Tuesday, 5 February 2019

Off The Grid

DVD, Stargate SG-1 S9 (Off The Grid)

Baal turns out to be the biggest sci-fi collector out there when he starts stealing 'gates (there's an idea they should have latched onto: full size 'gate replicas!), from various planets to further his plans for a new empire, but seemingly gets destroyed by the Lucian Alliance which come looking for one of their own. We see several Baals, so it's difficult to know if there's supposed to be one directing things or if they've become like the Borg with a hive mind, all in cahoots. If not, and they are genuinely individual, despite being exact clones, then what happens if they decide to do different things, and is there one 'main' Baal? It looked like it might turn into something dramatic when we have these two factions of bad guys facing off, but there really wasn't much of a fight at all, and the only energetic moments come from SG-1 doing what they always used to do and firing automatic weapons at stupid, lumbering, staff-wielding Goa'uld as if the events of the last season or two never happened. In one sense it's lovely to experience an episode that is just like the series of old, but in another, it reminds you of the over-complicated, not that well plot-driven narratives and repetitive nature of much of the conflict with that enemy. Plus we need O'Neill there to add that little extra something.

As it is, and it is nice to see SG-1 being SG-1 (like the last season or two never happened), the episode is as lumbering as the Goa'uld they face, with Landry going off to get information from the previously captured Nerus, SG-1 spending half their time as captives of the Lucians and half pinned down in the 'gate collection room on Baal's ship, without much of anything to enjoy. It's one of those that makes the characters feel static when so much has moved on or changed in the series, and it's strange to be critical of an episode that is so old 'Stargate,' especially as we've now had a run of these middle of the season episodes that have gone back to the old formulas and ways of telling the story, or familiar settings and approaches, but this one is an example of the more mediocre stories they would too often do, and while it may have ramifications for the overall season, on its own wasn't the most gripping. It's perfectly adequate, and introduces a new ship (the Odyssey), and its commander (Colonel Emerson), but isn't it a bit soon to have a new hero ship that can zip over to a planet in a few hours and bail our heroes out of their scrapes? It takes away the sense of their independence and ingenuity and we could have done with at least a few episodes where they don't have the cavalry coming to their rescue, forcing them to be more resourceful and daring.

There would be other ships than the Prometheus, but they could have been engaged with other missions. And I never liked Nerus as a character, he just wasn't interesting. And the way Landry offhandedly asks if the Stargates were blown up with Baal's ship makes it seem like it wouldn't be a big deal, but I thought the 'gate explosion was supposed to be massive? Maybe I'm misremembering… But it all seemed too pat, and I've never liked this band of smuggler pirates, or whatever the Lucian Alliance is, so meeting one of their higher ups, Netan, held no interest for me either. I always think of them as more of a 'Stargate Universe' story element, though that came much later. The 'piece of cake' line was good, but the episode lacked lustre, was join the dots in Stargate-land, and didn't really achieve anything beyond a runabout with SG-1 behaving like the SG-1 they used to be, which isn't always enough. Plus the things they did to try and pep the story up were unnecessary time-wasting - I refer specifically to the opening where we see SG-1 running from some enemies before being trapped by the Stargate beaming away before they can use it. So we then see how it got to that point, but we could have just arrived there chronologically without doing it twice. Except they want to throw us into some action to get people to keep watching, I understand that, and I'm not against the storytelling device when it's used to good effect, but it felt redundant here.

**

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