Enemy At The Gate
Jan. 11th, 2009 12:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jackwabbitHERE BE SPOILERS FOR STARGATE ATLANTIS' FINAL EPISODE!
YE HAVE BEEN WARNED!
Many have said that this past Friday night, at least in the States, was the end of an era. I suppose I agree. After all, my Friday nights have been spent with Stargate for the past several years. And while I realize that Stargate Universe will join the franchise later, I just can't get very excited about it. So, the airing of the final episode of Atlantis truly does feel like the end. And I'm ok with that. Stargate has been struggling lately, and either because of that or because of changes in myself, my interest was waning a bit. Of course, season four is mostly to blame for that and season five has been better, but the fact remains that everything ends. No one wants to stay too long at the party.
But I watched the ball drop, folks. No way I'd have missed it.
Incoming Wormhole!
Best opening line for a Stargate episode ever, so we're ok so far.
Oh, and Todd's on the other side? Sweet.
He has ZPMs for us? Even better. But what's the catch? Oh, right. Someone stole them from him and kicked his ass and he needs our help to defeat said traitor. And that helps us out because this guy will be one hell of a bad mother if we let things go unchecked. Ok, I'm on board with that.
Let's go check it out in the Daedulus, but don't forget to send in a jumper first.
Oh, crap. Wraith Super Ship! I hate it when that happens.
The episode started strong for me, simply because it jumped right into the plot and, well, there was Todd. By the time the plot got really rolling, I was excited to see Caldwell and even slimy Cavanaugh, too. I enjoyed the truly classic Rodney moments in the puddlejumper with Shep (though, once again, Star Trek logic did make me wonder why Teyla and Ronon even had to be there, risk-wise).
The continuity with last week's odd pipe dream of an episode was actually a nice touch, too. Though I fully expected it, I was still interested when the Wraith message appeared from subspace, and I was very tickled to see Rodney pull another true Rodney by instantly recognizing it and then shoving Cavanaugh out of the way to translate it.
From there, we get serious Trek homage, at least in my eyes. This was a good thing.
As the Daedulus raced toward Atlantis, other ships were mentioned. They can fight, too! A space battle was coming! Yay! Now, I'm not so much for space battles in general in Stargate, but this one seemed like it would be a doozy, and I was excited about it.
When the Daedulus reached the city, and we found out that the Apollo and her sister ship were crippled in space while the Wraith were barely bleeding and still racing toward Earh, I grinned like an idiot. I mean, I've seen The Best of Both Worlds. I know the history of Wolf 359. And since that history tells me that Wolf was one of the greatest space battles of all time, even if the Borg wiped out half of Starfleet, I'm ok with a little homage.
So, now all that stands between Earth and certain destruction is the ancient weapons platform in Antarctica. The Daedalus can't get home in time to make any difference, and she's badly wounded, too.
Enter John Sheppard.
And his brain.
That's right, John came up with an idea that might pull the collective asses of the SGA crew out of the fire before Rodney. The brief hallway walking scene where this becomes obvious is worth its weight in gold-pressed latinum.
I loved it.
Loved it.
And it was followed by my favorite Shep of all. The one who knows how to get what he wants.
Remember-Todd's got more ZPMs somewhere. And we need them if we're going to fly the city back to Earth and save the day, which is John's perfectly logical plan.
John pushes Todd's buttons, and Todd knows it but caves anyway. That simply fills me with glee.
So, Todd helps out and we get the ZPMs needed to fly the city back to earth. Yay!
But Shep is needed back on Earth to power the ancient weapons platform in case this plan fails. General O'Neill wants him there. (Never mind that Jack could do it himself-my brain immediately rationalized that with a 'but John has more Wraith experience' line of thought. Oh, and I think Jack might be on the Odyssey, but we'll have to wait and see about that. Remember, no spoilers for me, please, but Caldwell did say the ship was on a mission even he didn't know about. Hm...)
So, who's to fly this behemoth of a ship?
Enter Carson Beckett.
You heard me.
Carson Beckett.
At first glance, this makes no sense. Surely the frazzled 'do no harm' doctor who nearly shot Jack and John out of the sky five years ago should not be given the keys to the city again?
Ah, but this Carson is not that Carson. This one...well, there's fic coming to explain this one. But suffice to say I think he could fly the city just fine. No problems. (What kind of Carson fan would I be if I didn't think that? Come on!)
So, John's off to the SGC and Carson's in the chair. Ok, then.
On Earth, Shep meets up with Sam, and two things gave me squee about that:
1-Sam was working, and about to take a new assignment (sorry, OTP true shippers-she isn't home having babies) with some serious butt-kicking potential.
2- The name of her new ship-THUD. Nice touch, SGA folks. Nice touch. Props from me for the class it took to do this, and do it well, especially in a rushed for time episode.
I was also beyond delighted to see Major Davis (ever going to give him a promotion?) back and not just for a minute.
Meanwhile, Carson and the rest hurtle through space, leaving the Pegasus galaxy behind. Woolsey checking in on Teyla and Ronon to be sure they're in the fight was a nice touch. And, of course, their answer rocked the house.
They're with us, all the way.
But what's this?
Things aren't going according to plan on Earth?
The chair has been moved and the Wraith reached Earth sooner than expected? And they're attacking the chair?
Scramble the F-302s! Ready or not, here we come!
And don't forget to have John Sheppard pull a hero routine, complete with fully-full-on Jack O'Neill Star Wars homage! Except the bad guys won. (Come on: two fighters have broken off from the main group? His wingman was 'Riggs'? And Riggs bites it? Really? Add the Top Gun flat spin and you've got nearly enough homage to choke. But it was nice to see John pony up afterwards and go kamikaze. Part of me thinks this was overdone, but then I remember how many times Jack did the exact same thing and how I enjoyed him doing it, so why not appreciate it in John?)
Incidentally, I loved seeing Walter at the SGC, and Davis' IOA line was like candy. Sweetly perfect.
So, the chair's destroyed and John's waiting for the right moment to jump-start his little back-up plan when all hell breaks lose on Atlantis.
Oh, shocker. The hyperdrive has glitched out on us.
It's not like we didn't see that coming, but that's ok. We need some peril.
And peril we have. Atlantis can't get through to Earth via the Stargate.
Oh, noes!
But the wormhole leads to the Wraith ship, instead? SWEET. It was nice to see the Wraith behaving like Wraith, and the chance for a little sabotage is always fun. Rodney, Teyla, Ronon, Lorne (yay!), and some red shirts take off to the hive. The ensuing battle, complete with John joining it when he fires up his plan, is too much to summarize, but:
1-serious props to Jason Momoa. THE scene was extremely well done. More on that in a sec.
2-ditto to Rachel Lutrell, and to whoever decided how Teyla would react to THE scene. Well done.
3-none of that at all for David Hewlett and whoever decided Rodney's fate here. Sigh....I love David more than most, but (and this is not his fault so much) I get tired of Rodney standing around and cowering while the shit is hitting the fan. I know that's the character, but really? This is why Daniel Jackson was/is such an endearing character. Daniel grew over the course of SG-1. He became a warrior out of necessity. Rodney has shown some glimpses of this growth, but at other times, the writers throw him back to pre-school. Sigh...
4-THE scene. Why? Well, because it gives drama. A lot of it. I was blown away, and that was the point. I laid wide-eyed on my living room floor and thought 'NO WAY'. I understood it, but I was pissed. I mean, first Carson, then Liz, then even Heightmeyer just for fun. Ronon's death served no purpose, and if it had been permanent (my hubby was going off on alternate realities behind me on the couch), it would've seriously put a damper on any more Stargate in my life at all.
5-but it wasn't. This is a good thing for me (see above). However, it was a little off somehow. Not very believable for me. But whatever. I'll take it to get CHEWY back. (The Chewy line that soon followed made my day.)
So, the team's all together again, but the only way to destroy the hive and save Earth is to sacrifice themselves. No time to get off the hive and all that. Them's the breaks, I suppose.
Well, them's the breaks if you don't have Radek Zelenka on your side, anyway. CZECH POWER!
Radek saves the day for Atlantis and the city shows up just in time to allow Shep and company to get off the hive.
Convenient, but perfectly plausible in the situation. And Lord knows it was nice to see Radek step up.
The last few minutes of the battle gave me warm fuzzies simply because my favorite episode of SG-1 is Lost City.
And rest assured, this was Lost City in many ways. I appreciated Carson kicking some ass. I loved him having to make a choice between saving the city or killing the Wraith, and Woolsey not hesitating on which course to take was awesome.
He's come a long way, that Woolsey.
And when all was said and done, the city was safe anyway (though Radek throwing his hands in the air in a big 'hell if I know' was beyond awesome), so all's well that ends well, I suppose.
In the wrap-up scene, I liked the hints that Ronon is finally leaving Sateda behind him (an implied ship, calling Atlantis home, etc), and I actually liked Sam's cheesy but sweet line about Atlantis coming home, too. My only gripe about the final wrap-up scene was...you know it's coming...McKeller.
Ugh.
Whatever.
But it wasn't too overdone and I could live with it.
Mostly.
I thought it was hysterical that Atlantis was in San Francisco bay and I could only think of Starfleet Academy every time they showed it.
I do wonder what they'll do with Todd now, but I think that's the point.
All in all, they left themselves set up for the movie quite well.
As finales go, this one wasn't half bad.
I give it an B+. It would get an A- if it was a little longer. It did feel rushed in a few places, but they did a pretty good job of giving every character a little nod without making it too terribly overdone.
Rest in peace, SGA. It's beeen surreal.
YE HAVE BEEN WARNED!
Many have said that this past Friday night, at least in the States, was the end of an era. I suppose I agree. After all, my Friday nights have been spent with Stargate for the past several years. And while I realize that Stargate Universe will join the franchise later, I just can't get very excited about it. So, the airing of the final episode of Atlantis truly does feel like the end. And I'm ok with that. Stargate has been struggling lately, and either because of that or because of changes in myself, my interest was waning a bit. Of course, season four is mostly to blame for that and season five has been better, but the fact remains that everything ends. No one wants to stay too long at the party.
But I watched the ball drop, folks. No way I'd have missed it.
Incoming Wormhole!
Best opening line for a Stargate episode ever, so we're ok so far.
Oh, and Todd's on the other side? Sweet.
He has ZPMs for us? Even better. But what's the catch? Oh, right. Someone stole them from him and kicked his ass and he needs our help to defeat said traitor. And that helps us out because this guy will be one hell of a bad mother if we let things go unchecked. Ok, I'm on board with that.
Let's go check it out in the Daedulus, but don't forget to send in a jumper first.
Oh, crap. Wraith Super Ship! I hate it when that happens.
The episode started strong for me, simply because it jumped right into the plot and, well, there was Todd. By the time the plot got really rolling, I was excited to see Caldwell and even slimy Cavanaugh, too. I enjoyed the truly classic Rodney moments in the puddlejumper with Shep (though, once again, Star Trek logic did make me wonder why Teyla and Ronon even had to be there, risk-wise).
The continuity with last week's odd pipe dream of an episode was actually a nice touch, too. Though I fully expected it, I was still interested when the Wraith message appeared from subspace, and I was very tickled to see Rodney pull another true Rodney by instantly recognizing it and then shoving Cavanaugh out of the way to translate it.
From there, we get serious Trek homage, at least in my eyes. This was a good thing.
As the Daedulus raced toward Atlantis, other ships were mentioned. They can fight, too! A space battle was coming! Yay! Now, I'm not so much for space battles in general in Stargate, but this one seemed like it would be a doozy, and I was excited about it.
When the Daedulus reached the city, and we found out that the Apollo and her sister ship were crippled in space while the Wraith were barely bleeding and still racing toward Earh, I grinned like an idiot. I mean, I've seen The Best of Both Worlds. I know the history of Wolf 359. And since that history tells me that Wolf was one of the greatest space battles of all time, even if the Borg wiped out half of Starfleet, I'm ok with a little homage.
So, now all that stands between Earth and certain destruction is the ancient weapons platform in Antarctica. The Daedalus can't get home in time to make any difference, and she's badly wounded, too.
Enter John Sheppard.
And his brain.
That's right, John came up with an idea that might pull the collective asses of the SGA crew out of the fire before Rodney. The brief hallway walking scene where this becomes obvious is worth its weight in gold-pressed latinum.
I loved it.
Loved it.
And it was followed by my favorite Shep of all. The one who knows how to get what he wants.
Remember-Todd's got more ZPMs somewhere. And we need them if we're going to fly the city back to Earth and save the day, which is John's perfectly logical plan.
John pushes Todd's buttons, and Todd knows it but caves anyway. That simply fills me with glee.
So, Todd helps out and we get the ZPMs needed to fly the city back to earth. Yay!
But Shep is needed back on Earth to power the ancient weapons platform in case this plan fails. General O'Neill wants him there. (Never mind that Jack could do it himself-my brain immediately rationalized that with a 'but John has more Wraith experience' line of thought. Oh, and I think Jack might be on the Odyssey, but we'll have to wait and see about that. Remember, no spoilers for me, please, but Caldwell did say the ship was on a mission even he didn't know about. Hm...)
So, who's to fly this behemoth of a ship?
Enter Carson Beckett.
You heard me.
Carson Beckett.
At first glance, this makes no sense. Surely the frazzled 'do no harm' doctor who nearly shot Jack and John out of the sky five years ago should not be given the keys to the city again?
Ah, but this Carson is not that Carson. This one...well, there's fic coming to explain this one. But suffice to say I think he could fly the city just fine. No problems. (What kind of Carson fan would I be if I didn't think that? Come on!)
So, John's off to the SGC and Carson's in the chair. Ok, then.
On Earth, Shep meets up with Sam, and two things gave me squee about that:
1-Sam was working, and about to take a new assignment (sorry, OTP true shippers-she isn't home having babies) with some serious butt-kicking potential.
2- The name of her new ship-THUD. Nice touch, SGA folks. Nice touch. Props from me for the class it took to do this, and do it well, especially in a rushed for time episode.
I was also beyond delighted to see Major Davis (ever going to give him a promotion?) back and not just for a minute.
Meanwhile, Carson and the rest hurtle through space, leaving the Pegasus galaxy behind. Woolsey checking in on Teyla and Ronon to be sure they're in the fight was a nice touch. And, of course, their answer rocked the house.
They're with us, all the way.
But what's this?
Things aren't going according to plan on Earth?
The chair has been moved and the Wraith reached Earth sooner than expected? And they're attacking the chair?
Scramble the F-302s! Ready or not, here we come!
And don't forget to have John Sheppard pull a hero routine, complete with fully-full-on Jack O'Neill Star Wars homage! Except the bad guys won. (Come on: two fighters have broken off from the main group? His wingman was 'Riggs'? And Riggs bites it? Really? Add the Top Gun flat spin and you've got nearly enough homage to choke. But it was nice to see John pony up afterwards and go kamikaze. Part of me thinks this was overdone, but then I remember how many times Jack did the exact same thing and how I enjoyed him doing it, so why not appreciate it in John?)
Incidentally, I loved seeing Walter at the SGC, and Davis' IOA line was like candy. Sweetly perfect.
So, the chair's destroyed and John's waiting for the right moment to jump-start his little back-up plan when all hell breaks lose on Atlantis.
Oh, shocker. The hyperdrive has glitched out on us.
It's not like we didn't see that coming, but that's ok. We need some peril.
And peril we have. Atlantis can't get through to Earth via the Stargate.
Oh, noes!
But the wormhole leads to the Wraith ship, instead? SWEET. It was nice to see the Wraith behaving like Wraith, and the chance for a little sabotage is always fun. Rodney, Teyla, Ronon, Lorne (yay!), and some red shirts take off to the hive. The ensuing battle, complete with John joining it when he fires up his plan, is too much to summarize, but:
1-serious props to Jason Momoa. THE scene was extremely well done. More on that in a sec.
2-ditto to Rachel Lutrell, and to whoever decided how Teyla would react to THE scene. Well done.
3-none of that at all for David Hewlett and whoever decided Rodney's fate here. Sigh....I love David more than most, but (and this is not his fault so much) I get tired of Rodney standing around and cowering while the shit is hitting the fan. I know that's the character, but really? This is why Daniel Jackson was/is such an endearing character. Daniel grew over the course of SG-1. He became a warrior out of necessity. Rodney has shown some glimpses of this growth, but at other times, the writers throw him back to pre-school. Sigh...
4-THE scene. Why? Well, because it gives drama. A lot of it. I was blown away, and that was the point. I laid wide-eyed on my living room floor and thought 'NO WAY'. I understood it, but I was pissed. I mean, first Carson, then Liz, then even Heightmeyer just for fun. Ronon's death served no purpose, and if it had been permanent (my hubby was going off on alternate realities behind me on the couch), it would've seriously put a damper on any more Stargate in my life at all.
5-but it wasn't. This is a good thing for me (see above). However, it was a little off somehow. Not very believable for me. But whatever. I'll take it to get CHEWY back. (The Chewy line that soon followed made my day.)
So, the team's all together again, but the only way to destroy the hive and save Earth is to sacrifice themselves. No time to get off the hive and all that. Them's the breaks, I suppose.
Well, them's the breaks if you don't have Radek Zelenka on your side, anyway. CZECH POWER!
Radek saves the day for Atlantis and the city shows up just in time to allow Shep and company to get off the hive.
Convenient, but perfectly plausible in the situation. And Lord knows it was nice to see Radek step up.
The last few minutes of the battle gave me warm fuzzies simply because my favorite episode of SG-1 is Lost City.
And rest assured, this was Lost City in many ways. I appreciated Carson kicking some ass. I loved him having to make a choice between saving the city or killing the Wraith, and Woolsey not hesitating on which course to take was awesome.
He's come a long way, that Woolsey.
And when all was said and done, the city was safe anyway (though Radek throwing his hands in the air in a big 'hell if I know' was beyond awesome), so all's well that ends well, I suppose.
In the wrap-up scene, I liked the hints that Ronon is finally leaving Sateda behind him (an implied ship, calling Atlantis home, etc), and I actually liked Sam's cheesy but sweet line about Atlantis coming home, too. My only gripe about the final wrap-up scene was...you know it's coming...McKeller.
Ugh.
Whatever.
But it wasn't too overdone and I could live with it.
Mostly.
I thought it was hysterical that Atlantis was in San Francisco bay and I could only think of Starfleet Academy every time they showed it.
I do wonder what they'll do with Todd now, but I think that's the point.
All in all, they left themselves set up for the movie quite well.
As finales go, this one wasn't half bad.
I give it an B+. It would get an A- if it was a little longer. It did feel rushed in a few places, but they did a pretty good job of giving every character a little nod without making it too terribly overdone.
Rest in peace, SGA. It's beeen surreal.
