Sanctuary Discussion (Spoilers for the most recent episode)

[Rocky89]

http://tvbythenumbers.com/2009/10/12...ond-week/30250

New York, NY – October 12, 2009 – Maintaining Syfy’s ratings surge, the second season premiere of Sanctuary leaped 18% in Adults 18-49 and 7% in Adults 25-54 versus last year’s average, while grabbing nearly 1.9 million viewers (1.85) on Friday, October 9, at 10PM (ET/PT).

Sanctuary, starring Amanda Tapping and Robin Dunne, delivered nearly one million Adults 18-49 (946,000) — its second highest A18-49 delivery ever — along with 1.15 million Adults 25-54.

Cool.

[RealmOfX]

Video from the Syfy Digital Press Tour http://forum.gateworld.net/showpost....postcount=1291

[jckfan55]

I was under the impression that the Five created a "serum" containing vampire blood / derived from the source blood. Which would essentially mean that the blood sample wasn't pure. That's how I understood it. As much as I would love to hope that Ashley has the capacity to go the same way, there's an additional clue in the episode.

Spoiler:

Helen tells John that one doesn't become what he did without a predisposition t murder.

Thoughts on the season opener. The first section is not specific and only discusses things others have discussed outside of spoiler tags. But personally, I would be upset to read these things before seeing the show, so I've put them in tags. Do unto others...

The second, however, is more plot specific.

Spoiler:

Overall, I really enjoyed it. A lot more than most of the season one episodes. But there were some niggly bits for me.

Like others have mentioned, the split screen was a little off-putting. At times it worked well, at other times it felt over-done and at others it was just plain annoying. The most jarring split screen event, for me, was with the gun. Hopefully, however, it was just a stylistic thing they did for one episode, a little like the hand-held camera in Instinct.

The Essex thing.... Chelmsford is Essex, right? I seem to remember plenty of fields and greenery outside Chelmsford. Ok, so it's not the first thing I would think of when thinking of Essex, I would also think of cities, towns, industrial areas and so on, but greenery does exist. Though, maybe not as idyllic as in the episode (I certainly haven't seen a landscape in Essex unspoiled by pylons, roads or other such industrial evidence).

I would agree that a British audience, for the mostpart, would not be predisposed to think of Essex as a "green" county, but it was probably the first that came to mind, what with Amanda having been born there.

I think, as well, that we in the UK got different a different title sequence to the US. Someone told me the other day that Robin Dunne was only listed as a guest star in the US one or something, so I presume it was different. That might answer questions about the actor status.

Although I sometimes found Emilie's performance jarring in the webisodes, my only little issue in the series is her accent. I can hear the Danish in it. Now, as a foreign language teacher myself, I will be the first to acknowledge that no non-native speaker of a language can ever be absolutely and wonderfully flawless, but they can get pretty damn close - like Emilie has. And, as such, my issue is more with the writing than the actress. I just wish we had had some line about Ashley moving around growing up, or having spent part of her childhood elsewhere, or having a foreign tutor as a child, something that might just explain away that little trace. Just one comment or one line. I suppose it's very much like I'd love a throwaway comment about Helen's accent to stop the critics (I still think Ashley's comment in Sanctuary For All was wasted. It should have been "A bit like yours, but more British" and Helen could have been slightly affronted, instead of "but more evil").

Spoiler:

Onto the show specific stuff.

Henry's behaviour really annoyed me. I know Henry's the Sanctuary's weak link, that he's a complete prat and he messes up on almost a weekly basis. But really? Would he really have done it? It was just far too contrived for my liking. Granted, I don't know how else they could have done it, but the look on her face and everything else... there's no way he would have fallen for that, no matter how dumb he can be.

Kate bypassing security. I can sort of understand this in a way. I mean, the guys WANT the Cabal to show up so that they can interrogate them, and John's the only other thing they were trying to keep away. Now he's on their side, security can afford to be quite lax. But it would have been nice to have Henry defend that with a "yeah, but we're not really trying" or something similar. I can hardly see, on normal operating duty as we saw last season, anyone penetrating the fortress unwanted and undetected.

All in all, I really enjoyed it. But little things do niggle me and those are them. It's reassuring to see that people agree with me on some of those issues.

I agree with your Henry comment.

Spoiler:

I was practically yelling at the tv--"please don't make Henry that stupid!"

interesting point re: the Sanctuary for All accent line. though I do like the original.

As far as Emilie I can't say I can identify the Danish--just a layperson, you know, -- though sometimes something does feel a bit odd in her pronunciation. I like your proposed explanation. It makes real sense since Helen's lived all over the place. Some line about them spending Ashley's early years there. If she learned English in a non-English speaking country...

[SunKrux]

I agree with your Henry comment.

Spoiler:

I was practically yelling at the tv--"please don't make Henry that stupid!"

I'm with you and TracyJane. I was not pleased at that bit o' the show. Really Henry...you are SMARTER than that.

Other than that, I really enjoyed the premiere.

[EvenstarSRV]

I'm with you and TracyJane. I was not pleased at that bit o' the show. Really Henry...you are SMARTER than that.

Other than that, I really enjoyed the premiere.

Yeah, I'm with you guys too.

Spoiler:

I think it does kinda of play to Henry's inexperience in the field, and he can be distracted by pretty women ala Instinct and Nubbins. But mostly I think Henry just fell victim to the plot requiring Kate to escape after meeting up with Helen and co., so the Cabal would kick her out and onto the Sanctuary's doorstep.

For EU's accent, I've never really noticed anything weird, but then I'm not really good with accents in general. But I think it'd make sense that Ashley would have traveled with her mother throughout her childhood and for that to have affected her accent like it affected Helen's.

[OboeTheres]

For EU's accent, I've never really noticed anything weird, but then I'm not really good with accents in general. But I think it'd make sense that Ashley would have traveled with her mother throughout her childhood and for that to have affected her accent like it affected Helen's.

I never had a problem with either of their accents, I just figured that due to the nature of their work, and Helen's long life their accents would probably be a bit of a mix. I don't think that it really needs explaining now that we see what they do, and apparently that will be reinforced this season as we see more of the global sanctuary network.

[SamJackShipLover]

Emilie spoke of languages at Haven. She speaks a lot of them (including Vietnamese), cause she has lived in a lot of countries when she was young. She said she would really like it if it turned out Ashley can speak more languages as well, cause that would make her look smarter (not het exact words lol, when she said it it sounded slightly different, but you get the idea).

[antoa]

So I was watching my DVD of Revelations Part 1 today (with commentary), only to discover that the disc had a defect! 42:29 into the episode, it froze for several seconds, then skipped a bit, finally playing normal again about 15 seconds later *sigh*

I emailed Amazon.com and they are sending me a replacement. Yay! When it arrives I just have to ship my defective set back.

Other than that 15 seconds, I am finished watching all the eps with the commentary. Now I just need to watch the special features. Yeah, I know I am late to the party.

And as a random aside, the ad banner is saying that Jeff Dunham has a new show starting on Comedy Central. Wicked. I like Je-fah-fah.

[kes]

For me the thing with EU is that her english is to clean. I think its the lack of accent lol

[antoa]

And I just had an epiphany. The old order for the dvds was simply duplicated to send me out a new set.

The old set was sent to my former work place. It's now too late to change the delivery address. I am *not* happy. I do not want to be dealing with them at all *sigh*

[Rocky89]

Video from the Syfy Digital Press Tour http://forum.gateworld.net/showpost....postcount=1291

Ladies and gentleman, our queen of syfy, the incomparable Amanda Tapping. I loved how the spoke so highly of Amanda and I CAN'T believe Amanda dropped the S bomb AGAIN.

Btw, if you love Amanda and the show, and will do anything to support her, than join this group started by our very one LilFerret.

Amanda Tapping Love

I joined, and you'll noticed that my love for Amanda has grown so much that it's actually rubbed off on my avatar.

[Tracy Jane]

For me the thing with EU is that her english is to clean. I think its the lack of accent lol

Personally, I disagree. Not that that is an insult or criticism in any way (as I said before).

One of the things, when you study linguistics, you study phonology and phonetics and also about language acquisition, which comes under psycholinguistics. So you sort of learn what languages have certain sounds and where non-native speakers have difficulty with certain sounds. We actually had a test once where we had to listen to ten non-native speakers of English and work out where they came from.

So it might just be that it's made me hyper-sensitive to it. I mean, it's only once or twice an episode, in general, that something really stands out. So not all the time. So it's probably that I'm hyper sensitive because I know what I'm listening for.

I have a German friend whose English is wonderful. Most people who speak to her think she's American. But every so often, if you listen closely, there will be something in what she says that gives her away. Sometimes it's pronounciation, sometimes it's a consonant that's slightly too hard or too rounded, or sometimes it's just the emphasis on a word, where a native speaker would accentuate something slightly different. Tiny, tiny giveaways that a lot of people wouldn't really notice, I guess.

But yeah, Emilie is uber talented when it comes to languages. I'm incredibly jealous!

Whoever said that we don't need a line, we can work it out for ourselves, you're probably right. But a little evidence of Ash growing up elsewhere wouldn't hurt the character's backstory. And as for Helen, it would stop a LOT of the sniping at Amanda.

[kes]

Personally, I disagree. Not that that is an insult or criticism in any way (as I said before).

One of the things, when you study linguistics, you study phonology and phonetics and also about language acquisition, which comes under psycholinguistics. So you sort of learn what languages have certain sounds and where non-native speakers have difficulty with certain sounds. We actually had a test once where we had to listen to ten non-native speakers of English and work out where they came from.

So it might just be that it's made me hyper-sensitive to it. I mean, it's only once or twice an episode, in general, that something really stands out. So not all the time. So it's probably that I'm hyper sensitive because I know what I'm listening for.

I have a German friend whose English is wonderful. Most people who speak to her think she's American. But every so often, if you listen closely, there will be something in what she says that gives her away. Sometimes it's pronounciation, sometimes it's a consonant that's slightly too hard or too rounded, or sometimes it's just the emphasis on a word, where a native speaker would accentuate something slightly different. Tiny, tiny giveaways that a lot of people wouldn't really notice, I guess.

But yeah, Emilie is uber talented when it comes to languages. I'm incredibly jealous!

Whoever said that we don't need a line, we can work it out for ourselves, you're probably right. But a little evidence of Ash growing up elsewhere wouldn't hurt the character's backstory. And as for Helen, it would stop a LOT of the sniping at Amanda.

Yeh if its your thing, its yoyr thing LOL

I guess what I ment was english is not my 1st language and EU pronounces the words so clean, like she doesnt swallow like some actors do. You always understand what she's saying. So ok maybe she says the "o" differently or whatever lol but you can hear her better, you know?

[Rocky89]

Amanda Tapping & the Women of Stargate Universe - Part 2 : Exclusive

[parsifal]

Amanda Tapping & the Women of Stargate Universe - Part 2 : Exclusive

Download here.