Spoilers For Stargate Universe's Pilot

[cylkoth]

I love how so much of SG's fandom is condemning the show before it even airs. *sigh* This sounds eerily like the lynch mob that was forming when SG:A was announced. And by the end of the first season, some of those same people were eating their words. I wonder how many now will be as well?

Yeah, it sounds like Voyager crossed with Lost in Space and Space 1999, big frigging deal. Throwing Our Heroes into the abyss where they can't get home has been done more times than that, and outside of science fiction, too. So has the whole "space station/city where everything comes to us" setup. Arguing lack of originality of concept in televised science fiction? Hell, even nuBSG wasn't that original if you look at it with an unbiased eye. All it did was take a lot of the old war movie tropes and put them in space.

From what I've heard so far, it sounds interesting. I'm certainly willing to give it an episode or two before I decide to condemn it.

I doubt the comments would've been so harsh, if the last series hadn't had the exact same concept! That's why the howling has been so intense. It's a retread of Atlantis' original concept, only tweaked BSG style.
I agree, this could turn out to be a well produced show, but the judgments passed on the info that's been put out are mostly valid, imo.
And there's nothing wrong with being proven wrong either, if those who are skeptical have a change of heart after seeing the finished product.

 

[tharpdevenport]

That article jsut went on and on and on. The tech and history of the show is causing it's premise to get lost in Stargate's own world. A fate later seasons of "The X-Files" suffered from.

I couldn't find a single thing to give a damn about, and was even annoyed that there might be another new villainous race to deal with.

 

[cultcross]

The Ancient ship-Destiny, is in another galaxy. While the Ancients possessed the means of real time trans galactic communication (the body swap doohickey couldn't have been the only thing they came up with) , the SGC doesn't. Also the galaxy is even further away than Pegasus, and without a ZPM or equivalent power source, there's no way to dial Earth Or Pegasus, so they're stuck.

Good lord I hope this show doesn't revolve around ZPMs and 'getting power' to do things. I'm sorry to break it to the writing team, but "where can I plug this in?" does not compelling jeopardy make.

 

[Harvey]

I love how so much of SG's fandom is condemning the show before it even airs. *sigh* This sounds eerily like the lynch mob that was forming when SG:A was announced. And by the end of the first season, some of those same people were eating their words. I wonder how many now will be as well?

I wasn't aware of a fandom that was vocally against SGA from the start, but I didn't get involved with Stargate until relatively late in the game. From where I'm sitting, though, the first season of Atlantis was very impressive, and everything that came afterwards was pretty consistently disappointing. That's what's crushed my confidence in these writers/producers--four consistently mediocre years of science fiction (for a total of six seasons and two DVD movies). That doesn't inspire a lot of confidence.

But...what I have seen looks promising. As I've been saying for a while: we'll see when it airs.

 

[Brent]

One of the problems I have with the plot is that they've beaten the Ancients down to a pulp. When they first mentioned the Ancients, this great race of the people who seeded our galaxy, had an alliance with other aliens, it seemed so grand and big to me. But everything we've seen of the Ancients in Atlantis seems so small and puny. They've taken away the awe of the Ancients. Luckily they haven't downplayed the Furlings yet, they still seem grand, it is that unknown. I just feel like Universe is beating down the Ancients once again. Maybe the Ancients should have had nothing to do with this new series.

 

[DWF]

One of the problems I have with the plot is that they've beaten the Ancients down to a pulp. When they first mentioned the Ancients, this great race of the people who seeded our galaxy, had an alliance with other aliens, it seemed so grand and big to me. But everything we've seen of the Ancients in Atlantis seems so small and puny. They've taken away the awe of the Ancients. Luckily they haven't downplayed the Furlings yet, they still seem grand, it is that unknown. I just feel like Universe is beating down the Ancients once again. Maybe the Ancients should have had nothing to do with this new series.

It's an Ancients' ship but I don't how the Ancients are involved beyond that.

 

[Brent]

One of the problems I have with the plot is that they've beaten the Ancients down to a pulp. When they first mentioned the Ancients, this great race of the people who seeded our galaxy, had an alliance with other aliens, it seemed so grand and big to me. But everything we've seen of the Ancients in Atlantis seems so small and puny. They've taken away the awe of the Ancients. Luckily they haven't downplayed the Furlings yet, they still seem grand, it is that unknown. I just feel like Universe is beating down the Ancients once again. Maybe the Ancients should have had nothing to do with this new series.

It's an Ancients' ship but I don't how the Ancients are involved beyond that.

Atlantis was an Ancient ship too...

 

[TerriO]

I doubt the comments would've been so harsh, if the last series hadn't had the exact same concept! That's why the howling has been so intense. It's a retread of Atlantis' original concept, only tweaked BSG style.
I agree, this could turn out to be a well produced show, but the judgments passed on the info that's been put out are mostly valid, imo.
And there's nothing wrong with being proven wrong either, if those who are skeptical have a change of heart after seeing the finished product.

Concepts evolve. That's a natural part of the process. Perhaps they saw where Atlantis went off the rails, and decided to try to start with another Ancient ship in another distant cut-off realm and try to avoid those bumps? We won't know for sure until "Air" hits the TV.

This is starting to sound like the Trek XI forum, condeming stuff before you even get a glimpse of it. I was one of Trek XI's condemners, too, so I can recognize more than a few things here.

Granted, the SW prequels have pretty much jaded a lot of people on the notion of creators revisiting their universes, but in all my days as a Gater, I don't think I've ever seen anything this vitriolic.

And, "tweaked BSG style"? Only an idiot wouldn't expect them to try that, IMO. Sci Fi (I refuse to use the new name) just got rid of a setpiece. You really don't think they might try to commission a similar type of setpiece to take its place, do you?

It's going in increments. Atlantis had moments where it was much, much darker than SG-1. If SGU has moments where it's darker than Atlantis, especially if it has a lot of them, hell, I'll take it. That's just ducky by me.

 

[bigdaddy]

The voice out over Atlantis was very minor from what I remember. Even I was looknig forward to the show.

My only complaint when Atlantis started was the fact they had to change several ideas around, like the city being on Earth, because SG-1 wasn't ever ending.

 

[Roberto]

I'm looking forward to Stargate Universe, I've seen all the SG1 and Atlantis episodes.

 

[Dark Gilligan]

I never got into SG1 or Atlantis. I'll give Universe a try though, I'm itching for something new now that Galactica is gone.

 

[hyzmarca]

I love how so much of SG's fandom is condemning the show before it even airs. *sigh* This sounds eerily like the lynch mob that was forming when SG:A was announced. And by the end of the first season, some of those same people were eating their words. I wonder how many now will be as well?

Yeah, it sounds like Voyager crossed with Lost in Space and Space 1999, big frigging deal. Throwing Our Heroes into the abyss where they can't get home has been done more times than that, and outside of science fiction, too. So has the whole "space station/city where everything comes to us" setup. Arguing lack of originality of concept in televised science fiction? Hell, even nuBSG wasn't that original if you look at it with an unbiased eye. All it did was take a lot of the old war movie tropes and put them in space.

From what I've heard so far, it sounds interesting. I'm certainly willing to give it an episode or two before I decide to condemn it.

I doubt the comments would've been so harsh, if the last series hadn't had the exact same concept! That's why the howling has been so intense. It's a retread of Atlantis' original concept, only tweaked BSG style.
I agree, this could turn out to be a well produced show, but the judgments passed on the info that's been put out are mostly valid, imo.
And there's nothing wrong with being proven wrong either, if those who are skeptical have a change of heart after seeing the finished product.

Universe's concept is a continuation of an unfortunate trend that has plagued the Stargate franchise for a long time, the Action/Adventure Sorting Algorithms. Every problem has to be bigger than the last, and every enemy more powerful. It became Dragonball Z at one point, and not in a good way. They kept making the heroes more powerful to defeat the threat, so the next threat had to be even more powerful and more dangerous. And lets not even mention the TNG technobable solutions. Universe is Atlantis over nine thousand. They're farther away from home.
Plus the nineth chevron thing is stupid and based entirely on silly fanwank.

It can be better than Atlantis, certainly. It can actually be good. But I don't have faith in the people in charge.

 

[DWF]

I love how so much of SG's fandom is condemning the show before it even airs. *sigh* This sounds eerily like the lynch mob that was forming when SG:A was announced. And by the end of the first season, some of those same people were eating their words. I wonder how many now will be as well?

Yeah, it sounds like Voyager crossed with Lost in Space and Space 1999, big frigging deal. Throwing Our Heroes into the abyss where they can't get home has been done more times than that, and outside of science fiction, too. So has the whole "space station/city where everything comes to us" setup. Arguing lack of originality of concept in televised science fiction? Hell, even nuBSG wasn't that original if you look at it with an unbiased eye. All it did was take a lot of the old war movie tropes and put them in space.

From what I've heard so far, it sounds interesting. I'm certainly willing to give it an episode or two before I decide to condemn it.

I doubt the comments would've been so harsh, if the last series hadn't had the exact same concept! That's why the howling has been so intense. It's a retread of Atlantis' original concept, only tweaked BSG style.
I agree, this could turn out to be a well produced show, but the judgments passed on the info that's been put out are mostly valid, imo.
And there's nothing wrong with being proven wrong either, if those who are skeptical have a change of heart after seeing the finished product.

Universe's concept is a continuation of an unfortunate trend that has plagued the Stargate franchise for a long time, the Action/Adventure Sorting Algorithms. Every problem has to be bigger than the last, and every enemy more powerful. It became Dragonball Z at one point, and not in a good way. They kept making the heroes more powerful to defeat the threat, so the next threat had to be even more powerful and more dangerous. And lets not even mention the TNG technobable solutions. Universe is Atlantis over nine thousand. They're farther away from home.
Plus the nineth chevron thing is stupid and based entirely on silly fanwank.

It can be better than Atlantis, certainly. It can actually be good. But I don't have faith in the people in charge.

I haven't seen anything that indictates some threat bigger than the Goa'uld, Ori, Replicators or the Wraith existing on Universe. If anything the leaked info on the eps. so far would seem to prove they are going a different route. And I have no problem trusting Robert Cooper and Brad Wright with the new show.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

This sounds eerily like the lynch mob that was forming when SG:A was announced. And by the end of the first season, some of those same people were eating their words.

That's funny, the first season of SG:A that I watched was pretty much a rehash of the same crap that Stargate had been doling out for years, with a few interesting notions (Poisoning the Well) that were dropped, as per usual. The main attraction of S1 was the same as for the show's whole run: Shep.

I'll cut Stargate some slack when they give me reason to believe the writing will be anything other than the same old tired approach we've seen before. That would require radical changes in the producers and writers on the payroll. I'd say the current crop is out of ideas, except that I don't think they ever had any ideas that were worthwhile. Hacks, all of them.

If I were in charge of Stargate, I would fire every last person with "producer" or "writer" in their job title and bring in some folks with a proven track record of interesting ideas and the ability to execute them. Grab them from various interestingly written sci fi or action series - BSG, The 4400, Lost (if any of that crew are up for grabs). The Terminator and Prison Break writers will soon be looking for employment, that's also a good source for talent.

There are plenty of shows being cancelled for reasons other than that the writing stinks. There's no shortage of writing talent out there looking for jobs.

The idea that the current Stargate hacks might try to ape the BSG style of storytelling fills me with equal amounts of dread and glee - well, mainly glee. It will be a train wreck but at least not a boring one. It could be comedy gold.

I wasn't aware of a fandom that was vocally against SGA from the start

They weren't, not compared with the usual kvetching that accompanies any new show. Stargate was only starting to really wear out its welcome when SG:A debuted.

When they first mentioned the Ancients, this great race of the people who seeded our galaxy, had an alliance with other aliens, it seemed so grand and big to me. But everything we've seen of the Ancients in Atlantis seems so small and puny.

The Ancients have rarely been any good. They were an intriguing notion when we didn't know anything about them, but seeing them has destroyed their mystique. The more we know, the dumber they look. The problem is that they are depicted in the hokiest manner possible: bad actors reciting terrible dialogue while standing around stiffly wearing costumes straight outta TOS.

The one time they were reasonably good is when they were potrayed by Mel Harris and George Dzundza. You need actors of outstanding caliber to compensate for writing based on tired cliches. Which is why I'm generally enthusiastic about seeing Lou Diamond Phillips in the cast - the only way to salvage Stargate is to find great actors who will work cheap because they aren't young and pretty enough for mainstream Hollywood anymore. That way at least something is working in the episodes.

I'll give Universe a try though, I'm itching for something new now that Galactica is gone.

This is why I'm fearful/gleeful that SG:U will end up coming off as a terrible parody of BSG - they'll be trying to appeal to the Frakheads. I can already imagine how well that's gonna work out.

I haven't seen anything that indictates some threat bigger than the Goa'uld, Ori, Replicators or the Wraith existing on Universe.

I'd be happy if they'd come up with a villain who isn't laughable, like that bunch you just cited. The entire Stargate franchise has yet to invent a villain that is credible, interesting, and based on anything but tired cliches cribbed from other sci fi. I'm happy to give them another shot at it, but their track record doesn't inspire confidence.

 

[DWF]

I'd be happy if they'd come up with a villain who isn't laughable, like that bunch you just cited. The entire Stargate franchise has yet to invent a villain that is credible, interesting, and based on anything but tired cliches cribbed from other sci fi. I'm happy to give them another shot at it, but their track record doesn't inspire confidence.

Well nobody's come up with anything really new for a good 30 years or more, it's going to happen anytime soon.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

I'd be happy if they'd come up with a villain who isn't laughable, like that bunch you just cited. The entire Stargate franchise has yet to invent a villain that is credible, interesting, and based on anything but tired cliches cribbed from other sci fi. I'm happy to give them another shot at it, but their track record doesn't inspire confidence.

Well nobody's come up with anything really new for a good 30 years or more, it's going to happen anytime soon.

I didn't say new. I said good.

Other shows manage to use standard sci fi themes without them coming off as hackneyed. Lost for instance. There are plenty of examples of shows far better than Stargate, so it's no use pretending that nobody can do better than trite, tired garbage when we see it done all the time.

 

[DWF]

I'd be happy if they'd come up with a villain who isn't laughable, like that bunch you just cited. The entire Stargate franchise has yet to invent a villain that is credible, interesting, and based on anything but tired cliches cribbed from other sci fi. I'm happy to give them another shot at it, but their track record doesn't inspire confidence.

Well nobody's come up with anything really new for a good 30 years or more, it's going to happen anytime soon.

I didn't say new. I said good.

Other shows manage to use standard sci fi themes without them coming off as hackneyed. Lost for instance. There are plenty of examples of shows far better than Stargate, so it's no use pretending that nobody can do better than trite, tired garbage when we see it done all the time.

Lost isn't a good example of not being hackneyed that's for sure.

 

[MrPointy]

I really want SGU to turn out great. If it's Stargate + BSG + Firefly, as the writers seem to indicate, then I'll at least check out the first season.