Exeunt Ford, Intro Ronon Dex. A sort of piecemeal epsiode that really doesn't develop anyone, even Ford. We'll be getting more of him later, I'm sure, and I do hop he redeems himself before he's inevitably killed off.
-Ronon's homeworld seems to have had a significant level of technology, eclipsing that of the Genii. oviously a good target for culling by the Wraith.
-And that's one kickass gun he has. I want. Also, it's the first time I think we've seen a weapon that can stun AND kill since the zat gun.
-Ronon is Tosk. Apparently the Wraith can't feed on him (recalling the popular bounty hunter Aris Boch from SG-1), so they jammed a tracker in his back and turned him loose. He doesn't know why - he suspects he's sport, study, or training. I think it's a clever way for the Wraith to use him as an unwilling scout, finding populations on unknown worlds while trying to hide, that they can then come to cull. Whatever the reason, he's been doing this for seven years.
-Dr. B wears a grey field outfit, though it doesn't have the division-indicating panels on it. I'm still wondering what the difference is. McKay started out with the beige version, but now wears the black one.
-Speaking of outfits, Atlantis is equipped with four Class-1 radiation suits. Kinda wierd considering how many people are on Atlantis now. Perhaps they haven't been able to get spares since the Daedalus started showing up?
-The life scanner used by Beckett is an upgraded cersion fo the ones used by the gang in the first season - they look less like PDAs in stock bumper enclosures.
-We don't SEE the Daedalus in this episode, though Caldwell's presence means she's around somewhere. We know that Atlantis has a pier large and flat and strong enough for her to land on.. Prometheus is often seen berthed in her dock on Earth. What could the space endurance of these things be?
-So why are the darts just randomly sweeping the area with their beams? They've done it before, though I thought they knew people were running around there. An intimidation tactic? Sweeping in patterns somehow? The Ancient scanners didn't work on this world, so the Wraith versions couldn't be much better.
Mark
Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
What was with those two P3X planets named? Haven't all the planets so far been M-whatever-whatever? Though I guess there's no reason for the planetary designations to start making sense now.
I liked Ford in this, myself. More so than we he was first infected, anyway, on account of him still being Ford here, more or less. Just with poor impulse control.
Ronon's world seemed a little too advanced, really.
Posted by B.J. (Member # 858) on :
Beckett's scanner looked similar to the one from "Quantum Leap" to me. Hmm... the name's the same... But the design and they was it's used is similar to the TNG medical tricorders.
Ford's stun gun looked like a Wraith weapon. But I don't think we've seen them use a pistol weapon before, just those large ones.
As for Ronon's planet, the producers wanted to make it obvious that his planet was wiped out. But the Wraith's weapons are non-destructive, right? At least not in the typical way they use them. So his planet should have looked normal, only devoid of people.
B.J.
Posted by Mark Nguyen (Member # 469) on :
We've seen the Wraith pistols before, just not up close. Steve had one.
As for Ronon's place, I'm guessing that the Wraith took 'em out due to their advanced technology. Somehow, they'd managed to significantly advance since the previous culling, and thus needed to be bombed back to the stone age, or something. The Wraith are fulling capable of orbital bombardment for destructive purposes, as we've seen this season alone.
The planet designations make NO sense. In general, the first letter is P or M, denoting a planet or moon; they usually stick to that. The next two are changed frequently - "3X" was originally meant to mean one of the planets that Apophis escaped to in the SG-1 premiere; O'Neill managed to identify three of the gylphs from that distance, and so any of the worlds since visited carried the designation "P3X" as a possible home base for ol' Snakehead.
Since then though, the show seems to have forgotten this, randomly assigning "P3X" to any number of known worlds. I have no idea how this works for Atlantis, though they seem to follow the same convention, despite their being essentially an independent naming group. How can they name a place "P3X-850" without knowing whether or not that same name hasn't been assigned at the SGC?
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