Ewww.. SGU let's have some freaking protocol

[bullethead]

Well I would agree Rush tended to take the view of what they needed to do too survie. Whilst Young seemed to take the view of what needed to be done so everyone survived. Rush at times appeared to be willing to sacrifice someone if it improved the survival chances of the remainder.

Which is right or wrong depends on your point of view, but Rush appeared to be more willing to take the tough decisions than Young.

But then, that's because Col. Young had actual empathy for the people around him, and Rush just didn't give a shit. He scarcely cared about anyone but himself. If other people had to die so he could live, so be it.

I wouldn't say Rush didn't give a shit, but he was alienated from the crew by his overall shitty life and the crew alienated him by being stupid and/or assholes. But I wouldn't say Young had empathy for the crew (aside from his little clique of officers), at least in the first 1.5 seasons. A lot of the time he was an asshole and seemed to give the bare minimum of fucks needed to be perceived to be the leader. His alienation of the civilians by having his handful of closest minions do everything lead to the freaking mutiny and only the writers ignoring stuff that happened in one of the earliest episodes prevented a decent chunk of the military crew from turning on him. Some of that could be explained by his marital problems and that briefly mentioned mission that went bad, but the writers didn't really flesh him out enough to make anyone like him as a person instead of as a counterpoint to Rush.

 

[The Borgified Corpse]

Yeah, Col. Young seemed to have an attitude tailor made for alienating the civilian population. And since Dr. Rush seemed to be their best, if not ONLY, chance of surviving and getting home, I was surprised that Col. Young didn't try harder to stay on Rush's good side. Granted, Rush was probably always going to be a shifty bastard no matter what. But Young could have at least put in an effort to try to get Rush to trust him, which would have been better for everyone.

And on the list of bad leadership, I would also include Col. Telford, who also seemed hellbent on antagonizing everyone, including the military personnel.

Now, I suppose we're not supposed to judge them all too harshly because they're in such dire circumstances. But I would think, were I in a life or death situation like that, I would be more like Dr. Rush and work the damn problem instead of addressing all of the petty, irrelevant personal squabbles; which seemed to be the main focus of Col. Young, Col. Telford, & Camile Wray.

The stones generally didn't go over with the fans. Personally, I liked that they stayed in contact with Earth from the get-go, but the way the stones were depicted wasn't handled properly. Very rarely do we see them used for practical purposes like sending experts over to help out with Destiny.

This. I always felt that, had they used the stones to bring in Carter, McKay, Zelenka, & Jeannie Miller to consult with Rush & Eli, they would have all been home by lunchtime.

Yeah, and then the writers decide to do nonsense that led to this picture:

Spoiler: SGU Women

Ok that's pretty funny... but, the hotness ratings are a bit off.

Perry, a nine? Give me a break. Wray, a 6 is even still too generous, Chloe probably deserves more like a 7, but I can understand how watching her character can make someone not vote with a clear mind.

Agreed, mostly. He certainly underrates Chloe. Like you said, a 7 would be more appropriate.

I would actually rate Camille Wray a bit higher, like a 7, even if she was a bitch. And on the crazy bitch scale, I'd certainly say she's nowhere near as bad as Laura Roslin or Captain Janeway.

Spoiler: Commander Kiva

As for Commander Kiva, in fairness, I suspect the main reason why she was killed off so early was because Rhona Mitra was either too expensive or unavailable.

Ginn deserves a 10 on hotness.

Spoiler: Ginn

And it really pissed me off when they killed her. I think it would have been a lot more interesting to see how her relationship with Eli would have evolved and how this might have impacted Eli's friendship with Chloe. Instead, it was just used as an excuse to make Eli just as mopey as everyone else.

But I think T.J. would rank closer to a 5 than a 7.

Spoiler: T.J.

And when she kept hooking up with Col. Young, I give her taste in men a 1.

 

[The Borgified Corpse]

Also, since someone mentioned the Dr. McKay episode, I'd just like to say I was really disappointed with that one. When I heard that Dr. McKay was going to be on the show, my one & only hope was that he'd have some scenes with Dr. Rush. I was expecting his clashes with Dr. Rush to be even greater than his love-hate relationship with Samantha Carter or his brief fast-talking duels with Daniel Jackson. But instead, he & Rush never met each other once for the entire episode.

 

[bullethead]

Yeah, Col. Young seemed to have an attitude tailor made for alienating the civilian population. And since Dr. Rush seemed to be their best, if not ONLY, chance of surviving and getting home, I was surprised that Col. Young didn't try harder to stay on Rush's good side. Granted, Rush was probably always going to be a shifty bastard no matter what. But Young could have at least put in an effort to try to get Rush to trust him, which would have been better for everyone.

And on the list of bad leadership, I would also include Col. Telford, who also seemed hellbent on antagonizing everyone, including the military personnel.

Now, I suppose we're not supposed to judge them all too harshly because they're in such dire circumstances. But I would think, were I in a life or death situation like that, I would be more like Dr. Rush and work the damn problem instead of addressing all of the petty, irrelevant personal squabbles; which seemed to be the main focus of Col. Young, Col. Telford, & Camile Wray.

Telford mellowed out after he broke free of the brainwashing, at least until his bizarre personality shift in Twin Destinies. I would've gladly taken him as the military commander before he took his asshole turn. Varro would've been a good replacement for Young as well, although it would've been hard to see how the military would've accepted him.

But yeah, everyone should've tried to at least put as much effort into figuring things out as Rush did, if they weren't going to work with the guy at all. No one else seemed to do anything unless it was plot required, which made Rush seem all the more justified in his dickishness.

 

[46379.1]

No one else seemed to do anything unless it was plot required

Yeah, this is truly unique to Stargate Universe. No other tv show or movie have ever had characters to do things to move the plot forward.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

Three episodes to go. Can the phone stop ringing please.

 

[AJ86]

Them not being all one big happy family isn't the problem. The problem is the fact that aside from Rush, none of the supposed leadership (Young or Wray) seems to be able to figure out that they should focus on increasing the odds of their survival instead of wasting time and energy on petty squabbles that decreased their ability to survive in the long term.

But... why do you think there are these "squabbles" are happening in the first place? It's because they're all desperate to survive, but disagree on how to best accomplish that. What sane adult would hush up and do what their leader told them to even if they thought he was inept and liable to get them killed? The military are trained to, sure. But the civilians? Fuck that.

 

[MacLeod]

^Perhaps, but the civllians did have a point the Stargate Programme is overseen by the IOA a civillian body. AS Wray was the IOA rep technically she out ranked Young (as Military Commader) and Rush (as Chief Scientist).

If we look at SG:A which had a more similar blend of military and civilian scientists, they worked better together but they had a civilian leader. So perhaps it was more a case of Young didn't know how to deal with civilians.

Yes I know in SG:A they knew it could be a one way trip to Atlantis, and in SG:U it was kind of forced upon them.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

Okay I'm done. Fairly irritated that it finally started getting stargatey and then it was cancelled. I'm wondering if it had started out a little more exciting with aliens and stuff actually happening if the ratings would have been sufficient? Or was there some Stargate fatigue going on?

I really enjoyed Common Descent and Epilogue.

The finale was good too.. I'm going to assume that Eli on the observation deck with a grin on his face means he figured out how to fix the pod.

I think one of the shows weaknesses which the improvements of season 2 don't fix is the characters. So many are dull or one note. They ramped up the humor in season 2, the passive aggressive bickering with Brody and Volker was an upbeat addition. While SG;A had one note characters for the first couple seasons at least they were fun in their own way, they were colorful. Here the drabness is just too much, especially with the ship so drab. The arguing between Rush, Young and Wray is tedious, none of the color Rodney brought to bickering. If Rush had just confided in someone to tease us along and think that he had something really exciting in his plans..but no, just lots of terse condescension from all three of them.

Still, might have upped the drama in season 3

 

[cylkoth]

Okay I'm done. Fairly irritated that it finally started getting stargatey and then it was cancelled. I'm wondering if it had started out a little more exciting with aliens and stuff actually happening if the ratings would have been sufficient? Or was there some Stargate fatigue going on?

As with Star Trek, the fatigue was entirely on the part of the powers that were, not the audience. I really hate the coining of the term ''franchise fatigue'' because it allowed Berman era Trek to dismiss the true reasons behind the waning interest in Trek-fatigue over the lackluster writing and stories, and place blame squarely on the shoulders of the audience, too dense to 'get' what the writers are dishing out. And the Gate showrunners, genre fans no different than us, chose to follow that example and blame hostile, disappointed fans rather than own up to the weaknesses that were actually behind the sinking of the ship.

 

[Sindatur]

Okay I'm done. Fairly irritated that it finally started getting stargatey and then it was cancelled. I'm wondering if it had started out a little more exciting with aliens and stuff actually happening if the ratings would have been sufficient? Or was there some Stargate fatigue going on?

I really enjoyed Common Descent and Epilogue.

The finale was good too.. I'm going to assume that Eli on the observation deck with a grin on his face means he figured out how to fix the pod.

I think one of the shows weaknesses which the improvements of season 2 don't fix is the characters. So many are dull or one note. They ramped up the humor in season 2, the passive aggressive bickering with Brody and Volker was an upbeat addition. While SG;A had one note characters for the first couple seasons at least they were fun in their own way, they were colorful. Here the drabness is just too much, especially with the ship so drab. The arguing between Rush, Young and Wray is tedious, none of the color Rodney brought to bickering. If Rush had just confided in someone to tease us along and think that he had something really exciting in his plans..but no, just lots of terse condescension from all three of them.

Still, might have upped the drama in season 3

I hated everyone in S1, it was a trial getting through it (I woulda been happy to see the entire cast shoved out an airlock, and a new crew find the ship. S2, finally, the characters gave me something to latch onto, at least half of S2 first 10 episodes felt worth watching and I rarely wished to see anyone airlocked. S2 second half, I liked about every one of the episodes, and never felt the impulse to watch one of the regular's horrible death. I think S3 would've been really good, it's a shame they had to make the first season so unrelatable to me

 

[DWF]

Okay I'm done. Fairly irritated that it finally started getting stargatey and then it was cancelled. I'm wondering if it had started out a little more exciting with aliens and stuff actually happening if the ratings would have been sufficient? Or was there some Stargate fatigue going on?

As with Star Trek, the fatigue was entirely on the part of the powers that were, not the audience. I really hate the coining of the term ''franchise fatigue'' because it allowed Berman era Trek to dismiss the true reasons behind the waning interest in Trek-fatigue over the lackluster writing and stories, and place blame squarely on the shoulders of the audience, too dense to 'get' what the writers are dishing out. And the Gate showrunners, genre fans no different than us, chose to follow that example and blame hostile, disappointed fans rather than own up to the weaknesses that were actually behind the sinking of the ship.

I don't recall Berman ever making that claim. And even if had and he believed it why start Enterprise in the first place. I can't say the audience is entire blameless either, but then in the case of Stargate Universe it was put opposite NCIS: LA one of the top rated shows on the air, instead of the normal summer runs that SG1 and Atlantis enjoyed. Teh breakup of Sci-Fi's Friday night line up is one of the major causes IMO for the demise of Universe. Of course like Star Trek there was no let up between shows, so I do think there's a level of fatgue there.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

Okay I'm done. Fairly irritated that it finally started getting stargatey and then it was cancelled. I'm wondering if it had started out a little more exciting with aliens and stuff actually happening if the ratings would have been sufficient? Or was there some Stargate fatigue going on?

I really enjoyed Common Descent and Epilogue.

The finale was good too.. I'm going to assume that Eli on the observation deck with a grin on his face means he figured out how to fix the pod.

I think one of the shows weaknesses which the improvements of season 2 don't fix is the characters. So many are dull or one note. They ramped up the humor in season 2, the passive aggressive bickering with Brody and Volker was an upbeat addition. While SG;A had one note characters for the first couple seasons at least they were fun in their own way, they were colorful. Here the drabness is just too much, especially with the ship so drab. The arguing between Rush, Young and Wray is tedious, none of the color Rodney brought to bickering. If Rush had just confided in someone to tease us along and think that he had something really exciting in his plans..but no, just lots of terse condescension from all three of them.

Still, might have upped the drama in season 3

I hated everyone in S1, it was a trial getting through it (I woulda been happy to see the entire cast shoved out an airlock, and a new crew find the ship. S2, finally, the characters gave me something to latch onto, at least half of S2 first 10 episodes felt worth watching and I rarely wished to see anyone airlocked. S2 second half, I liked about every one of the episodes, and never felt the impulse to watch one of the regular's horrible death. I think S3 would've been really good, it's a shame they had to make the first season so unrelatable to me

By the very end I was quite fond of Eli who I liked all along, thought Dale Volker was hot and had a bit of a thing for Park. Also, Greer made me laugh. That's my peak relationship with the characters.

Still, season 3 should have happened.

 

[Sindatur]

Yea, if my catastrophe could've spared Eli, I would've made the effort. Park, yea, she was usually pretty alright.

Greer, I hated him, he was so arrogant and had such a large chip on his shoulder, until he got trapped in that underground Earth Military base. After that, they developed his character, and I liked him more and more each episode until the end.

Rush, when he came back, after the Rebellion, he was much easier to take. I really liked him by the End too (And I've loved Mr Gold/Rumplestiltskin since the beginning on Once Upon A Time). I also liked him alot in Heroes Season 4

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

Rush is one of the most repulsive looking people I've ever seen on television. He really needs a hairdresser and to stop parting his hair in the middle like that. I had trouble looking at him for most of the show.

Yes, I am very shallow.

 

[The Borgified Corpse]

Them not being all one big happy family isn't the problem. The problem is the fact that aside from Rush, none of the supposed leadership (Young or Wray) seems to be able to figure out that they should focus on increasing the odds of their survival instead of wasting time and energy on petty squabbles that decreased their ability to survive in the long term.

But... why do you think there are these "squabbles" are happening in the first place? It's because they're all desperate to survive, but disagree on how to best accomplish that. What sane adult would hush up and do what their leader told them to even if they thought he was inept and liable to get them killed? The military are trained to, sure. But the civilians? Fuck that.

Other than Dr. Rush, no one seemed to really understand what was going on. I could understand if they were arguing over competing plans over the best way to get home. But no one besides Dr. Rush even seemed to have the foggiest idea of where to start on that front. Mostly, they were just bickering because that's what so much of sci-fi is nowadays: People bickering like petty jerks whenever the going gets tough.

I'm wondering if it had started out a little more exciting with aliens and stuff actually happening if the ratings would have been sufficient? Or was there some Stargate fatigue going on?

Hard to say. IIRC, the ratings for Stargate Atlantis were on the decline towards the end, which is why the Sci-Fi Channel ended the show. So, the Stargate franchise was not on the strongest footing to begin with. But then SGU just killed it by being slow & depressing & nothing at all like the 2 previous shows. And the people who might have been interested in a dark, broody show like SGU didn't give it a chance because it was related to cheesy popcorn shows like SG-1 & Atlantis.

My personal theory is that SGU would have been more successful if either:
1. It had been the 1st new spin-off, not the 2nd. When Atlantis began, I think fans would have been open to the spin-off taking a significantly darker tone than SG-1. But when Atlantis demonstrated that it was just going to be the same show with different characters, that created a pattern. Once that pattern was established, I don't think too many fans were interested in a 2nd spin-off that radically reinvented the franchise that most fans thought wasn't broke to begin with.
OR
2. SGU had aired concurrently with the 6th season of Atlantis. I think fans might have been open to a much darker incarnation of the Stargate franchise if it wasn't the ONLY kind of Stargate they were getting at the time. If they'd set up Atlantis as the light flavor & SGU as the dark flavor and put them next to each other, I think people might have been intrigued enough to give it a try. But when Atlantis got cancelled and SGU became the only 'Gate in town, I think most fans felt safer jumping ship altogether and basking in their warm memories (and DVDs) of SG-1 & Atlantis rather than try to muddle along with this new abomination.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

Who ARE these people that don't watch everything.

 

[MacLeod]

As a TV viewer a like a range of show, some lighthearted some a bit more serious. I liked SG:U and I suspect I would have liked it if it had been a bit more lighthearted. But keeping the same formula that you've used previously doesn't mean it'll work this time around. I'll say it again it could still have failed had it been more in tone with SG-1 and SG:A and instead of hearing cries of 'They changed it now it sucks' we have cries of 'they should have done something different'.

No matter what they did they couldn't win. Quite simply you can't please evryone all of the time.

 

[The Borgified Corpse]

Perhaps. But I still think that the radically darker tone managed to drive away many of the franchise's existing fans. Perhaps neither was a perfect solution. Perhaps they just never should have cancelled Atlantis in the first place. (Ding!) But I have no doubt that more fans were driven away faster by SGU's darkness than would have been driven away by a gradual realization of sameness.

 

[Sindatur]

Perhaps. But I still think that the radically darker tone managed to drive away many of the franchise's existing fans. Perhaps neither was a perfect solution. Perhaps they just never should have cancelled Atlantis in the first place. (Ding!) But I have no doubt that more fans were driven away faster by SGU's darkness than would have been driven away by a gradual realization of sameness.

For me, it wasn't the darker tone, that frustrated my ability to like it in the First Season (And would have driven me away if I was the type to give up so quickly), it was the lack of characters that you wanted to see, I just hated most of the characters, and not in a "love to hate" kind of way or understanding they were there to cause drama for someone I did like. I actually felt they were damaging the show. Non-stop bickering and I didn't care who won or lost or scored points or lost ground. Also, nothing gave me any reason to look forward to the next episode.