Stuart Fails To Save The Universe: Review

Chances are you'll have a perception of what you think you can expect from the latest spinoff from The Big Bang Theory, the 10-episode Stuart Fails To Save The Universe.

Given the canned laughter that made the original Big Bang Theory feel so forced (and an endless collection of repeats on TV), you'll probably be expecting something similar from a show that sees Stuart Bloom, the owner of the comic book store in Pasadena, tasked with saving the universe.

But, Stuart Fails To Save The Universe is like nothing on TV - and it's headscratchingly different, maddeningly short and utterly difficult to fit into one genre. All of which are good things, bizarrely, but still somehow leave the spinoff feeling like it's a little underdeveloped and formulaic.

Essentially a kind of Sliders-based comedy drama mixed with elements of Rick and Morty, with the emphasis on the drama (no canned laughter here), the show follows the hapless Stuart Bloom (Kevin Sussman, looking increasingly like Paul Giamatti's brother) as he tries to save the universe because an alternate version of himself told him to do so.

Armed with an Orac-style gizmo created by Leonard and Sheldon Cooper that's malfunctioned, the group of Stuart, Denise, Bert and Kripke hurtle across multiverses, (yes, there are familiar cameos) trying to get to the root cause of the chaos that unfolded leaving Pasadena in a post-apocalyptic world where people are trading cans for comic books or juggling rats to get food.

Some universes are chaotically bad, some are seemingly perfect until like Homer Simpson in the Treehouse of Horror, one element ruins the whole thing. (And some clearly are based off of Warner properties - step forward, Wizard World.) The budget's clearly been thrown into the FX and while the slipping between universes just uses bubbles and a vortex, the money's been spent elsewhere and is all the better for it.

Armed with a Danny Elfman earworm theme song, Stuart Fails To Save The Universe is an odd show to categorise - there's a sci-fi sweetness here that will thrill some and alienate others. And its finale will certainly leave many discussing the meta edges, but thanks to Sussman's increasingly non-plussed charm and his rapport with both Lauren Lapkus' Denise and Brian Posehn's Bert, there's a real heart here to grab onto.

Not all of the episodes gel and there's a little too much of a feeling of the group navigating their way through the new universe and then finding their escape route to make it feel complex. But with each episode ending on a cliffhanger as such, there's plenty of reasons to continue on week-by-week.

There's also an inventiveness in Stuart Fails To Save The Universe that is far too spoiler-heavy to discuss here. But certainly some of the narrative jumps and storylines made by Chuck Lorre and his writing team add a great deal to the uncertainty of what comes next.

Stuart Fails To Save The Universe won't be to everyone's taste; but its mix of sweet drama and Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die cum Sliders will be a refreshingly original and brave fit on the HBO Max streaming service.

All 10 episodes of Stuart Fails To Save The Universe Season one were viewed for the purpose of this review.

Stuart Fails To Save The Universe streams exclusively on HBO Max from July 24.