How would you have done SG: Atlantis differently?

[ReadyAndWilling]

This show seemed to have a lot of potential, but through seasons 3 and 4 it kind of falls short. It picks up really in S5 and IMO, finds its footing here.

Adding another dominant race (instead of the replicators) would have been really great.

 

[Kirby]

I would have made the Genii, or some other Pegasus society, much more advanced, on par with the Atlantis team. I still would have had the Wraith hibernating but have more of them awake and fighting the Genii in a small scale war. The Genii, learning that we had Atlantis would demand access to the city, and demand control of the city in their attempts to stop the Wraith.
Much tension between the Genii and the Milky Way humans, until the Wraith were woken up at the end of the first season which would ultimately lead to a cooperation of sorts between Atlantis and the Genii. Robert Patrick's character would have lasted about 10 episodes, and probably been killed by the Genii instead of the Wraith. Sheppard would have been much more unprepared to be a military leader than he was, and Ford would have been a little older and much more seasoned than he really was, not afraid to give Sheppard guidance on occasion.

Atlantis would have had more cool stuff in addition to all of the failed experiments that littered it's halls.

 

[crouteru]

Not ditch Weir and Beckett after season 3 instantly comes to mind.

Better follow-through with some of the long-term storylines, specifically the Genii and Michael. They just seemed to fade away into disappointing conclusions.

Tone down McKay a little bit. Sometimes I wish another character would put him in his place instead of enduring his arrogance.

 

[Harvey]

I wish the show had spent a little more time exploring the city than it did. The show was called Stargate Atlantis, not Stargate Renaissance Village. Very rarely was the scope of the city conveyed, and the sense of wonder its exploration should have produced was almost always absent.

The character of Teyla turned out to be a big liability, especially after the first season. For one, they should have done a better job at casting. Rachel Lutrell has never been a strong actress, and after five seasons it's obvious she doesn't have much chemistry with her co-stars. How they managed to hold onto her while losing other regulars left and right totally bewilders me, honestly.

 

[bullethead]

-Make Atlantis a whole lot bigger so that it can hold industrial stuff and be even more impressive as the capital of the Ancients.
-Give Ford more to do by making him an enthusiastic but experienced SG team member to offset Sheppard's inexperience and don't ditch him in S2.
-Get somebody else to play Teyla and have her be more useful as a guide to the Pegasus societies.
-Less encounters with the Wraith and make them more dangerous in each fight.
-Don't have the Genii screw over the Atlantis group so early in the show.
-More building alliances with societies around Pegasus.
-Instead of the Asurans, have another human population find a wrecked city ship and use the tech to start expanding their influence by force.
-Ditch Ronan or rewrite him to be a more interesting character.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Keep Shep, McKay and Weir. Lose Teyla as a character and recast Ronan with someone who can act.

Treat both the Wraith and Genii more seriously as foes. Lose the haunted house theatrics for the Wraith. They would be far scarier if they looked and acted "normal," yet were still in effect cannibals.

Be honest about the premise. If the Atlanteans are going to stay in Pegasus, they either need to turn a blind eye to the Wraiths' depredations or they need to commit to a campaign of genocide. I wouldn't mind the genocidal option - it's gutsy. But once you've chosen that path, you can't pretend that the results can ever be anything but an ethical mess. Embrace the mess and you might come up with something brilliant. At the very least, it won't be the same old crap.

Be logical about the premise. By staying in Pegasus, the Atlanteans are endangering Earth and putting themselves in a situation where they may be forced into genocidal behaviors. Stumbling across the odd ZPM doesn't seem like adequate inducement. Come up with a better reason for them to stick around.

Ban all Renaissance Faire villages from the cosmos. I know the budget is tight, but make an attempt to come up with decent costuming. The vaguely Soviet costumes of the Genii showed some imagination for instance. And while you're at it, purge the costume department of Robes for Cliched Advanced Aliens. If you must include the Ancients, come up with anything else for them to wear. I don't care if it's a tutu or clown suit.

Forget the Replicators exist.

Be careful how you write the characters so they aren't such dunces. For instance, the "Michael" problem should never have happened. They should have planned in advance what to do in case of failure (kill Michael) so they weren't caught off guard when they failed. If they weren't willing to kill a human-looking Michael, then they should have known better than to embark on the experiment in the first place.

 

[The Wormhole]

-I would have kept Colonel Sumner as military commander of Atlantis (he'd still answer to Weir), with Sheppard only commanding Atlantis's primary SG team. I think it would have made for a more interesting dynamic.

-The Genii would be a major player in the series, with Kolya being something like the Atlantis version of Gul Dukat.

-Make the Wraith more like that warlord Ronon fought in Sateda. Seriosly, that guy was scary and badass, which is what we would expect of an alien race that was a threat to the Ancients.

-Actually bring back the Ancients instead of Replicators posing as them. Make them villains as a result of millenia fighting the Wraith.

-Keep Weir and Beckett. But, if for some reason Weir had to go, I'd immediately replace her with Woolsey.

 

[Caliburn24]

I'd have made the show darker(not physically darker like SGU) where you cannot waltz into heavily defended Wraith ships and bases every week with a four man team and get out in one piece. The Wraith themselves would be tougher, smarter and much more individualistic.

There would be no contact with Earth, none. The Genii would be just one of many human groups fighting the Wraith in a vicious wide ranging war.

At the end of the first season Atlantis would fall to the Wraith and our heroes would go on the run Rebellion Alliance style fighting the Wraith for the next three or four seasons from planet to planet.

At least one main character would die a season, but plenty of new allies and cast members would be found. There would also be a ton of reoccurring characters.

Basically turn SGA from a Voyager clone into something with more shades of DS9.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Kolya being something like the Atlantis version of Gul Dukat.

Basically turn SGA from a Voyager clone into something with more shades of DS9.

Why do people here always describe shows I want to see and the people making the shows seem to have no frakkin' clue? Everyone: TRADE PLACES!

 

[Chocolate Log]

At the end of season 3 freeze the city and its inhabitants in time due to a mistake by Rodney. When the city returns to normal some arbitrary amount of time say 1000 years has passed. The universe has changed in the following ways.
:- Sometime just after Atlantis froze something defeated the replicators and the wraith.
:- The Genii having taken the credit for the defeat have become one of the dominate advanced forces in the galaxy
:- In the first episode of the new season someone kidnaps Teyla with the intent to re-engineer the wraith race.
:- For a reason left to explore at a later date no contact can be made with earth, or any gates in the milky way galaxy.

I know its all gone a bit Andromeda but I promise no Kevin Sorbo in sight.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

I know its all gone a bit Andromeda but I promise no Kevin Sorbo in sight.

Andromeda minus Sorbo plus Flanigan. I'm in!

 

[The Wormhole]

Some more thoughts:

-Keep McKay as an arrogant douchebag. He was fun then. Making him sympathetic and reconciling with his sister ruined the character.

-Continue to show an international presence on Atlantis. They did alright with this in the first season, but afterwards, everyone was American except for characters established in S1 to be non-American (McKay, Zelenka, Beckett, Chuck).

 

[ReadyAndWilling]

yea, i think the casting of teyla was a bad decision.

they should have gone for someone who is attractive and can actually act.

maybe an amazon version of carter or something like that?

 

[Training]

I would have made sure that the characters were copies of SG-1. Make sure Sheppard and Telya stopped acting like Jack and Teal'c. Made sure that Ronon was never cast.

Stopped the Wraith from being killed of easily. In fact encounters with the wraith should been rare. They should be a mysterious and all powerful species that can't be killed simply by shooting them. I liked them in S1 because they were an enemy to be feared. They couldn't be killed off easily.

Made the Genii a more effective enemy. Instead of a bunch of A idiots looking for C4.


No contact with earth. Full stop.

 

[DarKush]

-Changed the Wraith. I would've made them a bit more terrifying. Perhaps by having them eat humans instead of sucking their life force out. When I was watching the movie Pandorum and saw those creatures, I immediately thought of the Wraith and realized that's what they should've been like. Something like the Pandorum creatures or the Reapers from Blade 2. Not sure I would've had the Wraith be the ones to defeat the Ancients. Maybe left that to the evil Asgard or the Asurans.
-I would've made Teyla and the Athosians more alien-looking. (BTW, I had no problem with Luttrell as an actress and she looked fine to me). But I thought the Athosians were boring and more could've been done with them.
-Done more with the Genii. I probably would've had them be more up front as villains, saving the Wraith, Asurans, and Asgard for special occasions.
-Done more with Ford. I didn't mind how he was mutated, but I wish the character had been more established before he took that dark turn.
-Kept contact with Earth to a bare minimum as the series progressed. By the end, it was too easy to get to Earth.
-Not make Earth the primary target. Earth is almost always the primary target in almost any sci-fi show. So, maybe I would have the Atlantis team trying not only to save themselves but ultimately a group of Ancient descendants or something like that, to remove Earth as the tried and true indicator that something is major on the line.
-Developed Shepherd-Teyla relationship more. At times it seemed to was going in one direction but then the writers veered off. I would've definitely sent them down the path to a relationship, not sure they would've reached it though.
-Would not have killed Beckett off. (When they bought Beckett back as a clone, I would've made him the real Beckett and the one killed off would've been a clone infiltrator)
-If I got rid of Weir (probably wouldn't), I would've replaced her with Woolsey immediately and had Carter guest star as the captain of a starship. I thought Carter brought nothing to the show.
-If not Woolsey as head of Atlantis I would've used Colonel Ellis more or the dude who was Skinner on the X-Files. Though Woolsey would've been my preferred choice.
-Give some non-white people the Ancient gene.
-Built up the evil Asgard more. Included them in the series finale.

 

[Brikar99]

I would've given the seasons some structure. As it stands, only Season One has any kind of good progression, building over time to a climax. The rest of the show just meanders around far too much and then throws a midseason two-parter and a finale into the mix and calls it a day.

 

[Leroy]

I would have given seasons 4 and 5 more of a direction as opposed to some good two parters and then some terrible filler. I would have had stories that would feature the Travelers and the Vanir more.

 

[Star Wolf]

The series lost me early. With no vampires with a soul or vegatarian vampires able to live off pigs blood the Wraith just seemed too tough. Then the magic bullets worked better and better against them.

 

[Harvey]

The physical resilience of the Wraith was sure forgotten in short order, wasn't it? Remember in the pilot when all that remained of one Wraith was a hand, and it was still moving? By season two or three the largest Wraith guards were being dropped by a short burst of a small machine gun.

 

[The Wormhole]

Never question the might of the P-90! No alien can stand against it. Except for Priors, which is a reminder of how serious a threat the Ori pose.

And Replicators. But then extinction twice can't even kill the Replicators.