Stargate: Universe

Stargate: Universe just had its premiere episode.

General idea: Stargate Atlantis meets Star Trek: Voyager meets Battlestar Galactica.

On Atlantis, a reference was discovered in a database to an eighth chevron. One stargate was discovered to contain this eighth chevron, a gate which also had an incredible power source, which was required to power the gate to connect with the eighth chevron. Connecting with six chevrons uses relatively little power; connecting with seven (to a neighboring galaxy) requires a lot of power, such that only a ZPM can power it without being quickly drained. Eight chevrons use more power than we can generate using any known power source.

SPOILER: Highlight the space to reveal the text.

This eight-chevron combination wound up connecting to a spaceship far from Earth, with the eighth chevron indicating distance. Only one such eighth chevron was in the database, perhaps indicating only one ship had a gate onboard, but it seems many ships have been sent out, discovering habitable worlds, and building and locating stargates on these worlds. The ship the Stargate crew are on was sent unmanned, with a gate onboard to allow personnel to join the ship after it had already traveled a great distance. But the ship cannot power the gate sufficiently for a return trip, and the world containing the gate they came through was destroyed in the process. (Think of the Caretaker in Star Trek: Voyager; the ship was sent on a one-way trip with no way back. One could also make a comparison with Farscape's wormhole.)

We now have a group of people which have been thrown together, many unwillingly, with different goals and backgrounds. We started with a Senator and his daughter onboard. The Senator gave his life to buy the others time, but we still have his daughter. We have several IOA members who question the purpose and efficiency of the Stargate program and the intentions of those work with it. We have SGC members, some of whom are newly out of training and some of whom thought they had completed their duty tours. And we have an individual who was drafted after solving a long-standing mystery that was coded into a video game, an individual who is very smart but has exhibited little initiative or purpose in life so far.

They wind up at the end of the two-hour episode on a ship with one day of usable air, which is traveling through hyperspace AWAY from Earth and is currently billions of light-years away.

These people have two overall goals:
First, repair the ship so that they can survive to the second goal.

Second, find a way home. This part is in essence very similar to Star Trek: Voyager. Maybe this will be with the stargate that brought them here, but it is believed that the ship doesn't have enough power to do so. They may also be able to take control of the ship and reverse course, but, like with the Voyager, it may take a very long time to get home. And the third possibility is to settle on a habitable world.

But first, they must survive.

End spoiler.