What was the idea behind Aiden Ford?

[ReadyAndWilling]

ok, so i was watching 'Sanctuary' from S1 and i can't understand what the writers were going for with his character? to me he appears as a diluted version of Teal'c. he's smaller, has a timid voice, and he even looks a lot like Teal'c.

surely they didn't begin the show with him deserting the team in mind? or was it always their plan for him to play his role for a little while and then leave? i dislike ronon intensely, but he's much better than ford. the latter's lines are confined to addressing shepphard with 'yes sir!'

 

[Brent]

They simply did not know where to go with him, so they ended up pushing him off the show as you'll see later on. It is a classic story of not knowing what to do with a character, so they tried to make him interesting, which failed, so eventually they got rid of him. They had no real direction for Ford going in unfortunately.

 

[AJ86]

I think he was meant to be comic relief, but with McKay around and even Shep they soon realised they didn't need him.

 

[firehawk12]

He was the Mayweather/Eli Wallace of the show.

Except, he didn't have super powers like Eli, so they had no idea what to do with the "newbie" character.

 

[DWF]

He was the Mayweather/Eli Wallace of the show.

Except, he didn't have super powers like Eli, so they had no idea what to do with the "newbie" character.

Shepard was the newbie, he had no idea what a stargate was when the series started. I got the impression from the pilot that Ford had travelled off world in the past.

 

[Skywalker]

Yes, Ford had been through the stargate before.

I think it would have been better if they'd merged the characters of Ford and Bates together. Make Ford a little older and more experienced than he was originally, and also more by-the-book and less trusting than Sheppard was, thus leading to the occasional clash between the two, rather than Ford being a goofball and Sheppard's biggest cheerleader.

 

[BlobVanDam]

I never liked Ford, because he never seemed to have a clear role as a character or a personality. I really don't know where they could have gone with him if he stayed on the team. The worst part is that he annoyed me even more as a recurring role after S1!
It seems that everything about putting together SGA was rushed, and it seemed Ford was the one part where that bit them in the ass.

 

[Star Wolf]

He was the Mayweather/Eli Wallace of the show.

Except, he didn't have super powers like Eli, so they had no idea what to do with the "newbie" character.

Shepard was the newbie, he had no idea what a stargate was when the series started. I got the impression from the pilot that Ford had travelled off world in the past.

Yes, Ford had been through the stargate before.

I think it would have been better if they'd merged the characters of Ford and Bates together. Make Ford a little older and more experienced than he was originally, and also more by-the-book and less trusting than Sheppard was, thus leading to the occasional clash between the two, rather than Ford being a goofball and Sheppard's biggest cheerleader.

I was thinking Major Lorne myself. The ex special operations helicopter was just to adaptable and awesome and never freaked at the ideal that he was fighting aliens so Ford or a sergeant was not needed.

 

[Meredith]

I liked Ford, i wish they would have redeemed him after going crazy in season 2 and have him more hardened and more experienced and still struggling with the wraith juice dependency.

 

[Mark_Nguyen]

I remember reading from various producers blogs and interviews that the idea was to contrast Ford's youth and easygoing nature with Shep's relative age and trepidation at being tapped for the expedition. The implication is that Ford was an experienced SGC soldier and was supposed to be okay, and even openly enjoying all the wierd alien stuff that's supposed to make Sheppard (and McKay for that matter) hesitate.

Thing is, Sheppard got into his role pretty quickly, and the way Flanigan portrayed him had the character pretty easygoing and adapted to being stuck in a faraway galaxy right away, making any contrast with Ford redundant. At the same time, in the first season, aside from the Wraith there wasn't much weird alien stuff for everyone to gawk at. Francks did what he was told to do and played Ford as young, living in the adventure and gleefully taking in everything that happened, and in that sense the actor isn't much at fault. Any real conflict came from his youth or lack of scientific know-how compared to the other characters, and even that barely showed up before they removed him.

I did like what they did with him in the second season, giving him something for the others to care about besides basically having another guy with a gun around. They set him up with a Carter-esque arc of gaining some of the abilities of the bad guys; unfortunately they didn't explore it further and Ford faded away with a "oh, he's probably blown up, but you never know" line.

Mark

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Ford should have been an old, tough guy, for better contrast with Shep, who was more a guy who thought he was tough. For maximum contrast with crazy-hair Shep, make Ford bald.

Thing is, Sheppard got into his role pretty quickly, and the way Flanigan portrayed him had the character pretty easygoing and adapted to being stuck in a faraway galaxy right away, making any contrast with Ford redundant.

Yeah, maybe the casting frakked up the original idea. So they should have recast Ford as well and re-thought the character.

 

[RoJoHen]

Aside from them both being black, I really don't see the Teal'c comparison.

 

[Star Wolf]

Aside from them both being black, I really don't see the Teal'c comparison.

Ford was the second gun (Teal'c to O'Neil) along with the scientist McKay(Carter) and interpreter Teyla (Jackson). But then Teyla also served as the native guide which was part of Teal'c's role.

 

[firehawk12]

He was the Mayweather/Eli Wallace of the show.

Except, he didn't have super powers like Eli, so they had no idea what to do with the "newbie" character.

Shepard was the newbie, he had no idea what a stargate was when the series started. I got the impression from the pilot that Ford had travelled off world in the past.

Yeah, he did. I sort of meant in the "soldiering" sense. He'd be the one who the writers would use whenever Shepard had some military plan, "So you want us to use c4 and set up over there?"

But they really didn't need that character since everyone else would serve that role - from Teyla to Weir.

I think they also wanted someone young to reflect sort of the wide-eyed "this is awesome" optimism that Daniel had back in SG1, but that character didn't really need to exist either.

Either way, the character became redundant fairly quickly so they offed him.

 

[Admiral_Young]

I liked Ford and always thought they didn't really know what to do with him or even how to resolve what happened to him. It was always amusing anyways for me seeing as how Rainbow Sun Francks will always be known to me as one of my favorite Much Music VJ's.

 

[Morpheus 02]

Ford should have been an old, tough guy, for better contrast with Shep, who was more a guy who thought he was tough. For maximum contrast with crazy-hair Shep, make Ford bald.

Thing is, Sheppard got into his role pretty quickly, and the way Flanigan portrayed him had the character pretty easygoing and adapted to being stuck in a faraway galaxy right away, making any contrast with Ford redundant.

Yeah, maybe the casting frakked up the original idea. So they should have recast Ford as well and re-thought the character.

No, i think Ford SHOULD have been younger. It would have been ironic having the younger guy teach his commanding officer the way the universe works.

What they should have done was have some occasional flashbacks to Ford's days on an SG team. Maybe contrast a current situation with a previous one. (That way, they could use SG-1 sets without SG-1).


if they were stil stuck in the character growth dept., they could have found a way to promote him to his own team, and then bring him back as needed.

 

[apollo1984]

I agree with all of the above the writers did ot know what to do with him. I also remember reading somewhere they had a slight problem with the actor with his timekeeping and wasting time on film, though I could be wrong about that.

 

[ReadyAndWilling]

I liked Ford, i wish they would have redeemed him after going crazy in season 2 and have him more hardened and more experienced and still struggling with the wraith juice dependency.

this actually sounds really good.

couldn't they have kept him on the team even if he still needed the wraith enzyme? kind of like how they kept teal'c when teal'c needed the tretonin?

damn, as soon as i typed the last sentence i realized i'm also making ford a replica of teal'c.

 

[Admiral_Young]

I disagree that Ford needed to be younger. The age he was in the show was the age he should be. The writers just needed to come up with something for him to do and they couldn't so they wrote him out. Kind of Weir which is more disappointing to me. I liked her.

 

[Star Wolf]

I liked Ford, i wish they would have redeemed him after going crazy in season 2 and have him more hardened and more experienced and still struggling with the wraith juice dependency.

this actually sounds really good.

couldn't they have kept him on the team even if he still needed the wraith enzyme? kind of like how they kept teal'c when teal'c needed the tretonin?

damn, as soon as i typed the last sentence i realized i'm also making ford a replica of teal'c.

So the big bad are bad because they eat us to survive. But then one of the stars needs to eat the big bad to survive.