EPISODE REVIEW: Stargate: Universe: “Air, Parts 1 and 2” (Season 1, Episodes 1 and 2)

I know, I know, I'm just yanking your chain.

There might be an element of similarity that isn't immediately apparent: Smith wasn't supposed to be on the Jupiter II mission, he was sabotaging it, and got trapped on board, so everything that happened was his fault. I'm beginning to wonder if, perhaps, everything that's happening with the folks in this show isn't directly Rush's fault. He's got some kind of ulterior motive. How far does that go?

It seems reasonable to assume he had *some* idea of what to expect on the other end of the Stargate - no one was as deep in to the research as him, and they've repeatedly implied that no one can really follow what he's doing. He could have worked on this for months, and no one would have even noticed. What if he enticed the Lucian Alliance to attack Icarus, in the hopes of prompting exactly the situation we now see?

The only negative on this is that you'd think he would have packed some more food or something.

In any event, he's more like the anti-Smith: he *IS* useful, they can't do without him if they're ever to get home. A Dr. Smith that you can't afford to just kill or maroon somewhere is vastly, vastly worse than the *real* Dr. Smith.

Yeah, that's why the formula ended with "minus humor."

Anyway, I mean he's the character that always knocks things off balance just when everyone is getting into the groove.

Not the feeling I'm getting. Certainly I wouldn't fear for the safety of children around Rush like I would with Smith, and of course Rush isn't a damn bit funny. Smith was basically comedy relief who bent the whole show to his self serving whims, on and offscreen. Rush is kind of a jackass, but at the same time they need him.

Dr. Rush = Dr. Zachary Smith in Lost In Space - humor?

Yeah, well, anything that obscures the actor's face has a short lifespan on TV. The snakeheads continued to show up in ceremonial roles well in to the shows' run, though.

Remember those cumbersome combat helmets and Jaffa headpieces? Those got lost pretty quick too.

Plus, it's kinda funny seeing CRT's in Stargate Command instead of LCD's.

Sorry, a local broadcast channel started showing 1st season reruns and I'm enjoying it.

I was surprised they dropped the "Cold" thing without explanation. I mean, how hard would it have been to say "We figured out why it did that, and we got it to stop"? I got a kick out of the difference between the SGC gate and the Atlantis gate thing, too, Gin. I'd forgotten about it, but I remember laughing at it too.

Yes, they quickly dropped the idea that you arrived on the other side of the gate all cold and frosty. I like how in the first episode of Atlantis, which apparently had an upgraded stargate which was digital instead of using physical dialing, someone started the old slow outgoing sequence of "Chevron one encoded... chevron one locked..." and someone else was like "Oh for pete's sake, just push the damn buttons and get it over with!" Click click click and it just lit up and finished. I was dying laughing. The writers were smart in that they recognized that the old crap was just tired and no longer had any drama. So we didn't have any analogue of old Walter.

but I've always felt that SG was respectful of the world's major religions. It only dealt with long dead ones. My wife and I were studying biblical Hebrew at the time the original movie came out and absolutely loved the scene in the catacombs where Sha'uri is teaching Daniel the Abydosian dialect of Egyptian (yes, we are language geeks). We enjoyed the premise of basing ancient deities, religions, cultures and legends on visiting aliens. However, as the series progressed it moved away from those elements and we got a little bored with it. The Ori arc was just excruciating (except for the leather-clad Claudia Black).

However, I never felt its treatment of the Ori or Gua'uld was specifically anti-religion, it was anti-false religion or anti-religious victimhood. Within all religions is the opportunity for corruption and abuse (I've seen too much myself), and all people should universally despise it when it happens, but it doesn't mean you throw the baby out with the baptismal water.

BTW 3.0, you mentioned the people being "thrown from the Destiny gate." This goes back the SG-1 episode "The Fifth Race" where Jack rigs up a means of dialing the Asgaard gate, which is so far away it needs an extra coordinate, and supposedly that is the reason he is flung through the gate. But just like how gate travelers came through cold and disoriented in the first couple of episodes, that was a technical detail that was long forgotten by the time they dialed up Atlantis.

Can't say anything about SGU. I don't have cable.

Oh, undoubtedly.

Speaking of which, I've been toying with the idea of an unintentional allegory for the War on Terror in the show - with SG1 being the war in Iraq and the SGA being Afghanistan. I don't think this is something anyone connected with the show intended, but these sorts of zeitgeisty things slip through occasionally.

"I don't want any of our more conservative readers to get the feeling that the Franchise is "Stargate: Evangelical Atheists" either, because it's not."

Absolutely. I didn't mean to imply that every episode was filled with some hate filled anti-religion rant. For anybody reading this I think that because of its pro-military stand both Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis are pretty entertaining genre shows for us Conservatives viewers. The franchise as a whole is probably one of the most Conservative friendly sci-fi shows going.

There's a certain class of atheist who vigorously reject anything pertaining to religion, regardless of whether it's a plot twist in a story, or an object d'art, or what have you. It's not enough that they don't believe, (I have many friends who are more standardized atheists), but they're angry about it, and they don't want anyone to believe. It's a passion with them.

The central irony being that they treat their atheism in pretty much exactly the same way a fundamentalist Christian treats their religion: it guides all aspects of their life, their interaction with other people, and even what kinds of books and shows they'll put up with. My friend is one of those. His experience isn't standard, of course, because he's so driven by his passions that even my other atheist friends call him a jackass and wish he'd go away (It's fun having a Pseudonym and being able to get away with saying stuff like this! I'd never be able to do it if people knew who I was!), but it's interesting to note that for some people, the show isn't atheist enough.

I never felt that Landry was the church-on-sunday-killing-ori-on-saturday-night kind of guy, but he made a few comments that seemed to me to indicate that he wasn't opposed to it. I honestly don't remember Mitchell saying anything bad about organized religion, and I found his comments about his grandmother to be loving, if a bit condescending. It's possible that there were ones I didn't see, though, since I've missed a lot of those years, too.

In the show's defence, there is one theological line they haven't crossed: They've made it clear that the Goauld were not gods, they merely pretended to be for personal power. Likewise, they made it very clear that the Ori were not gods, they were just a noncorporeal intelligence that was viciously manipulating a religion for their own personal goals (Much like, say, Al Quaida is doing, and I think that's a deliberate paralel). At no point in the shows (that I'm aware of) has anyone ever said "There is no God" nor have they said that there isn't a *real* God somewhere, behind all the charletans.

Which is not me saying you're wrong, 'cuz you're not - the show is irreligious by definition - but I don't want any of our more conservative readers to get the feeling that the Franchise is "Stargate: Evangelical Atheists" either, because it's not. Hence, I'm striving to be clear.

So TJ's a catholic, huh? I'm not, but that *is* interesting.

yes she was.

Its funny to hear that an atheist would have a problem with the show. I can't really comment on General Landry. I never really got the vibe that he was religious. But, since he was always mocking his religious grandmother I'd have to say that Col. Mitchell seemed pretty anti-religious to me. In fact, the last two seasons of Stargate SG-1 the "Fargate" years with the Ori were the most anti-religion of the series.

As a final footnote I have to point out that my brother claimed that on Stargate Universe he saw the medic character wearing a crucifix. I honestly don't remember. If he's correct, that could be interesting.

It's interesting. The Soviets never came up with a great SF TV series - which is odd when you think of it - but I've always thought that if they did, it would have been something like Stargate, where the heroes heroically rob foolish theists of their beliefs for the greater good. I agree with you that it's basically anti-religious as a default position, but a militant and evangelical atheist friend of mine refuses to watch it becuase, for some crazy-ass reason that he can't explain to me, he feels it's too pro-religious. I dont' know how he gets that. I don't understand, but evidently it's got something to do with either Ascension, or maybe the fact that they've never gone after one of the big modern world religions like Christianity, Islam, Sikhism, Buddhsim, Hindusim, Judaism, whatever.

Like I said, I don't pretend to understand it, but I guess no matter how you look at something, and no matter what message you intend to send, there's always someone who'll take it as a complete 180.

I want to say that General Landry was implied to be pro-religion, if not actually religious himself, and the Ark of Truth seemed to be implying that religion had some kind of deeper value beyond its literal truth, too, if you want to take the opposite viewpoint.

Oh, I agree with you totally. Outside its constant negative depiction of organized religion, the Stargate series has always appealed to me as a Conservative because its been so pro-military. So much so that the head of the Air Force had a small cameo in an episode. Like I said I'll give the creators the benefit of the doubt but I just think this show is going to get preachy (the brain-trust are Canadians after all). Already you can see where cliques are going to form and you just know that the civilian vs military angle is going to be played.

I guess I'm reluctant to embrace the show for the same reasons you've stated. Yes, the show is dramatic and well done, but its not very fun. It seems to be dark and cynical, everyone is flawed. There's no sense of wonder or excitement. Just a bunch of folks with problems at each others throats trying to survive. I don't know if I want to commit to a series like that.

I loved that link. It was a great review but those comments. Wow. You forget sometimes how many morons there are out there.

Thanks, Fornax.

You could well be right. Based on what we've seen thus far makes it Conservative-friendly. Realy, the previous shows were (Generally) not all that amazingly right of center, but they had respect for the military, respect for the US government, and generally upheld what we'd consider to be conservative values, there was some moral decorum (Jack and Carter never dallied, though obviously they both wanted to, and Jack was clearly not a lothario). It is entirely possible that they'll throw all that away, of course, but they've earned my faith, at least provisionally. As of right now, it's something Conservatives should like, at least guardedly, if only for the fact that it drives liberals loopy just to know it exists.

Read some of the comments on the AV club here http://www.avclub.com/articles/stargate-universe-pilot,33633/ and you'll see what I mean - people who've obviously never watched any of the shows, who nevertheless feel compelled to sound off about how terrible it is that there's a show out there which promotes the US Military as an honorable organization, and that "Wingnuts" such as ourselves watch it and "Get all worked up over it."

My major concern (Which I stated over at the AV club, BTW) is that the show isn't really much fun, nor does it have much audience identification, which have always been the two strongest aspects of the franchise to date.

Great review, very insightful. To continue the "derivative" theme I thought the action beats were cliche. "Get away from the console!" "GET AWAY FROM THE CONSOLE!" as the soldier points the gun. "PLEASE DADDY OPEN THE DOOR!" as a character sacrifices himself. We haven't seen these scenarios before. Yeah right. The second hour was a dull talk a-thon. And the Galactica-eque wonky camera movement got a little distracting. I haven't given up on the show this early but thus far I'm cool to this new version and I'm a big fan of the franchise, I have every season on DVD.

The only quibble I have with your review is the Conservative angle. I'm not sure in the long run Conservatives are going to like this show. As you said this is the show Cooper and Wright always wanted to make, and I've always felt that they wanted to make Stargate more political then SyFy would allow. They have gotten political at times "The Road Not Taken" (yuck) for example. Now they've already said this is going to be an "edgy" show and we on the right know what that's code for. Remember Ming Na's character is reportedly going to be a lesbian so the opportunity for GLAAD preachiness abounds. But we'll have to wait and see. But I can't shake the feeling that Stargate Galactica just won't be able to resist being "socially relevant" in a way that its predecessors weren't

On a final note I have a pointless nitpick. If the survivors took so little with them then where did they get a cammo outfit that fits the chunky nerdy guy? They just have a bunch of cammo clothes in plus sizes hanging around?

Wow, that's an unexpectedly strong reaction. It just makes me want to know what she disliked all the more! Bailing on it in less than a half an hour is...well...I don't know what to make of that. It wasn't great, it wasn't epic, it wasn't mindbending entertainment by any stretch of the imagination, but it certainly wasn't *That* bad.

Ya' gotta' find out what she hated. Ply her with news that there's an SGA DVD movie in the works, and also another SG1 one, and see if that'll get her to talk...

This show has almost all the sci fi archetypes, a mad scientist and his good natured nerdy assistant, the wounded older leader and his heroic but green lieutenant, the secrete love interest, the pretty and humane girl, the insubordinate but I got your back NCO. I am sure we will get more in coming episodes since it looks like we may have the cold administrative type the medic over her head and of course we have the pretty girl that now has to live up to her fathers sacrifice for the greater good.

Except for the soft porn we got at the beginning of the show this could be a 1930’s or 1940’s Flash Gordon or Buck Rogers serial. It even has the ancient alien space ship and they are in a galaxy far far away. This does not mean it’s going to be bad, the only real complaint I have is that it felt like they had an episode and a half of material and made it stretch to fit a two hour time slot. But what is with the psy corps like uniforms is SGC going fascist on us.

As R3 said it looks like they have taken a little from column A and a little from column B for this show. Hopefully it will not become Starlost with planetary side trips or the planet of the week type show.

Even though the ship looks cool it would be nice to see a realistically designed ship just once on a sci fi TV show or movie for that matter the only one that made any kind of sense was the DeathStar in Star Wars how lame is that.

I was disappointed to see SGA come to an end because my wife is a Stargate fanatic and I have been able to get her season sets of the various Gates for her birthday and Christmas every year. She watches them over and over again and has as much of an encylopedic knowledge of the Stargate 'verse as I do of Mayberry.

So when I saw that this new show was starting at 8 last night, I happily handed her the keys to my parents' house (they have satellite and were out of town) and sent her and the kids over to see it. They excitedly went.

Imagine my surprise when they showed up back at our house at 8:35 pronouning the show a "waste of time" and a "total dog". My wife had less complimentary things to say about it. I asked a couple questions but, according to them, it wasn't even worth commenting on.