Michael got the good news (in our opinion, anyway) late last night that Firefly and Death at a Funeral star Alan Tudyk has been cast as the gay lead in the new pilot that Mutchnick/Kohan (the guys behind Will & Grace) are producing for ABC. We're excited because Tudyk is a great comic actor and isn't afraid of taking risks (as his extended comic nude scene in Funeral can attest).

Another plus to Tudyk's casting, purely from a visibility perspective, is that he's got an enormous built-in fanbase of folks who might not otherwise be inclined to tune into a gay/straight buddy comedy: sci-fi geeks. 

Now let's hope that the rest of the cast fills out as well and that the pilot is a slam-dunk, and that we see the series on our sets this fall, eh? For an idea of just how insanely popular this guy is with the sci-fi set, check out the video after the break of his and co-star Summer Glau's appearance at a sci-fi convention. It's pretty awesome.