There is an obvious reason why Oliver Taylor’s epic new inter-galactic comedy, Warp Factor, was awarded the Footlights Harry Porter Prize 2015: Taylor is outrageously funny.

The scene is set by the two muses, ‘science’ and ‘fiction’, who give us a historical introduction to the origin of the universe, accounting for the alternative perspectives on the subject, science and fiction – respectively. They tell us we are about to witness the story of the starship ‘Warp Factor’ and its heroic crew led by Taylor himself as Captain Heracles Andromeda and the first mate-cum-engineer-cum-galactic fiend Matt Levier and 497 other personalities, aptly embodied by Kyle Turakhia. The gags fly fast and are unrelentingly hilarious in this initial exposition. Simon Copley is particularly memorable as the hapless super computer Gideon who is conferred with human empathy. Captain Andromeda, a Captain Kirk wannabe, is a well-meaning but blundering fool who sends himself to hyper sleep for three weeks by pressing the snooze button and tries to embellish the iconic Vulcan salute into an extended secret handshake. In spite of his incompetence, Andromeda and Levier manage to escape from the fast degenerating wreck of their ship, only to fall into the clutches of the arrestingly compelling Astrid Starscream (Laura Inge), that glare! Starscream, an ardent Feminid, is the commander of the starship ethnic rainbow and their task is to prove "the lethal power of universal acceptance". Starscream is locked in a cosmic struggle against the "militant atheist league" who have assembled a formidable fleet of star ships including the ‘bane of belief’ and ‘Dawkin’s delight’. Their leader Voltox Corvan is given a rather sinister presence by Orlando Gibbs.

The crew of the ethnic rainbow are specially chosen, exclusively from the planet Vulvox, in order to promote diversity. While the utopian quality of society on the planet Vulvox is maintained by the ritual of sex selection at 18 when asexual adolescents can choose to actualise the gender they self-define as through gene therapy. Naturally, Vulvox is made up exclusively of women, given higher life expectancies, lower crime rates and more generally the information the ‘grand matriarchy’ feeds to people to perpetuate that ideal of femininity. I think Taylor’s target is close to home. Warp Factor is a deliciously entertaining send up of that precious militancy that characterises too much of the rhetoric of groups like the CUSU Women’s campaign as well as the self-righteousness of extreme atheists like Dawkins whose parochialism can often be as noxious as that of the most ignorant believer.

The cast do a universally excellent job of performing a script I am told they had only two weeks to rehearse. There were forgiveable fumbles and occasional moments of absent-mindedness. But they all brought the energy that kept the effervescent flow of this innovative and fast moving script going.

Taylor lays it on a little too thick towards the end though. The incisive parody of the militant enforcers of liberty and tolerance against the zealotry of Dawkins-bashing atheists is contrasted with a cloying moral: isn’t equality about kindness and empathy in the end? Maybe it is, but an hour long sketch show is hardly going to settle the question. I think the play would have been funnier if it had left the preachy sentimentality of the climax out and left the audience to come to their own conclusion. But to be fair to Taylor, how else was he supposed to resolve such a clever premise into a conventional denouement within an hour?