DVD, Stargate SG-1 S5 (Rite of Passage)
This suffers from an over-long mystery and another sci-fi trope, one that doesn't even reach its conclusion: I'm not saying I wanted Cassandra to turn into some terrible psychokinetic creature that could chuck people around with her mind (although…), but it was a relief that the episode didn't turn into a base under siege tale with her as the 'monster' they have to hunt down. The saving grace of the episode was the ending, but getting there was often a chore. I like old characters returning so of course it was good to have Cassandra back if nothing else than for Dr. Fraiser to get a storyline. Her care (and Sam's), of the refugee from another planet is played so real and strongly. I gather this was a different actress playing Cassandra this time, and the character's certainly aged since her first appearance in Season 1. It was nice to hear mention of that episode, one in which Sam risked her life to help this little girl even when it seemed she was going to destroy everything. That's probably an episode I'd reevaluate if I saw it again as I didn't particularly rate it, yet I still think fondly of it as something where Carter showed her colours.
Maybe I didn't rate the episode much for the same reason I don't rate this one highly: it took a long time to say what it wanted to say or do what it wanted to do. The series can be quite slow sometimes, and gets bogged down in its labyrinthine continuity - actually it's not so much labyrinthine as wide, with little or no recapping of past events that happened episodes or even seasons ago. I'm sure that's one thing people love about it, but unless you want to sit through the episodes several times you do forget exact details and I'd appreciate a bit of explanation occasionally. Case in point: Nierte. I remembered her, but didn't remember at what point she had last appeared; what season; what the story was; what her character means in this context.
I felt the character scenes worked in terms of showing the bond Janet and Sam have for Cassandra, and was at first intrigued by the mystery of the glowing handprint in the forest and the secret Goa'uld lab it 'Ringed' to. Later it was creepy to think that Nierte had been there all the time (when the weird POV came in I thought it was one of those invisible insectile creatures they faced a while back - see, I do keep continuity in my mind!), but after the initial interest it soon died down. I also found it hard to believe Nierte had been there ever since she'd been a captive of Cronus, that she'd returned there and waited until… what? Cassandra showed up? Did she know it was going to happen? How long did she have to wait? The story really didn't go anywhere until it became a question of a girl's life versus the valuable and potentially life-saving knowledge a Goa'uld captive could provide. If only this point had been reached earlier and there had been less build-up to Cassandra's changing which ultimately never happened, the episode would have been considerably improved.
I wasn't sure if she was going to die or leave, as I thought she was in more episodes, but I never really thought things would go back to normal. I was impressed to see Fraiser holding a gun against her enemy, though I thought she was going to help her escape in exchange for healing her daughter, which, in retrospect, was even less likely. It seemed like the coercion of the moment was lost once all those soldiers were aiming at Fraiser, and O'Neill or Hammond could have disarmed her at any time. It didn't seem Nierte would back down so easily, but maybe she saw it was the best course of action. On the other hand it could have been staged, though Fraiser would have had to be a good actor if she wasn't really Cassie's Mum. There was a good visual of Nierte flipping through the glass window, but the episode was mostly devoid of such excitement. It was a character piece which left things hanging too often, though with the occasional moment of warmth.
I wondered at their bargaining with someone who had seemingly killed one of the soldiers on the base. The guy's neck gets checked and the guy checking it shakes his head, which I took to mean he was dead, yet that's never mentioned. Is the life of a soldier not worth talking about, do we only care about girls? Another funny observation I couldn't help make was that the birthday cake candles which had been lit when Cassandra left the kitchen, had been blown out when Carter and Fraiser heard the boyfriend's shouts for help. Which one of them couldn't wait for her to come back? Not a bad episode, but a late-starter. I'm all for episodes about Fraiser and Cassandra, but let's have something more interesting than the poor girl lying in bed all the time while Janet looks on concerned.
**
Monday, 5 March 2012
Bounty
DVD, Enterprise S2 (Bounty)
It has come to something when both the A- and B-stories are interesting and linked to 'TOS' lore, but it's something good. Even the fact that there is a proper B-story is a positive, perhaps a sign of the sure hand of Berman and Braga rather than the newer writers on staff. It was a clever way to deal with T'Pol's Pon Farr - keeping it between her and Phlox, happening while under the influence of an alien virus or whatever, and also leaving the door open for them to do a 'proper' examination of the issue if they wanted to in future. Her behaviour reminded me of 'Strange New World' from Season 1, and makes me realise there have been few examples of the Sub-Commander getting out of character, something Spock did a little more regularly. I also felt her outlandish actions were less jarring, and thus less effective because she's a bit more emotional than Vulcans on other series', though by 'Enterprise' terms she's certainly one of the least emotional of the series. Jolene Blalock did a fine job of it, but it's a shame Vulcan superior strength didn't show itself. She might have been weakened by the virus, but I wanted to see her pick people up and throw them across rooms, not ineffectively shove them into walls!
It was wise not to hide from the famous Vulcan mating ritual, and fortunate that it was dealt with this early in the series (though comparatively, Spock dealt with it even earlier: at the beginning of the second season of 'TOS' rather than the end of the season as we are here), but as I mentioned above, it can easily be explained away as early activation by the virus meaning she could be due the real experience at any point in the series' future. I don't believe it ever was addressed again, but if the series had run for a successful length I feel sure it would have been dealt with. Then again, they also had to be wary of treading on the toes of continuity as it was an unknown custom to the crew of 'TOS,' only a century later, so perhaps the issue wouldn't have come up again, or if it had it would necessarily have had to be dealt with in a way that no, or few, humans would be aware of it.
The other interesting thing about the story was getting to know a little more about Phlox, not the least his alien physique: brown markings on his torso and limbs, and most interestingly a ribbed backbone. It was also fascinating to hear that Denobulan males are quite subdued and private, probably even more so in Phlox' case. I like the hint that he was responsible for installing curtains in the decon chamber because not everyone is comfortable with the procedure. Ironically it humanises the sequence and is also a sly nod back to the pilot when companionable decontamination was made such a fuss of! This episode also sees the return of T'Pol's white uniform, which I think had been used before, in 'Marauders' and foreshadowed her new uniforms for Season 3.
The main story and the main import of it is the first chronological appearance of that mainstay of 'The Original Series,' the Tellarites. Okay, so they weren't exactly prevalent like the Vulcans and Klingons, but they cropped up more than once and looked different enough that they were always remembered, and even mentioned in later episodes (I remember Captain Sisko talking about a Tellarite friend of his who was killed by the Klingons on 'DS9'). At the time everyone was waiting for the next race to be updated as the Andorians had been in Season 1, but it had taken this long before they finally gave us another one, preferring to chart their own course and make up new aliens. Makeup chief Michael Westmore made noises early on that he wanted to do the Tellarites so perhaps this was written thanks to his wish, who knows? I wouldn't have done the makeup quite as it was. I preferred the deeper set eyes that didn't reveal the eyeball, and the stronger pig-like nose of the original creations, but I still like this version and its 'high-res' detail (including the old hairy hands, this time with added bony protrusion), and I'm glad they mentioned the style of the species, their argumentative nature, even if it didn't come across in the two Tellarites we met in the episode.
If anything, I felt Skalaar wasn't very representative of his race, but I can understand that having him argue and obstruct all the time might have made for a difficult story, but because of this, the race didn't work out (at first), as well as the Andorians did. I think partly it was that they came along right before the big sea-change in direction away from the familiar and into the truly unknown, something that was both a blessing and a curse for the series and to be discussed when I review Season 3. As an introduction to the species it did its job, regardless of the fact it could have been any alien that had captured Archer. I enjoyed the surprise opening with Archer getting kidnapped by the burly Tellarite, but Skalaar was taking an awful risk. How did he know the Captain would be there at the airlock or that he wouldn't bring a team of security with him? He didn't, I suppose - for these bounty hunters risk is all part of the deal.
I liked that Skalaar was given a bit more backstory than we sometimes get, his troubles with his brother, his wish to get back the freighter the Klingons had impounded, helped to make him a more rounded person (and let's face it, for a Tellarite he wasn't that rounded physically so he needed all he could get!). After seeing Robert O'Reilly's name in the opening credits I was trying to work out if he was playing Skalaar, but it wasn't until he showed up in a bit part as the alien (Kago?), that the unmistakable tones of Gowron growled out at me. I like that they bring back familiar faces (or voices in this case), but, as with Casey Biggs next season, it's a shame when they aren't important to the episode.
As much as I enjoyed the content of the episode for its Trek crowd-pleasing use of previously owned aliens and lore (Orion slave girls and the Klingons' 'nasty-looking swords' also get a mention), I rarely felt excited by the action on screen. T'Pol escapes from decon and goes on the rampage but is stopped without trouble. It only needed a shot of the deck being evacuated by hurrying crew-members to make it more urgent. Similarly, the only time things really got going for Archer were in the initial scuffle with Skalaar and at the end, on the Klingon ship. But I will say I enjoyed the twist of Archer and Skalaar's collusion and the Captain running down Klingon corridors having a firefight with the warrior race. But where were all the crew of that ship? I wanted to see Archer pinned down and having to make a last desperate dive as he leaps into the escape pod, firing all the way, but I suppose that's down to a TV budget and a TV time limit and I'm not going to criticise Roxann Dawson who was back in the director's chair, for not being John Woo, as much as I might like that.
The story was also neatly tied into Archer's earlier Klingon adventures of this season, which I believe would continue into the season finale. Such continuity is always a pleasure, especially on a series that isn't known for its story arcs. Although the CGI ships and action were fine, especially when the NX-01 was involved, I found the Tellarite ship lacking in distinctiveness where most races have strong design. Another case of end of season time limits? Equally the design for the ship of alien, Kago, was lacking, although the Klingon vessel, almost boomerang-shaped, did pique my interest as being so different to the usual Birds-of-Prey or battlecruisers. I would also say it was good to see Archer having to do things the old-fashioned way, on his own, using his fists as well as his talk. I would have liked to see Skalaar again, but although he didn't return we did at least get stronger episodes for the Tellarites thanks to Season 4.
***
It has come to something when both the A- and B-stories are interesting and linked to 'TOS' lore, but it's something good. Even the fact that there is a proper B-story is a positive, perhaps a sign of the sure hand of Berman and Braga rather than the newer writers on staff. It was a clever way to deal with T'Pol's Pon Farr - keeping it between her and Phlox, happening while under the influence of an alien virus or whatever, and also leaving the door open for them to do a 'proper' examination of the issue if they wanted to in future. Her behaviour reminded me of 'Strange New World' from Season 1, and makes me realise there have been few examples of the Sub-Commander getting out of character, something Spock did a little more regularly. I also felt her outlandish actions were less jarring, and thus less effective because she's a bit more emotional than Vulcans on other series', though by 'Enterprise' terms she's certainly one of the least emotional of the series. Jolene Blalock did a fine job of it, but it's a shame Vulcan superior strength didn't show itself. She might have been weakened by the virus, but I wanted to see her pick people up and throw them across rooms, not ineffectively shove them into walls!
It was wise not to hide from the famous Vulcan mating ritual, and fortunate that it was dealt with this early in the series (though comparatively, Spock dealt with it even earlier: at the beginning of the second season of 'TOS' rather than the end of the season as we are here), but as I mentioned above, it can easily be explained away as early activation by the virus meaning she could be due the real experience at any point in the series' future. I don't believe it ever was addressed again, but if the series had run for a successful length I feel sure it would have been dealt with. Then again, they also had to be wary of treading on the toes of continuity as it was an unknown custom to the crew of 'TOS,' only a century later, so perhaps the issue wouldn't have come up again, or if it had it would necessarily have had to be dealt with in a way that no, or few, humans would be aware of it.
The other interesting thing about the story was getting to know a little more about Phlox, not the least his alien physique: brown markings on his torso and limbs, and most interestingly a ribbed backbone. It was also fascinating to hear that Denobulan males are quite subdued and private, probably even more so in Phlox' case. I like the hint that he was responsible for installing curtains in the decon chamber because not everyone is comfortable with the procedure. Ironically it humanises the sequence and is also a sly nod back to the pilot when companionable decontamination was made such a fuss of! This episode also sees the return of T'Pol's white uniform, which I think had been used before, in 'Marauders' and foreshadowed her new uniforms for Season 3.
The main story and the main import of it is the first chronological appearance of that mainstay of 'The Original Series,' the Tellarites. Okay, so they weren't exactly prevalent like the Vulcans and Klingons, but they cropped up more than once and looked different enough that they were always remembered, and even mentioned in later episodes (I remember Captain Sisko talking about a Tellarite friend of his who was killed by the Klingons on 'DS9'). At the time everyone was waiting for the next race to be updated as the Andorians had been in Season 1, but it had taken this long before they finally gave us another one, preferring to chart their own course and make up new aliens. Makeup chief Michael Westmore made noises early on that he wanted to do the Tellarites so perhaps this was written thanks to his wish, who knows? I wouldn't have done the makeup quite as it was. I preferred the deeper set eyes that didn't reveal the eyeball, and the stronger pig-like nose of the original creations, but I still like this version and its 'high-res' detail (including the old hairy hands, this time with added bony protrusion), and I'm glad they mentioned the style of the species, their argumentative nature, even if it didn't come across in the two Tellarites we met in the episode.
If anything, I felt Skalaar wasn't very representative of his race, but I can understand that having him argue and obstruct all the time might have made for a difficult story, but because of this, the race didn't work out (at first), as well as the Andorians did. I think partly it was that they came along right before the big sea-change in direction away from the familiar and into the truly unknown, something that was both a blessing and a curse for the series and to be discussed when I review Season 3. As an introduction to the species it did its job, regardless of the fact it could have been any alien that had captured Archer. I enjoyed the surprise opening with Archer getting kidnapped by the burly Tellarite, but Skalaar was taking an awful risk. How did he know the Captain would be there at the airlock or that he wouldn't bring a team of security with him? He didn't, I suppose - for these bounty hunters risk is all part of the deal.
I liked that Skalaar was given a bit more backstory than we sometimes get, his troubles with his brother, his wish to get back the freighter the Klingons had impounded, helped to make him a more rounded person (and let's face it, for a Tellarite he wasn't that rounded physically so he needed all he could get!). After seeing Robert O'Reilly's name in the opening credits I was trying to work out if he was playing Skalaar, but it wasn't until he showed up in a bit part as the alien (Kago?), that the unmistakable tones of Gowron growled out at me. I like that they bring back familiar faces (or voices in this case), but, as with Casey Biggs next season, it's a shame when they aren't important to the episode.
As much as I enjoyed the content of the episode for its Trek crowd-pleasing use of previously owned aliens and lore (Orion slave girls and the Klingons' 'nasty-looking swords' also get a mention), I rarely felt excited by the action on screen. T'Pol escapes from decon and goes on the rampage but is stopped without trouble. It only needed a shot of the deck being evacuated by hurrying crew-members to make it more urgent. Similarly, the only time things really got going for Archer were in the initial scuffle with Skalaar and at the end, on the Klingon ship. But I will say I enjoyed the twist of Archer and Skalaar's collusion and the Captain running down Klingon corridors having a firefight with the warrior race. But where were all the crew of that ship? I wanted to see Archer pinned down and having to make a last desperate dive as he leaps into the escape pod, firing all the way, but I suppose that's down to a TV budget and a TV time limit and I'm not going to criticise Roxann Dawson who was back in the director's chair, for not being John Woo, as much as I might like that.
The story was also neatly tied into Archer's earlier Klingon adventures of this season, which I believe would continue into the season finale. Such continuity is always a pleasure, especially on a series that isn't known for its story arcs. Although the CGI ships and action were fine, especially when the NX-01 was involved, I found the Tellarite ship lacking in distinctiveness where most races have strong design. Another case of end of season time limits? Equally the design for the ship of alien, Kago, was lacking, although the Klingon vessel, almost boomerang-shaped, did pique my interest as being so different to the usual Birds-of-Prey or battlecruisers. I would also say it was good to see Archer having to do things the old-fashioned way, on his own, using his fists as well as his talk. I would have liked to see Skalaar again, but although he didn't return we did at least get stronger episodes for the Tellarites thanks to Season 4.
***
Monday, 13 February 2012
Red Sky
DVD, Stargate SG-1 S5 (Red Sky)
A terrible mistake by the SG-1 team means a world will die. That's a good blurb for an episode if ever there was one, and as mistakes aren't all that common these days it made for a change. In the early seasons they had to overcome all kinds of problems and built up expectations of what could go wrong and how they'd be received by less advanced cultures (this time they're seen as Elves!), but the program had become cocky, had disabled some safeties on the Stargate so they could dial up this particular world, and because of that, they do something to the sun which means it's going to kill all life on the planet! I felt the explanation of what had happened, the circumstances of how this particular event could happen, and the way it could be resolved, were all well explained and believable. Somehow the wormhole from their Stargate picked up some kind of element that got dragged from somewhere else into the sun of the K'Tal people, and because of that the sky went red, all the plants would die and consequently the oxygen would be depleted leaving all the people dead.
I liked the way the episode started with a wormhole POV, then we're tumbling out of the 'gate with the team. I also felt it was lit and shot really well, which I've noticed has been the difference this season, but even more so because of the red light and saturation or over-exposure which wasn't overdone, but was sufficient to say this is an alien landscape. I'm not sure the people would have understood the concept of an alien, they probably thought O'Neill was referring to someone not of their village. I kind of like these stories where they visit a group of humans that have grown up on these alternate versions of Earth, created a different culture and even progressed. There's something fascinating about the possibility of the Vikings or Norse or whatever, living into the present day having altered their culture with new innovations, while also still following the gods of their ancestors.
That was what I expected to get with this episode: a mix of whatever the culture was, but with changes, and indeed there was some of that as the people seemed to worship in a traditional chapel, though obviously they hadn't been exposed to Christianity so their pagan belief system was still in place. My problem with these anthropological stories is that they either don't go far enough in demonstrating the culture or they become the same kind of story: Jack or one of the others explains their beliefs are wrong for whatever reason and/or one of the team/all of the team are taken captive. There's always one man who is their enemy, who looks on them as a threat to his power or beliefs, and another, weaker character who is less 'fundamental' and wishes to help them, but must overcome the prejudices of his way of life. Now that did look the way this one was going to go, but I liked the way, for one it was connected to Thor and the Asgard, and for another, since it was a story that had been done many times before, there was a shortcut to developments.
Previously they'd have had to discover Thor's Hammer or whatever piece of tech, but now they know all about that and the treaty the Asgard have with the Goa'uld to protect certain planets. So they get right on with trying to get in touch with the aliens, only this time there's no Thor for them to talk to, O'Neill has to deal with Freyr, who doesn't know him personally and is a little more reticent of helping him than his friend Thor would have been. I love that the Asgard are finally being given a bit more personality, and that there are internal politics a little bit - they don't immediately jump to attention and help them sort out their mess, even though SG-1 had saved them from the Replicators (or put off the close conflict a bit, they're clearly still fighting the creatures and I think that was where Thor may have been when they said he was off in a distant place). O'Neill isn't known for his diplomacy, and one of the most enjoyable things about his character is watching him bumble around trying to say the right things that will unlock what he knows all about: action.
The other characters also get proper roles to play, with the possible exception of Teal'c, who mostly stands in the background, the K'Tal a bit suspicious of him as he looks like the enemy. Carter and Daniel are the voices of reason in the episode. Where Jack is willing to try and convince the people of the true facts or just leave them to their fate and forget about them, his subordinates feel the same responsibility and don't allow anger to cloud their judgement. Daniel doesn't want to dig too deeply, and understands the futility of stripping them of their religion, while Carter feels the most responsible and comes up with a way to solve the problem. Actually she comes up with two ways, and I should have seen it coming that they'd have to fall back on the 'million-to-one' plan she mentions earlier. It is a shocking moment when the initial plan to send a rocket into the sun is sabotaged by Malkus in the 'bad guy' role, with the loss of two SG team members and the destruction of the equipment.
I can understand Jack's rage against the man, after they've just put this difficult plan into operation, taking an expensive rocket that had been built for Earth's benefit, putting all their efforts and manpower into saving their planet, only for it to be destroyed by the planet's people. But as Daniel points out, it wasn't representative of all the people, and even those that carried out the deed didn't know what they were doing, and thought they were doing good. It's not often we see Jack go off the rails, ranting and raving, almost pulling the trigger on Malkus, and shows how important in tempering him, his team are. He's the leader, without doubt, but each of the four has their part to play in rounding out the team and nowhere is this better displayed than in the scene where they convince him to keep trying to help the people.
My only problem with the episode is the strong anti-God message that is given voice through Jack. In this case it's true that these people have been deceived by a powerful being that isn't actually a god, just pretending to be one. Daniel makes the point that more important than the existence of God is the existence of belief in God, which I felt was a very tenuous argument, weakly trying to have the best of both worlds - is he saying that to believe in something false is okay as long as it means we do good? What about all the bad that 'religion' has done to the world? Actually I think it would be better to believe in nothing, rather than a lie, or to believe in the truth of the existence of God, but they're trying to have it both ways.
The villagers are portrayed as buffoons who blindly follow the teachings of their god Freyr, and the SG-1 team come swanning in and try to convince them otherwise. Actually that's not quite true, they try and keep the belief intact until it seems there's nothing to do but get them to listen to reason, and it's only Jack that's doing this. This is a marked improvement compared with earlier seasons where they were quite happy to go in and upset the status quo regardless of the impact it would have on a society. Now they're a bit better informed, knowing about the Asgard/Goa'uld treaty. That was another plus point for me, the way the treaty presented a logical reason for the Asgard's non-interference. Sometimes the galactic politics doesn't make much sense, but this time it did. I never expected the episode to end on a downer so they were always going to go back to the back-up plan, even though it had miraculously gone from a million-to-one, to a one hundred-to-one chance of success. If the planet and all its people had been annihilated it would have given the SGC something to think about, but I liked the way they guess at the Asgard having something to do with it secretly and that the plan would have failed but for their suspected intervention.
When I first saw this years ago, I didn't think much of it. I didn't like the anti-God sentiments which the series sometimes preaches through metaphor, which was very unsubtle and on-the-nose, but this time I appreciated the unfolding continuity which I didn't know about before. I found the Asgard irritating, but now I see them as more rounded, partly thanks to this episode. I liked the humour, I liked the way the team was used and that the solutions made sense and could be easily understood, and while there are still reservations about the subject matter, it does deal with some interesting questions of higher powers, the mistakes that can come from not observing procedure, and dealing with people that don't want your help, yet still finding a way to support them. A well rounded episode that also looked very nice.
***
A terrible mistake by the SG-1 team means a world will die. That's a good blurb for an episode if ever there was one, and as mistakes aren't all that common these days it made for a change. In the early seasons they had to overcome all kinds of problems and built up expectations of what could go wrong and how they'd be received by less advanced cultures (this time they're seen as Elves!), but the program had become cocky, had disabled some safeties on the Stargate so they could dial up this particular world, and because of that, they do something to the sun which means it's going to kill all life on the planet! I felt the explanation of what had happened, the circumstances of how this particular event could happen, and the way it could be resolved, were all well explained and believable. Somehow the wormhole from their Stargate picked up some kind of element that got dragged from somewhere else into the sun of the K'Tal people, and because of that the sky went red, all the plants would die and consequently the oxygen would be depleted leaving all the people dead.
I liked the way the episode started with a wormhole POV, then we're tumbling out of the 'gate with the team. I also felt it was lit and shot really well, which I've noticed has been the difference this season, but even more so because of the red light and saturation or over-exposure which wasn't overdone, but was sufficient to say this is an alien landscape. I'm not sure the people would have understood the concept of an alien, they probably thought O'Neill was referring to someone not of their village. I kind of like these stories where they visit a group of humans that have grown up on these alternate versions of Earth, created a different culture and even progressed. There's something fascinating about the possibility of the Vikings or Norse or whatever, living into the present day having altered their culture with new innovations, while also still following the gods of their ancestors.
That was what I expected to get with this episode: a mix of whatever the culture was, but with changes, and indeed there was some of that as the people seemed to worship in a traditional chapel, though obviously they hadn't been exposed to Christianity so their pagan belief system was still in place. My problem with these anthropological stories is that they either don't go far enough in demonstrating the culture or they become the same kind of story: Jack or one of the others explains their beliefs are wrong for whatever reason and/or one of the team/all of the team are taken captive. There's always one man who is their enemy, who looks on them as a threat to his power or beliefs, and another, weaker character who is less 'fundamental' and wishes to help them, but must overcome the prejudices of his way of life. Now that did look the way this one was going to go, but I liked the way, for one it was connected to Thor and the Asgard, and for another, since it was a story that had been done many times before, there was a shortcut to developments.
Previously they'd have had to discover Thor's Hammer or whatever piece of tech, but now they know all about that and the treaty the Asgard have with the Goa'uld to protect certain planets. So they get right on with trying to get in touch with the aliens, only this time there's no Thor for them to talk to, O'Neill has to deal with Freyr, who doesn't know him personally and is a little more reticent of helping him than his friend Thor would have been. I love that the Asgard are finally being given a bit more personality, and that there are internal politics a little bit - they don't immediately jump to attention and help them sort out their mess, even though SG-1 had saved them from the Replicators (or put off the close conflict a bit, they're clearly still fighting the creatures and I think that was where Thor may have been when they said he was off in a distant place). O'Neill isn't known for his diplomacy, and one of the most enjoyable things about his character is watching him bumble around trying to say the right things that will unlock what he knows all about: action.
The other characters also get proper roles to play, with the possible exception of Teal'c, who mostly stands in the background, the K'Tal a bit suspicious of him as he looks like the enemy. Carter and Daniel are the voices of reason in the episode. Where Jack is willing to try and convince the people of the true facts or just leave them to their fate and forget about them, his subordinates feel the same responsibility and don't allow anger to cloud their judgement. Daniel doesn't want to dig too deeply, and understands the futility of stripping them of their religion, while Carter feels the most responsible and comes up with a way to solve the problem. Actually she comes up with two ways, and I should have seen it coming that they'd have to fall back on the 'million-to-one' plan she mentions earlier. It is a shocking moment when the initial plan to send a rocket into the sun is sabotaged by Malkus in the 'bad guy' role, with the loss of two SG team members and the destruction of the equipment.
I can understand Jack's rage against the man, after they've just put this difficult plan into operation, taking an expensive rocket that had been built for Earth's benefit, putting all their efforts and manpower into saving their planet, only for it to be destroyed by the planet's people. But as Daniel points out, it wasn't representative of all the people, and even those that carried out the deed didn't know what they were doing, and thought they were doing good. It's not often we see Jack go off the rails, ranting and raving, almost pulling the trigger on Malkus, and shows how important in tempering him, his team are. He's the leader, without doubt, but each of the four has their part to play in rounding out the team and nowhere is this better displayed than in the scene where they convince him to keep trying to help the people.
My only problem with the episode is the strong anti-God message that is given voice through Jack. In this case it's true that these people have been deceived by a powerful being that isn't actually a god, just pretending to be one. Daniel makes the point that more important than the existence of God is the existence of belief in God, which I felt was a very tenuous argument, weakly trying to have the best of both worlds - is he saying that to believe in something false is okay as long as it means we do good? What about all the bad that 'religion' has done to the world? Actually I think it would be better to believe in nothing, rather than a lie, or to believe in the truth of the existence of God, but they're trying to have it both ways.
The villagers are portrayed as buffoons who blindly follow the teachings of their god Freyr, and the SG-1 team come swanning in and try to convince them otherwise. Actually that's not quite true, they try and keep the belief intact until it seems there's nothing to do but get them to listen to reason, and it's only Jack that's doing this. This is a marked improvement compared with earlier seasons where they were quite happy to go in and upset the status quo regardless of the impact it would have on a society. Now they're a bit better informed, knowing about the Asgard/Goa'uld treaty. That was another plus point for me, the way the treaty presented a logical reason for the Asgard's non-interference. Sometimes the galactic politics doesn't make much sense, but this time it did. I never expected the episode to end on a downer so they were always going to go back to the back-up plan, even though it had miraculously gone from a million-to-one, to a one hundred-to-one chance of success. If the planet and all its people had been annihilated it would have given the SGC something to think about, but I liked the way they guess at the Asgard having something to do with it secretly and that the plan would have failed but for their suspected intervention.
When I first saw this years ago, I didn't think much of it. I didn't like the anti-God sentiments which the series sometimes preaches through metaphor, which was very unsubtle and on-the-nose, but this time I appreciated the unfolding continuity which I didn't know about before. I found the Asgard irritating, but now I see them as more rounded, partly thanks to this episode. I liked the humour, I liked the way the team was used and that the solutions made sense and could be easily understood, and while there are still reservations about the subject matter, it does deal with some interesting questions of higher powers, the mistakes that can come from not observing procedure, and dealing with people that don't want your help, yet still finding a way to support them. A well rounded episode that also looked very nice.
***
Dakar 2
GameCube, Dakar 2 (2003) game
I don't know what happened to 'Dakar 1,' presumably that was a PlayStation game whose success led to the sequel going multi-format. It wasn't that this game had great reviews or had been lauded, but I had the impression it wasn't the standard racing game that most of the genre turn out to be. For that intangible reason I was expecting this to be a bit different and was a little bit disappointed that it was the usual kind of game, but not very disappointed as I only paid £2.99 for it on eBay! I imagined it was going to be more of a 'Smuggler's Run' affair with wide open spaces, not knowing anything about the real world Paris-Dakar race. To an extent it did contain free and open expanses, but only on the few desert courses, the rest were set tracks with so low a threshold for exploration that even driving a couple of metres off track could sometimes be enough to force you into the 'Recovery' position, a safety feature designed to stop you getting trapped on the scenery.
'Recovery' bears a little more discussion because although it's there with the best of intentions, it can be extremely annoying when it works in the wrong way (as mentioned above), but even more so when it doesn't work at all. I've been trapped inside a skeletal tree a few times and not been able to escape except by reversing for ages until I eventually break free, by which time any hope of completing the course in the goal time is lost, or when I've gone careering over a sand dune, flipped onto my side and been rolling around trying to get back up and even though I'm pressing the 'Recovery' button itself, it doesn't do anything! So there were problems with that. Another annoyance is that the 'Restart' option is clouded out during the Championship racing so if you mess up you have to either finish the race or quit - no quick restarts in this game! The graphics aren't bad for the time, but don't compare with some of the better racing games of the period such as 'Burnout 2.' Functional is the best way to describe them, although there are occasional flashes of beauty such as the sun blinding you as you turn a corner up in the mountains.
Collision detection can be as erratic as the 'Recovery' feature. Hit a rock or a sand mound and you can get stuck and at the very least it stops you dead whereas it really should be possible to bounce over such obstacles at the risk of damaging your vehicle. On the subject of vehicles there are three types to try out: Bikes, Cars and Trucks. Bikes are certainly the most agile, Cars are a bit average, and Trucks I was warned against in a review, for reasons of lack of control, but found them to be the easiest to use as they have so much power they can barge through other competitors, rarely tip over thanks to their weight, and even corner pretty well because of their great power.
Another missing element were the other competitors. There are supposedly over a hundred teams competing according to the end of race times, but you only get three opponents to actually race against (one of each vehicle). It would have been a bit beyond the GameCube to cope with a hundred racers, but a few more wouldn't have gone amiss and might have injected some degree of excitement into proceedings. Because the tracks are mostly okay, but once you've raced to the end and reached Dakar, and done the courses in reverse, the only incentive to race again is to unlock all the blacked out vehicles. This is fine and you do get into a rhythm and enjoy some tracks more than others, but there's nothing worse than getting to the end of the entire length of the race to find that for some reason you haven't been awarded one of the vehicles. I haven't worked out what criteria it is you need to meet for that to happen - is it overtaking the three opponents, coming 1st in the ranking, beating a certain time? Not having the booklet I don't know, hence frustration.
The difficulty level is a bit unbalanced as I would consider one of the most difficult tracks to be the second one, with its mud-filled course and tight bends, whereas the last track is very easy. My favourite is the Ahaggar Mountains course which is so difficult at first, but once you get the hang of speeding round cliff-top paths becomes quite a joy. I wasn't so keen on the desert tracks and their empty stretches, and ultimately I'd rather go and have the variety and excitement of 'Smuggler's Run' than this straightforward, competent racer. But there's still that one last vehicle to unlock…
I should also mention that this is one of the few games to actually use the Game Boy Advance link-up, something Nintendo hoped to get most games to do at the time to add functionality, but was often ignored or used weakly. The way it's used this time is middling to good, as there are a host of unlockable tracks to play on the GBA adding incentive to replay. The thing is, and this is probably why the GC-GBA link failed to excite the public, is that there's little point sitting there connected to your big screen with the GameCube whirring away, just to play some basic 2D tracks on your handheld! You can't download the tracks permanently so you have to stay connected, and there's no way to save your scores or times, so although the GBA tracks look fine, there's little point in doing anything more than sampling them and giving yourself another reason to keep playing the 'Cube game. Good to have extras, but not worthy of an extra star.
**
I don't know what happened to 'Dakar 1,' presumably that was a PlayStation game whose success led to the sequel going multi-format. It wasn't that this game had great reviews or had been lauded, but I had the impression it wasn't the standard racing game that most of the genre turn out to be. For that intangible reason I was expecting this to be a bit different and was a little bit disappointed that it was the usual kind of game, but not very disappointed as I only paid £2.99 for it on eBay! I imagined it was going to be more of a 'Smuggler's Run' affair with wide open spaces, not knowing anything about the real world Paris-Dakar race. To an extent it did contain free and open expanses, but only on the few desert courses, the rest were set tracks with so low a threshold for exploration that even driving a couple of metres off track could sometimes be enough to force you into the 'Recovery' position, a safety feature designed to stop you getting trapped on the scenery.
'Recovery' bears a little more discussion because although it's there with the best of intentions, it can be extremely annoying when it works in the wrong way (as mentioned above), but even more so when it doesn't work at all. I've been trapped inside a skeletal tree a few times and not been able to escape except by reversing for ages until I eventually break free, by which time any hope of completing the course in the goal time is lost, or when I've gone careering over a sand dune, flipped onto my side and been rolling around trying to get back up and even though I'm pressing the 'Recovery' button itself, it doesn't do anything! So there were problems with that. Another annoyance is that the 'Restart' option is clouded out during the Championship racing so if you mess up you have to either finish the race or quit - no quick restarts in this game! The graphics aren't bad for the time, but don't compare with some of the better racing games of the period such as 'Burnout 2.' Functional is the best way to describe them, although there are occasional flashes of beauty such as the sun blinding you as you turn a corner up in the mountains.
Collision detection can be as erratic as the 'Recovery' feature. Hit a rock or a sand mound and you can get stuck and at the very least it stops you dead whereas it really should be possible to bounce over such obstacles at the risk of damaging your vehicle. On the subject of vehicles there are three types to try out: Bikes, Cars and Trucks. Bikes are certainly the most agile, Cars are a bit average, and Trucks I was warned against in a review, for reasons of lack of control, but found them to be the easiest to use as they have so much power they can barge through other competitors, rarely tip over thanks to their weight, and even corner pretty well because of their great power.
Another missing element were the other competitors. There are supposedly over a hundred teams competing according to the end of race times, but you only get three opponents to actually race against (one of each vehicle). It would have been a bit beyond the GameCube to cope with a hundred racers, but a few more wouldn't have gone amiss and might have injected some degree of excitement into proceedings. Because the tracks are mostly okay, but once you've raced to the end and reached Dakar, and done the courses in reverse, the only incentive to race again is to unlock all the blacked out vehicles. This is fine and you do get into a rhythm and enjoy some tracks more than others, but there's nothing worse than getting to the end of the entire length of the race to find that for some reason you haven't been awarded one of the vehicles. I haven't worked out what criteria it is you need to meet for that to happen - is it overtaking the three opponents, coming 1st in the ranking, beating a certain time? Not having the booklet I don't know, hence frustration.
The difficulty level is a bit unbalanced as I would consider one of the most difficult tracks to be the second one, with its mud-filled course and tight bends, whereas the last track is very easy. My favourite is the Ahaggar Mountains course which is so difficult at first, but once you get the hang of speeding round cliff-top paths becomes quite a joy. I wasn't so keen on the desert tracks and their empty stretches, and ultimately I'd rather go and have the variety and excitement of 'Smuggler's Run' than this straightforward, competent racer. But there's still that one last vehicle to unlock…
I should also mention that this is one of the few games to actually use the Game Boy Advance link-up, something Nintendo hoped to get most games to do at the time to add functionality, but was often ignored or used weakly. The way it's used this time is middling to good, as there are a host of unlockable tracks to play on the GBA adding incentive to replay. The thing is, and this is probably why the GC-GBA link failed to excite the public, is that there's little point sitting there connected to your big screen with the GameCube whirring away, just to play some basic 2D tracks on your handheld! You can't download the tracks permanently so you have to stay connected, and there's no way to save your scores or times, so although the GBA tracks look fine, there's little point in doing anything more than sampling them and giving yourself another reason to keep playing the 'Cube game. Good to have extras, but not worthy of an extra star.
**
First Flight
DVD, Enterprise S2 (First Flight)
This was meant as a nostalgic look back at the origins of the warp program and the first steps toward human starships, but I felt more confused about it than pleasantly informed. The time span was the first thing I wasn't sure about. It's fun to see the first meeting of Trip and Archer (or it should have been, but it was a fairly low-key introduction with Trip appearing to let some steam off at the Vulcans), but because they look almost exactly as they do in the series, do the same things, where the same kind of uniform it seemed like a very short time before the start of the series. At the end we learn it was about six years or so before, but that makes me question why it took so long for humans to go from warp 1 (Zefram Cochrane first broke the warp barrier in 'First Contact' set in 2063), to going above warp 2 (about 2145?). Trip says it took the Vulcans over a hundred years to go from 1 to 2, and it's almost that here. So why in the following years did they get up to warp 5 and produce the Enterprise NX-01? The timeframe seems 'warped' itself!
If a little thing like fiddling with the intermix of the engines got them half a warp faster (2.5), surely it wouldn't have taken so long to get to warp 2 in the first place? And is Henry Archer, Jonathan's Dad, responsible for the warp 2 engine or something less than that, as I can't remember from the pilot. Jonathan Archer's never seemed like much of an engineer yet he's the one giving all the advice on the engine, and what exactly was the cause of Henry's death, and have we even been told? Apart from all these questions, and the suggestion that sometimes the problems take years to solve and other times they only take a few months, it was interesting to see back to those earlier days. I just wish more had been done to show this as an earlier period beyond Archer being a Commander and Forrest a Commodore. That was another confusing thing as I thought Commodore was a step up from Admiral, so was Forrest demoted or (more likely), am I just confusing the ranking system?
AG Robinson wasn't a bad character and seeing a bit of the rivalry between him and Archer for the first flight of the title gives the series some background, but it didn't bring the period or the situation to life for me. It's probably an episode that would appeal more to the tech-heads and those interested in the real dynamics of spaceflight and charting the progress between present day advances and the future of Trek, but I'm more interested in the fantastical areas of the series. I like that there is a basis of fact and reality that the technology and history is founded upon, but I can't see this appealing on a story level to that many people.
Again the 'senior staff' are missing, even Archer says a line for Phlox - "'Optimism,' as Phlox would say," but the doc doesn't even appear. I'm all for exploring individual characters, and this is definitely an Archer story, but I didn't feel like I'd learned that much about him. We already knew he hated the Vulcans at this point, and it's more about AG, this character that's been created for the episode. As always, if this had been a name we'd heard before, or someone we'd seen, as Admiral Forrest has been, there would be more of a connection, but we're supposed to get all that from the interaction between Archer and AG, and, I wouldn't say it was forced, but it wasn't particularly engaging. The framing story of Archer and T'Pol going off to look for Dark Matter was a bit ho-hum and although there were interesting aspects to the episode (seeing the launch ramp of the NX-Alpha and -Beta models, a step along from Cochrane's Phoenix; mention of the inevitable NX-02, maybe the first time it's been talked about?), it didn't spark.
I believe this was the 50th episode and was deliberately meant as a tribute to the space program and the connection between it and the series, and while Levar Burton, returning as director, didn't mess it up, it didn't quite become that work of feeling and momentous occasion it should have been due to the time and progress of the warp program not being clearly enough spelled out for me and not much heart to the story and characters. We should have felt Archer's grief over his Father not being there to supervise, the intense joy of getting to warp 2.5, and the sense of relief that the human warp program would continue. But the episode didn't deliver on those things and remains merely interesting from a coldly logical point of view, just like the Vulcans who watched over it.
**
This was meant as a nostalgic look back at the origins of the warp program and the first steps toward human starships, but I felt more confused about it than pleasantly informed. The time span was the first thing I wasn't sure about. It's fun to see the first meeting of Trip and Archer (or it should have been, but it was a fairly low-key introduction with Trip appearing to let some steam off at the Vulcans), but because they look almost exactly as they do in the series, do the same things, where the same kind of uniform it seemed like a very short time before the start of the series. At the end we learn it was about six years or so before, but that makes me question why it took so long for humans to go from warp 1 (Zefram Cochrane first broke the warp barrier in 'First Contact' set in 2063), to going above warp 2 (about 2145?). Trip says it took the Vulcans over a hundred years to go from 1 to 2, and it's almost that here. So why in the following years did they get up to warp 5 and produce the Enterprise NX-01? The timeframe seems 'warped' itself!
If a little thing like fiddling with the intermix of the engines got them half a warp faster (2.5), surely it wouldn't have taken so long to get to warp 2 in the first place? And is Henry Archer, Jonathan's Dad, responsible for the warp 2 engine or something less than that, as I can't remember from the pilot. Jonathan Archer's never seemed like much of an engineer yet he's the one giving all the advice on the engine, and what exactly was the cause of Henry's death, and have we even been told? Apart from all these questions, and the suggestion that sometimes the problems take years to solve and other times they only take a few months, it was interesting to see back to those earlier days. I just wish more had been done to show this as an earlier period beyond Archer being a Commander and Forrest a Commodore. That was another confusing thing as I thought Commodore was a step up from Admiral, so was Forrest demoted or (more likely), am I just confusing the ranking system?
AG Robinson wasn't a bad character and seeing a bit of the rivalry between him and Archer for the first flight of the title gives the series some background, but it didn't bring the period or the situation to life for me. It's probably an episode that would appeal more to the tech-heads and those interested in the real dynamics of spaceflight and charting the progress between present day advances and the future of Trek, but I'm more interested in the fantastical areas of the series. I like that there is a basis of fact and reality that the technology and history is founded upon, but I can't see this appealing on a story level to that many people.
Again the 'senior staff' are missing, even Archer says a line for Phlox - "'Optimism,' as Phlox would say," but the doc doesn't even appear. I'm all for exploring individual characters, and this is definitely an Archer story, but I didn't feel like I'd learned that much about him. We already knew he hated the Vulcans at this point, and it's more about AG, this character that's been created for the episode. As always, if this had been a name we'd heard before, or someone we'd seen, as Admiral Forrest has been, there would be more of a connection, but we're supposed to get all that from the interaction between Archer and AG, and, I wouldn't say it was forced, but it wasn't particularly engaging. The framing story of Archer and T'Pol going off to look for Dark Matter was a bit ho-hum and although there were interesting aspects to the episode (seeing the launch ramp of the NX-Alpha and -Beta models, a step along from Cochrane's Phoenix; mention of the inevitable NX-02, maybe the first time it's been talked about?), it didn't spark.
I believe this was the 50th episode and was deliberately meant as a tribute to the space program and the connection between it and the series, and while Levar Burton, returning as director, didn't mess it up, it didn't quite become that work of feeling and momentous occasion it should have been due to the time and progress of the warp program not being clearly enough spelled out for me and not much heart to the story and characters. We should have felt Archer's grief over his Father not being there to supervise, the intense joy of getting to warp 2.5, and the sense of relief that the human warp program would continue. But the episode didn't deliver on those things and remains merely interesting from a coldly logical point of view, just like the Vulcans who watched over it.
**
The Fifth Man
DVD, Stargate SG-1 S5 (The Fifth Man)
An action-packed opening leads to a mystery about a fifth member of the SG-1 team, called Lieutenant Tyler, and Carter, Daniel and Teal'c are locked up for being delusional as no one else has heard about this extra team member. There's also the discovery by Sam that someone's been hacking into the base computer system and reading reports and such, and what do you know, Colonel Frank Simmons pops up again to take them all to task. The recipe for a strong episode, but the promising opening soon falls into a lacklustre resolution. I guessed right away that the 'hacker' would be Simmons since he's already been shown as less than sympathetic to the SGC, but I was surprised this was confirmed before the end of the episode as I imagined it would be a running plot. Now it seems the running plot is that Simmons is working for someone that wants a regime change for political reasons and the only person that would fit that bill would be Senator Kinsey. The veiled threat that Hammond should know when to leave gracefully would eventually be borne out, I know, but I hope it isn't this season he leaves, and I don't think it is.
The mystery soon dissipates when quite early the team question their own judgement, and then Dr. Fraiser finds evidence of a pollen that passes on false memories and also begins to remember Tyler. Then we get the visual clue that Tyler got his name from a wrapper of food or something and we can easily guess he's an alien. But there's very little going on in the scenes between him and Jack, trapped on the planet, except that humans are good guys that will go back for their people and not leave them behind. Once trust has been earned he reveals himself as a Gollum-like creature, which was some nice CGI, and I reiterate this season looks beautifully and crisply shot, but it was all a bit same old, same old. It wasn't the best idea to follow a story about an alien pretending to be human to find out more about them, with one about an alien pretending to be human so he could find out if he could trust them! With Simmons also playing a role in both episodes there's a distinct sense of déjà vu, regardless that much of this occurs on a planet.
The other side of the story is Simmons' questioning of the SG-1 team and citing examples of Teal'c changing sides, Daniel being emotionally compromised (a reference to Sha're wouldn't have gone amiss here), and Carter being a suspicious character. No one was going to buy that these heroes are really compromised and there's no feeling of a real threat from Simmons - he may look and sound a bit like Agent Smith interrogating Neo in 'The Matrix,' but it doesn't go anywhere and it was a missed opportunity to cite continuity in a way that showed the team in a bad light. He did that, but halfheartedly with a few references here and there. Everyone responded predictably (Daniel looked bemused and irritated, especially at the mention of Dr. Sarah Gardner who ended up as a Goa'uld last season, Teal'c says he'd kill Simmons if he were a Goa'uld agent, and Carter looks daggers before turning the tables on him), but Hammond waved him on before long. He may well be a source of worry for the future, but it wasn't too evident in this episode. It also ends with a bit of a firefight with Goa'uld warriors, but again, they act halfheartedly and it's too similar to the previous episode where the alien sacrificed itself to save Carter. In this one the team save it and it ends optimistically that they might have another ally, but there's little concrete story going on. Almost like we've been touched by the pollen and remember an episode that was better, then wake up and realise it wasn't quite there after all.
**
An action-packed opening leads to a mystery about a fifth member of the SG-1 team, called Lieutenant Tyler, and Carter, Daniel and Teal'c are locked up for being delusional as no one else has heard about this extra team member. There's also the discovery by Sam that someone's been hacking into the base computer system and reading reports and such, and what do you know, Colonel Frank Simmons pops up again to take them all to task. The recipe for a strong episode, but the promising opening soon falls into a lacklustre resolution. I guessed right away that the 'hacker' would be Simmons since he's already been shown as less than sympathetic to the SGC, but I was surprised this was confirmed before the end of the episode as I imagined it would be a running plot. Now it seems the running plot is that Simmons is working for someone that wants a regime change for political reasons and the only person that would fit that bill would be Senator Kinsey. The veiled threat that Hammond should know when to leave gracefully would eventually be borne out, I know, but I hope it isn't this season he leaves, and I don't think it is.
The mystery soon dissipates when quite early the team question their own judgement, and then Dr. Fraiser finds evidence of a pollen that passes on false memories and also begins to remember Tyler. Then we get the visual clue that Tyler got his name from a wrapper of food or something and we can easily guess he's an alien. But there's very little going on in the scenes between him and Jack, trapped on the planet, except that humans are good guys that will go back for their people and not leave them behind. Once trust has been earned he reveals himself as a Gollum-like creature, which was some nice CGI, and I reiterate this season looks beautifully and crisply shot, but it was all a bit same old, same old. It wasn't the best idea to follow a story about an alien pretending to be human to find out more about them, with one about an alien pretending to be human so he could find out if he could trust them! With Simmons also playing a role in both episodes there's a distinct sense of déjà vu, regardless that much of this occurs on a planet.
The other side of the story is Simmons' questioning of the SG-1 team and citing examples of Teal'c changing sides, Daniel being emotionally compromised (a reference to Sha're wouldn't have gone amiss here), and Carter being a suspicious character. No one was going to buy that these heroes are really compromised and there's no feeling of a real threat from Simmons - he may look and sound a bit like Agent Smith interrogating Neo in 'The Matrix,' but it doesn't go anywhere and it was a missed opportunity to cite continuity in a way that showed the team in a bad light. He did that, but halfheartedly with a few references here and there. Everyone responded predictably (Daniel looked bemused and irritated, especially at the mention of Dr. Sarah Gardner who ended up as a Goa'uld last season, Teal'c says he'd kill Simmons if he were a Goa'uld agent, and Carter looks daggers before turning the tables on him), but Hammond waved him on before long. He may well be a source of worry for the future, but it wasn't too evident in this episode. It also ends with a bit of a firefight with Goa'uld warriors, but again, they act halfheartedly and it's too similar to the previous episode where the alien sacrificed itself to save Carter. In this one the team save it and it ends optimistically that they might have another ally, but there's little concrete story going on. Almost like we've been touched by the pollen and remember an episode that was better, then wake up and realise it wasn't quite there after all.
**
Ascension
DVD, Stargate SG-1 S5 (Ascension)
I thought this might be the one where Daniel Jackson leaves the series because of the episode title, although I wasn't ready for it to happen so early in the season and was glad to discover it wasn't about that at all. It was actually a pleasant Carter episode that's very quiet, but has some little moments of note and a return to stories set on the base or in their homes, one of those strands the series sometimes uses, while also doing the alien planet thing. They really love their alien pillars on this series and the weapon that was so central to the story looked suspiciously similar to other alien devices we've seen before, such as the one where which mesmerised them with light which made them stand around inside the dome for hours not realising how much time had passed. It may not have been seen before, but on a television budget it's often necessary for props and sets to be reused in that way.
The story isn't very exciting and it's not particularly clever, but at least it gives us some time with Sam, seeing into her civilian life a little as they've done with some of the other main characters. Not that we learn much about her, it's purely a visual tour of her house, and I was expecting O'Neill to come up with his offer of a fishing trip again when she admitted she had nothing to do, so that didn't quite ring true, especially as Jack had been sent on leave too. There was something else that didn't make a lot of sense, and that was the disbelief of Sam's colleagues. It's not until the Pentagon gets involved and bugs her house that anyone believes her story of an alien that followed her through the Stargate. How many times has this kind of thing happened, that one person experiences something which the others don't, but for the benefit of creating some tension or making the character solve their problem alone, the others simply don't believe it? It doesn't make any sense. I understand that Jack was headed to the loo, but it was still a bit hard to accept that he'd act that way. I did buy Dr. Fraiser's explanation of why Sam blacked out, because she references several events that Sam's brain has been through and I agree, it would take a toll. Maybe they should have played with that a bit more, but I suppose mental health wasn't the kind of issue covered by this series generally.
As much as I was intrigued by the scenes with Orlan (and I felt the initial strangeness of the alien swooping about as a disembodied POV was well done and created a bit of atmosphere), I didn't really see where it could go, so when he eventually died and then sacrificed himself to save Sam it wasn't as affecting as it could have been. It felt very much like a one-shot alien of the week that needed to be dealt with. Sam was never going to live with this alien guy hanging around her house even if he did turn himself human, although perhaps they should have tried something like that for a few episodes. It would have been much more sensible for him to ask her first before committing to human form. There are some magical moments with a sensitively performed score as he tells her about himself, and there's a touch of humour at other times in the way he talks or stands (or the way Carter walks round her house eyeing up the security cameras that are watching her), but there was no future in him being there.
He was likeable enough and I appreciated that he was of the same race as the Mother Nature creature (I can't remember her name!), which gives us a little more detail on them, and it was very cool to have a mini Stargate in your basement - mind you she's got such a huge basement it would be pretty cool to just have the basement! But how did he make the 'gate? How did he make the emerald? Through alien 'magic' we're supposed to assume, I suppose. It's a bit farfetched and they try and get away with it by having him say it will only work once, but even so, if the Pentagon had the list of ingredients as they did they might be able to recreate one of their own. They also get around explaining it too much by saying he 'mostly' used Earth materials so there must have been a vital component that only he had access too.
The big thing of the episode is Q's first appearance, or Pentagon Man, whatever his name was: John De Lancie, joining the roster of former Trek actors to show up and cementing the idea that 'old Trek actors never die, they just appear on 'Stargate.'' He seems to be set up as the next Mayborn, a troublemaker who puts his department's desires above any SGC qualms. I remembered him being in the series (mainly for his last appearance), but I didn't recall much of this episode. I think the only bit that jumped out at me was when Jack and Teal'c show up at Carter's place with pizza and a video of 'Star Wars' - yes, we were still using videos in those days, can you believe it? It wasn't until about 2002 that videos began to be phased out and DVDs began to come down from their lofty £19.99 price tag. It's great fun to imagine Teal'c watching 'Star Wars' (nine times!), and is a really crazy universe thing where they're in a sci-fi series talking about how Jack doesn't like sci-fi!
As much fun as it is, and as crisp and beautifully as it's shot, it didn't quite do it for me. They were going for a bit of romance I suppose, which didn't really work, and at the same time the story of an alien popping up on Earth to experience humanity for a bit is hardly the most inventive idea. It didn't go anywhere different and so even though it's a comfortable episode to watch, it doesn't go beyond that to get somewhere interesting or exciting, unlike the Teal'c episode that preceded this.
**
I thought this might be the one where Daniel Jackson leaves the series because of the episode title, although I wasn't ready for it to happen so early in the season and was glad to discover it wasn't about that at all. It was actually a pleasant Carter episode that's very quiet, but has some little moments of note and a return to stories set on the base or in their homes, one of those strands the series sometimes uses, while also doing the alien planet thing. They really love their alien pillars on this series and the weapon that was so central to the story looked suspiciously similar to other alien devices we've seen before, such as the one where which mesmerised them with light which made them stand around inside the dome for hours not realising how much time had passed. It may not have been seen before, but on a television budget it's often necessary for props and sets to be reused in that way.
The story isn't very exciting and it's not particularly clever, but at least it gives us some time with Sam, seeing into her civilian life a little as they've done with some of the other main characters. Not that we learn much about her, it's purely a visual tour of her house, and I was expecting O'Neill to come up with his offer of a fishing trip again when she admitted she had nothing to do, so that didn't quite ring true, especially as Jack had been sent on leave too. There was something else that didn't make a lot of sense, and that was the disbelief of Sam's colleagues. It's not until the Pentagon gets involved and bugs her house that anyone believes her story of an alien that followed her through the Stargate. How many times has this kind of thing happened, that one person experiences something which the others don't, but for the benefit of creating some tension or making the character solve their problem alone, the others simply don't believe it? It doesn't make any sense. I understand that Jack was headed to the loo, but it was still a bit hard to accept that he'd act that way. I did buy Dr. Fraiser's explanation of why Sam blacked out, because she references several events that Sam's brain has been through and I agree, it would take a toll. Maybe they should have played with that a bit more, but I suppose mental health wasn't the kind of issue covered by this series generally.
As much as I was intrigued by the scenes with Orlan (and I felt the initial strangeness of the alien swooping about as a disembodied POV was well done and created a bit of atmosphere), I didn't really see where it could go, so when he eventually died and then sacrificed himself to save Sam it wasn't as affecting as it could have been. It felt very much like a one-shot alien of the week that needed to be dealt with. Sam was never going to live with this alien guy hanging around her house even if he did turn himself human, although perhaps they should have tried something like that for a few episodes. It would have been much more sensible for him to ask her first before committing to human form. There are some magical moments with a sensitively performed score as he tells her about himself, and there's a touch of humour at other times in the way he talks or stands (or the way Carter walks round her house eyeing up the security cameras that are watching her), but there was no future in him being there.
He was likeable enough and I appreciated that he was of the same race as the Mother Nature creature (I can't remember her name!), which gives us a little more detail on them, and it was very cool to have a mini Stargate in your basement - mind you she's got such a huge basement it would be pretty cool to just have the basement! But how did he make the 'gate? How did he make the emerald? Through alien 'magic' we're supposed to assume, I suppose. It's a bit farfetched and they try and get away with it by having him say it will only work once, but even so, if the Pentagon had the list of ingredients as they did they might be able to recreate one of their own. They also get around explaining it too much by saying he 'mostly' used Earth materials so there must have been a vital component that only he had access too.
The big thing of the episode is Q's first appearance, or Pentagon Man, whatever his name was: John De Lancie, joining the roster of former Trek actors to show up and cementing the idea that 'old Trek actors never die, they just appear on 'Stargate.'' He seems to be set up as the next Mayborn, a troublemaker who puts his department's desires above any SGC qualms. I remembered him being in the series (mainly for his last appearance), but I didn't recall much of this episode. I think the only bit that jumped out at me was when Jack and Teal'c show up at Carter's place with pizza and a video of 'Star Wars' - yes, we were still using videos in those days, can you believe it? It wasn't until about 2002 that videos began to be phased out and DVDs began to come down from their lofty £19.99 price tag. It's great fun to imagine Teal'c watching 'Star Wars' (nine times!), and is a really crazy universe thing where they're in a sci-fi series talking about how Jack doesn't like sci-fi!
As much fun as it is, and as crisp and beautifully as it's shot, it didn't quite do it for me. They were going for a bit of romance I suppose, which didn't really work, and at the same time the story of an alien popping up on Earth to experience humanity for a bit is hardly the most inventive idea. It didn't go anywhere different and so even though it's a comfortable episode to watch, it doesn't go beyond that to get somewhere interesting or exciting, unlike the Teal'c episode that preceded this.
**
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