Stuart Fails to Save the Universe is very different from The Big Bang Theory. That’s a good thing.
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The big bang happened nearly 14 billion years ago, when the whole universe was in a hot dense state, but The Big Bang Theory began in 2007, when four male nerds and an exasperated Cheesecake Factory waitress found themselves on a couch in Pasadena. They stayed there—wearing the same clothes, ordering the same takeout, butts glued to the same sofa cushions, pretty much—for 12 years. Expansion of the megahit series started in 2017, when CBS launched Young Sheldon, a Bildungs-sitcom about the education of uptight know-it-all Sheldon Cooper, and fractured one more time in 2024, with the creation of Georgie & Mandy’s First Marriage, about the age-gap union of Sheldon’s older brother.
On Thursday, HBO Max debuts another spin-off, Stuart Fails to Save the Universe, in which the eponymous comic-store owner … well, the title says it all. There’s a device, built by Sheldon and Leonard; there’s a malfunction, apparently caused by Stuart; there are dimensional rifts and wormhole weirdnesses, but what really matters is that this isn’t just a spin-off; it’s a do-over. Stuart isn’t only trying to save the universe—he’s out to fix the sitcom.
In many ways, Stuart is the most BBT-like of the descendant shows. Original creators Chuck Lorre and Bill Prady are in charge, now joined by veteran Marvel universe screenwriter Zak Penn. We’re back in Pasadena, and a few familiar faces, whose identities I won’t spoil, show up over the course of the 10-episode first season. Most significantly, the lead characters are played by BBT supporting actors who hung up their graphic T-shirts seven years ago.
All that said, Stuart Fails to Save the Universe couldn’t be more different from its forebear, in the best and most surprising way possible.
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For many years, Lorre has been sharing his innermost thoughts on the vanity cards that appear onscreen for a couple of seconds at the end of every TV show made by Chuck Lorre Productions. Many of these messages are stupid; occasionally, they’re repulsive; but the card at the end of Episode 1 contains a clear and bracing declaration. It reads: “I have spent almost forty years writing scenes in which a small group of people sit on a couch and exchange witty banter. … I just couldn’t do the couch thing anymore. I had to try something else.”
Well, Lorre succeeded: Stuart Fails to Save the Universe really is something else. Whereas The Big Bang Theory was all about stasis and that big, solid hunk of living-room furniture, the new show has to be the most dynamic live-action sitcom that has ever existed.
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It is the bizarro Big Bang Theory. Instead of four guys and a girl, here we have three geezers and a grown woman. In every episode, Stuart (Kevin Sussman), his girlfriend and former co-worker Denise (Lauren Lapkus), geologist pal Bert (Brian Posehn), and quantum physicist/human annoyance Barry Kripke (John Ross Bowie) find themselves in a brand-new setting where they have no alternative but to try something—anything—different. There’s an improv aspect to their performances, which feels appropriate given that the show is an ever-escalating series of “What could possibly go wrong?” scenarios.
The alternate universes are so wildly inventive and so completely wackadoo that I’ll leave you to discover their pleasures for yourself, but let’s just say that if you’ve ever craved a TV sitcom that features centaurs, lecherous telepaths, or characters who share the digestive process of ruminant animals, you might want to check this one out.
In fact, Stuart Fails to Save the Universe isn’t only trying to fix the sitcom; it’s trying to change the way we watch TV now, distracted as we are these days by second (or third) screens and endless scrolling. The opening credits—this time accompanied by an original Danny Elfman composition rather than a Barenaked Ladies track—contain a series of pleas begging viewers to pay attention instead of hitting the fast-forward button. Each episode features a new set of entreaties, and while they’re mostly meh, I have to award points for trying.
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Unfortunately, SFTSTU can’t expiate BBT’s original sins. Since the producers weren’t able to alter the space-time continuum, the actors have aged. This means that, while BBT could send Howard Wolowitz into space, SFTSTU can’t permit men aged between 55 and 60 to lust after a woman older than 41. With no other female characters for Denise to talk to, the show fails the Bechdel Test at the first hurdle, and whereas BBT had one main character of color, SFTSTU is blindingly white. Oh, yeah, and Kripke still has the speech impediment. Gwow up, Chuck Wowwe!
The Big Bang Theory was the poster child for Slow TV: It took 278 episodes just to fix the apartment building’s elevator. There’s more action in five minutes of Stuart Fails to Save the Universe than in a season—heck, perhaps the whole run—of its progenitor. Will Stuart succeed in transforming the TV comedy universe? Probably not, but it has already changed its velocity, and for the better.
