Okay, aside from being a completely awful episode � easily the series' absolute WORST so far � I also have a very big plot hole:
Why bother threatening Lucius with revealing Atlantis' existence when Beckett, Teyla, and Ronan already did that by dialing directly back to the city in that little raid to the Wraith planet? The Wraith now (should) know because they know where the escaping "Lanteans" returned to... a planet that shouldn't have any Stargate at all!
So, did anyone NOT predict exactly where this episode was going from the very beginning? Even before he took a swig of that potion at the end of the teaser, it was friggin' obvious what was going on. I even figured out that Beckett was already cured of the potion's effects when he was "rescued." GodDAMN, this was an awful outing.
The sole redeeming scene was the exchange where McKay and Sheppard were discussing their plight's similarity to an old episode of "Batman." At the very least, the writers had the sense to acknowledge how cheesy and hackneyed the story's plot is, even if they didn't have the good sense to avoid the whole damn story in the first place.
*sigh*
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
I have to say, I thought Julie Newmar was better-known as Catwoman than Eartha Kitt was. Am I wrong?
Posted by Krenim (Member # 22) on :
Compared to the SG-1 episode this week, Atlantis was seriously lacking. I had read at Gateworld that Lucius was supposed to be a Harry Mudd-like character, but whereas Mudd had a natural charisma that made you like him, Lucius had absolutely none. When he was goading Shepherd in the cell, telling him that as soon as his cold was gone, he'd be just like the others, I wanted to wipe that snear clean off his face. In short, yes, I agree this is easily Atlantis' worst episode to date.
Posted by Mark Nguyen (Member # 469) on :
Since this was a harmless, fluffy filler episode, I'm not going to bother with the detailed analysis this week. But we'll start with:
-The intergalactic bridge! The instigator of the episode is that the gang is now looking for space-based stargates above worlds that don't need 'em. These gates can then be re-programmed to allow a jumper to use them and essentially go gate to gate all the way back to the Milky Way (which is a rather repetetive task - how many gates would be necessary? What is the upper range limit for a stargate, anyway?
-It's been calculated that the bridge, once set up, will allow a jumper to make the trip to Earth in about half an hour. This would free up the ZPM drain and eliminate reliance on the Daedalus or other starships for all but the large equipment hauling. It would also allow travel both ways. I'm guessing they'd figure out SOME sort of safeguard to prevent a Wraith dart from doing the same...
-McKay really likes the idea, even if he didn't come up with it. Methinks he's just trying to impress Carter, who did.
-It's the same village set again (the first use on Atlantis this season), except painted brightly and with addiional facades. And does anyone else think that the colourful outfits this week were right out of a Disney movie?
-DAMN, those are big.
-How DOES Shep get his hair to go like that?
-Sheppard notes that the Daedalus is still under repair - last week it WAS heavily damaged, but capable of limited hyperspace. I'm guessing she's on Earth for repair, which partially explains why the Odyssey was sent to ferry SG-1 this week.
-Beckett brings Lucius to Atlantis on foot. Did he walk all the way to Lucius' village? Everyone else got to take a jumper...
-How DOES Ronon get his hair to go like that?
-Weir's office continues to get more detailed. Now, there's a spiffy wooden logo of the Atlantis expedition on the wall behind her desk, where there used to be an African mask.
-Waitasec... They say they're only taking space gates from planets that don't rely on them for trade. What planets have they run into so far that actually DO use them for any purpose? Only Atlantis and the Wraith have advanced spacefaring technology - everyone else gets culled before that can happen.
-Beckett can walk on his hands. This is not important in any way. Also, his catch phrase seems to be "Oh, crap".
-Just to show how baked the Atlantis guys are, Ronon fires a shot back into the wormhole AFTER he emerges back into the gatrium.
-The Athosians barely mentioned this time on the mainland, as having hunting parties out and about. What are they hunting, anyway? In two years, we've only seen those whale things.
Mark
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
-Waitasec... They say they're only taking space gates from planets that don't rely on them for trade. What planets have they run into so far that actually DO use them for any purpose? Only Atlantis and the Wraith have advanced spacefaring technology - everyone else gets culled before that can happen.
Tayla and her people didn't seem surprised to see strangers, a few others were like that. The ep where Meany gets vaporized says that the pics had been distributed around various planets. How did the pics get scattered?
What was the episode number for when they finally show the giant whalish things?
Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
"Tayla and her people didn't seem surprised to see strangers"
Their stargate wasn't in space, though. The one in orbit was around another planet they went to (in the pilot). I think the one that had a hiveship on it?
Posted by B.J. (Member # 858) on :
Range of a stargate? I'd say minimum of 100,000 light years, for the Milky Way ones at least, in order to get from one side of the galaxy to the other.
So, given that the Pegasus galaxy is about 3 million light years away, they'd need AT MOST 30 stargates between Peagsus and the Milky Way.
Sounds reasonable, and a high enough number that they couldn't do it in a single episode.
B.J.
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
The one planet did, but my memory is foggy as usual, I'd need to look at an episode guide to refresh it.
B.J. Range of a stargate is limited by its available power, in the Fifth Race Jack went to which galaxy? The gate was also used to go straight to Atlantis, so the range, with proper power is at least 3 million light years. But with ZPMs at a premium the shorter hops taken between galaxies would require far less power to do, with an increase in the number of hops the power requirement would drop even more. How much power does a Jumper provide to a gate?
Posted by Cartman (Member # 256) on :
"So, given that the Pegasus galaxy is about 3 million light years away..."
Well, the real (Andromeda VI) Pegasus galaxy is, anyway. It'd be one long-ass bridge to cross if we go by McKay's 300-million lightyear throwaway figure from Suspicion, though.
Posted by Mark Nguyen (Member # 469) on :
A jumper presumably has enough power to activate the gate through normal means, as any DHD would be able to do. Mind you, Pegasus is much smaller than the Milky Way, but its distance (never quantified) could be up to six or seven million light years away, if it's one fo the two clusters we call Pegasus in real life.
Mark
Posted by WizArtist II (Member # 1425) on :
In the original movie, didn't they say that the probe they sent had traveled to "another galaxy"? Putting Abydos outside the Milky Way, perhaps in the Three Musketeers Galaxy?
Posted by Mark Nguyen (Member # 469) on :
Yes they did. The movie establishes Abydos to be literally at the other side of the universe. Then again, it also establishes O'Neil with one L, Feretti as an airman and not an officer, O'Neil's son to be named NOT Charlie, Sha're is spelled and pronounced Sha'uri, and so on.
The first season of SG-1 had one reference to the stargate being intergalactic in nature, but other wise establishes from the start that the gate network is native to the Milky Way galaxy, and that Abydos is actually pretty close to Earth.
Mark
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
It seems that the jumper may have, or could have, more power for it's DHD than a ground mount unit. The size of the jumper being far bigger and all.
If the gate network is native to our galaxy why don't/didn't SG-1 find any jumpers in their travels? I do mean a sizable number of them. They all seem to be in the Pegasus galaxy.
Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :
My guess is the Goa'uld salvaged most obvious Ancient tech long ago. They did find the time machine jumper, though.