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Yay, back to back Rodney episodes! Well, it ended up as a Rodney & Shep episode, which is still fun. And for the record, I don't know what they skipped over "Sunday". I've read somewhere that there's a chracter or events in it that they wanted to keep for later though, so I'm sure there's a proper reason for it and it wasn't a simple mistake.
-The whole premise is laughably fun. Back in the first season, McKay and Sheppard stumble upon (and conveniently forget to tell anyone about) what they think is the Ancient version of the "Civilization" PC strategy game. In truth, the choices they make for their respective nations are real-time broadcasted as "oracle" dictations from above, which the sheep implement immediately. Hilarity ensues!
-This is the first time that the Atlantis Expedition has really had to deal with being taken as "gods" by the population of another planet, something the SG-1 gang had to deal with a lot early on. This was dealt with fairly decently, harkenning back to the days when everyone else besides Earth was pretty gullible.
-Rodney makes the "in vogue" female hairstyle that of Sam Carter. Also, his country's flag is basically our Canadian flag with his face as the maple leaf. Is there NO end to the conceit of this guy when there's no apparent risk involved?!
-Nice touch putting McKay back into the beige jacket he was wearing in the first part of the first season.
-To keep the consciences of our two main characters clean, absolutely no one is killed in the episode despite both nations essentially being at war. Furthermore, the little dots move at speeds typical for this sort of game, but in reality they must be running really, REALLY fast!
-Driving the "Absolute power corrupts absolutely" point home, a secondary plot has Zelenka and Major Lorne (where's HE been recently?) making innocent saving gestures on another planet that the Lantean game manipulates. What results is a rare funny scene between two secondary characters, which is pretty rare in the show. However, this same thing made some secondary characters on DS9 into regular fan favorites... Go Dr. Z! Go Lorne! Spin yourselves off into the upcoming Series 3!
-Yet again, we see characters master alien technology in no time. This time, an alien general, with a few keystrokes, can type in commands on an Earth keyboard to tell his troops to attack. No wonder he's in charge.
-Hey, it took me a whole half show to realize that they were using the existing village set, this time with angled facades built on the main thoroughfare to make it look like another TWO completely different medieval villages! Say what you will about the writing this year, but the set designers are only getting better.
-At one point, Shep hops into his Jumper to harmlessly shoot down a bomb-laden balloon. I'm quite surprised that the drone they used didn't explode it completely... It probably ripped right through the balloon part and just let it drop. Well, this ISN'T a Michael Bay show, so...
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