Going out with a whimper, not a bang.
Since 1997, there has been at least one incarnation of the Stargate saga running on television that spawned from the original 1994 film. Much like the Star Trek series that came before it, Stargate ran on a similar formula about a group of explorers who would explore strange new worlds, seek out new life and new civilizations and boldly go where no man had gone before. But instead of using a spaceship, they use special gates that allow you to move through a wormhole from one world to another.
In Stargate Universe, they decided to deviate from their standard formula, which ultimately brought about the demise of the show. Trying to be more like the recent Battlestar Galactica remake that ran for several years to critical acclaim, the show was a lot darker. The crew was a ragtag group of military, scientists, and civilians forced together on an alien spaceship, called the Destiny. They were trapped on the other side of the universe, forced to go along with wherever the computer run ship would take them. There was little to no hope of survival, and even less chance for them to ever return home.
Not only was the tone a major contributor to the downfall, but it was also due to the lack of serialization. No longer was it possible to sit down and watch a self-contained episode, but instead you needed to watch multiple episodes in order to get resolution of the simplest plotline. The most evident of this was during the first season where it required three parts just so that the crew could find a fresh air supply. That also led to three more to get the lights and water replenished. Season Two was a little better, but still the final storyline about the ship being hunted by drone ships that are bent on the destruction of all technology has taken half the season to accomplish.
The final issue facing the show was the lack of villains. The two villains in the show were an unknown and rarely seen alien race, and a group of drone spacecraft. The real adversary that the crew faced was survival. While finding food and supplies can be a difficult undertaking it doesn’t make for great television. If it was, then the reality show Survivor wouldn’t need to have challenges or vote people off.
So what was the reason to watch? The reason was because of the characters. Every character was well thought out and absolutely fascinating to watch. They were nothing close to the stereotypical ones you might find in your typical sci-fi show. They were complex. They weren’t always good or bad. Simply put, they were real. Some of the best moments came from how they reacted to their situation. When Colonel Young (Louis Ferreira) abandoned Dr. Rush (Robert Carlyle) on a deserted planet because of his mutinous ways, or Rush and Eli (David Blue) tracking down a murderer for the simple fact of vengeance, and even when the Colonel had to smother one of his own men who was too injured to survive but would have slowly bled out and died. Those moments are what made it worth watching. The show was just beginning to hit its stride when it got cancelled.
The second season finale was also the series finale. The finale episode left off where the last one ended. The Destiny was trapped. All along the path that the ship was heading, the drone ships had set up blockades around the planets containing stargates and around the suns and stars where Destiny could replenish its energy supply. The blockades were set up as far as the sensors could read, which was to the end of the galaxy. That left the crew two options. The first one, and most dangerous, was to blast their way through each of the blockades. It might work a few times, but they would keep taking damage and eventually it would catch up with them.
The second choice was to plot a continuous three-year course in hyperspace that would take them out and around the blockades and eventually into the next galaxy. But there was not enough food, water or life support to last that long. So in order for them to survive, the entire crew would need to go into stasis and hope that no problems occurred during those three years or that their calculations would be correct. If even the slightest thing went wrong, they may never leave the stasis pods.
While it would have been completely out of character for the show to end with a happy reunion back home on Earth, a certain amount of closure would have been preferable. But instead of a final battle or even a solution to their current dilemma, it ended with a whimper and not a bang. With most of the crew in the stasis pods, some pods not working, some people not able to get into the pods just yet, and no idea if the plan would work, it was over.
And we will never know what happened to the crew of the Destiny.
This review originally appeared on TV Geek Army.
