S10: Critique & Contemplation

[Jackie]

Um, you do realize that that would make it necessary for the female lead to actually be "the lead"?
Never, ever in this universe are TPTB going to have a female lead with top billing.

-mckay type scientist that is female.

No wait, you actually believe there are going to be two female main cast members?

-female fighter pilot who is very much like starbuck of BSG

That would be female main cast member 3. You really think the 15-year-olds would watch a show with that many chicks in charge? No way! Can't really sell such a show! Not even if the CIC have big bazookas (not the weapon).

You must be living in an AU.
Mind if I join you there?

Oh, wait...that's was my own half baked attempt to come up with the series.

TPTB wouldn't do any of that.

if there are 3 females they would all be bomb shell beauties with no real purpose...maybe just a title.

[Gregorius]

Mutters something *uncomplimentary* about Lucius.

Is there any other way to talk about Lucius?

As much as I love jms' writing he's doe some pretty cheesy stuff, even of B5.

True, but at least his cheesy stuff is made up for by the stories. He does, however, need someone to check his dialogue.

I'm not sure MGM would pay any of them the type of money needed to induce them to play in someone else's sandbox, even with carte blanche

Sadly that's probably true too. It's a shame MGM hasn't learned from Paramount (?) and its cash cow Star Trek.

the lack of exploration of atlantis i'm putting down to 'hoarding' story ideas. A city exploration is, i'm sure, seen as boring. but also, exploring the story is a 'cheap' bottle episode, so they are hoarding the ideas to pull otu when the budget demands.

They'd had a lot more budget if they'd stopped using CGI as filler in the episodes and write more dialogue and scenes. I don't have to see Atlantis from yet another angle, same goes for the ships. Perhaps they should take a page (or is it leaf?) from Doctor Who's PTB and create episodes with minimal CGI.

Anyway, I find exploring the city to be far more amusing than seeing them go off-world where Shep gets into trouble, flirts with, and gets, the girl, where McKay solves the problem, where Teyla looks pretty and provides some information about the society at hand and where Ronon shoots everyone.

Lets compare that to the last city exploration episodes: Killer nanites, McKay fears he's going to die and it's up to the other to save him and his crew. McKay plays with a machine which makes him even more intelligent, almost dies and returns back to life (The machine, with its reversable effects is conviently forgotten while it could be used to explore a dilemma: Use it time and time again on McKay to turn him hyper intelligent and when he almost dies return his to normal, and repeat this process?).

for me? they're living in an alien city. i woudl think priority #1, even if it's jsut for a team or two, would be to explore every single room of that city. Heck, with the right sheilding a whole group of people could be living in a tower or on a pier and they'd never know about it.

Don't forget the Ancient database. In it there must be information about ZPMs, Ancient outposts, ship factories, etc... yet we never see them use it unless it's a convenient plot device. Why don't they explore the database and use it?

Thank you!

I nearly puked when they introduced the Prometheus. That was the worst part of an otherwise excellent season.
You just put in words what I thought when they showed Prometheus for the first time. "too big, way too big, plus reverse engineering something *that big* in such a short time, who do they think they are kidding?"

I was surprised by it as it was like the Wright brothers introducing a Boeing 747 a short time after their Wright flyer was succesful. It makes absolutely no sense.

What would've made sense was to use the Nightwalkers' ship and introduce that in S7 as a ship they can make fly but don't understand.

As for the reverse engineering part, it really took me by surprise that a secret program, in peace time, can attract the best of the best and enough people to actively reverse engineer such a thing in such a short amount of time. And even so, to do that in 2 years? In season 4 they were barely capable of using a retro-fitted Goa'uld glider and 2 years later they can build something that's supposed to resemble a battlecruiser? That would only be possible if more advanced species helped them design and produce it, which we know isn't the case as no-one wanted to help the humans.


And in conclusion: In one of my previous posts I mentioned I'd have to take a look at the still of the Aurora class vessel. I did, and it does indeed somewhat resemble a submarine.

[Gregorius]

On a completely unrelated note to my last posts: I've been reading my first posts in this thread and I'm surprised by how accurate my predictions have been. :/

Now you've done it! Don't spoil the big ending where SG-1 defeats the Ori. It turns out the Ori can be defeated by love! So SG-1'll travel to the Ori Galaxy where their pureness turns the Ori into good Ascended. This way everyone'll be happy!

Here. That pretty much sums up the Ark of the Bori thing. Although details are different - Append followers to Ori and change Ascended into humans - I'm pretty much dead on how it has ended.

Here I pretty much have the concept of Universe without ever reading a spoiler about it at the time and only being sarcastic. Again, the details may be different (I guess "living" should be removed) but I'm pretty much dead on.

Sarcasm and cynicism: Accurately predicting SG since 2006.

[jckfan55]

yeah, they will NEVER really put a female in command. If they try, it'll be another Weir situation, where she was leader in name only and shep is the true leader of the show and she's just there to facilitate his hewoness.

Sam was put down to facilitate cameron being the leader, weir supported shep more than bossed him around (he flauted her authority more than once) and, even on atlantis, sam really conflicted with no one and was just there.

at least they didn't use her to ship with someone, but i think they were so aware of 'ooh, people might not like this' coupled with AT's hectic schedule, that they trod so lightly you sometimes wonder why they even bothered to bring her over. By the time they figured out what to do with sam, it was the end of the season and she was gone (or soon to be gone)

Can't green ya again, but I think you're right (unfortunately) on all counts.

[jckfan55]

Is there any other way to talk about Lucius?

No. Oh, that was a rhetorical question.

They'd had a lot more budget if they'd stopped using CGI as filler in the episodes and write more dialogue and scenes. I don't have to see Atlantis from yet another angle, same goes for the ships. Perhaps they should take a page (or is it leaf?) from Doctor Who's PTB and create episodes with minimal CGI.

Anyway, I find exploring the city to be far more amusing than seeing them go off-world where Shep gets into trouble, flirts with, and gets, the girl, where McKay solves the problem, where Teyla looks pretty and provides some information about the society at hand and where Ronon shoots everyone.

Somewhere along the way in the last few seasons TPTB lost their sense of balance. There used to be a combination of shoot em up & actual stories--often in the same episode. But some episodes were more dramatic than action oriented. I remember a commentary where the person said about "Tangent" that he was afraid the audience would think it was boring since there was no "action." WEll, there was a good story with characters we cared about.

In retrospect, as someone pointed out, the introduction of the Prometheus was problematic. I think it started out ok in that it had limited capabilities but once they started down the road of earth ships they seemed to forget about the Gate. By the time you got to S10, the earth ships had Star Trek-like capabilities and the SGC personnel seemed very jaded. That wasn't the show I loved anymore.

Well that and TPTB's new found bloodthirsty tendencies. If I wanted a show where I could expect characters to get killed, I would watch that show. That show didn't used to be SG. There is a valid place for a show where the heroes win. For me the interesting thing is *how* will they win? What clever move will they make?
I suspect it may be harder to write such a show about heroes without making it a cartoon. How much better to kill some characters to be "taken seriously."
/ramble

[Jackie]

On a completely unrelated note to my last posts: I've been reading my first posts in this thread and I'm surprised by how accurate my predictions have been. :/



Here. That pretty much sums up the Ark of the Bori thing. Although details are different - Append followers to Ori and change Ascended into humans - I'm pretty much dead on how it has ended.

Here I pretty much have the concept of Universe without ever reading a spoiler about it at the time and only being sarcastic. Again, the details may be different (I guess "living" should be removed) but I'm pretty much dead on.

Sarcasm and cynicsm: Accurately predicting SG since 2006.

Can't green ya again, but I think you're right (unfortunately) on all counts.

tried to green ya but but can't. Guess I'm out of more than just greenbacks.


OMG...that was too funny.

[Gregorius]

In retrospect, as someone pointed out, the introduction of the Prometheus was problematic. I think it started out ok in that it had limited capabilities but once they started down the road of earth ships they seemed to forget about the Gate. By the time you got to S10, the earth ships had Star Trek-like capabilities and the SGC personnel seemed very jaded. That wasn't the show I loved anymore.

S10 and S9 were horrible. They didn't have to run to the gate or steal a ship, instead Captain Kirk beams them up in the nick of time, and unlike tangent that is boring.

As for the Prometheus, had it been a prototype build with the help of Tollan survivors, the Tok'Ra or whatever at the Alpha site and it was the fifth or so prototype because the others had crashed or exploded, then I would've bought it. But an underground facility at Area 51? Come on, that's too Independence Day for me.

Well that and TPTB's new found bloodthirsty tendencies. If I wanted a show where I could expect characters to get killed, I would watch that show. That show didn't used to be SG. There is a valid place for a show where the heroes win. For me the interesting thing is *how* will they win? What clever move will they make?

I don't care much for people killing of characters but at least make it believable and not some lame plotdevice like exploding tumors, that's an insult to the characters, the actors and the viewers.

If they wanted Beckett dead they could've had him have a heart attack from being bitten by a snake/spider or due to eating the wrong fish. It would've been more believable.

[Skydiver]

i didn't mind us getting the ship, per se, but my issues came when it became the 'get out of trouble free card' of the seasons.

the scourge for example...what tension when ya can just get beamed to safety?

for the rampant over use of plot devices they should have jsut found a sarcophagus and replaced Lam with it.

half of the appeal of our heros was that they DIDN'T plot device their way out of trouble, they used their brains. Until seasons 9 and 10 that is, then we became just as tech dependant as the asgard. push a button and make all your worries go away

[Mandysg1]

I don't care much for people killing of characters but at least make it believable and not some lame plotdevice like exploding tumors, that's an insult to the characters, the actors and the viewers.

If they wanted Beckett dead they could've had him have a heart attack from being bitten by a snake/spider or due to eating the wrong fish. It would've been more believable.

I think they lost sight of this when they kept killing off Daniel...how many times can you kill one character It just became a joke, not to mention every time Daniel was in 'danger', you'd think..."oh here we go again"

Take the scene where he is outside the door where Adria is (can't remember the name of episode, and won't even try ) He's running out of oxygen, and I didn't even care, come on we knew it's Daniel, he never really dies, for long

[Jackie]

S10 and S9 were horrible. They didn't have to run to the gate or steal a ship, instead Captain Kirk beams them up in the nick of time, and unlike tangent that is boring.

As for the Prometheus, had it been a prototype build with the help of Tollan survivors, the Tok'Ra or whatever at the Alpha site and it was the fifth or so prototype because the others had crashed or exploded, then I would've bought it. But an underground facility at Area 51? Come on, that's too Independence Day for me.

Area 51 has been done to death. So much so that it's a main stay of pop fiction. If they wanted realistic, the ship would have been a recovered Ancient, tollen, asgrad...whatever ship that crashed.

The beam up scotty got a little predictable and really old, really fast.

I don't care much for people killing of characters but at least make it believable and not some lame plotdevice like exploding tumors, that's an insult to the characters, the actors and the viewers.

If they wanted Beckett dead they could've had him have a heart attack from being bitten by a snake/spider or due to eating the wrong fish. It would've been more believable.

Maybe a "puffer fish"

[jckfan55]

Take the scene where he is outside the door where Adria is (can't remember the name of episode, and won't even try ) He's running out of oxygen, and I didn't even care, come on we knew it's Daniel, he never really dies, for long

I felt no suspense in that scene either. I don't know if it was b/c I was turned off by the Action Jackson seasons & didn't really care if he died or b/c of what you said. In early seasons, even though I knew SG1 wouldn't die, I DID feel suspense many times when they were in jeopardy. Of course that was before the get out of trouble free card of beaming.

[Jackie]

I think they lost sight of this when they kept killing off Daniel...how many times can you kill one character It just became a joke, not to mention every time Daniel was in 'danger', you'd think..."oh here we go again"

Take the scene where he is outside the door where Adria is (can't remember the name of episode, and won't even try ) He's running out of oxygen, and I didn't even care, come on we knew it's Daniel, he never really dies, for long

must have missed this post,

Daniel dying in general became the running joke by season 9. Even the show began to put Daniel dying jokes in scenes...the scene in the ep where they blew up the Prometheus. Daniel made a joke about his "dying" when talking to a prisoner in the cell scene.

The best Daniel dying dying scene tptb ever did was when he ascended.

Then Anubis took his place in season 7 and Daniel just hasn't been Daniel since.

[jckfan55]

Then Anubis took his place in season 7 and Daniel just hasn't been Daniel since.

Danubis.

[hisg1fans]

That would be female main cast member 3. You really think the 15-year-olds would watch a show with that many chicks in charge? No way! Can't really sell such a show! Not even if the CIC have big bazookas (not the weapon).

ROTFLMAO!!!!

I'm not used to the abbreviation of CIC standing for 'Chicks-In-Charge'.

[scifithinker]

Um, you do realize that that would make it necessary for the female lead to actually be "the lead"?
Never, ever in this universe are TPTB going to have a female lead with top billing.

-mckay type scientist that is female.

No wait, you actually believe there are going to be two female main cast members?

-female fighter pilot who is very much like starbuck of BSG

That would be female main cast member 3. You really think the 15-year-olds would watch a show with that many chicks in charge? No way! Can't really sell such a show! Not even if the CIC have big bazookas (not the weapon).

You must be living in an AU.
Mind if I join you there?

Oh, come on. Add some camel toes to the inevitable cleavage, and you'd have a hit on your hands. Even better, you can have one of them take her top off so someone can smear gel on her back.

Oh, wait...that's was my own half baked attempt to come up with the series.

TPTB wouldn't do any of that.

if there are 3 females they would all be bomb shell beauties with no real purpose...maybe just a title.

Marina Sirtis made a comment once that putting Troi in a uniform rather than having her wear that dress meant she suddenly grew brains.