How can we know, we haven't gotten to the naked decontamination rubdown scene yet. Oh wait, wrong show.
8 Chevrons for me... I am impressed. And I would split that into 9 chevrons for the 1st hour (quite well done introduction, nice use of flashbacks), and 7 chevrons for the 2nd hour (a bit pedestrian compared to the 1st). Eli surprised me in a good way. I loved his monologuing to the drone/cam bit. No character truly annoys me so far, so this is promising. I expected to loathe the senator's daughter (chloe?), but she was OK. Daniels tapes were great. A better start than Atlantis, that's for sure.
I gave it a generous 4/10. It started out OK, I like the Last Starfighter. Him and Dr. Gauis Bal... I mean... Dr. Zachary Smi.... err.... Geoffry Rush... wait that's the Pirates of the Carribean guy, right? I give up. Anyway, the two 'smart' guys were entertaining. Everything else, not so much. We got the Channing Tatum wannabe, he's pretty awful... the uhh, Colonel guy.. Young? He sucks, someone should tell the actor that his calling is probably "Sitcom Dad"... the guy couldn't have been any more bland. Sad to see Senator Shooter McGavin go... I mean he wasn't that interesting, but if you don't listen to what he might say, then you might pay! It's freakin' Shooter! People were actually complaining about the girlie eye candy? REALLY? Chloe and the medic chick are actually both solid. This is freaking Stargate... what we've had so far is Grandma Carter... Teyla (who is straight up UGLY) a season or two of Jewel from Firefly over on Atlantis... and what's her face that they kicked off of Atlantis (who was actually really pretty, but kind of old). I think these two beat the ladies of the other shows combined hands down. The chick that Channing Tatum was banging was a little nasty though. As for the tone? Really this is nothing like BSG, because it's too hard to take seriously. The premise and setup is just too damned hokey. I think the show lost all credibility about at the point where they busted out the intergalactic communication devices. I know they're established Stargate canon and all, but they really sabotage the lost in space aspect. Heck, even Voyager lasted longer isolated than that . The logic of having ships going ahead of the main ship just to lay down Stargates in front of the Destiny is so ridiculously contrived, complete with the stupid 12 hour timer. Seriously... that's just laughable. The Atlantis reboot factor also can't be overlooked. So far it's pretty much the same damned thing with some superficial tweaks. Part of me is glad they didn't show the third part today. I haven't seen any previews or read any spoilers, but I'm very fearful for how bad this show might get on the planet next week. I hope to God they don't meet some noble savage local who ends up joining the ship. Oh, and poor Lou Diamond Philips didn't last too long. That's really too bad. He has some awesome points on account of the Young Guns movies... and he's about on par with a Richard Dean Anderson or a Scott Bakula as far as B-list celebrities go. I think he's much more of a keeper than Young.
Watching the episode again, there was no way the Kino could have pushed the button, it was recessed. The stones don't burn out. I agree that someone should have grabbed his bag, have two other military guys grab him, and go check out for themselves by contacting Earth. If they were going for drama and realism, that would be it. They didn't have time to barricade the door, and no welding equipment.
Who says the life support had been running that long? Perhaps the systems were just worn out, way past their expiration point as they noted. Hundreds of thousands to millions of years is a heck of a long time. And who is to say other aliens or what have you haven't visited the ship You are right about the Point of Origin, they royally screwed that up.
Whoops, due to the stupid grading system I voted 4 chevrons , which is 5/10 instead of 3 chevrons which would be 4/10. I feel a little ripped off.
At the very very beginning, as the stargate on the ship is spinning up, we see lights coming on in corridors. I got the impression that the ship had been "asleep" and was waking up when it detected an incoming wormhole. A lot of the episode seemed very contrived. I tend to think of it as lazy writing. The liberal use of the word "somehow" whenever they're "explaining" things is a dead giveaway. But that's been a symptom of syfy shows from the beginning.
So just finished watching the premiere that I had taped. I should also point out that for the first time in Stargate history, both American and Canadian viewers saw a new episode at the same time. I came into the episode expecting to not like the majority of the characters. Young is more of a traditional military commander in comparison to O'Neill, Mitchell, and Sheppard (that role now being filled by Scott). I do like Greer a lot. His first line of "What the hell was that!" was nicely delivered. However the female characters are painfully horrible. The worst however is Ming-Na in my opinion. Her few scenes reminded me of early Woolsley and therefore made me want to slam her face off a table. And even though it was only one scene, I definitely would love to point out the evolution of the O'Neill/Carter relationship. Within the last week, Space has begun their SG-1 re-run cycle back at the beginning. In these early episodes, we see how young Sam and older Jack (a lot like the Young/Scott relationship seems to be developing) began. Tonight, we saw them fifteen years later. Gone is the "Carter!" moments and the SG-1 mentor/student relationship. They are now equals and it's nice to see how its come to be that way. I'll be looking forward to next week!
I can see what they're trying to do with the show when they said it'd be "darker". Rush is supposed to be a version of Daniel who was obsessed with reading Ancient symbols back in the season 1 episode, so all he cares about is finding answers. I imagine at some point they'll break him and he'll be more "human" or whatever. And there's also Grier (I think that's what his name was anyway), which is probably the first time they've shown a "bad" soldier on the show in the 15 seasons the franchise has been around. I suppose it's funny that he's an NCO though... because officers would never end up in the brig or steal food from the supplies. I also suppose if I was racially sensitive, I'd be interested in why they made the black dude the "bad" soldier. Overall, it's very... passable. It's basically where Atlantis started all those years ago. Here's hoping they can take it somewhere before introducing Replicators, Ancients and Vampire Goths. Two small notes though - There was no Chris Judge cameo and no cameo from any of the Atlantis crew. Teal'c may just be chilling with the Jaffa I guess, but I suppose the implication is that Atlantis has been returned to Pegasus.
Life isn't fair. And time hasn't been that fair to Amanda Tapping She was decent looking at the beginning, but they didn't do much to bring out her sex appeal, and her haircuts were atrocious.
I can't wait to get home from work and watch this. And I have the added bonus of knowing one of the extras who's in this episode. So it'll be fun trying to spot her. She's a female military person on the show, she has dark hair and has it back in a pony tail. Anyone see her?
In response to Yoda, to each his own, but I thought Teyla was hot. I also thought Jewel Staite and Amanda Tapping were nice looking as well. The females on SGU look fine too me. I like that the Senator's daughter doesn't look airbrushed. She looks like she would actually be a staffperson on Capitol Hill. In response to Firehawk, when I heard about Greer's description, it did give me pause. Not necessarily because Greer was bad, but because I thought the writers were sticking the black character back into the warrior/noble savage type role. Not to mention the angry black man characterization. Aren't there any black scientists, medics, commanding officers, or politicians, IOA (?) officials perhaps? In Stargate, I feel that blacks have often been used for the muscle. But I disgress. I enjoyed SGU far more than I thought I would. I liked Rush. He's a complex character, very driven, very egotistical, but I don't think he's full on evil. There's a core of humanity there. He's sort of like Rodney unleashed, perhaps not braying as much about his accomplishments but without Rodney's sense of ethics or teamplay. I really thought that Chloe and Eli, reading their character descriptions, would get on my nerves. Neither did. I'm glad they made Eli more sympathetic due to the situation with his mom, and I thought O'Neill's asides to Eli made him come off as a bit of a jerk, even before they revealed the situation with his mom. Chloe came off as far more real and competent than I thought the character would be. I also like her friendship with Eli, but from the previews I know she'll be gravitating towards Scott. I liked Scott too. I like how he's in over his head and he knows it. He's not the snarky kind of guy like O'Neill or Shepherd. Young works as a more senior, grizzled commanding officer too. I'm reserving judgment on Greer. I think the actor, Jamil Smith, played the role well, but I'm curious to see what they plan to do with him. I also liked Tamara, but we didn't get too see a lot of Ming Na's character Camille(?), and I've got a bad feeling she's going to have an unfortunate run in with Greer before too long. The two-hour opener was effective. It didn't feel like Stargate, but at the same time they did a good job weaving in O'Neill, Carter, and Daniel. I wish they had thrown in an Atlantis character, Rodney perhaps for some of those tapes Eli was reviewing. I'm really curious to see where this show is going. Was it the Gou'ld (sp) that attacked the planet base? I thought those where Gou'ld ships? I'm also curious to see how long they will spend on internal conflict before they introduce new aliens and adversaries.
Really, really liked this. It still fit the universe, but the way it was shot and the tone made it seem so much more mature and realistic than the previous two series. Really liked it. It's kind of amazing to see how the franchise has evolved over time, both in the writing and in the production values. This feels way more cinematic than the franchise has ever felt. Just compare this pilot to Children of the Gods. Times have changed a lot.
I really enjoyed it, 8 out of 10. I had a lot of preconceived notions going in about some of the characters, especially thinking that Eli would be a McKay clone, but thankfully they didn't go there. I quite like all of these characters, but I think they're giving Scott too much to do, unless he's supposed to be the lead character. Great visual effects, solid acting, and the story kept me engaged for the full two hours.
this show needs a charater who will laugh in the face of danger....even when it's REALLY inappropriate to do so