABC premiered its snarky, musical alternative to Once Upon a Time. Though its time on TV was brief, the wacky comedic take on a hero’s journey was a welcome and quirky addition to television.
Created by Dan Fogelman (Tangled), Galavant watches like a live-action and slightly raunchier version of Shrek. The series follows Galavant (Joshua Sasse), the most heroic knight in all the land who loses all of his charms and confidence when the love of his life (Mallory Jansen) leaves him for her rich king kidnapper (Timothy Omundson). It’s the classic knight in shining armor tale that happens to star a princess who values fame and fortune over true love. But despite its silly premise and even sillier songs, there was a sincerity to Galavant most shows lack. That scrappy authenticity became even more pronounced during the show’s second season.
Galavant is and likely always will remain a solid show. The acting is good, wonderfully bouncing between tongue-in-cheek and genuine performances. The sets and cinematography are excellent, often as good as if not better than Once Upon a Time, despite the show’s limited budget, and then there are the songs. Galavant wouldn’t fare well in the Tonys, but its musical numbers were always off-kilter delights, gleefully inverting expected genre tropes and, in its second season, skewering the television industry as a whole. Watching it now, it seems clear that the show’s greatest weakness was always the same system that infused it with such scrappy energy — its network.
The musical comedy was never a ratings hit for ABC, always bordering on the edge of cancellation during its two seasons on the air. However, this week-by-week battle to stay alive gave birth to the tone that would define later episodes of the series, something that was desperate, a bit frustrated, and almost always painfully self-aware of its impending failure. If the musical comedy was on a streaming service, it would likely have a more comfortable safety net, but god it wouldn’t be nearly as much fun without its underdog energy.
Throughout its scant 18 episodes, Galavant transformed into the onscreen doppelgänger of every high school’s theater group. It was ignored by most, filled with highly talented people (especially Karen David), and desperately, passionately loved by a dedicated few. Galavant was an under-appreciated musical mess that’s absolutely worth your time.
