'Pain' (117) General Discussion

[jelgate]

I can't believe that they went with the ticks. I was hoping throughout the episode that the ticks would be a hallucination too, especially when Scott's tick disappeared.

My biggest cringe moment was get rid of the ticks. Yeah we're going to just pull this ticks that are attached to a person's brain with no brain damange. That makes a lot of sense:rollleys:

[Commander Zelix]

My biggest cringe moment was get rid of the ticks. Yeah we're going to just pull this ticks that are attached to a person's brain with no brain damange. That makes a lot of sense:rollleys:

I took it the ticks were not attached to the brain, but released some kind of hallucinating toxin in the body.

[jelgate]

I took it the ticks were not attached to the brain, but released some kind of hallucinating toxin in the body.

If that was the case the hallucinations should have continued for a time after TJ removed them

[wargrafix]

Horray! Rush stabbed the most annoying character on the ship! He deserves a medal. Her lesbian story should run its course soon.

[Commander Zelix]

If that was the case the hallucinations should have continued for a time after TJ removed them

Not necessarily. The toxin could metabolize very fast in the body. So without a continuous provision of toxin, it would quickly disappeared from the host body.

[jelgate]

Not necessarily. The toxin could metabolize very fast in the body. So without a continuous provision of toxin, it would quickly disappeared from the host body.

Not that fast. It would still linger in the body. I don't care how fast it metabolizes the venom would not go away the second TJ removed the ticks

[flobo]

This episode was my first complete disappointment with SGU. It was OK until when they revealed the trailer was fake and the blue aliens will not invade the ship. I was so disappointed that i lost interest in the remaining part of the episode.

Then there was the WTF moment in the end when they found a planet in the galactic void and no one told us what it was. I thought it mind be another hallucination, but i'm not sure.

[Egle01]

This episode was my first complete disappointment with SGU. It was OK until when they revealed the trailer was fake and the blue aliens will not invade the ship. I was so disappointed that i lost interest in the remaining part of the episode.

Nobody told you that aliens will be coming through the stargate for real. You made that assumption. That doesn't make the trailer fake.

Then there was the WTF moment in the end when they found a planet in the galactic void and no one told us what it was. I thought it mind be another hallucination, but i'm not sure.

They're in another galaxy. Chloe said 'welcome to the new galaxy' or something close to it.

[AndSoItBegins]

Personally, I'm tired of this good black male stereotype. I like a rough, angry even psycho black character from time to time. We almost never see those on TV and movies.

We also rarely ever see on TV :

Black guy as lead character (for an ensemble) .
Black guy as the problem solver.
Black guy who gets equal screen time and development as white leads
Black guy who gets the hot lady on the show
Black guy who saves the day
Black guy with the fully fleshed out background
Black guy as leader
Black guy as character who drives the plots
Black guy as the man with mysterious and interesting past.


On the movies that show up on SyFy we also get black guys (when they make an appearance) who never live up to the ending credits.

I could go on and on. You want to go there we can go there. The suggestion that black characters are somehow getting some sort of benefit (because they aren’t playing psychos) is absurd. It comes down to this…if you want a crazy, black, serial killer, with no redeemable qualities or whatever then lets have them. But lets balance it out as you do with white characters. In other words you have the white male leads, the white guy who saves the day, the white guy who gets the girl, the white guy with the interesting background, the white guy who drives the plot, etc., etc. to counterbalance the white bad guys who are on the screen. Give black characters that type of variety and I would have no problem whatsoever if you created a bunch of two dimensional, mustache-twirling black villains to go along with them. However the problem is these TV shows doesn’t typically do that.

This reminds me of those arguments that break out when the lone black character dies on a series and someone moans about it. Sure enough these days you find a bunch of posters who will then respond with something like “well, the writers killed off white characters too.” But what those responders don’t seem to get is that if you have 15 characters and 12 of them are white and the remaining three are “minorities” (black, Asian, non-white Hispanic), then it doesn’t matter if you kill off one or two white characters. You still have ten to eleven to work with (and more than likely amongst that group will be the LEAD CHARACTERS of the show). However if you kill off, say, the one Asian dude then that’s it for any Asian representation on the show.

Another thing that comes out of this ridiculous token casting of one actor/actress from a non-white race is that those characters unintentionally end up representing the entire race to some extent. For example on SGU if you don’t like Rush’s attitude there’s always Eli to balance that out. If you think Young is a bad leader then at least there’s Scott as maybe a better choice or Rush as a different choice altogether. No one white character ever represents white people because these shows tend to have a (vast) majority white cast or from time to time an all-white cast. But with a character like Greer what you have is the one lone black person on the show. Unless you want to include the black guy who does all the cooking but barely gets any lines . So if Greer is seen as having some pretty negative traits its amplified simply because he is the lone representation of black people. Again this is an unintentional consequence of casting. If TPTB had cast Young as a black male then the issue of Greer being angry and black becomes less of an issue because Young would present a different view of a black individual as a contrast. The same also if, say, Eli or Scott had been cast as a black male. But that’s not what happened. It would be interesting to see the original casting calls to see whether or not TPTB were even opened to the idea of non-white males auditioning for the four main male roles (Young, Rush, Scott, Eli). When the one role to be cast with a black performer (who also happens to be very gifted) is the role of a soldier with a huge chip on his shoulder and anger issues you will get folks who are weary of such a portrayal. Plain and simple. Personally I think Jamil overcomes the stereotypes and the limitations with his performances so the whole anger issue doesn’t personally bother me as much.

And by the way in defense at those who take issue wit being upset by the angry, black stereotype I must ask is there point of view less tolerable than those who hate to see females portrayed as damsels in distress who need men to save them? There isn’t as much teeth gnashing when folks say they object to the lack of strong, capable, decisive females roles. Its no different than when people don’t have much use for caricatures of non-white characters on TV shows.

So, Zelix, if you wanted some black dude to play Spencer are you just okay with having multiple black actors/actresses playing a few of the main roles for this show as well? He more three dimensional roles. Because last tie I checked Spencer was never the one white male on the show. Why ask for black people to play the simplistic, knucklehead roles if they can’t play the three dimensional lead roles as well. We’ll see true progress in Hollywood when black actors/actresses are cast as both.

Sorry to get off topic, folks.

[AndSoItBegins]

This episode was my first complete disappointment with SGU. It was OK until when they revealed the trailer was fake and the blue aliens will not invade the ship. I was so disappointed that i lost interest in the remaining part of the episode.

How was the trailer fake? Sounds like you faked yourself out. The trailers don't and shouldn't reveal the twists and turns of the plot. And I’m thankful the aliens didn’t invade the ship. We don’t need the blue aliens to be overused at this point. Leave them for other storylines down the road. It sounds as if you judged the episode negatively because not of hw the ep was written but because the episode turned out not to be what you hoped it would be about. How about judging the episode strictly on its own terms?

Then there was the WTF moment in the end when they found a planet in the galactic void and no one told us what it was. I thought it mind be another hallucination, but i'm not sure.

I didn’t view it like that. I viewed it as the crew getting back to business as usual but a weariness had crept on them with the reminder, by the ticks, that these trips to unknown planets can bring unknown dangers and consequences. Did anyone else feel that way?

[AndSoItBegins]

Horray! Rush stabbed the most annoying character on the ship! He deserves a medal. Her lesbian story should run its course soon.

Seriously does the lesbian angle bother you? I only ask because you felt the need to mention that particular element?

[s09119]

Horray! Rush stabbed the most annoying character on the ship! He deserves a medal. Her lesbian story should run its course soon.

"Lesbian story"? This is someone's life, not some experimentation with sexuality.

[Commander Zelix]

We also rarely ever see on TV :

My goal was not to offend anyone. But I think its crazy to say black people can't play the angry bad ass character or that woman can't be emotional and must not have flaws (like some journalist said). All kind of characters archetype should be playable by a diverse cast. I think Greer is a good character and Walker Smith play him right. I don't remember all the shows because I don't take notes of the ethnicity of the people. But I remember a black lead in "Day Break" and in the Syfy original movie "MegaFault". NCIS LA also got a black lead I think (I never watched the show). I think it's worse when you say "black can't play that type of character" or that "woman cant be that way". So yes, I think Greer would have been more fun as a character if he was really a psycho (with some redeeming value so its believable that he's a army Sergeant) and had some of the Spencer's storyline and it has nothing to do with his race or ethnicity.

[flobo]

Nobody told you that aliens will be coming through the stargate for real. You made that assumption. That doesn't make the trailer fake.

The trailer was still sequenced to fool people with Chloe saying "We're not safe, are we ?" and then showing the aliens coming thought the gate.
They made it look like it would really be happening. That's fooling the viewer to me, it makes me think of a old Voyager trailer when they implied Picard would be in an episode while in the end, he wasn't.

[PG15]

The trailer was still sequenced to fool people with Chloe saying "We're not safe, are we ?" and then showing the aliens coming thought the gate.
They made it look like it would really be happening. That's fooling the viewer to me, it makes me think of a old Voyager trailer when they implied Picard would be in an episode while in the end, he wasn't.

Never trust a trailer.