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Lt. Matthew Scott is not–repeat not–a horn dog.

“If you ask me, he’s had sex with three people his whole life,” said Brian J. Smith, the actor who plays Scott in “Stargate Universe.” “We just happened to meet [all his partners] in the show.”

Smith is referencing one of the complaints about the latest series in the “Stargate” franchise, which returns to Syfy for the rest of its freshman season in April. “SGU 1.0,” the DVD and Blu-ray set of the first half of the season, came out Tuesday.

Many viewers were angered that in the “SGU” series premiere Scott was shown having sex in a broom closet with a female soldier. Later we learn about two other sex partners–past and present.

The scenes make complete sense for his character, according to Smith, who he believes is a bit lost, alone and searching for a connection that he finally finds with Chloe Armstrong (Elyse Levesque).

“It’s just assumed that he can’t keep it in his pants,” he said of one misconception of Scott. “I think we’ve made it very clear that with him and Chloe there’s an emotional attachment. Their relationship is based on a kind of shared pain. And it’s not about sex; it’s not about getting off.”

Smith’s defense of his character makes complete sense: The Julliard-trained actor likes him as much as many fans do.

“I always saw him as incredibly noble,” he said. “There’s something very, very noble about him, and he’s a thinker.”

As the “SGU” begins, newly minted officer Scott is thrown into a leadership role when his superior, Col. Everett Young (Louis Ferreira), is injured. He has to step out of his comfort zone to take care of the civilians and soldiers now trapped on the unknown and mysterious space ship Destiny.

Smith, who will return to Vancouver after the Olympics to begin work on Season 2 of “SGU,” told me that Young leans on Scott even more in upcoming episodes. Scott will go through some difficult tests, Smith said, the kind that the 27-year-old actor claims he would not pass.

“I don’t think I’d be able to handle myself that well under crazy circumstances. I’d fall apart and ask Young where the food is.”

During a chat at Syfy’s New York offices last month, Smith and I talked more about Scott, the negative and positive reactions to “SGU” and, OK, a few little teasers of the rest of the season.

Smith also answered some questions from fans on Twitter in the video above. Enjoy, and click here for my pre-season interview with Brian J. Smith.

How do you feel about Lt. Scott now that you’ve lived in his skin for awhile?

How I feel about him now? I have to get back in that interview mind set; I’ve been in hiatus mode. I’m really happy with where he went this year. … I remember the first time I heard about his backstory and where they were thinking of going with him this first season. I was incredibly moved by it. I thought it was a really great story line for that kid. And now seeing where he’s ended up at the end of the entire season, again, they’ve done a really good job of setting things up for next year.

So much of what’s happened in this, especially in the first half and you’ll see it, too, in the second half, is the sort of continued problems between Rush and Young and the kind of power struggles that happen on the ship. It got pretty tense in the first half and it’s about to get worse.

Do you see him as a hero, as heroic?

He’s a hero, but he’s not perfect. He doesn’t want to screw anything up. I remember I had a conversation with Brad [Wright] at one point about Scott. Early on he was like, “Don’t let Scott get too good. Don’t let him get too good at what he’s doing. Don’t let him get too sure of himself early on.” I had to keep that kind of unsure kind of halting, a little bit stuttering, conflicted quality about him, because a) it gives him somewhere to go, and b) Col. Young is waiting for this kid to grow up. He sees a lot of potential in him, but he also realizes that he’s a raw package, he’s raw material.

Down the road, I think that you’ll see possibly Scott become a leader, become a hero, or become someone who finds his own charisma and finds his footing.

And that, to me, is just so much more interesting than someone who shows up and has the complete package and then they just set off on a bunch of adventures, which is great and fine.

But the approach, and I love this approach, and they’ve been very consistent with it, is “Let’s start him off as a mess. Let’s start him off as a mess, he’s got a lot of potential, and then we’ll see where he goes.”

Is he going to stay heroic?

Yes, from what I’ve heard [he will]. He and Greer are oddly two different sides of the coin. There’s a really great scene in “Air,” in the desert, when Greer shoots Franklin. Rush says, “Shoot him,” and Greer shoots Franklin. Eli asks, “Why did you do it? Why’d you shoot him?” And he goes, “He told me to.”

And that’s what Greer knows how to do, is how to follow orders.
Scott, although he wants to do really good, he’s also a thinker and he’s not going to do something or he will very reluctantly do something that he thinks is counterintuitive to the welfare of everybody on the ship.

Right. Even if ordered.

Even if ordered. I think that’s something that will come up later in the season as well. He starts doubting people who he’s had very strong loyalties to before. He starts doubting their ability to keep people safe and starts doubting their decision making process and he’s going to face some tough decisions, I think.

When the series begins, everybody is thrown into an unusual situation but Scott really has to step up because Young put him in charge. But that’s new for him. How did you handle that when you were creating your take on the character?

Scott says he’s a lieutenant, but Scott was on Icarus pulling security. He wasn’t the guy in charge, really, of anything. He was personally chosen by Col. Young, not by Rush. Rush says, “None of you people were on my list to be a part of this project.” Scott has been attached to Col. Young to be a sort of, I don’t know, apprentice or a protégé. Because again, [Young says] there’s something there about him. He’s got potential but he doesn’t have the direction yet.

How much of Brian do we see in Scott?

As far as how much Brian is in Scott or Scott is in Brian, I guess it’s hard to say. I think people who know me really well would tell you I’m nothing at all like the character. He’s actually much more internal than I tend to be. And as the series goes on we’ll see how skillful Scott is. I think the events at the beginning of the series really went a long way in showing how unprepared all of the characters were to be in this situation. I’m looking forward to people getting to see Scott in his element, which is thinking under pressure and making decisions that come from the heart and not just from military necessity.

How has your personal past, present informed your character choices for Scott?

I think acting is a subconscious process. You’re always winging it, no matter how prepared you are. You read the script, you get a feeling for what’s going on, you get the text down cold and then you try to respond to what’s happening in each take. If you’re really cooking and plugged in to what’s going on around you, your imagination will start to take over, and that can include a lot of things.

I never go into a scene thinking, “I’m going to try to relive the day my dog died.” I’ve tried it before, and it just doesn’t work for me. I’m much more interested in the character than I am in myself.

Sometimes you do end up revealing things about yourself through the character’s actions, but those moments usually take you completely by surprise. The director calls “cut” and you’re like “Whoa, that was a mind-trip.”

That’s what I love about this job. I can’t plan anything, as much as I’d like to. The cameras roll and you’re completely lost, but in a great way.

You must be pleased to have landed on a series that is sci-fi, but has so much drama that has nothing to do with tech or aliens or anything like that.

That’s the best part. Look, anybody can run down a hallway with a gun and look cool. You put the uniform on, you’re standing in this awesome set, they’re going to light you and make you look good. It’s not that difficult to do. What is hard is to put yourself as an actor in a situation where you’re vulnerable and where your character is weak and possibly ugly, and possibly controversial, and still stick to that. And not comment on it, and not try to make the character kind of goofy or funny or cute to make it more popular. It’s to stay true to what that person’s doing because your sense of truth won’t let you do anything else, and that’s hard.

That’s difficult, and it’s risky, especially in an environment like this, where everything’s got to be faster. What people are looking for is “faster” and “funnier” and “brighter” and “new,” you know? In a way this show is quite old-fashioned because we’re saying, “No, we’re going to take time. We’re really going to take time and we’re going to go slow.” No, we’re not just going to be action adventure; we’re also going to take time to show these people at their lowest and at their most ugly, at their most vulnerable.

And that’s kind of old fashioned and it’s very risky. And it’s going to tick a lot of people off, but I’ll tell you, for me as an actor that’s what keeps me ticking. That’s what keeps me going.

In “Life,” Scott learns he has a son. How does that change him?

It’s a big game changer. He does some growing up.

I’ve been a little bit concerned about some of the fan reaction online–the sort of insistence on sexualizing his character in a way that I don’t think is appropriate. I’m kind of confused by it, honestly…

It’s just assumed that he’s the sex-pot and he can’t keep it in his pants. I think we’ve made it very clear that with him and Chloe there’s an emotional attachment. They have an understanding based on the loss that they’ve both experienced–her recently and him in his past, that nobody can understand, not even Eli. Their relationship is based on that kind of shared pain. And it’s not about sex. We didn’t shoot the first time that they make love in “Light” as rollicking, you know? It set a very different tone from when you saw him engaging with Lt. James on Icarus Base. [It's] very, very different. These are two people who found each other.

I think especially now that Scott has found out that he’s got a son, he’s completely thrown by [the revelation] and completely confused by it and hurt and feels helpless and powerless. I think his relationship with Chloe becomes something stable and something that gives him a lot of comfort.

I think his dalliance with James in “Air” seems strange after we learn that he had gotten someone pregnant in the past. If he felt so bad about that, why is he doing it again? But then again, guys are guys. This kid obviously didn’t learn his lesson. So it does ultimately inform you about the character, even if you don’t like that information.

Yeah, and the thing is, too, he knew that he got [Annie Balic] pregnant but he did not know that he had a son. You find out about his back story and you see him in the church and he’s very, very distraught. To me that was a very powerful image because here’s a kid who thinks he’s going to be a priest, he thinks he’s going to be a man of God, and in his mind he’s just been involved in the creation and then the destruction of a life. And it doesn’t add up, it doesn’t make any sense. I think that’s one of the things that spurred his need to go into the military.

And I think it’s wrong to just assume that after he had that issue with Annie Balic, that he’s this free-wheeling playboy in the military. I think what happened with James was very consensual; it was these two young adults who are literally light years away from home, you know? And they don’t have any attachment to family at all and they need some kind of physical connection to somebody.

Also, it’s interesting to me, too, if you watch that scene with her and Scott, Scott does not look, to me–and I didn’t feel it when I was doing it–does not look to me like he’s enjoying that sex. Looking back on it, it makes a lot of sense. He looks actually very conflicted. That’s not the look on someone’s face whose really into what he’s doing, you know?

And that, to me, was always key. It’s the little subtle things that are there and you have to look for them and you can’t pass them over because they say a lot about the character. Those behavioral details you’re not going to find in the writing. It’s acting choices and we’re trying to tell the audience, this guy isn’t probably who you think he is.

What’s your favorite Scott moment?

The scene at the end of “Air Part 3.” It’s Scott at his best. He’s been through hell and back again, he’s sun burned to a crisp, he’s dehydrated and was this close to death and he’s more concerned about how Chloe is coping with her father’s death. He opens up to her in a way that is selfless and caring and full of dignity. He’s trying to give her hope. It’s just pure class. That’s why it kills me when I hear people saying that the characters are all a bunch of selfish whiners. I don’t think they’re watching the same show.

That scene was just so powerful because of the contrast to his dalliance with James. It gave me another reason to like Scott.

Yeah. To me, again, [the negative fan reaction to Scott] just comes so out of left field. I think that people sometimes want to find those qualities in the character, which I don’t know what you do about.

I think part of the problem is the character, Eli, is such a powerful force with the fans because he is the fan base. They’re supposed to see everything through his eyes. He is the guy who goes to these conventions and loves sci-fi and plays all the games and he finds himself in this situation. So they’re all experiencing this situation through him.

I think Scott, unfortunately, became an antagonist, in some people’s eyes, in that [Chloe-Eli-Scott] relationship. When actually, it was meant to be a very ambiguous kind of triangle between these people. We didn’t want anybody to side with anybody. We wanted the situation to be complex and confusing and pull you in all sorts of different directions. Maybe we didn’t take into accountc the fact that fans would put themselves in Eli’s shoes and experience the story through him.

I’m laughing because I just thought those guys should be used to not getting the girl.

But that’s the thing, they want to see [Eli get the girl]. Anyone who gets in the way of that, for whatever reason, becomes a dick, becomes the bad guy.

Look, I completely understand it, but I guess I still stand by what we’ve done and I think if you really go back there are a lot of details there that signal you that Scott’s not a bad guy.

CONTROVERSY ABOUT THE SHOW

Let’s talk about the debate over “SGU.” A lot of “Stargate” fans felt the franchise is ruined. Why do you think that is and how do you respond?

This is a transition experience for everybody. The tomatoes and lettuce and rotten vegetables were flying threw the air before we even opened the curtain.

And you read things like, “Well, I really wanted to like it,” I don’t find that preface to any sort of comment genuine at all. I actually find that’s usually a subconscious signal from that person saying, “I have the ax grindings on the floor,” you know?

I think that what we’re trying to do is very difficult, which is acknowledge the fact that this does come from 15 years of built-up mythology and also 15 years of very specific kind of tone that appealed in a very intense way to a number of people. And now that we’re trying to take what’s great about “Stargate” and make it accessible to new people.

I think the hard-core fans feel the same way that people felt about “Star Trek.” “How dare you commercialize what is so special to me! How dare you try and take something that I’ve supported and watched and bought the DVDs and gone to conventions and try and make it something that my next-door neighbor, who’s a jock and who I can’t stand, can get into as well!”

There’s a sense of ownership from a lot of fans that’s amazing and rare, but it’s also dangerous. It’s a double-edge sword.

Maybe they should’ve just called your show “Universe” and dropped the “Stargate?” Not unlike “Caprica” has no “Battlestar” or “Galactica” in the name.

I know, I’ve heard people say that, too. I remember when we first got rolling on “Universe” and I was talking to one of the producers and he goes, “Yeah, just be prepared, there’s probably going to be some unfortunate comparisons to a show like ‘Battlestar Galactica.’” I thought it was a cartoon, honestly. I had no clue. No clue whatsoever. And then I went and watched it. I watched the entire four years in like two months. Loved it, loved it, loved it and I’m probably going to go back and buy the complete series for myself now because it was amazing.

And to me, you have to deal with “Battlestar.” You have to. “Battlestar” in my opinion, is now like the Beethoven of sci-fi and you cannot do a post-”Battlestar Galactica” series without in some way dealing with the implications of what that show was. It was like, Brahms could not write music without somehow taking into account what Beethoven did.

I hate to sound so highfalutin’, but I can’t think of any other kind of analogy to that.

It’s funny because “BSG” was a remake that was also frowned upon at first.

Yeah. Yeah. But at the same time, had its very hard-core fans who rejected the new idea and couldn’t stand it and were offended by someone trying to “make better” something that in their eyes was already perfect.

Another knock on the show is that “SGU” is sexist. They claim it doesn’t have strong women. And they complained about the exploitation of Lt. James in the Kino scene.

Right.

But what’s interesting is that episode had your character almost nude and had Jamil Walker Smith’s Greer completely nude. And she was fully clothed.

That’s a really good point. That’s a really good point, I hadn’t thought about that before, yeah.

You know, that scene was not supposed to at all exploit Julia as an actress or exploit that character or any of that. That scene was actually to make fun of the immaturity of Eli and Riley. That’s what that scene was about, that’s the point of the scene. And again, we got a lot of people who have got a lot of ax grinding to do and they’re going to jump on the first opportunity that they can to take it from a standpoint of, “Well, I just don’t like it” to, “Oh, see, well, now there’s major problem is because it’s sexist” or “Oh, oh, it’s racist.” You put an “ist” at the end of anything, you can really feel right.

That scene I thought was important because it showed what Col. Young has to deal with and it showed that all the people on the ship are not military and are sometimes immature.

Right. It’s immaturity. I mean, if anything, you can say it’s sexist toward men because you’re painting men as immature boob lovers or something, I don’t know.

Are you happy with the fan response overall?

I’ve gotten so many responses from people who have never seen “Stargate” before and they’re excited to be excited about sci-fi again. I’m glad that we’ve gotten to reach those kinds of people–people like me who watch shows like “The Shield” or “Friday Night Lights” and want to see programming that transcends genres. But even more than that, I’m really happy to see the support we’re getting from the more open-minded “Stargate” fans. And this support isn’t coerced. They watch the show each week and … just go with the flow and like the show for the unique thing it is, as opposed to watching “the show that isn’t like ‘Atlantis.’”

LIFE

Did you have a favorite first half episode?

Oh, yeah–”Life.” Yeah, for sure.

Why is that?

It’s ironic because a lot of viewers complained about it. The joke when we were shooting “Life” was that, “Oh, watch, they’re really going to have a problem with this.” But we couldn’t help it, we loved it so much. It felt like, like shooting an independent film. It was nice to get off the ship. It was nice to shoot a scene in the living room, not wearing an Icarus Base uniform. It was nice to deal with an issue, you know, fatherhood.

That episode, from the very beginning, was the one I was most looking forward to. And I think that it’s got everything in it that expresses what we’re trying to do with the series.

Was it hard to be Scott when he visits his ex, having to pretend not to be himself and then learning this totally shocking thing but as much as you want to react, you can’t?

Yeah. There’s a moment when he says, “Well, why didn’t you tell him?” My instinct in that moment was to keep it really internal, and like really like have it happen and then collect myself and just say, “Why didn’t you tell him?”

But Alex, the director, he said, “No, just do it, let’s do another take and just go for it, just yell at her. Just have it just be something you’re so caught off guard and you’re so upset that the mask slips for a second.” And it ended up working and that’s the version that made it in the cut. So it was very difficult.

Well, I’m surprised you said “him” instead of “me.”

Exactly. Yeah, he could’ve easily slipped a little bit too far and said, “Why didn’t you tell me?” Which actually would have been interesting.

But that’s what a great director does and that’s why, whether you like that kind of episode or not, I defy anybody to go through that episode and criticize the way it was directed.

The shot choices, the way it was edited, the use of the music at the beginning and the end, is very difficult to pull off just from an editing standpoint. The moments that Alex Chapple caught, like that interview with Franklin.

Alex is such a great actor’s director, he lets you not just play the obvious choice. Franklin could have sat there and just been like, “I hate it, I’m miserable.” Alex told him, “No, put a smile on your face and say, ‘I hate it, I’m miserable.’” That’s interesting; that’s great directing.

And that’s why Alex came back and directed a couple episodes at the end of the season and he’s going to be back big time next year. He’s the real deal; he’s a great director.

TIME

The second half of S1 we get some aliens, but we’ve already had aliens in the first half.

Yes. But they’ve been more sort of elemental, like the sort of swirly, swarmy things you saw in “Water” and also “Air.” And then an octopus, squid-type creature is in “Time.”

The sperm?

The sperm, right, the evil sperm.

Did it take you awhile to figure out “Time?”

There’s a Kino that sort of helps. It’s hard. Actually, David Blue had to explain it to me after I read the thing. Basically all you need to know is that everything is fine. Because we did that final Kino that you see me talking into and I’m explaining to them?

Based on my knowledge of what we had seen for the previous timeline, Kinos that had come through the gate, I, in this one, say, “Everything that they need to know to come down to this planet, to A) not come at night, to B) stay away from a certain area, and C) we’ve all got this disease and the only way to cure it is to harvest the venom from these creatures in their little caves. But it took us dying and going through these crazy timelines for us to figure it out. It’s tough.

So now they’ve come back to the ship, harvested the stuff and saved the world?

Yes. The Kino that they really got in real time, it was based on watching Kinos from other timelines. They got enough information from that Kino to realize exactly what they had to do. It’s tough. It’s hard to explain.

WATER

Let’s talk a little bit about the spacesuits in “Water.”

The spacesuits! I think me and Louie spent two or three days in those suits. Long days. You get used to them real quick, but Louie is one of the funniest guys I’ve ever met in my life. We were all connected by this sort of comm. system that was in the helmets. They were shooting some inserts of him and I was at the back of the studio, but I could still hear him. The things he was saying, like in between set-ups he’d have to kneel down and all you could hear is, “Oh, patella! Oh, patella!” What was it, “None on cartilage?” “Bone on cartilage!”

I almost had a panic attack in the suits. They had to lower me into the ice crevice and your movement already is constricted and on top of that, I was hanging from a cord quite a ways up. You’re lowered into this crevice and you can’t move and you’re completely dependent on someone else to get you out. Even then it takes like a good minute to pull you out of there. So you feel like you’re trapped; like you’re in a coffin. And I didn’t think I was claustrophobic, but I figured out that I was claustrophobic when that happened.

So you’re sort of not even really acting at that point?

You’re not because those suits were very hard. I didn’t think about this, but this is something that Louis was telling me, “Hey, we need to be careful in these scenes.”

A) We’re going to ADR all of this. Pretty much every [scene shot] in those suits we had to go back and re-record the dialogue because there was a fan system in them to keep us cool, to keep the glass from fogging up.

B) What was really going to be important was our eyes, because they can’t see your mouth. You had to be able to express what was going on with your eyes, with your face.

Jamil and I spend quite a lot of time in those suits again. We can talk about that later–in one of the last episodes. Now those things are just kind of like old hat.

And they stink. Because I mean, so many of us have worn them and worn them for hours on end and they just smell like gross man. Just the BO is, they really need to Fabreeze those things.

Maybe the Ancients weren’t advanced in every way.

I know. Maybe it’s the ancients that stink so bad.

Is T.J. going to get more command time? That was fun.

Yeah! Wasn’t that great? Yeah, and again, you hear people complaining about, “Why aren’t the women strong?” I always point to that episode. She kept the ship together and that whole thing would’ve fallen apart. If Greer had been in control, there would’ve been a disaster. Absolute disaster. She’s a thinker and a feeler, and she comes from a very compassionate place. You see her cry, you see her vulnerable. I guess in some people’s eyes that might make her a “weak” character. In my eyes, it just makes her more complex and human, and then you see what she was able to do in “Water” and you go, “Oh, OK.” You’d be in really good hands.

I love that she didn’t back down and her scenes with Jamil, in that episode.

She really put her foot down. She’s not intimidated.

In another scene Scott, Greer and T.J. are in the shuttle and Scott says something about…

“It’s a shame, you should’ve been out of here.”

Yeah, what was that all about?

There’s sort of a flashback in “Air,” where you see her talking to Camille and Camille’s like, “I don’t understand, I thought you were so happy here.” Camille is HR and she’s trying to understand why this very capable and talented member of the team wants to leave and go to college, when just a week ago she was saying that this is what she was meant to do. Whatever happened had to do, of course, with now a few people are catching on to her and her and Young.

That’s going to get much more complicated. Especially in an episode called “Faith.” Which is another one of my favorite episodes…Will Waring directed that episode and it’s beautiful.