Disclosure

DVD, Stargate SG-1 S6 (Disclosure)

It's a clips show. What more can be said? But seriously, episodes made to save money by relying on clips of other episodes do seem ultimately rather pointless - we watch a series to see new stories, not get a reminder of old ones. While that might have been a nostalgic and fun revisit of fondly remembered moments before it was possible to watch any TV episode on demand, in the days when we can easily get hold of almost anything, it's more of a time waster. Did they really need to get that exact quotient of episodes? Could they not have skipped one if they had to save money? Or even get the cast in a room and do a stage play - 'Twelve Angry Men' is a thrilling film and that all happens in one room! But for that you'd need extra high quality writing, perhaps not available for TV? It follows in the tradition of the series, right from Season 1 with 'Politics,' to 'Out of Mind' with 'Divide and Conquer,' 'Threshold' and 'The Sentinel' suggesting they might be, but fortunately weren't, clips shows, so at least it had been a while since we last got one of these.

Regardless of the format I suppose I ought to at least provide an opinion on the new material contained in the episode. It doesn't feature any of the main cast, except General Hammond, so I think this is the first one since Jonas joined up that doesn't include him. I wonder if the actors enjoyed having a little holiday? The episode starts with a bombshell: several of the 'big' nations have been summoned by the USA for a secret meeting at the Pentagon. They include representatives of the UK, France, China and Russia. The title gives it all away, but not until I saw the various countries represented did I realise this was the big moment I'd been waiting for; the day when the Stargate became public knowledge the world over! But it didn't quite transpire like that. It was great to see the question of why the US hadn't informed other nations about such a life-changing revelation as the Stargate and the advances in technology it led to, something I've been wondering about even in recent reviews: why do they not at least have teams from their allies? Well, the answer is… I'm still not sure, but I had to agree with China, in about the most realistic moment of the story, who are horrified with the shift in the balance of power that America now has with space-capable vehicles and high-powered weaponry. This is how most would react, I think, when confronted with such an incredible story.

That the other nations would agree to keep everything quiet just because an alien (Thor), makes a guest appearance and assures them that Hammond and the team are the best bet, was farfetched, and I was expecting him to brainwash them to forget, as the most logical way out of such a hole. But no, even China now believe that the Stargate programme is in safe hands! Totally ridiculous, but this is an American programme, so of course they had to come out on top! It doesn't look like we'll be having any English SG teams any time soon, even if, as was indicated, each of the representatives were able to convince their governments that it's best to keep it all quiet for the foreseeable future. The reality would be that it wouldn't be up to one ambassador, and the Chinese government weren't going to sit on this thing. Nor would anyone, I think, but we're living in a fictional world here, where political realities don't have too much weight. Take Senator Kinsey, the old goat, this time trying to take control of the programme by manoeuvring the NID to be voted into control which he'll soon be overseeing. Would such a man be able to survive politically, and would the other nations be any happier with a different branch of the US government being in control? I wouldn't have thought so.

In a way this would be an ideal episode for a new viewer to start with, as it deals with the main points about the Stargate programme, reminds about several adventures that occurred, as well as the advancement in manmade technology. It would be ideal if it weren't so dull, with five men in a briefing room being given a video presentation by Major Davis. That's the main problem with this so-called episode: it's dull, even chucking in some exciting clips from past episodes didn't wake me up, and it's such a shame that such an important issue of the series as the secrecy (or not), of the whole organisation could be wasted in a non-episode. The only other little glimmer of interest for me was that Michael Shanks makes another return - yes, we see him as Daniel in old clips, but also we have him doing the voice of Thor again, so that was a nice addition, though hardly worth the price of admission. Eminently missable.

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