Eight years after the cast ofThe Big Bang Theory made their last Comic-Con appearance ahead of the hit CBS sitcom’s 12th and final season, four Big Bang actors were back at the comic book convention with spinoff Stuart Fails To Save the Universe.
The single-camera offshoot’s leads, Kevin Sussman (Stuart), Lauren Lapkus (Denise), John Ross Bowie (Kripke) and Brian Posehn (Bert) were joined on the Hall H stage by series creators Chuck Lorre and Bill Prady, who also co-created Big Bang, and Zak Penn.
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During a panel after a screening of Stuart Fails To Save the Universe‘s premiere episode, Prady promised more appearances by Big Bang alums.
“Well, you saw one wonderful member of the the Big Bang Theory family in that first episode,” he said. “There are more, and there are also some performers who are some wonderful minor characters that are coming back.”
A number of them are in the show’s official trailer, released last month.
Making a “drive-by” appearance at the panel was DC Comics’ Publisher and Chief Creative Officer Jim Lee who teased a DC-focused episode of Stuart Fails To Save the Universe.
“They requested some DC characters to be involved in an episode,” he said.
We saw a glimpse of that in the trailer, which features Mr. Freeze.
“It was just amazing that they were trying to do something that was true to our characters, but at the same time find comedy in it,” Lee continued. “What was funny is we had scheduled the set visit to come to the set, and I just see the dialogue, the script. And when I came to the set, I was just blown away. It was completely not what I was expecting, I was expecting a multi-cam setup where they were sitting around, and then they start showing the visual effects that they were going to do, and all the bespoke elements they added to [Stuart’s comic book] store.”
Added Lee, “Then Bill start talking about the overall arc of the 10 episodes, and I thought this is super ambitious, this is completely not what I expected. It’s like nerds going through Gulliver’s Travels, and I was sold. I was like, this is awesome, this is fantastic.”
Lee closed out with praise for how the show handles the DC IP.
“Some of the DC characters they have in it, I think are some of the best versions I’ve seen of those characters, and so I’m super excited for you guys,” he said.
Inspired by the set visit, Lee created the cover for an exclusive Stuart Failed to Save the Universe comic book, which is also featured on the show.
Elsewhere on the panel, Lorre said that the goal with Stuart Fails To Save the Universe was to “try to make a science-fiction comedy that the characters of The Big Bang Theorywould watch and argue about.”
Questioning reality after his experience on the show, star Sussman spoke about being summoned by Lorre in 2022 for a meeting where the comedy uber producer pitched him the idea for Stuart Fails To Save the Universe.
“That was nice of him to make it seem like I might say no,” Sussman quipped.
In Stuart Fails To Save the Universe,which premieres July 23 on HBO Max, comic bookstore owner Stuart Bloom (Sussman) is tasked with restoring reality after he breaks a device built by Sheldon and Leonard, accidentally bringing about a multiverse Armageddon. Stuart is aided in this quest by his girlfriend Denise (Lapkus), geologist friend Bert (Posehn), and quantum physicist/all-around pain in the ass Barry Kripke (Bowie). Along the way, they meet alternate-universe versions of characters we’ve come to know and love from The Big Bang Theory. As the title implies, things don’t go well.
Katie Campione contributed to this report.
