Harper describes Hunt as "huge. He's like a Greek god." Kevin Sorbo is best known for playing Hercules in Hercules: The Legendary Journeys (1995).
The basic premise of this series is a collapsed galactic empire and subsequently isolated populations with dark age loss of technology. This Sci Fi trope has been around since Isaac Asimov started his Foundation trilogy in 1942.
Beka and crew use 'bucky cables' to pull the Andromeda away from the black hole. Bucky tubes, aka carbon nanotubes, are a class of fullerines. These pure carbon, nanoscale, single or multi-walled tubes have incredible tensile strength with good flexibility.
Beka's ship is named the Eureka Maru. The Japanese word 'maru' means 'circle' and is traditionally added to the name of any non-military Japanese ship.
Gene Roddenberry previously used Dylan Hunt as the name of the protagonists of the unsold pilots Genesis II (1973), Planet Earth (1974) and Strange New World (1975).