A review of the television series, Stargate Universe

I just finished watching a few hours of the marathon recap before tonight's season premiere, having attempted to catch this show before. I find it always to be disheartening to see producers say they are going for "darker, more mature" and end up with melancholy combined with juvenile. If  you look at why things are so bad for the characters in the show, (1) every disaster is completely contrived; (2) the commander is a terrible, morale-depressing "leader" (more fitting all the traits of the negative elements within military command), who also lacks decisiveness and intelligence (You have to be smart to be a real Colonel!).

And, no-one should be in the cast simply because they make good eye candy. Just because this is a TV show is no excuse for pandering to baser emotion, especially when this doesn't fit with the concept for the show. This is not mature. This is American Pie material.

Regarding Blue and Carlyle's characters, they are the only interesting characters, but they fit more into standard charicatures of brainy types, rather than being truly representative of gamers or scientists, including the brilliant ones. I'm part of the gaming culture, I understand most science and I have seen biographies of many famous scientific personalities on television and video. The best in both categories fit more into the appearance and style of the general culture than what's typically represented.

The rest of the characters, including the character of Lt. Smith are just boring. MSgt. Greer appears to be typical of stereotypes of Blacks in the Military as portrayed in so much of television (Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, and Mass Effect 1 and 2 have much better portrayals of smart, thoughtful, strong Black characters.) Lou Diamond Phillips character, while seeming to be the only truly intelligent military character is still portrayed as the raspy, old-timer type of General. And come on, since when can a Military Officer just "quit" their essential job in the middle of a crisis like Lt. Johannsen's character did early on? The only intelligent portrayal by a female was Ming-Na's discussion with the commander about the lottery, which he responded to with a perfunctory, arbitrary reaction.