'Awakening' (203) General Discussion

[ianrobbie]

The Asgard race is way less than hundred thousand years old, they only had space tech for 30,000 years.
The destiny project was launch by the ancients millions of years ago. Way before the Asgard have even evolve language let alone technology or interacted with the ancients. There no way the new aliens could be related to the asgard.

Yeah, but the whole thing with the familiar Armour and the eerily familiar Aliens, coupled with the fact that they seem to be friendly (they didn't shoot Telford at first and they also didn't kill Rush and Brody, they only stunned them) could possibly mean the Asgard somehow found out a way to dial the ninth chevron onto a seeder ship OR they struck out on their own.
Remember, Destiny isn't flying through Hyperspace, only a little bit faster than light.
Maybe it's a breakaway Asgard clan, who fled when the genetic manipulation started?

[UniverseSizePlotHole]

No disappointment is seeing weapons fire without seeing the device that shot it. What next, off screen juggling?

This is more like a slowroll, Rush pouts when he can't go like a little kid, finds an excuse to go, sees the gate factory says 'meh,' blown by alien weapon, gets back to Destiny and drops the seed ship like its hot. Then we have Telford squirreled away on it instead of a USAF sticker. Rush could have blown the sucker (main weapon was right near it I thought it would interfere with docking) that would have stopped the power transfer and not made Destiny go straight back into FTL.

So anyways the Seeder is nothing special, at least not to Rush and the thoughts of an epic meeting of gods of the journey was more like your cousin came over and dumped some old video cassettes and tried to drink your beer.

(This post is in homage to sfdebris)

[Descended]

No disappointment is seeing weapons fire without seeing the device that shot it. What next, off screen juggling?

This is more like a slowroll, Rush pouts when he can't go like a little kid, finds an excuse to go, sees the gate factory says 'meh,' blown by alien weapon, gets back to Destiny and drops the seed ship like its hot. Then we have Telford squirreled away on it instead of a USAF sticker. Rush could have blown the sucker (main weapon was right near it I thought it would interfere with docking) that would have stopped the power transfer and not made Destiny go straight back into FTL.

So anyways the Seeder is nothing special, at least not to Rush and the thoughts of an epic meeting of gods of the journey was more like your cousin came over and dumped some old video cassettes and tried to drink your beer.

(This post is in homage to sfdebris)

I think hitting it with the main weapon would have been counterproductive :-)

1) it would have used up their already diminished power
2) it could have destroyed destiny when it exploded

Looks like Destiny will need another star pit stop soon.

[jelgate]

PS: A bit of an off-topic question - Are there gonna be any kinosodes this season?

No

While i will agree Riley;s death IS ON rush, Telford is A) not dead yet and B) even young wanted rush to get up to the control room to disconnect the ships..... Rush just did it from the bridge rather than the control room...

Rush could have easily let Telford to continue his work and reverse the energy drain instead of separating Destiny from seeder. Or use the bridge to see if it was going to work instead of automatically separating the two. Finally if Rush had been truthful about discovering the bridge and how to control Destiny they could of separated long before Telford's life was in peril

[Phenom]

What a great ep! The past 2 have been fantastic....let's hope season 2 continues like this!

[Egle01]

What a great ep! The past 2 have been fantastic....let's hope season 2 continues like this!

It has been pretty extraordinary, hasn't it. Enjoying this show so much!

[ipfnd]

it could have been so much cooler, fine not tons of power but how about letting them get at least all the reserves full and maybe one reg tank full... still at 40% reserve max poer after sun trip , right?

new tech

seeing a stargate actually being built
more exploring seed ship


kinda dropped the ball

Exactly!!!!!!

[knowles2]

I think hitting it with the main weapon would have been counterproductive :-)

1) it would have used up their already diminished power
2) it could have destroyed destiny when it exploded

Looks like Destiny will need another star pit stop soon.

Plus there is always a chance, once the others learn of the bridge that they will go searching for the seed vessel an try to capture it off the aliens an then they can use it get home.

But I suspect Rush is already considering is options. Destroying the seed vessel make no sense.

[Kaiphantom]

Not sure what "at fault" means here (are you putting the blame on only one person, or is the blame shared between several?), but either way Rush is not innocent. He had a hand in both Riley's death and Telford's exile from the ship. He was the one who "got the ball rolling", so to speak, by making the ship stop for both the planet and the seed ship. Obviously it's not completely his fault nor did he intend for both stops to end the way they did, but he's not completely innocent.

One big thing I've learned in life is that fault rarely belongs to one person alone. So you're partially right; my biggest beef is with those who try to claim it was all Rush's fault; last I checked, it wasn't Rush who had his hand over Riley's mouth. But you have to be careful with the "who got the ball rolling" thing, because we can keep going back farther and farther to see who got the ball rolling. Let's go back to the SGC who created the Icarus Project. Or the SGC that sent Telford into the LA that allowed him to be brainwashed. Or the LA for attacking the planet. Or let let's go farther back and blame the SGC who first activated the gate and sent a team through.

They all "got the ball rolling."

Young bears more direct responsibility for Riley's death. Young picked the team that would go, and ordered them to go. So Riley being on that ship in the first place was Young's fault. But I find it hilarious to try and blame Rush for a decision that everyone here would have made. Supplies are low and you are given the chance to go to a planet to replenish them. So your choices are eventual starvation, or a risky chance. Every damn planet the SGC or the SGU teams have gone to, has had risk and chances of death. And due to bad luck or whatever, people have died.

To blame Rush for giving them a chance is beyond stupid. If you truly believe this, then you obviously must believe that ever going through the gate is too dangerous, and everyone should forevermore stay on the ship. In fact, don't leave your house. Stay in the basement. Even though I'm telling you that you need to go out to get more food, you don't know what will happen; you could die. And if you do die, I'm at fault for telling you that you could possibly get food in the outside world when you are starving.

See how stupid that is?

People ironically have a better case for Telford, but still the fault is split. Telford wanted to stay, knowing he could get stranded or could die. The aliens could have come back at any time to kill him, so Telford is partially at fault for his own situation. Young could have ordered him back at anytime as the man in charge (and we can all see how dearly he wants to remain the sole man in charge). So Young bears responsibility. Rush didn't know that Telford was trying to reverse the power flow, and there's no guarantee he would have succeeded. Even if he had, the aliens could have shown up and changed it right back, thus changing NOTHING. Young himself wanted to disconnect the ship, so Rush was technically doing what Young wanted anyway.

So while Rush bears some blame, the majority falls on Telford and Young. Trying to pin Riley and Telford 100% on Rush is disingenuous at best, and deliberate lying and misinformation at worst. Rush has real faults you can ping him for (and I do), so if someone doesn't like him, they'd be better off focusing on those.

Why do you assume the worst, that TPTB are putting music montages in because they're payed to do so?

Why not? It's probably not the only reason, but I'd make an educated guess that it's part of it. Generally speaking, unless a song is already incredibly popular and done by a well-known band, people pay to have their songs included as advertisements. It's only my viewpoint, but I view such things as no different than Coke paying to have their product used in a movie (such as "Mac and Me"). I view it as a sellout, but I recognize that human greed is a basic instinct.

Is it difficult to accept that maybe they're putting it in because they think it's a good way to tell the story?

If it helped tell the story, you'd have a point. I will admit that some of them have been decent, but most have been bad and the story has suffered for it. Opportunity cost; when you include a montage, you can't include scenes where the characters explain info that might be helpful (and there are always scenes left on the cutting room floor). For instance, Chloe's wound should have been addressed last episode; I bet quite a few people were going "Wait, they are only getting around to people talking about Chloe's wound NOW!?"

Do you have a Nielsen box?Because if you didn't then you never helped in the ratings anyway.

I don't. But I could be part of those "download numbers" that JM is so desperate to cling to rather than face other possible reasons for why ratings are falling. Also, I could spread the word to other people and get them to watch SGU, and those people might have Nielson boxes. I don't feel inclined to spread the word now. So, I could have had a positive effect, but I definitely won't now. I'll be pitching them to watch other shows.

Last note: I don't expect Jelgate to respond to me, anyway, because I have a feeling he/she has me on ignore. Which is a shame, for a poster of Jelgate's status to pretty much plug their ears and go "LALALA! I CAN'T HEAR YOU AND THE GOOD POINTS YOU ARE MAKING AND WOULD PREFER NOT TO DISCUSS OR DEFEND MY VIEWPOINTS! LALALA!" I haven't felt a need to put anyone on ignore yet; the problem today, as it always has been, is people unwilling to engage in communication to discuss their ideas and come to mutual understanding. If you ever wonder politics is so polarized with the sides not willing to listen to each other, you need only look here and understand that it is simply representative of the population.

[xxxevilgrinxxx]

great review, MattSilver3k!

[zainea13]

I was waiting for that bit of information to clarify this as well. And if the reason is that reusing props is cheaper I'm gonna be pretty mad.

PS: A bit of an off-topic question - Are there gonna be any kinosodes this season?

Yes I asked joseph mallozzi about it and he said because they were cool and it was a good tiem to reuse them cuz they were expensive to make. I'm not really upset about it. they reuse the same actors to play different characters. I mean even Varro, his actor was a guy that killed Natan in SG1 ... yet now he is someone totally different.

[JadedWraith]

Another kinda OT or should I said, out of the current line of discussion question

Spoiler:

I was multitasking when I watched the episode, so I obviously missed something: first Lt Scott, Greer and the science team was on the seeder, then Rush and Telford went to the seeder as well. The plot moves, the aliens show up and take control of the Seeder ship, cutting off the progress of Lt. Scott' team, carrying unconscious Rush. Rush regains conscience and disappears. Destiny jumps to FTL. But only Telford was left behing on the Seeder Ship. So my question is : when did everyone else returned to Destiny? I must have missed a scene.

[leiasky]

So do you guys think the LA will hit earth?

Yep. In the new SG-1 movie.

Hate Young. Wish Telford would have kicked his ass and taken over. He's a pitiful commander that shouldn't be allowed to lead.

Rush having to tell the military guys what they should probably be doing yanked me out of the moment. Telford should have known.

Rush - I get why he's doing what he's doing. He has nothing to go home to so he wants to continue his research on Destiny. I like the 'conscience/ascended ancient' in the form of his dead wife.

Anyone else on the ship? Just don't care.

Did love the unevolved Asgard (before their cloning wacked them out), tho'.

[bart112]

The episode's are getting better and better if this keeps building up like this I will go out of my mind. And Joel Goldsmiths BGM is just awesome its giving me the creeps when I hear it.

I just realised that in the 16 years of stargate I have seen this is the first time we ever have seen how te gates are made and how they look on the inside.

And also a big hint on how they are going home:

Spoiler:

On the end of destiny's destination there is gonna be the second seeder ship so they can gate back home.

[The Mighty 6 platoon]

I thought it was a great episode. Dropped some little hints for future storylines and had fun with the suspense/mystery aspect to the seeder ship, while not going nuts and forgetting that SGU is still a character show.

First off, I'm glad they didn't forget about Riley. Seriously, I thought it pretty likely that he was going to be ignored, but he wasn't - hell, you could feel the weight of his death all over, which was great. Segueing from Riley I get to Young, who is seriously starting to lose his marbles at the bottom of an alcohol bottle. He still has his moments of badassery, but dammit all if it's kinda sad, yet understandable, to see him spiral. I'm not quite criticising the move, it's just depressing to watch. Poor guy.

Rush, on the other hand, is just... Ugh. I've got mixed feelings about him right now. Dude's up one moment and down the next, and he's starting to get a little more responsible for some bad shift going down. I kinda hope more incidents like Riley and Telford don't occur before he realises that maybe he's doing the wrong thing.

Speaking of, Telford was the MVP tonight. Dude was spot on with his calling out of Young, while staying supportive and mostly on the level. Sacrificing himself I saw coming as soon as the option arose, but since I wouldn't have expected him to do something like that this time last year, it's good that he's changed so much in my eyes and able to be thought of as a heroic sacrificer. Wray was pretty cool too - I get where she's coming from with the humane angle, and she isn't suffocating me with it, at least.

Now, to the seeder ship itself. I liked it - kinda like Destiny but not. I very much dug the brown aliens (Not Boogers. To hell with this ****in' fandom and its naming practices. Seriously, stop it.), especially in hindsight - they were a research team, they stopped the ship or something, and didn't have enough power to start up again. So they waited, let us start the power transfer, reversed it, and BAM! Instant power boost. Victory to them. I'm actually hoping that the browns are actually fighting against the blue aliens, both sides hoping to gain control of Ancient tech and destroy the other...

The Lucian Alliance angle is interesting. Man, that prick Simeon must have a lot of intel - why the hell would they keep him on the ship? Jeez... Varro is awesome. I think the guy's sympathetic levels are increasing by the episode, and he's actually kinda sweet to TJ, which is awesome. Ginn didn't appear much, but dammit all if her little puppy dog routine at the sound of ancient tech wasn't just the most adorable thing I've seen this year... Followed by the little brown alien playing possum. D'awww...

Oh right, and there were other characters. Poor, flustered, naive, Eli. Dude's going to have to snap sometime. Should be fun. Scott and Greer's little conversation was epic. Scott being all Daniel Jackson-y to the alien was epic times a million (Dude's a soft touch. It's kinda nice compared to the rest of the military). I love that Chloe's mysterious leg wound thing is getting explored some more, little seeds being planted as we go... Should be fun.

Great episode, one that may just become one of my favourites down the track.

Ah thank you Matt, for doing my work for me. I might have had to spend quite a time (time that can now be spent on other things like eating pie) articulating my thoughts on the episode into a long post. However helpfully you have posted something that pretty much sums up what I think of the ep. Therefore I can happily say that this man/beast/cybernetic monkey thing speaks for me!