5 Responses to “Stargate M.E.H. Guest Review”

1. McDucky Posted: Oct 7th, 2009 at 9:19 am

   1 I wasn’t impressed with SG:1′s opening, either. It was like a lame excuse to pull characters back together and introduce an alien into the mix, and the props of the first episodes were awful. I absolutely hated Captain Carter for the first FIVE episodes. They did do a better job by avoiding the freaking flashback syndrome, though. Atlantis was the same way – I absolutely hated Rodney and Sheppard at first, as well, and they turned out to be two of the best characters in the show. I’m going to say this one will pick up when they leave the ship to go planet-side. I think the appeal of Stargate is going offworld to weird places and running into impossible situations. I also think the campier the episodes get, the better it will get. It has no “in-jokes” yet, and we really don’t know anything about a lot of the characters. I think nerd kid will eventually get better – he’s already touching things he shouldn’t be touching.

2. Archon Divinus Posted: Oct 7th, 2009 at 11:24 am

   2 “And speaking of Fox, it’s also up against Joss Wheedon’s edgy and intriguing and better written Dollhouse in the same time slot.” I like Dollhouse, I really do, but I would never call it edgy, intriguing or well written. Epitaph One (which was edgy, intriguing and well written) made me believe that it could be an amazing show, but so far season 2 has failed to live up to that. The real problem is that the premise just isn’t strong enough for a weekly show. Maybe it will get better when we start seeing more of Echo, rather than the imprint of the week. As for SGU, I enjoyed the premier. I like the premise (although it isn’t exactly original), I like the characters well enough, and I like the story well enough. I’m not going to say it’s the best show ever, but I’ll definitely keep watching it.

3. Ajanhelendam Posted: Oct 7th, 2009 at 8:03 pm

   3 When compared to BSG, SGU does seem weaker at the premiere, but then again BSG opened as a mini-series which allowed it a lot more screen time in comparison. Though SGU opened with a double episode, it was equiv to half of the mini-series. Furthermore, BSG was a reboot so there was no canon to worry about. I think the continuity/canon issues are bothering fans of the series, but probably wouldn’t have been noticed by a new audience which SGU is definitely aiming at. Enough fans didn’t like the BSG reboot at first. Heck, it launching as a mini-series is a common indicator that they didn’t know how the public was going to react since this wasn’t a minor reboot at all, basically a whole new premise loosely based on the original back story. Richard Hatch was originally against it. In many ways BSG was a Hail Mary. As for the characters, can you really judge them in the premiere besides the obvious stereotypes. If you thought Helo was memorable I’m not sure if you’re talking about his chiseled features or his dialog since I assumed he was cannon fodder in the mini-series. I think Samurai Art Guy might be mixing it up a bit. I seriously, didn’t pay attention to Helo and I watched the mini-series more than once before the start of the first season. Maybe, he wasn’t including the mini-series, but then the premieres would be equally as stellar between the two. As for Dollhouse, it’s not one of Whedon’s better works and even he admits it due to struggling with FOX, but then again FOX did mess up Firefly’s intended story line as well, though Dollhouse seem to be more greatly impacted. Dollhouse does seem to have a lot of potential, but along with Archon, it’s premise doesn’t seem to lend itself well to the episodic format, but it’s the premise, which is vaguely new to tv at best but not to sci-fi at all, that is intriguing. I do like Whedon a lot, especially Firefly, but his stuff is far from original in premise, with the possible exception of Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog. I can’t think of a parody in a similar vein. But who really cares if the premise is original or not. If most of us did, would novels be as prolific as they are. What about comic books, the king of rebooting so we can re-tell/rehash again, we don’t even need to bother with a knock-off. Seriously have you thought about how long some of these characters have been going. As for me, I’m not judging the opening of SGU until this 3-part opening arc is finished, 2-part premiere + 1 based on the episode listings. And since this isn’t suppose to be a reboot of the franchise, I’m not expecting to be wowed either, but rather I’m hoping to see a rapport between the main cast which typically takes a couple of episodes to reveal itself. And I don’t agree that this is a “Quest in Space” (if by quest you mean successfully dial the 9 symbol address then quest completed already), rather it’s a “You Can’t Go Home Again” making it very similar to Lost in Space, Voyager, Quantum Leap and Sliders in general premise. As for the comparisons to other characters that Samurai Art Guy makes, their superficial at best. Dr. Smith was a traitor/saboteur in Lost in Space. He never planned to be on Jupiter 2. It’s very unlikely that Dr. Rush is working for the enemy. However, I suspect that Dr. Rush will continue to play the role of the primary antagonist in the vein of Ahab a la Moby Dick instead. Since he’s the only one really proficient in ancient he’ll be able to maintain his position, but I’m doubting he’ll be the one saving the day; otherwise, why bother with Eli. And as Eli being a “fish-out-of-water”, Wesley Crusher|Will Robinson stand in, what?!? The only person that was probably originally meant to be on “Destiny” was Dr. Rush. The expedition team hadn’t been assembled yet by, the expedition leader, Col. Telford, so basically everyone but Rush is a “fish-out-of-water”. Only thing Eli shares with Wesley and Will is intellect since he clearly isn’t a model student as alluded to and he currently lacks the confidence the other two start out with being unemployed, living with mom, and playing video games a lot to the point where his speech is inundated with gamer jargon. Yeah… not Wesley Crusher or Will Robinson. If anything Eli is the opposite of Rush setting him up to be a foil. Strangely, Eli is reminding me of a younger version of Steve Wassenfelder from Defying Gravity.

4. Aegis Posted: Oct 7th, 2009 at 8:10 pm

   4 I really enjoyed SGU’s intro – though yes i can see where they begged, borrowed and stole from most every other successful sci-fi show. I wouldn’t've made the comparison with dollhouse mind you – for one thing dollhouse sucked hugely for the first few eps so SGU is already ahead there. For another, dollhouse doesn’t deliver starship combat directly to the vein. There were some moments i didn’t like – the forced character development “tell me about your father – i want to know about the man who died so i can live! *heart* *cry* *slashwrists*”. And my biggest gripe with it was that this ship with uber mathematicians aboard could not put two and two together to see a way to press a button inside a shuttle while they were outside of it – despite having just found radio controlled camera drones! FFS duct tape and a pencil and you have a remote button pusher! clearly they needed RDA with them to think of that one. anyway, i thought it was a decent enough first ep.

5. Darren J. Gendron Posted: Oct 7th, 2009 at 8:48 pm

   5 dude, who watches things live then complains about commercials anymore? Seriously, there’s this thing called a DVR, and before that a VCR. 20-year-old tech really invalidates THAT gripe. On power struggles and characterization – freaking Ming Na. They needed a name actor with gravitas to quickly establish a potential power challenge. Between her and the colonel, that’s a mess to where Rush can’t hold on to for long. And a special note – holy crap a major series is giving one of the positions of power to a female minority. And L.D. Phillips is another case where we’re going to see more of him later. He’s on for at least five more episodes, and will probably be the archetype of the one keeping the home torches lit. overall, good action and good premise. I’m hopeful that this doesn’t turn into a “chased by yet another super-evil alien race,” because the stargate universe has already used that magic bullet FOUR TIMES now. And with it being only 80 people on that ship (natch, 79 minus the senator), that’s really not Nina/Pinta/Santa Maria crew numbers. It really makes the math and chance of survival bleak (so yeah, no air-locking). Worrying about this show not lasting the season or doing poorly is just plain silly. It had the best Stargate premier since 2005, and it had more viewers than Dollhouse.