SG-U – Lost (1x15) - (Discuss – Grade | SPOILERS)

[Checkmate]

As stated before; she was designed to house a crew. There's no way she'd keep the ship on minimal power if the journey was going to take a significant amount of time. In all likelihood, she's just saving up for one massive jump or burst of speed or something. She wouldn't keep her entire crew "in the dark" for the entire journey. Especially since she's well aware that she has a crew now.

 

[Hyperspace05]

There is another possibility... There is still much of Destiny left to be discovered - Perhaps there are hibernation/stasis pods that are meant to be used between galaxies, if the trip takes months/years.

In fact it would be interesting if every season of SGU covers one galaxy. We'll see.

 

[Brent]

As stated before; she was designed to house a crew. There's no way she'd keep the ship on minimal power if the journey was going to take a significant amount of time. In all likelihood, she's just saving up for one massive jump or burst of speed or something. She wouldn't keep her entire crew "in the dark" for the entire journey. Especially since she's well aware that she has a crew now.

The Ancients could just have easily have gated back home during the trips it takes between Voids. We do not know if it was ever meant to house a crew for such an extended time.

Anyway, we don't exactly know the Ancients plans, they intended to gate to it at some point and explore the worlds it laid gates on, but obviously they didn't, and its just been on automatic now. It may be that it was never intended to travel so far in the first place.

 

[Lindley]

They broke the classic 'if you are lost rule'. Stay put. Wait for rescue to come to you.

I'm not so sure in this case.

Sure, narratively it worked out that way. But logically?

The further any team needs to search, the more expansive the frontier they need to check becomes. It's not so bad if, as Eli claimed, the Gates were only laid out in a narrow corridor; but it's still bad enough.

In a program like MapQuest, it's often more efficient to start at both the beginning *and* destination and search in both directions until two searches meet each other, since it limits the maximum distance you need to search in either direction.

Of course, for that to work in this case, each team (on both sides) would need to be smart enough to leave a list containing the sequence of Gates back to Destiny (or, in the case of Eli's group, the sequence they were trying) pinned near the gate on each planet. There was no sign they were doing that.

Could be OpSec issues with doing that, I suppose, but it would be the most reliable way to ensure they got back.

 

[label]

You know, this show has shown flashes of what it could be but I think this was the first episode that really hit on all cylinders throughout the entire episode. Greer's backstory was very powerful.........them not making it back and Greer did was unexpected......all in all I enjoyed that pretty well and look forward to next weeks.

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

One possible solution might be that it's not a dead end after all.
Assuming the gates are meant as a corridor through the universe, much like the galaxy bridge shown on Atlanti,s there will either be gates seeded in the void or the last planet is capable of dialing the eighth chevron for a galaxy jump.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

Hmm, you could be right. Maybe the seeder ships put down supergates as they left each galaxy?

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

Not so much supergates, but the planets might be chosen because they have a sufficiant power supply. Like the thermonuclear properties on the Icarus planet.

 

[Harvey]

They broke the classic 'if you are lost rule'. Stay put. Wait for rescue to come to you.

I'm not so sure in this case.

Sure, narratively it worked out that way. But logically?

Logically they had a 50/50 chance, according to Eli, of heading in the right direction. But as soon as they started to move from planet to planet, things would have only gotten worse, even if they began to move in the right direction. Unless they managed to stumble upon the Destiny, then their only hope was to stumble across one of the rescue teams--rescue teams which were going from planet to planet and only spending a few minutes at each destination. So why didn't Eli and the rest simply stay at their original destination (of which the gate address would at least be known by the rescue parties, no?) in order to maximize the possibility of making contact with a rescue team?

If they had made the effort you suggest, I can see an argument for Eli's plan. But they didn't, so it only seems like a bad choice to me.

 

[David cgc]

What I'd like about the "pregnancy subplot": At what point did the writers know about Alaina Huffman's real-life pregnancy?

Was the affair between T.J. and the colonel specifically written into the show with the purpose of eventually explaining her pregnancy? Or did they make the two characters (ex-)lovers before finding out about Huffman's pregnancy and deciding that their affair could be in fact a pretty convenient tool for explaining the pregnancy?

As I understand it, they found out about the Huffman into production. They'd already written the affair, and were planning to begin a running plot with someone on the ship being or becoming pregnant (I'm not sure if that was really solid, or if it was just on the list of Interesting Things To Do With The Premise). They made it T.J. once they found out.

 

[Lindley]

They broke the classic 'if you are lost rule'. Stay put. Wait for rescue to come to you.

I'm not so sure in this case.

Sure, narratively it worked out that way. But logically?

Logically they had a 50/50 chance, according to Eli, of heading in the right direction. But as soon as they started to move from planet to planet, things would have only gotten worse, even if they began to move in the right direction. Unless they managed to stumble upon the Destiny, then their only hope was to stumble across one of the rescue teams--rescue teams which were going from planet to planet and only spending a few minutes at each destination. So why didn't Eli and the rest simply stay at their original destination (of which the gate address would at least be known by the rescue parties, no?) in order to maximize the possibility of making contact with a rescue team?

If they had made the effort you suggest, I can see an argument for Eli's plan. But they didn't, so it only seems like a bad choice to me.

My suggestions should have been the first thought of anyone who's vaguely familiar with any kind of graph search algorithm. That's everyone who's ever graduated college with a computer science degree, at the least. Both Rush and Eli are clearly smart enough to have thought of it.

The fact that it wasn't even mentioned is just one of those unfortunate things that happens when writers try to write people who are smart in ways the writers themselves are not.

 

[Harvey]

True, but that's where John Scalzi is supposed to step up to the plate. Unless he did and the writers just didn't listen (which often happens with technical advisors).

 

[DWF]

They broke the classic 'if you are lost rule'. Stay put. Wait for rescue to come to you.

I'm not so sure in this case.

Sure, narratively it worked out that way. But logically?

Logically they had a 50/50 chance, according to Eli, of heading in the right direction. But as soon as they started to move from planet to planet, things would have only gotten worse, even if they began to move in the right direction. Unless they managed to stumble upon the Destiny, then their only hope was to stumble across one of the rescue teams--rescue teams which were going from planet to planet and only spending a few minutes at each destination. So why didn't Eli and the rest simply stay at their original destination (of which the gate address would at least be known by the rescue parties, no?) in order to maximize the possibility of making contact with a rescue team?

If they had made the effort you suggest, I can see an argument for Eli's plan. But they didn't, so it only seems like a bad choice to me.

How could Eli and have known there were rescue teams on the way though?

 

[Harvey]

He of course didn't know, but Eli makes the assumption that Destiny will send out rescue teams in the episode, and it's not a poor one. Are they really going to leave Chloe (daughter of a U.S. Senator), Greer (one of their best soldiers), Scott (one of only two Lt.'s), and Eli (second only to Rush) out in the cold?

 

[Xerxus]

I don't think the graph search algorithm

Staying put wouldn't necessarily mean the greatest chance for rescue.

If the Destiny had travelled in FTL longer, or the count down timer was shorter, then there would be zero chance of rescuing the team. Neither of these things are in control.

 

[Checkmate]

Traveling blind doesn't help anyone. If they knew roughly where they were and roughly which direction to go, that's one thing. What's more, each gate takes them to a world with multiple paths to follow. So it's not even close to being a 50-50 shot.

It was just fucking stupid for them to leave. They should have waited in what was clearly a relatively safe, inhabitable world and wait a safe amount of time for a rescue party. If one didn't show up and they were indeed stranded, they could then use the gate to try and find a better place to live. Just wandering mindlessly about hopping that every jump (with its grossly diminishing chance of being the right path) was the right one to take was exactly that: Mindless. And there's no way anyone even remotely trained in special ops would go for it.

But again, if they did know which way to go, that would be a completely different story. But they didn't. And each jump (assuming, say, an average of 4 addresses per gate), gave them a diminishing ~25% chance of being the right way. Which means they had a 25% chance of picking the right gate the first time, then a 6% chance of using the right one, then a 2% chance of using the right one, then... etc.

Eli, alone, would have certainly known that the Destiny's crew would have had a significantly easier time of finding them. Since, you know, they actually had charts and knew where both they and the ship were.

Very, very poor writing.

 

[Lindley]

Traveling blind doesn't help anyone. If they knew roughly where they were and roughly which direction to go, that's one thing. What's more, each gate takes them to a world with multiple paths to follow. So it's not even close to being a 50-50 shot.

It was just fucking stupid for them to leave. They should have waited in what was clearly a relatively safe, inhabitable world and wait a safe amount of time for a rescue party. If one didn't show up and they were indeed stranded, they could then use the gate to try and find a better place to live. Just wandering mindlessly about hopping that every jump (with its grossly diminishing chance of being the right path) was the right one to take was exactly that: Mindless. And there's no way anyone even remotely trained in special ops would go for it.

But again, if they did know which way to go, that would be a completely different story. But they didn't. And each jump (assuming, say, an average of 4 addresses per gate), gave them a diminishing ~25% chance of being the right way. Which means they had a 25% chance of picking the right gate the first time, then a 6% chance of using the right one, then a 2% chance of using the right one, then... etc.

Eli, alone, would have certainly known that the Destiny's crew would have had a significantly easier time of finding them. Since, you know, they actually had charts and knew where both they and the ship were.

Very, very poor writing.

Well, that would be true assuming a uniform distribution of gates through the galaxy. However, as Eli pointed out, that isn't the way it is----the gates follow a relatively narrow "corridor" through the galaxy near the path of the ship. So it basically turns into a 1-D random walk problem. Still not likely to get very far, but not so bad as you make out.

The really stupidity was not leaving notes on each planet with the gate they came from/went to next.

 

[Harvey]

Another question: why did Scott waste ammunition firing at the "dinosaur" creature when he was just going to run through the gate anyway? Considering that they're stranded from the Destiny (which is supposed to be short on ammunition, too) you'd think he would be a little more careful.

 

[Agent Richard07]

^ Yeah, that was dumb and didn't make sense.

As I understand it, they found out about the Huffman into production. They'd already written the affair, and were planning to begin a running plot with someone on the ship being or becoming pregnant (I'm not sure if that was really solid, or if it was just on the list of Interesting Things To Do With The Premise). They made it T.J. once they found out.

My preference would have been for Chloe to get pregnant. Having it happen to the weaker, more unprepared girl would have been something.

 

[Star Wolf]

Another question: why did Scott waste ammunition firing at the "dinosaur" creature when he was just going to run through the gate anyway? Considering that they're stranded from the Destiny (which is supposed to be short on ammunition, too) you'd think he would be a little more careful.

Simple, he got scared with more reason then Master Sergeant Greer did when he went full auto on a coyote sized spider.