‘Stuart Fails To Save The Universe’: Here Is Why Episodes Of ‘Big Bang Theory’ Spinoff Are So Short

Let’s hope the writers and producers of HBO Max’s upcoming Big Bang Theory spinoff Stuart Fails To Save the Universe are not paid by the minute for what they have made.

Not shackled by broadcast schedules where half-hour comedies need to be exactly 22 minutes to fit into a 30-min slot with time for ads, episodes of streaming comedies typically run between 25 min – 35 min.

Not Stuart Fails To Save the Universe. Despite the fact that they do not have time constraints, the show’s creators, Chuck Lorre, Bill Prady and Zak Penn, went in the other direction with episodes that are very short, even by broadcast standards.

Of the 10 episodes of Season 1, one is 15-minutes long, four are 18 min with the other five at 20 min, 21 min, 22 min, 24 min and 25 min. Why was that? With the elaborate sets and special effects involved to create the different alternate realities in each episode, did the producers run out of money in the budget?

“No, no. We just felt that we’d successfully told the story, and to add would be padding, and padding, generally, is a hammock between important scenes, and why would we do that if there’s no real reason,” Lorre said.

He and Prady have spent most of their careers working in broadcast comedy, creating episodes to fit the 22-min template with breaks for commercials.

“The historic length of a show is entirely arbitrary, it comes from network television where a certain amount of advertising has to be sold to pay the way of making this television, but it’s not an element any longer in streaming,” Lorre said. “So, why not just make the best show we can and hope the audience is entertained and is not looking at their watch, going, ‘Oh, I need five more minutes. You need to go further with this.’ I don’t think that would happen, that’d be my guess. I would think you either loved the episode or you didn’t, and you weren’t looking at your watch.” (You can watch the video below.)

This is Lorre’s third single-camera streaming comedy after the Golden Globe-winning The Kominsky Method for Netflix and Bookie for HBO Max. He has adjusted well to the binge-friendly format, with each episode of Stuart Fails To Save the Universe ending with the heroes landing in a new alternate reality to tease what comes next.

“The way we structured it, it just fell into our laps, it’s a teaser for the next week but it also felt like a natural way of telling this story,” Lorre said.

Added Prady, “We found it in the first episode where we wanted to go, ‘Everything’s all right. Oh wait, no, it isn’t.’ And that was fun, so we kept doing it.”

Stuart Fails to Save the Universe premieres on HBO Max July 23 with episodes released weekly.