'Aftermath' (202) General Discussion

[SciFiRick]

The gate is a circle. The top of a circle appears as a line. Greer was standing on an arc. Impossible, unless the circle is perpendicular to him.

As for how they cleared it, I would guess they did with a bit of C4 what Jack and Teal'c did with their hands in 100 Days. As for how they stood it up... a wizard did it.

So, You think the gate was not upright? Wow!! It seems that 1/5 of these discussions about the gate being upright or lying down will never end. May I suggest if anyone has downloaded the episode without the commercials to forward to the 25 minutes and 40 seconds thru 25 minutes and 50 seconds time (again this is without commercials) as I did and everyone can see for themselves the correct answer.

[morbosfist]

The gate is a circle. The top of a circle appears as a line. Greer was standing on an arc. Impossible, unless the circle is perpendicular to him.

As for how they cleared it, I would guess they did with a bit of C4 what Jack and Teal'c did with their hands in 100 Days. As for how they stood it up... a wizard did it.

The top of a circle does not appear as a line in three dimensions unless you're standing right on top of it. It appears as a deep arc. That's what Greer is standing on. I can see how you would make that determination, but it's a trick of perception. Greer is standing on top of the gate, and the arc goes into the ground, not out in a wide arc from his foot. Also, look at your close-up image. Completely smooth. The chevrons/glyphs would be visible if it were flat. Furthermore, you can actually see the tip of the chevron on the close-up (right of Volker's knee). It isn't flat, but going under the ground.

[Lahela]

*sigh* Whatever. We disagree, and it's such a trivial thing it's not worth banging on about.

Great ep though.

[PG15]

The gate is a circle. The top of a circle appears as a line. Greer was standing on an arc. Impossible, unless the circle is perpendicular to him.

As for how they cleared it, I would guess they did with a bit of C4 what Jack and Teal'c did with their hands in 100 Days. As for how they stood it up... a wizard did it.

I'm afraid that's just the unfortunate angle of your screencaps.

Here's a better view:



There is clearly a vertical arc. Now, if you're still not convinced, then there's this:



The gate, still buried, with one of the chevrons on the side, not the top.

The gate was vertical while buried. End of story.

[SciFiRick]

Sorry, for those who recorded the episode look for the scene where Greer, Volker, James and Eli had just cleared the section of the gate that exposed the facing and a chevron. Notice where Greer and Volker are standing, bending, lifting and tossing in relation to James and which direction the chevron is pointing just before Scott arrived and Eli asked how Riley was doing. Scott answers and leaves telling Eli to keep uncovering the gate. Judge for yourself. This is the best and I think clearrst evidence.

[Lahela]

Just had a look further on and it does seem to be more upright than flat. I concede.

[SciFiRick]

Way to go PG15.!!! That is the reference point that I just mentioned. This scene is at 25 minutes and 45 seconds into the episode (without commercials) I didn't know how to copy the frame and post. That is Greer and Volker in the background and James back end in the foreground.

[blade7gr]

so i watched 3 times now and i have to say that they ancients are one crazy race of people
why they needed to built a ascending ship?

[bobhope]

I've gone through most of the postings in this thread and maybe I'm missing the obvious, but no one seems to have asked about the Asian woman shown lying in the shuttle. I'm referring to the scene where TJ has just finished telling Riley about her baby and the camera pans around the inside of the shuttle and shows an Asian woman lying down with her head on what appears to be a pillow made of fatigues - the camera stays on her for a few seconds and then cuts to a new scene back on Destiny. Who is this woman???

It seemed to me that TJ and Riley thought they were alone on the shuttle.

[garhkal]

That episode was absolutely heartbreaking.

Spoiler:

poor riley!

Absolutly heart breaking.. no but still a big heart wrencher, yes.'

Riley was my favorite character and it kills me that he's dead.just like when Beckett died oh man in 1 season I've grown so attached to the characters. I love this show. Rip Riley

Becket's was not as tear jerkery as this one, but it was close to how grodin died.

I loved the Rush stuff in the episode, can't wait to see the events unfold next episode. Rush continues to grow into a even more fascinating character.

Part of me hopes he is not losing his mind as well (the halucinations of his wife), but part of me feels he might be cracking from the pressure of the past 3-4 weeks.

now the ship has no shuttles! they better get that "big" gun working 100%

With how rus has control of the bridge, that looks to be real close to being a good bet..

By this shows own rules there are thousands of alternate timelines where Riley is still alive. Death has never had any 'finality' meaning in Stargate. There are so many ways to bring someone back, clones, alternate reality people, alternate timeline people, ascension. It would be suprising if we never encountered Riley again.

While part of me feels like you, the rest hopes he stays dead so his death is not cheapened.

I'll admit it, I was expecting this ep to be the usual false danger and character shield tripe that SGA got us into. Truly a great end for Riley, and I absolutely LOVED how they used his "It's not being here, it's not being there" monologue from his Kinosode as a send off. Truly amazing.

While i agree on the false danger, we have already seen some named guys in this series die (the senator in air, what's his name in the water, spencer).. so there is not as much of a character shield in this season. And i LOVED the homage they paid with the kinosode.. reminded me of letters from pegasus.

Good to see Gloria and Franklin again, and even better that Rush questions his sanity. I'll admit, I really hope that Rush seeing the two of them is linked to his chair experience, if they're not going to let Rush slowly lose his mind.

And... in (almost) before anyone says Franklin ascended. Anyone who wants to claim he did better back it up.

I am actually hoping BOTH franklin and gloria being there were NOT halucinations, but the ships way to gauge rush and communicate with him. Gloria to gauge his reactions and intent, Franklin to give assistance how ever little..

Finally, set up for the next episode. Mysterious object coming, and Rush has an idea of what it is obviously.

From the previews we know it to be a seeder ship..

So... anyone else wondering when Rush found the bridge? He knew exactly where to go once he realized he'd cracked the master code, then input it from there.

Somebody's been doing some exploring...

Either that, or it was downloaded into his brain when he was in the chair, which i think is more likely

/i do have to say that i got kind of nostalgic at the sight of a buried stargate

And more importantly.. IT WAS SPINNING

I really love this show. But I have issue with a couple of storyline rushes(pardon the pun) in 'Aftermath'.
1. Um... Talford looked like he was gonna be a mole and then he wasn't. Could have been awesome.

That kind of flew out the window when he was part of the group that had to restrain Young. Heck he even ordered young to stand down... Kind of hard to see that from someone on your side.

3. I'm totally cool with Rush and Young going insane but not sure how I feel about both at the same time.

Whats to say either are breaking. BUT with the stran both have been under, it is not surprising either are cracking..

4. Speaking of Rush and Young... what happened to the almost humanizing of Rush and the close encounter of composer for Young? Soooo close. And my issue with that is I personally love how close the SG teams become. They would die for eachother. No other show pulled that off the way the Stargate shows have. It was they're secret ingredient.

It is still there as evident by Rush's demeanor at having to make the call to kill Scott etc near the end of last ep, and in his beratment of himself in this ep.

oh i've been meaning to ask, what do we think so far? was franklin in Rush's head or was that actually Franklin and Rush couldn't tell the difference? Rush did say that Franklin was much more helpful in technical matters.

[/quote]

I think it was the ship materializing him to help rush out.

The way Young handled Riley's situation I oddly didn't find to be cold or indicative of mental issues. He was doing the man a favor and respecting his final wises. If anything it made me feel a tad bit better about the Colonel.

As i mentioned in the other thread on this subject, i know 2 fellow mil people who had to make similar choices... as heart wrenching they may be, it is not about you, but the one who is asking to die... So in one sense i am glad he honored riley's request, and in the other i am saddened he had to do it.

The character interaction didn't seem pointless or tacked on and Rush making a bee-line for the bridge (apparently atop the "pyramid" thing) certainly makes one wonder just how much he really does know

Honestly i think the info on it's location was downloaded into his mind when he sat in the chair.. but he had no reason to go there until he cracked the code...

I know some may think Rush crazy, and it's possible he is; the simple fact of the matter is, we don't know if he's talking to himself, or if somehow there are other forces at play. As he theorized, it could be the ship itself manifesting something, or alien presences (either Faith aliens or Franklin being ascended, etc.)

Ohh.. i didn't even think about the possibility of it being the faith aliens helping him out. BUT why would they? As to an ascended Franklin, from what we have seen they don't out right give info like he did without reprocussions. NOW i know we are far away, but who's to say the rules still don't apply?

but I understand his reasoning. He was quite correct that Young is losing it, and that it was Young's fault the LA took over. By keeping the bridge secret, if the LA take over again (or Young screws up again), Rush can maintain control of the ship from his secret bridge. From that point of view, it makes logical sense.

Yup. His not telling the others is VERY logical for him. But also selfish in that he could have told some of his fellow scientists he trusts (volkar, or

I do understand the problem of keeping prisoners(or even any additional people), and it could be argued the LA brought this on themselves. But I didn't expect them to toss all the LA people out the gate (well, except for the two or three they kept). And obviously, the LA people aren't telling everything they know about Destiny. They have to know where it's headed or what it was built for in order to risk a death sentence to get there. Those door openers they used last season had to come from somewhere Destiny-related in order to work on the doors.

I believe the red head (ginn) said much about it in her 'debreifing' with wray.. BU most of what she said was what they Thought.. not what they know.. So who's to say they know anything for certain.

Seems like the seeder ship is up next, and without a shuttle, I wonder how they will get over there to check it out, but I assume they will get access to another shuttle to replace the one they lost. Of course, if what I read is to be believed, Caine and the others will end up back on Destiny, so maybe their shuttle will be returned as well.

Spoiler:

From what we have seen, it docks With the seeder ship...

I gotta say this episode was awesome except for the whole Riley Dying Part. My jaw was on the floor. I liked Riley. Except he was very accident prone. Seems like Telford dying and then being broken free of the brainwashing as well as being shot and living hasn't humbled the guy.

In that respet i think he was a cross between walter and siler.. loved by many, but accident prone.

agreed! great episode!

2) It was the phattest thing ever seeing the bridge actually rise up out of the top of the pyramid like a bunker(no wonder we could never find it in screenies!)

It was a very big surprise seeing it rise up.. And more so when they showed that it has 2 doors.. one seemed more of a secret wall rather than an actual door though.

Cont next post.. page 5 onward!!!

[garhkal]

If Riley can die then no one is safe. Well none of the secondary characters are safe anyway, the main cast is still completely safe as always.

ut who do we determine as a 'primary character'? Was grodin one in SGA? Beckett? Wier?? All 3 died off. Same with ford in the end.

And I'm back to having no sympathy for Rush. In my mind, he's directly responsible for Riley's death, because had he simply told the truth from the beginning, that would not have happened; they also wouldn't have lost the only remaining shuttle ... and he's got the nerve to be pointing fingers at Young and saying he's not fit to command anything. Hello - pot calling kettle black?

With the fact he was kicking himself (not literally) when speaking to 'gloria' on the bridge near the end, about his failures, i have not lost all sympathy for him..

The episode also brought out the worst of Rush and Young. Rush proved one more time that 1) he's not as smart as he think he is;

Ghost franklin said it best. "I don't care how smart you are, this is too much for any one man to handle..." And though it did seem he was greedly hoggig the bridge, he has to remember. not to long ago Young was willing to let the ship fall to enemies. SOME of those are still on the ship. So he is imo doing the right thing NOT letting that he has this yet out.. Now if he keeps it even wen he finds the rest of the LA gone and young is back to his old self, THEN i will agree he has lost all hope.

There seemed to be a gate screw-up in the ep too. Destiny dials the planet and Eli and Scott come through the gate onto Destiny. Two-way wormholes? Lol, that's new in Stargate. I'm also worried about the LA situation. The writers got rid of a bunch of them in this episode. Soon enough, there won't be anyone left and a major cop-out will unfold.

Nope. Eli was stoked about seeing the addy for Destinny pop up and so dialed it in. From what little we have seen i think the remotes are quicker at dialing/getting a lock than the ship is going outbound..

Liked: finally seeing Destiny's bridge, Rush's wife, Franklin, Ginn, that James is still alive.

5/10

I just about jumped out of my seat when the bridge rose up.. Man was that awesome.

The manifestation of Gloria & Franklin may just be a result of Rush being in the chair and he is still wirelessly linked or Rush who is very much deprived of sleep and rest may be creating his own manifestations. This reminds me of McKay manifesting Sam Carter when the jumper sank to the bottom of the ocean. That was his subconscious rationalizing and working through the problem. Of course, McKay was not deprived of sleep but felt he was going to die. Either way, the case could be made that his subconscious created Gloria & Franklin more than it being tied to the chair.

I agree it could be his lack of sleep/cracking under the pressure, but i still hold out hope for the chair having something to do with it. Remember It was gloria in the chair/vision who basically got him to breakdown/cry and admit he was messing up, and to refocus. So it is logical to me the ship would continue to use her to keep rush on the 'straight and narrow'.

Great special effects with the shuttle scenes. We never find out why the shuttle lost power after it cleared the turbulence but maybe it was intended to be a mystery and assumed that the turbulence had a direct effect on the failure.

Maybe something in the atmosphere shorts out electronics..

I have been trying to determine why Young was holding his breath as he agreed to Riley's request.

One of my command's HM2s answered this for me (he also watched it).. apparently some people just hold breath sympathetically when they choke others.. Kinda like sympathetic pukers.

Overall, it was a good episode. Though I hope they don't plan to drag out the mystery of the people in Rush's head for much longer. I was already starting to grow impatient with the whole concept by the time it was over. I'm not sure I'd be pleased with six more weeks of this.

I actually had no probllem with them.. Just like with carter in grace, or mccay in grace under pressure.

Interview with Haig Sutherland
'Stargate Universe' exclusive: Haig Sutherland and the life of Riley

.

Link no work.

I'm sorry guys, I give this a thumbs down. And not because Riley is dead (why didn't they just sever his lower torso?),

What to say the attempt at doing so did not kill him;. so we have wasted more resources... We don;t know if all our medicine (such as the alien bug knock out stuff) was gone from all the past 2 eps worth of doctoring. We also don't know if they even had anything to amputate his legs with (though it would have had to be at the hips).. And even if remotely, he survived.. how would he have been a use? They have no walker. No wheel chairs... And all the consoles are higher than the "Kinosled' they made for the ice planet..

And actually there WAS Chloe, you see her comforting Scott right at the end

Strange.. sine it is usually scott comforting her!

You're fine for not liking Rush, but you're going to have to find better reasons. For one, it's not clear Gloria is his conscience. The very fact that Franklin showed up, shows that something more is going on.

Also, it wasn't entirely Rush's fault for what happened to Riley. Yes, he stopped the ship so that they could take a shuttle to the planet, but Young gave the orders to, and they needed supplies. It's all well and good to say it was a bad choice after the fact, but you didn't know early on (unless you kept in touch with spoilers). Faced with dwindling supplies and a planet that has vegetation, you'd make the same call. I'd be willing to bet that if Rush was truthful and open about finding the bridge and the planet, Young would have ordered a stop and shuttle trip.

Big +1 there K.. Even if he told, there is nothign saying things would have not worked out the way they did. BUT i do fault him for not at least letting others into that he has the bridge, so they could have calld the shuttle back until they had scoured all the data the ship had on the planet.

And by the way, even if he's seeing things, it's clearly explained by his lack of sleep and his nightmares over being tortured (yeah, see how well YOU hold up after being tortured). Young, on the other hand, has no such excuses.

That is a good point, that he has the torture as an excuse.. BUT is it me, or was it that dream of his torture(Nightmare) that woke him when he first went to find the bridge. I wonder if the 2 might be linked..

What I liked best about this episode was the questioned asked by Franklin/Rush's wife entityt.

Which makes me wonder.. if that WAS the ship manifesting his wife/franklin.. why was it questioning him, unless to gauge whether he was worthy of having the master codes...

Hell, I even cried and I *never* cry watching Stargate.

For me Heroes Pt 2 and Meridian, along with Forever in a day are the only ones so far which have brought me close to tears (first time i watched FiaD and meridian i did)...

At first I thought he'd die naturally and then when he begged Young to help him (and I had a weird flashback to Abyss and Jack asking Daniel to do the same) I fully expected Young to give him his loaded gun and leave, letting him end his life by his own hand.

Part of me thought young was going to do that but i did thik i saw him reach for his gun and Riley shake his head.. then he placed his hands underhis back... And i agree, great flash back to Abyss...

I certainly didn't expect strangling. I've seen some critique of Young because of that, but I think he did it this way because he'd promised Riley he wouldn't die alone and true to his word he stayed with him to the very end. Again, wow. It was a very emotional scene.

You have at least got to give Young props for keeping his word...

I also liked how at the end everybody was shown grieving him. Interesting, that Greer was the one making toast.

Not to me. Greer seems to be the one most in line to want to protect everyone they have...

Young continues to slip and I can't help but wonder when will he hit the bottom. As of now he still has some restraint left, as evidenced by not killing LA guy.

I am not sure if that showed he had restraint, or whether he heard Telfords order to back off...

I want to see more of Ginn. The snippet of info about possible attack on Earth was interesting.

It will be interesting to see if they touch on it again, or whether it might be a set up for the new (third) SG1 movie..

Probably because we only saw the reaction of Janet's friends and colleagues and Bregman and the film guys; we only saw Janet get hit with the staff blast, and then all those reactions. With Riley, we had to watch while he was dying, and with TJ there talking to him, and then seeing Young with him and what Young did. Big difference in how those two deaths were played out.

Good point. I think his death is closer to how Daniel died in Meridian, and the linking to oneil being the one to make the call to let him go..

I don't understand - Everett suffocated Riley? You can't suffocate someone that quickly in reality, unless I'm missing something. Why didn't Tamara or people attempt to remove him from the crashed shuttle once they had a gate open with some supplies from Destiny? Or at least administer pain blocking drugs for him. I don't get why he died as well, he wasn't bleeding since she said the pressure on him was stopping it. So he wasn't bleeding to death, was it internal injuries? I thought he just got his legs pinned or something? In which, realistically, you wouldn't die very fast from that. Another thing - why does Young hold his breath as he's 'suffocating' Riley? Was Park lying in the shuttle because she wanted to be with Riley? If so, why was she hiding away from everyone else? Why didn't she help unbury the stargate?

Ok. 1) with how little time they had before the destiny jumped again i do not see them having the time to get a crew there to cut him out.
2) Where would they hav gotten the tools.. yes they had that plasma cutter in Water, but did they bring it back?
3) With all the medicing going on in Intervention (and in the ep before) who is to say they still have any of the pain killers left...
4) on the suffocation.. As i mentioned above, according to a HM (hospital corpsman) some people have sympathetic breathing when choking others out (mostly some seals)... just like there are many sympathetic pukers.

Done for now....

[Lahela]

From the previews we know

Spoiler:

it to be a seeder ship..

And those of us who actively avoid previews because we don't want to be spoiled know now too

It says at the top of this forum

#202. Talk about this episode here! Please keep discussion to this episode ONLY, and no spoilers beyond it.

Please???!!!

[starbystar]

Hey all - I'm new to the Forum, so be gentle!

I've been lurking for a while, and I had a general question about Aftermath: all the crew knows that Young is the father of TJ's baby, right? I mean, I know Chole and Scott know for sure, but how about the others? Clearly that would affect how the rest of them are judging Young and his developing instability.

[Kaiphantom]

Y'know, except for having the mother of his unborn child shot, and as far as he knows his unborn daughter is dead. It may or may not be alive on the Faith planet, but that's a whole other discussion. I don't think you can take the emotional stress he's going through, lightly. I believe anyone who has lost a child or a loved one would agree to this.

Mostly irrelevant, considering Young was breaking down before that happened.

But wasn't the problem the turbulence in the atmosphere? Rush and only Rush knew about it and he made the decision (despite Franklin's advice) to let the shuttle keep going instead of making them turn around, and that's what caused the crash.

If given all the info - there's a planet with vegetation, but its atmosphere was very turbulent - I think Young or anyone else may have made a different decision. May.

It's open for debate, but the shuttle passed through the turbulence and was flying for awhile afterward, before it suddenly cut out. Perhaps the turbulence had an effect, or maybe it was just an unlucky malfunction; we don't know. And I still believe that, even with the knowledge, Young would have still made the call to send the shuttle; they were low on supplies so it was worth the risk. Like I said, it's easy to call things out after the fact, but put yourself in the shoes of one of them before that.

Hell, let's say Rush made the shuttle turn back and the ship went on and they didn't find supplies and people started dying from starvation. You'd probably be ragging on him for making the ship turn around. "What the hell did Rush do? Why didn't he at least them them try to get supplies from that planet when he KNEW they were starving? Damn Rush, all his fault for wanting to keep the shuttle like he wanted to keep the one from Faith."

Ohh.. i didn't even think about the possibility of it being the faith aliens helping him out. BUT why would they? As to an ascended Franklin, from what we have seen they don't out right give info like he did without reprocussions. NOW i know we are far away, but who's to say the rules still don't apply?

Even if the rules applied, Franklin wasn't telling Rush anything he didn't already know, or could easily find out. What clues me more into the fact that Franklin may have been an ascended (or somehow part of the ship) is that he didn't appear again, despite Rush wanting him to. Hallucinations come from within, either things we want to see, or things are subconscious wants us to see. Gloria can be explained by the subconscious, but Franklin was clearly a surprise to him.

Yup. His not telling the others is VERY logical for him. But also selfish in that he could have told some of his fellow scientists he trusts (volkar, or

The more he tells, the greater the chance someone else will find out about it. There's an old question: "How many people can you tell a secret to?" The answer? None. As soon as you tell someone else, it's no longer secret.

I believe the red head (ginn) said much about it in her 'debreifing' with wray.. BU most of what she said was what they Thought.. not what they know.. So who's to say they know anything for certain.

The thing is, the legend and the reality don't match up. The LA would know the reality via Telford, thus they should have realized that gating to the ship is pointless. Simply sit back and gain intel and if something comes up, you can use your secret naquadria base to gate in. There has to be more information the LA has, as to why they decided to risk gating in and taking control.

Big +1 there K.. Even if he told, there is nothign saying things would have not worked out the way they did. BUT i do fault him for not at least letting others into that he has the bridge, so they could have calld the shuttle back until they had scoured all the data the ship had on the planet.

Yeah, but they had limited time; 7 hours before the ship jumped, and 1 hour travel time. That left 4-5 hours at most to find supplies on the planet, load them up, and come back.

[boo1234]

I see I'm in the minority here, but I did not like this episode! Nothing really happened outside of Rush gaining control of destiny. Instead the other 40 minutes of the episode were devoted to Riley dying needlessly.

And Eli is getting stranded again. Is this the new "daniel dies" running joke? lol