Stargate timeline

[Viv]

Hi!

I'm writing a BtVS/SG-1 crossover story, and as a nerd and nitpicker, I'm trying to get the dates of the events to work together as much as possible. I'm finding it very difficult, though, as one Stargate season is meant to wrap around a year without any major break (because of their cliffhanger-ending style), whilst one Buffy season pretty much happens at the same time as it's being aired (Halloween, Thanksgiving or Christmas episodes are aired around the right time of the year, Buffy's birthday always happens at the same time of the year, etc).

How would you go around this? Has anyone tried to create a Stargate timeline with dates as to when events are supposed to happen (taking into account things like "100 days" spans overs 3 months, and "Window of Opportunity" spans over at least that, too)? That would be really useful. Or should I just give up getting dates to work together, and just write what seems best, plot-wise? Will SG-1 fans notice if an event happens in June rather than in November?

Any help greatly appreciated!

Edit: this story is set in the summer between Season 4 and Season 5 of BtVS (June to end of September, approx), and in Stargate's S4 (at least after "Beneath the Surface").

[Erik Pasternak]

I don't think anyone has, but we get some date information in season one's "Politics."

[Lucia Tanaka]

I agree, no one knows that kind of info.

But if you think about it, it couldn't help at all. Having someone mention the "events of August 15, 1998" would do you no good because no one would know what happened then. ^.^ Unless you were planning to do it another way.

~Lucia

[Viv]

Thanks! Gods, no, I wasn't intending to mention stuff by date! All I wanted was a way to establish a correspondence between the Stargate timeline and the Buffy timeline, to make the crossover logical.

Well, in fact, what I really wanted to know, was how much room I had for tinkering with dates. Anyhow I've worked out my own timeline based on logic and air dates, by now. (are there any other authors who go as far as date the events in their fanfics, just to know how much time goes by, or am I a solitary nerd?)

[Lucia Tanaka]

..... Whoa. A logical crossover fic... *brain explodes trying to comprehend such a novel concept*

~Lucia

[TheKatGoddess]

Yeah, I try to get things to correspond pretty well... but not when it comes to crossovers. I mean, my fanfic series I'm working on now intertwines through Season Eight... but, it's no crossover... sorry, wish I could help, but you'll probably be better off just playing it by ear.

Logic... god, that's got to hurt.

[Lenonn]

Hi!
Has anyone tried to create a Stargate timeline with dates as to when events are supposed to happen (taking into account things like "100 days" spans overs 3 months, and "Window of Opportunity" spans over at least that, too)?

I had one, but it was lost in a hard drive crash a few months ago. I'm going to need to re-create it. The problem is a couple of dates came form the old Showtime SG-1 site, so that data is gone for good.

[brihana25]

Well, in fact, what I really wanted to know, was how much room I had for tinkering with dates.

You've got two years to play around within the first two seasons.

Between 1997 and 1999, the show went from 1995-1999.

After that (Out of Mind is the last time I can remember an actual SG-1 chronological date being applied to the show in any way - except, of course for 2001 which we know takes place in, oddly enough, 2001), you've still got some room to play.

Like you said, you've got 3 months in A Hundred Days, at least 3 months - though I'd guess closer to 6 or 7 - in Window of Opportunity. You've got at least six weeks between any episode that ends with a member of SG-1 badly wounded (shot, staffed, seriously ill - but most especially gunshot wounds) and the beginning of the next episode - with the exceptions of TBFtGOG/Politics and Heroes/Resurrection, where we either see or hear about the character's ongoing recovery. You've got 4-5 weeks for The Light and the 3 weeks immediately following with SG-1 "vacationing" on the planet. You've got a number of weeks - I think it's six, but they do say for sure so that's one you can check - between Nemesis and Small Victories. Jacob, at one point, says how long it will take them to get back to Earth, so you can pretty accurately figure out the timespan between Enemies and Threshhold. A Matter of Time, according to Daniel, spanned two weeks in what seemed to be no more than 3-4 hours because of the time dilation effects. A month passed between Evolution and Death Knell. Urgo was an entire week to most of the SGC but only a few seconds to SG-1. So far, the 8 episodes we've seen of Season Eight seem to have covered six-seven months.

There's quite a bit more than that, but those are the ones I can think of without looking them up.

With all of the different timespans that have been given for episodes in the past eight years, I'd say it's entirely possible that this show - which started out two years behind realtime - is quite possibly now two or three years ahead of it. I'm guessing that if anyone *were* to do a strict chronology on the show, they'd be closer to 2006-2007 right now than to 2004.

Long story short - I think you can put your story just about anywhere. I always try to to match up with airdates, since the actual chronology is so confusing - I wrote a story about SG-1's first Christmas together, and I put it between Singularity and Cor-Ai, strictly on airdates. If you want to do it that way:

Seasons One, Two and Three of Buffy would all fall somewhere between Children of the Gods and Into the Fire (1995-1999 for Stargate, 1997-1999 for Buffy)

After bridging that two year gap at the beginning, the rest of the seasons would line up, by airdate, as:

Summer hiatus of 1999 (Buffy) = Seth - Learning Curve
Season Four of Buffy = Forever in a Day - Small Victories (early Oct. 1999 - May/June 2000)
Summer hiatus of 2000 (Buffy) = The Other Side - The Curse
Season Five of Buffy = The Serpent's Venom - Threshhold (late Sept. 2000 - May/June 2001)
Summer hiatus of 2001 (Buffy) = Ascension - Wormhole X-Treme!
Season Six of Buffy = Proving Ground - Revelations (early Oct. 2001 - May 2002)
Summer hiatus of 2002 (Buffy) = Redemption - Cure
Season Seven of Buffy = Prometheus/Unnatural Selection - Full Circle (late Sept. 2002 - May 2003)
All of Seasons Seven and Eight would take place post-Sunnydale

And I don't know if any of that is going to do you any good at all, but gosh this was fun to dig up.

[Viv]

You've got two years to play around within the first two seasons.

Between 1997 and 1999, the show went from 1995-1999.

Wha...?! Apparently, a time frame is clearly mentioned for the time CotG happened, in Politics: O'Neill's report for the events in CotG is dated February 23, 1997 (one would suppose that the report can't have been typed up more than a couple of weeks after the actual events). Who ever said CotG happens in 1995? I suppose it would contradict movie canon, or put more time than one year between the movie and CotG, but I do like to go by the info given out in the series rather than the movie.

And I don't know if any of that is going to do you any good at all, but gosh this was fun to dig up.

At any rate, thanks for the thoughts! That was interesting, and I've been doing pretty much the same thing (aligning on air dates and tinkering where there should be longer spaces)

And I agree it's fun! Geeky fun, I guess. I amused myself greatly by making a detailed timeline for my fanfic, it actually helped me a lot (and none of my readers will ever realise that I did such a work, heh).

[brihana25]

Wha...?! Apparently, a time frame is clearly mentioned for the time CotG happened, in Politics: O'Neill's report for the events in CotG is dated February 23, 1997 (one would suppose that the report can't have been typed up more than a couple of weeks after the actual events). Who ever said CotG happens in 1995? I suppose it would contradict movie canon, or put more time than one year between the movie and CotG, but I do like to go by the info given out in the series rather than the movie.

Actually, I was going by the series. Particularly the part of CotG when Jack said it had been a year since the Abydos mission... which would be 1995.

Ugh... my brain's going to explode on this one. It was hard enough to keep things straight thinking they'd just condensed 4 years into 2... but to think that they added 1 to 1994 and came up with 1997 is just... gack!

*brain explosion*

This one's going to take a while to recover from. Good luck with the story; I'll be looking forward to reading it.

[Viv]

Actually, I was going by the series. Particularly the part of CotG when Jack said it had been a year since the Abydos mission... which would be 1995.

Well, unless something else is stated in the *series* (which is possible, I wish I had all the transcripts for all the episodes) about the Abydos mission happening in 1994, Jack's statement that the Abydos mission was "one year back" sets the first mission back to 1996, if we can go by the date on his report in "Politics". The series would then have its own timeline, which would differ from the movie's (which indeed is set in 1994).

Of course, it wouldn't be the first time that a TV series contradicts itself (a particularly amusing Buffy episode is Season 1's "I Robot... You Jane", where they come up with Buffy's school file - except that on two different shots, she has two different dates of birth, and neither matches up to her "real" birthday that came later on in the series)

This one's going to take a while to recover from. Good luck with the story; I'll be looking forward to reading it.

[shameless plug] It's here, actually: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/2027034/1/ well, the first chapter, anyway...[/plug]

Sorry for the brain explosion, I'll... find you a mop.

[Lenonn]

http://www.stargatebbs.com/index.php...=0&#entry26194

This is my updated timeline thus far.