TV Review: The Universe (2007 - ??)

Are you curious about our universe? Do you want to know what’s out there? Ever thought about time travel or the possibility of multiple universes or what it would take to live in space? Then have I got the show for you. It’s called The Universe, and it’s on Tuesday nights on the History Channel.

The Universe is in its fourth, nerd-glorious season, and I cannot recommend it highly enough. Although a show about science, The Universe is easily accessible for all audience. The show is well written to be both entertaining and informative. The scientists they interview are well spoken, entertaining, and easy to understand -- without sounding condescending. Many of them have distinguished careers as speaker or television hosts. The graphics used are impressive, informative and eye catching. And the show is careful to constantly use visual examples to make it easy for us non-scientists to understand the phenomena about which they are speaking.

The Universe has run for four seasons, with each one having a slightly different theme:

• The first season focused primarily on the planets within our solar system. Did you know that Jupiter has 63 moons, 23 of which were not discovered until 2003? Its largest is Ganymede, which is bigger than either Mercury or Pluto. Did you know that the largest volcano in our solar system is Olympus Mons, on Mars? It’s three times taller than Mount Everest and is as big as the state of New Mexico. Did you know that without the moon we wouldn’t be alive today?

• The second season branched out beyond the solar system and uncovered the secrets of our galaxy. How do they find other planets? What is a black hole or a super black hole? Do white holes create matter? Where is the Milky Way? Sex in space? Not as simple as it sounds (see the pornographic image to the right). And long term space travel is impossible because of bone mass loss. You’ve heard about the Big Bang right? Did you know that 95% of the matter that should be in the universe is missing?

• The third season shifted gears and talked more about theoretical physics. Is time travel possible? And can you come back to this world or would you come back to a parallel world? Do we live in one universe or are we part of a multiverse? Is gravity really a force pulling on objects, or do heavy objects simply bend space around them -- causing us to fall toward them, like a bowling ball on a bed will roll toward you?

The real key to the show, as I noted above, are the presenters. These people are absolutely top notch. Michio Kaku (left) is a theoretical physicist who specializes in string theory. He’s also a noted lecturer, radio and television personality, and he has an amazing ability to make the incredibly complex seem really simple.

Another presenter of note is Neil deGrasse Tyson (below), another television personality and the director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History in Manhattan.

The other presenters are a mix of JPL scientists and other noted professors, every of them top notch, and every one of them is capable of making the vast and complex universe something you and I can understand, and doing so without losing the wonder and amazement we should have for just what’s out there. Their joy at what they are presenting also comes through clearly, and gives the show a high re-watchability.

Moreover, unlike shows like Naked Science, which touches upon some of these same topics but crams them into stand-alone episodes, The Universe is able to take its time and break up the topics it covers over entire seasons rather than cramming them into single episodes. This allows for more information to be provided, for that information to be explained better, and keeps you from suffering from information overload.

The Universe is well worth watching if you have even the slightest interest in what makes the universe tick. You will learn something interesting every time you watch the show. It is entertaining, it is visually compelling, and it’s informative. In fact, The Universe is the kind of show that delivers upon the promise of television. Whenever people talk about using television to educate people, this is the kind of show they are talking about.

I can’t recommend it highly enough.