Cooper: Universe team is identifiable

The characters who make up Stargate Universe‘s team will be unqualified, imperfect, and imminently relatable, according to series co-creator Robert C. Cooper. Cooper talks about the characters and the show’s pre-production progress in a new interview at MGM’s official Stargate site, Stargate.MGM.com.

“One of the things I’m really excited about is that we’re looking for people who are a little more identifiable and contemporary,” Cooper told the site. “I always thought one of the things that was attractive about the original series was the ‘everyman on the street’ point of view that O’Neill had to science fiction. It made the characters identifiable. They were more like we would be in a science fiction situation, and how we would react. And that’s what we’re trying to do with the new show — create characters that are going to be challenged by the situation.”

The Stargate franchise has always sought to tell stories with present-day, relatable characters going on incredible adventures. But the third series will emphasize that more than its predecessors, putting younger and less experienced men and women into the field.

The team includes a number of unlikely candidates, including a Senator’s daughter (Chloe Carpenter) and young, slacker computer genius (Eli Hitchcock), as well as a group of junior S.G.C. officers (story). Their leader, Colonel Everett Young, is an experienced officer in his 40s — but the rest of the team is still wet behind the ears.

And there’s a good reason for that, Cooper hints.

“The team that ends up on the ship is not really who was supposed to go, and in some cases they’re very unprepared and unqualified to be in that situation,” he said. “So they don’t have all the answers as quickly, and the challenges are greater than they would be for people who have seen it all and don’t have as far to go as characters when they encounter an incredible situation.”

It’s certainly a far cry from the world’s leading minds sent to the Pegasus Galaxy in the premiere of Stargate Atlantis.

Stargate Universe will begin filming in February, and Cooper said that the target is for a July 2009 premiere on the SCI FI Channel in the United States. Read the full story now at Stargate.MGM.com, and learn much more about the new show and its characters at GateWorld’s Stargate Universe Launch Center!