Why I'm Fine with an Atlantis "Reset"

[amconway]

Don't get me wrong. I don't like the revolving door of cast members any more than most folks, but there are a few things (in my opinion) that keep SGA from being all that it can be. Most of these things stem from one big problem. Too many bad guys of too many types.
One of the great things about SG-1 was the element of exploration; the discovery of new worlds and civilizations, their cultures and knowledge. This is almost entirely absent from SGA. Is there even anyone there who knows about that sort of thing on Atlantis?
The Wraith are so numerous and omnipresent that almost every world is populated by the same type of rag-tag subsistance level farming culture. Sure, culling will do that to you, but it's not all that interesting. Were the Ancients the only advanced race in the galaxy? Surely there is a ruin or two to be explored that doesn't have Wraith in it! Daniel Jackson couldn't throw a stone without finding something cool....
These guys can't go anywhere without it turning into a massive, life and death battle with Replicators,Wraith or Michael. No wonder there is no time for character development! They are just too darn busy for chitchat! (wouldn't hurt is more of the characters showed a sense of humor, either-Sheppard can't keep up the banter all by his lonesome) In SG-1, the bad guys were introduced over a much longer time frame, with the exception of the Goa'uld, who were in it from day one.
By the time the baddies started getting knee deep, they had met many cultures who could be called on as allies and had all kinds of character building encounters with those who couldn't! Not to mention all of the knowledge that they had added to their arsenal. The gang at SGA don't have much more time for acquiring new knowledge than they do for chitchat! If MacKay can't do it already, it's just not gonna get done!
Something needs to take down the number of bad guys and give them someplace to go besides tiny villages. It's a big galaxy! Let's see some of it!
Let's see some stories about characters, strange cultures and exploration. C'mon, kids! Let's use those gates!

[Archaeis]

You do have to remember that Daniel and SG1 could come upon all those things because the milky way is enourmous, and while they were dominant, there really weren't that many Goauld to go around. They couldn't be everywhere at once.

In Pegasus, which has been stated to be a dwarf galaxy in the show, so much less area to start with. They are too many wraith for the galaxy, hence the fighting. So that does kind of negate the point of why they are nearly everywhere.

[Daedalus-304]

I was just thinking about that the other day. In SG-1 there were lots of interesting worlds with various cultures. In Atlantis it always seems to be a village in the woods somewhere and they all were the same kind of clothes. We don't even get much of a varity of climates, it all seems to be forests.

[amconway]

Well, I wasn't speaking to the reasoning behind the huge numbers, so much as to the general effect, which is to make the show battle heavy to the expense of most other lines of plot and character development. My hope, in terms of the "reset" is that there is some shift in the balance of power, or population base, that will allow for a broader range of scripts.

Excellent point about the worlds all having the same climate! That would be a most peculiar coincidence....

[Cory Holmes]

. In Atlantis it always seems to be a village in the woods somewhere and they all were the same kind of clothes.

This makes a bit of sense when you think about how the Wraith tend to obliterate societies on a whim, and cull the rest as needed. We know that most villages and tribes are willing to take in stragglers and survivors, so over the course of time most cultural differences would be obliterated into a sort of homogeny.

In terms of a reset, I'd love to see Atlantis cut off from Earth again. At most having the occasional visit by the Daedalus for a resupply run. I miss the frontier spirit S1 had.

[amconway]

No argument with why all the planets have small populations and low technological levels. Although this doesn't explain the lack of varation in terrain. My argument is that a galaxy populated with small agrarian societies and cursed with such an overwhelming number of evil types is limiting in terms of storytelling. You end up with the battle of the week. without interesting allies such as the Free Jaffa, and miss out on the sense of discovery that made SG-1 so compelling.

[KindlyKeller]

Excellent point about the worlds all having the same climate! That would be a most peculiar coincidence....

Wasn't that a problem on SG-1 too? They had to come up with a terraforming explanation as I recall, because every planet was the same.

Regarding your general assessment, I agree, even though I'm a huge fan of all things Atlantis. Outside of Season 1, everything has been a non-stop struggle against their enemies, to the point where it makes me wonder why Earth would keep pumping money into the program. I mean, what are they really getting out of it?

You're right that the culling premise really takes a lot of exploration options off the table. We did get that one incredibly interesting episode, though, with that extremely advanced society that had struck that deal with the Wraith to be left alone.

The big disappointment for me, though, was the lack of episodes focused on their exploration of Atlantis itself. I remember being EXTREMELY disappointed when, in an interview in Season 2 or so, one of TPTB said casually, "Yeah, they've explored about 85% of it at this point." I thought, "REALLY?! And there was NOTHING interesting enough for the audience to see???"

[KindlyKeller]

...

Weird sidenote -- I'm watching the episode from your sig at this exact moment. Eerie!

[amconway]

And a fine episode it is,too! Kind of illustrates what I'm talking about. "The First Ones" has cool new creatures, lots of humor, a new kind of society, background on the goa'uld and lots of opportunity for character development!
That's just the kind of thing I'd like to see on SGA.

I was also disappointed that they did so little with the city-especially when they weren't exploring anything else! There have been a couple of very good stories about cultures that, in one way or another, managed to avoid culling long enough to be interesting. They sure have to jump through hoops to make those happen though! Way to few and far between...

[Tupopoflungo]

Wasn't that a problem on SG-1 too? They had to come up with a terraforming explanation as I recall, because every planet was the same.

Indeed they did. It was something along the lines of

Well, we know the goa'uld took humans to plant throughout the galaxy, so any human sustainable world would need alot of the same things earth has, trees, acceptable atmosphere..etc."


something to that effect...

[amconway]

Well, unless you want to do the whole thing in front of a blue screen, your options are kind of limited. They did go for the occasional desert in SG-1. I'm trying to recall if there have been any desert planets in the Pegasus Galaxy....
There is quite a lot of terrain variation within a day of the Vancouver area where they film that they might be using for those location shots.

[Tupopoflungo]

Well, unless you want to do the whole thing in front of a blue screen, your options are kind of limited. They did go for the occasional desert in SG-1. I'm trying to recall if there have been any desert planets in the Pegasus Galaxy....
There is quite a lot of terrain variation within a day of the Vancouver area where they film that they might be using for those location shots.

There has been at least one desert planet that I can think of off the top of my head...the planet in the episode "The Defiant One" was a desert...and I think there was at least one other but I may be wrong...

[KindlyKeller]

There was also the canyon type terrain in "Inferno."

[Heaven]

It's a big galaxy! Let's see some of it!
Let's see some stories about characters, strange cultures and exploration. C'mon, kids! Let's use those gates!

couldn't agree with you more

the Pegasus galaxy looks like a war zone
even technology wise, all we see of the Wraith / Ancients is military technology and bases
I want to see more civilizations, even primitive ones. explore the relationship they had with the "ancestors" and unique things on their worlds.
I want to see alien cultures not just middle age villages and clones of Earth circa 1940 societies
Imagine if the wraith culled Ancient Rome, surely they wouldn't destroy all the buildings and infrastructure there as the Romans pose no threat
so why don't we see civilizations like that? why aren't there more ruins left?

we need more things to explore instead of X enemy coming up with Y new evil plot every week

[BloomGate]

From what I understand, a big problem that they have now that they didn't have with the earlier years of SG1, is that there are fewer areas around Vancouver where they can shoot without signs of civilzation creeping into the background. So, while there may be different types of terrain, that doesn't mean they can get permission to shoot there or find enough establishing shots to make it worthwhile. Your logic of "They did it with SG1 so why aren't they doing it now?" just doesn't fly because times have changed since then.

As for shooting in front of a green screen, that's problematic in and of itself because it means a different production schedule because there is so much post shooting work that needs to be done. I also think it's more expensive - at least as opposed to just using the areas readily available and not doing much more than a kawoosh or two. It's almost like for the budgets that they have to work with, they would have to dedicate the series to that kind of show because they would have to let the current outside support staff go in favor of more green screen support staff and SFX folks.

I would also add that I think the number of wraith story lines has to do with what the network wants and/or what gets the best ratings. If you've noticed, there's a whole slew of Wraith fans around here that would prefer the Wraith in MORE episodes than they currently are in proportionally. I would also add that if the pictures on JM's blog are any indication, get ready for alot more Michaeal/Wraith storylines in season 5.

As for more exploration of the city, yeah, that would be nice, but they would have to dedicate ALOT more storylines to it to justify the set space. I suppose they could try to do it half-assed with what they currently have, but there is really only so much you can do with lighting and adding a few new things to make the same corridors and rooms that already exist look differently. (I hope this isn't too condescending, but you guys do realize that Atlantis doesn't really exist right? It's not like they can just walk down a different corridor of Atlantis and film there right? They actually have to build it to shoot on it.)

I'm sure these answers aren't what you want to hear, but it's pretty much the reality of the situation.