Hide And Seek (103)

[Icemancmd]

Shepperd: He's ok, he just fainted
McKay: Can't we just say Passed out?

[Icemancmd]

You'll need 13 more posts to become a Mature Symbiote, not a Jaffa Warrior...

I am a Jaffa

[Major Tyler]

I loved everyone in this Episode! I was crying out for McKay to save the day and I'm glad I was not disappointed. I also liked Aiden's scene with Jinto..."Stuff happens."

[Selmak]

I am a Jaffa

That is VERY off topic.

[gwangung]

Heh. As of now, the TRUE major protagonist of this series is actually McKay. His character is going through the most changes, and they're of the classic hero mold - flawed character rises above his faults to achieve great things. He did a Hero move...though with the help of a superscience crutch. It's only a matter of time before he throws away his crutch....

[Archivekeepr]

*Sigh* It's becoming official that while I still love the Stargate universe, I have not enjoyed much from Atlantis. "Hide and Seek" was your general alien-loose-on-board episode. Yes, I'll admit that I actually liked it better than "Rising" plot-wise, but it's still not making me holler with joy or anything. It's so disappointing, especially since I was very much looking forward for a good episode. Below are a few notes:

- Although I liked the idea that the Ancients were a race of mixed nuts, like the human race, I didn't really like the idea that they were "experimenting with ascension" through the means of a shadowy energy blob; that just seems lame to me, but I'll talk more about that later. Further more, I believe that the whole "mixed nuts" issue was already demonstrated in SG-1's episode, "Ascension." Think about it, if the ascended can wipe out an entire planet of people, possibly numbering in the millions, just because they had in their possession a powerful weapon; while they fully had the ability to disable, remove or even tinker with the said weapon to make it ineffective- I think that already demonstrated that this isn't a group of fairy godmothers.

- More about that lame energy blob issue: Up until now, we've always been told implicitly by various lines in "meridian" and "abyss" that ascension is essentially a mystical spiritual journey, in which you become a powerful energy being, mainly because you no longer need your biological body. It was shown that while you could regain your corporal body, it would require one of the others to re-ascend. This would fit if it WAS a mystical situation, since normal people might not be able to cast aside all of the human negative emotions in order to become ascended and therefore need a bit of help from your glowy friends. But, now that we've got the Ancients who apparently studied ascension as a biology project, it becomes very FUBAR-ed.

If ascension really is biological and part of any species' evolutionary process, why couldn't anyone just ascend? I mean, just build yourself a big genetic machine and WHAM! Glowy time! For that matter, why didn't Nirrti just glowed herself up in "metamorphsis?" She had the mother of all genetic tweaking machines. Hell! Orlin could have build, or just gated to wherever there was an Ascend-a-tron and zapped himself! He didn't need the others at all! Bottom line, the concept of ascending be a genetic thing is absolutely nonsense even in the basic principles. Think of it, ascension converts the biological body, flesh, blood, cells, everything, into living energy- So, why would there be DNA left over if there are no cells? There's been two episodes so far and two big biology mistakes;BW and RCC, read the signs- GET A BIOLOGY TUTOR! Now, if they had implied that the whole ascension process was an atomic or subatomic thing, I would have kinda bought that, since energy would still require atoms and it's components.

- McKay: Although he looked absolutely like a pig when he was scrafing down those energy bars, at least the man is still snarky and funny. I think that the scene where he fainted was just too convienent to be anything but threatric, but I digress.

-Weir, Teyla and Ford: Weir didn't really push my buttons either way in this episode, she just said the things a leader would probably say and yelled commands when she's supposed to, that's it. That only interesting thing that showed up is that apparently one of the five languages that she's supposed to know is Latin. Which, for an international political player, would be logical. Good job on that one, TPTB. As for Teyla, I still think that they can stop paying Rachel to play her and just put the clothes on a mannequin and have a tape recorder play back the lines, since she's just as stoic as ever. But, at least she demonstrated that she does have some sort of a brain, since she suggested sending the entity to somewhere else. Before I forget, what the hell is that lighting thing that she burnt the candle with? Ancient lighter? Meh. Now, don't even get me started on Ford, who they just blobbed because they need to demonstrate that the blob is dangerous.

-Sheppard: He's still cute with that scruffy chin fuzz and no real signs of MEGA!Sheppard this week, so at least that's good.

Overall, I think that TPTB are still just doing average Scifi template loading episodes, with no real character development except just enough arguing and technobabble to make it barely presentable. *Shakes head, sighs* You were capable of SO much more, Atlantis.

[gwangung]

- More about that lame energy blob issue: Up until now, we've always been told implicitly by various lines in "meridian" and "abyss" that ascension is essentially a mystical spiritual journey, in which you become a powerful energy being, mainly because you no longer need your biological body. It was shown that while you could regain your corporal body, it would require one of the others to re-ascend. This would fit if it WAS a mystical situation, since normal people might not be able to cast aside all of the human negative emotions in order to become ascended and therefore need a bit of help from your glowy friends. But, now that we've got the Ancients who apparently studied ascension as a biology project, it becomes very FUBAR-ed.

If ascension really is biological and part of any species' evolutionary process, why couldn't anyone just ascend? I mean, just build yourself a big genetic machine and WHAM! Glowy time! For that matter, why didn't Nirrti just glowed herself up in "metamorphsis?" She had the mother of all genetic tweaking machines. Hell! Orlin could have build, or just gated to wherever there was an Ascend-a-tron and zapped himself! He didn't need the others at all! Bottom line, the concept of ascending be a genetic thing is absolutely nonsense even in the basic principles. Think of it, ascension converts the biological body, flesh, blood, cells, everything, into living energy- So, why would there be DNA left over if there are no cells? There's been two episodes so far and two big biology mistakes;BW and RCC, read the signs- GET A BIOLOGY TUTOR! Now, if they had implied that the whole ascension process was an atomic or subatomic thing, I would have kinda bought that, since energy would still require atoms and it's components.

a) Who said it was entirely physical or biological? Moreover, who said that the physical methods weren't a dead end? Or a necessary but not sufficient step. We simply don't know enough about the process.

b) Ascension, of course, would not convert the entire body. At least not the way you think. You shed dead cells, etc. as you live, leaving all that DNA around to be examined. I doubt ascension would "convert" all the skin, hair and all the other type of cells you left behind hours and days before....

[morjana]

The SciFi Channel has updated both the "Stargate SG-1" and the "Stargate Atlantis" sites with episode synopses for tonight's episodes:


STARGATE SG-1

Download teaser for "Zero Hour":

http://www.scifi.com/stargate/teaser/index.html

"Lockdown" Episode Synopsis:

http://www.scifi.com/stargate/episodes/season8/0803/

Plus four photos and a General O'Neill sound byte -- "The Problem with Yukon Gold Potatoes"

http://www.scifi.com/stargate/episod...neal_clip.html


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STARGATE ATLANTIS


"Hide and Seek" Episode Synopsis:

http://www.scifi.com/atlantis/episod...n1/episode103/

Plus four photos

And a "Did You Know?" feature on:

According to Dr. Beckett, "We believe ATA, or Ancient Technology Activation, is caused by a single gene that's always on, instructing various cells in the body to produce a series of proteins and enzymes that interact with the skin, the nervous system, and the brain." In his experimental genetic therapy that could allow ATA with treated humans, "we're using a mouse retrovirus to deliver the missing gene."

Download teaser for "Hide and Seek":

http://www.scifi.com/atlantis/episod...ideo_clip.html

Download the ORIGINAL Stargate Atlantis teaser:

http://www.scifi.com/atlantis/video/teaser.html



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Morjana

SG1-Spoilergate
http://tv.groups.yahoo.com/group/SG1-Spoilergate/

Richard Dean Anderson Fans
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/rdandersonfans/

[Manic]

"I didn't faint. I passed out... from manly hunger."

McKay totally stole this episode, in terms of humor. Or rather "humour," since he's Canadian and all. I was laughing at him from the beginning. I thought it was great how he told Dr. Beckett that medicine was about as scientific as voodoo, but Beckett explained the process of grafting the ancient gene into his DNA in the most complicated way possible. My opinion on that is mostly swayed by my ideas on the title of "doctor." I think it's great that physicists and archeologists can achieve advanced degrees, but I always associate the term "doctor" with medical pros. It's like that episode of SG-1 where someone assumed Daniel was a medic. But I digress.

Sheppard testing McKay's invulnerability thingy... priceless.
"I shot him!"

Teyla was no more stiff than Teal'c was during his first few episodes. Personally, I didn't come to love Teal'c until season 3. So that's saying something.

Dr. Weir's hair... interesting. It actually makes her look less uptight, which is good.

I have nothing to say about Ford. He was there, he got turned into cannon fodder (which, according to the rules of sci-fi, should've happened to the other guy), and he talked to a kid.

Sheppard had a few good moments. I liked how he would try to explain something (Friday the 13th, football), end up having to explain something else (a hockey mask, a hail mary), and still trying desperately to explain even more (the game of hockey, who Mary was). Storytelling is not one of his strongest suits, but at least he can hold your attention.

They explained the creature was probably used to experiment with ascension, but they never clearly stated that the creature was that similar to an ascended being. For all we know, the blob-cloud-shadow-thingy might've given the Ancients the idea of living in a pure-energy state, but the method we've seen people ascend in past episodes of SG-1 might be the results of a different experiment. After all, the Ancients ascended in the Milky Way, but this creature they were experimenting on was left in Pegasus.

[ShadowMaat]

Not to add to the fluff factor of this thread, but... since they're on an ocean world, maybe there's more humidity in the air making Wer's hair curl. Stupid explanation, I know, but I live on an island and I know that certain types of weather cause my hair to curl like mad.

Good to see that the Ancients are, as someone put it, "a flawed species". Perfection is nice, but it's a little unrealistic, IMO.

Have I mentioned how much I love McKay?? And he didn't look like a pig when he was scarfing the energy bar.

[IWantToBelieve]

Coming from a victim of natural curly hair, it doesn't look that good without a curling iron.

I agree, it made her seem softer, think it was a good move on their part, although I'm sure it'll change throughout.

I'm in luv with Shep. His character is adorable. He's got very good expressions, and his acting just feels right on all the time. He and McKay play off each other beautifully, and this episode really highlighted that ability.

[Teal'c]

I'm loving Atlantis even more! McKay was hilarious, this was soooo much better than I expected. And the main cast are gelling togther so well (except Teyla unfortunately...). Can't wait for 38 Minutes

[aAnubiSs]

I guess Teyla will be the outsider in the beginning, just like Teal'c was.

[Persephone]

Not to add to the fluff factor of this thread, but... since they're on an ocean world, maybe there's more humidity in the air making Wer's hair curl. Stupid explanation, I know, but I live on an island and I know that certain types of weather cause my hair to curl like mad.

Hmmn, that's a fair point. Could very well be, although as IWantToBelieve, for most humidity tends to add up to the frizz factor (I, too, am an unfortunate victim), however there is always the leeway of TV magic in this case.


I agree with whoever it was that pointed out just because the Ancients were experimenting with this darkness thingy for ascension research doesn't necessarily mean it had anything to do with how they eventually figured out how to do it. I believe it truly was a spiritual journey, in the end.

[Shipperahoy]

I really enjoyed this episode. I love Shepard and I LOVE McKay. Thus far they haven't really given the others much to do so it's hard to say. I'm sure they'll flesh them out more in upcoming episodes. So far they've given Dr. Beckett more to say and do than Lt. Ford and he's not even in the credits. I have a feeling they're going to do with him what they did with Dr. Fraiser and have him be in the series pretty much constantly but not put him in the opening credits. This show has definately got the comic quotient in high amounts. I haven't laughed that hard in a while. Have I mentioned how much I love David Hewlitt? Having Lockdown and Hide and Seek air back to back did seem a little bit like deja vu but I still liked it.