I was watching Stargate Universe last night, so far I’m doubting it will go to a second season. But last night had me raging in bed – I was supposed to be grabbing some low energy TV before sleepy time.
The “main” plot was about how 40,000 litres of water had dissapeared and the trip to an ice planet to replace it. The “sub-plot” was about some dust like aliens that had come aboard from a desert planet in a previous episode.
So what got my goat up?
Well, mostly it was about 40,000 litres of water dissappearing, the spaceship has a recycling system. But that wasn’t getting the water back, which means it has to be somewhere else. For the moment lets assume it’s gone “somewhere-else”, we don’t know where. So the crew decide they’ll send 2 people to get some ice from a conveniently nearby ice planet.
The mission to the ice planet to get more water (ice) seems OK, except 40,000 litres is 40 metric tons. That’s a lot of tons for 2 people to move. Also, I happen to know that 40 tons of water is exactly 40 cubic meters. That’s 40 of those huge bags that DIY shops use to deliver sand, and pebbles in. That’s an awful lot! It’s more than a full-sized articulated HGV can carry! So the search around the ship to see if anyone has stolen it and stashed it under their bed seems a bit, well stupid really!
Ok, so onto the alien dust specs. It seems these little buggers are responsible for the water going somewhere, but they’re teensy, and though there are a lot of them they still managed to fit in a container that was small enough and light enough to be carried by a single person. 40 tons is absolutely not carryable by one person. These little dust specs must be “trans-dimensional” beings capable of moving water from the real universe into “somewhere-else” so it doesn’t exist in this universe anymore. Cor! Blimey! You’d think that would be worth a mention somewhere in the storyline wouldn’t you?
Oh, and sticking with the little aliens, the cure was to lure them into the aforementioned canister and chuck them out the window. But life isn’t like that! If they missed enough to breed (traditionally 2) then within a few weeks the poor buggers on the spacecraft are going to be back where they started, life has an annoying habit of reproducing, potentially exponentially! Think rats!
I know what you’re thinking, “bloody nitpicker, I bet he whinges that you can’t hear sound in space”.
Well, I’m actually pretty good at suspending my disbelief, for example I’m happy with the miraculous:
Warp Drive – pretty canon in the SF universe and always necessary for plot.
Planets the size of a small town – have you ever noticed that people visit a planet and just so happen to land within an hours walk of the planetary leaders. Also necessary for plot.
Mind Reading – Magic! Fair enough, magic is a whole ballpark of the impossible.
Teleports – Magic again, saves on the boring travelling bit.
Its when you get down to the mundane, that I start having trouble. At least give me some kind of fantastic gobbledeygook explanation so it’s no longer mundane, and that’s what was missing in last nights episode. The scriptwriters didn’t even seem to know that there was anything wrong with the plot. Where do you hide FORTY FRELLING TONS! They certainly didn’t care enough to try to explain it away, and that’s plain sloppy.
rating: 2 stars (or less)
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