SG-A – Remnants (5x15) – (Discuss – Grade | SPOILERS!)
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I rated it a bad for weak dependence on "it's not really happening" storytelling. Final season, let's see shit happen! We don't need yet another "the IOA is a corrput beaucracy" episode, especially when Woosley used to be that guy that drove those episodes. Both Weir and Carter had the same interference from Earth so it's not one bit dramatic. I loved the idea that he'd have a relationship because all these people can't be single, someone should be getting laid. I barely paid attention to Rodney/Radek's subplot and Shep and Kolya was at first unbelieveable because his return made no sense and then lame when it was explained.
And again because these writers are so burned out the episode can only end two ways: Someone in a hospital bed or lunch. They chose lunch. Next week will be hospital.
Final seasons should be memorable. The final episodes should be wrapping it up so we feel like it's ending.
And again because these writers are so burned out the episode can only end two ways: Someone in a hospital bed or lunch. They chose lunch. Next week will be hospital.
Final seasons should be memorable. The final episodes should be wrapping it up so we feel like it's ending.
Overall, I thought it was a pretty good episode. Haha I loved the revelation at the end that even McKay was affected by the hallucination.
Eh, average. Kolya chopping off Shep's hand was kinda interesting and surprising, and it turned out to be a fake. Bah. It's not like they couldn't have whomped up some fake-hand Ancients tech to solve the problem at the end of the episode.
And you'd think the Ancients wouldn't be so careless as to allow dead flesh to pilot their ships...maybe that wasn't actually true, but shouldn't that be something Shep would have thought about before now? Take a toenail clipping and see if it works, for instance.
The issue of why Shep is in Pegasus and what he is running away from is the kind of charcter-based writing I wanted from the show from the start. But it went nowhere in this episode and there isn't time to take it anywhere now. Reminding me of how SG:A could have been so much better doesn't endear me to this episode.
Inconsistency: the AI says that it didn't mean to torture Shep because he was actually in control of his own hallucination. But Woolsey wasn't in control of the phony message that made Tamlyn Tomita's character change tactics. He didn't even know it was happening. I think the AI was lying to Shep and just liked smacking him around.
After 2000 years in stasis, the poor thing was bored and maybe a little crazy.
The silicon based lifeform: why have it be humanoid? Unimaginative.
And you'd think the Ancients wouldn't be so careless as to allow dead flesh to pilot their ships...maybe that wasn't actually true, but shouldn't that be something Shep would have thought about before now? Take a toenail clipping and see if it works, for instance.
The issue of why Shep is in Pegasus and what he is running away from is the kind of charcter-based writing I wanted from the show from the start. But it went nowhere in this episode and there isn't time to take it anywhere now. Reminding me of how SG:A could have been so much better doesn't endear me to this episode.
Inconsistency: the AI says that it didn't mean to torture Shep because he was actually in control of his own hallucination. But Woolsey wasn't in control of the phony message that made Tamlyn Tomita's character change tactics. He didn't even know it was happening. I think the AI was lying to Shep and just liked smacking him around.
After 2000 years in stasis, the poor thing was bored and maybe a little crazy.The silicon based lifeform: why have it be humanoid? Unimaginative.
Inconsistency: the AI says that it didn't mean to torture Shep because he was actually in control of his own hallucination. But Woolsey wasn't in control of the phony message that made Tamlyn Tomita's character change tactics. He didn't even know it was happening. I think the AI was lying to Shep and just liked smacking him around.
The silicon based lifeform: why have it be humanoid? Unimaginative.
It also said he could take more than any man he knew... Maybe Shep is just in to a little bit of tied up torture play, so he's had plenty of practice?
Is it just me, or did that alien look like a tweaked Asgard?
Inconsistency: the AI says that it didn't mean to torture Shep because he was actually in control of his own hallucination. But Woolsey wasn't in control of the phony message that made Tamlyn Tomita's character change tactics. He didn't even know it was happening. I think the AI was lying to Shep and just liked smacking him around.
The silicon based lifeform: why have it be humanoid? Unimaginative.
It also said he could take more than any man he knew... Maybe Shep is just in to a little bit of tied up torture play, so he's had plenty of practice?
It means Shep likes to think he's amazingly resistant to torture and maybe he has a need to prove it to himself. Makes me wonder why he didn't conjure up Larrin instead.
Hmm, waitaminute. This means Shep specifically wanted Kolya to torture him. He could have conjured up anyone. Have the writers been reading too much fanfic? At least it wasn't Rodney.
And the Freudian meaning behind Shep deciding that his hand should be cut off, that's veeery intriguing too. I'm turning this into a much more interesting episode than the writers intended.
^Well someone's got to, if they won't... 
The AI meant that the form of the hallucination was up to Sheppard. It was going for something along the lines of "a grave threat is preventing you from returning to Atlantis," and then pulled out the specifics (Kolya, having to be physically restrained, the Jumper being destroyed, the Jumper being stolen, his failure resulting in the deaths of all the people he cared for) from Sheppard's mind.
Similarly, Shen's hallucination was also pulled from her mind. The AI had a goal, "help Woolsey keep his job," but Shen's mind provided how exactly it would do that (have her replaced as the next commander of Atlantis by a moron, and further insult her by blowing her off with the environmental job).
The AI was trying to save Shep the embarrassment of realizing what it says about him that he'd choose that scenario. How could the AI know about Kolya, etc? The details of that scenario had to come from Shep, not just the general outline.
Even the detail about Shep imagining the scientists dead was revealing. Was that his passive-aggressive way of getting back at the woman scientist for rejecting him?
And the SG:A writers have presented Shep as being psychologically messed up in the past. They just haven't gone anywhere with it. They trot out this notion every once in a while, but it's too late to do anything with it now.
Even the detail about Shep imagining the scientists dead was revealing. Was that his passive-aggressive way of getting back at the woman scientist for rejecting him?
And the SG:A writers have presented Shep as being psychologically messed up in the past. They just haven't gone anywhere with it. They trot out this notion every once in a while, but it's too late to do anything with it now.
They do have flashes of great characters in these fluffy, resettable ones they present. They always seem to have such great ideas, setups, and plans that they never make use of. Such a shame, they could be great, rather than just somewhat enjoyable fluff.
I gave it a Bad. I was able to plot out the entire episode in the first ten minutes, and got everything right. Of course no one can see her. Of course Zilenka isn't there. Of course Kolya isn't there, etc. Sheppard's storyline was pointless, and what if he didn't grab that branch at the end - he would've died! Stupid AIs.
Only good point was it was nice to see Tamlyn Tomita again, even if it has been 15 years since she was in Babylon 5!
I'm glad this is the final season cos it's not got the punch it once had.
Only good point was it was nice to see Tamlyn Tomita again, even if it has been 15 years since she was in Babylon 5!
I'm glad this is the final season cos it's not got the punch it once had.
That's what I said. The AI had a general outline, but Sheppard provided the details. The AI was going to make him stay the hell off of Atlantis, but Sheppard's own subconscious is what made it so drastic. If it were Rodney who needed to be kept off of Atlantis, his hallucination probably would've been just a broken jumper with an excessively complicated tangle of burned out wires. Sheppard, on the other hand, wouldn't be convinced he couldn't do what he wanted unless he was bound, maimed, and demoralized by the scariest villain available.
That, or his subconscious was acting out his overdeveloped sense of responsibility. He failed, and not only was he tortured, but the people he was protecting were tortured and killed as well. And it was all his fault. For being weak, for being slow, for letting Kolya get the drop on him.
Not sure that Koyla is the scariest villain available - Sheppard's repeatedly beaten him. Michael might have been smarter. It's a lot more plausible that he'd somehow made it on to the mainland.
I knew there was something up when Koyla appeared, there aren't many ways any Genii could have made it to the mainland. To get to the mainland you need a ship because otherwise you have to go through Atlantis. There aren't too many people out there with interstellar spacecraft capable of reaching Atlantis. The only ones I can think of are the Travellers, and while I wouldn't put it past them, it didn't seem likely, and so the warning bells started to go off.
One other thing that my sad brain noticed.
Vanessa Conrad was played by Anna Galvin. My warped mind finds it funny that Galvin also played Lex's assistant Gina in several episodes of Smallville last season. Gina was killed on the orders of Edward Teague.
Vanessa Conrad was played by Anna Galvin. My warped mind finds it funny that Galvin also played Lex's assistant Gina in several episodes of Smallville last season. Gina was killed on the orders of Edward Teague.
Has Michael really had Sheppard by the balls as much as Kolya has? Michael never "killed" Weir, nor did he ever slowly torture Sheppard to death. Kolya is intelligent, methodical, and utterly goal-oriented. If an enemy has no more use to him, he'll simply kill them. Michael, on the other hand, is something of a brute and a bully. (Yes, yes, I know, he's really a delicate flower and wouldn't have harmed a soul except for all the people he would've eaten if only the mean ol' Atlantis crew hadn't had the temerity to try and find a permanent solution to the wraith problem, but now he's a brute and a bully.) Aside from the whole mad scientist angle, he's kind of stupid. To pick the freshest example, Kolya wouldn't have let Teyla live after he'd gotten the child, and he would've brought his own bomb to Atlantis.
Michael wanted to get back at the people who "wronged" him, with furthering his own personal goals coming in at a distant second. Kolya, while no doubt enjoying the opportunity to get some payback, never let that come before accomplishing his mission. That cold commitment always made Kolya far more intimidating a villain to me.
Oh, and speaking of intimidation (kidding!), did it weird anyone out that in the course of their convention and in a few ads, Robert Davi was the voice of the Republican Party this year? I remember David Hewlett mentioning in one of the DVD commentaries that Davi was far more politically active than the other actors, surprising them with his strength of opinion when they were making conversation in the lunch tent, but it was still a little weird to hear a voice I more associate with Pegasus galaxy militants and disfigured alien commanders telling me Barack Obama bought his side yard from a terrorist.
My point is that it's more plausible that Michael would have still been alive and on the mainland.
On the other hand, Sheppard saw Kolya pronounced dead and he knows how difficult it is to get to the mainland with no ship.
Did anyone get reminded of Adrian Conrad the moment Vanessa was introduced?
The alien IA faked a transmission to the evil IOA woman, which resulted in her writing a nice report which allowed Woolsey to keep his job. Great. But what stopped the IOA woman from changing this report just to spite Woolsey once she got back to earth and found out she had been set up?
Sean
Sean