 |
Stargate Universe Recap 1.03: Air Part 3
Sci-Fi Reviews, Sci-Fi TV News, Stargate: Universe TV Series — By endymi0n on October 10, 2009
Welcome to your weekly dose of Stargate Universe recapture. I am your host, Endy and I will guide you truthfully and faithfully through the myriad hazards of the weekly Sci-Fi program SGU.
Well, this is either the third episode of the show or the 2nd part of the 3 hour premiere of SGU smushed together under the title of “Air”. By air I’m assuming that they mean that there was little to breathe. If there is some other subtle play of words in that title I’m too dense to see it. I’m sure a lovely constructive comment or two will assist me with this. When last we left the marooned group of folks that now make up the passengers (I can’t call them crew yet) of the starship Destiny, a group of them, notably Dr. Rush, Mathew Scott, Eli Wallace and Roland Greer were just about to set forth through the Stargate to a desert planet to find some goop to fix the machines on the Destiny that scrub the air clean of excess Co2, a lovely molecule that we unfortunately can’t breathe in any great quantity.
So off they go and begin the big desert trudge. A confession. I’m an easily embarrassed person and so therefore I have a highly, almost spidey level sense of cheese. When cheese is found in anything I see I get immediately embarrassed for the actors. In this episode of SGU I’m afraid my cheesy-sense was tingling from time to time. I’ll note these events as we stumble on them.
The desert stomp was more or less to help us with a little backstory on the character of Matthew Scott, played by Brian J. Smith. I’m liking Matthew quite a bit. His backstory so far though was redolent of some epic cheese, a scent that pervaded the desert scenes. He’s a religious guy apparently and knocked up a girl back home. Did something bad to a Priest maybe. In the desert he sees the priest, perhaps summoned from either dehydration, space madness or a sentient dust devil. There was a cool moment when the priest illusion or hallucination appeared as a head in the sand after an offering of water to the dust devil, but the whole affair went careening downhill from that point and I had to watch with my hands on my face in horror. Somewhere in here was a cross on the sand signifying a deposit of co2 scrubbing minerals but I’m trying really hard to forget that part. I turned to my spouse as we watched and said that it would be best to forget that happened. Lets just move on I said.
Meanwhile, Dr Rush and angry dude Roland Greer are continuing to not get along. It’s early in the series and everyone is trying to work the kinks out of their characters. I understand this. At this point, we just have first impressions without character context, however as a first impression, Roland Greer really needs a tone down. He’s over the top. Maybe we’ll see another more sensitive, less psychotic side of young Mr. Greer in future episodes. In the meantime, he is making me grind my teeth. We get the picture, he’s troubled. I understand that not every character in the series can have a cross on the sand moment yet. Let’s hope Greer’s backstory isn’t quite as ripe as Matthew’s is so far.
Back on the Destiny, we get a little introduction to how the whole alien instant communication body switching “stones” work. Louis Ferreira is really doing a great job playing Colonel Everett Young. Less is more with the Colonel and this is how you do it. Everett swaps bodies with Lou Diamond Phillips (Colonel Telford) and Chloe Armstrong (Elyse Levesque) swaps bodies with someone I missed while I got up for a beverage. Colonel Young swapped to deliver an update on the proceedings to Command and Chloe to inform her mother that her father the Senator had made the ultimate sacrifice. The bad news scene was troubling. I had to squint to watch it. I should have gotten another beverage.
I’m still feeling quite a bit of love for SGU, despite the unfortunate moments. It’s early. I have faith. I’m starting to really enjoy the acting work of David Blue as Eli Wallace. He’s a bit smartassy but he’s good. Good acting is worth watching. How a former couch potato gamer can be put in charge of a search party over other military types I have no idea. The show has yet to explain why they have so much faith in him. Doing a math puzzle while scarfing Cheetos is no qualification for anything. Still, he’s fun to watch.
At shows end we got a nice creepy and mysterious shot of an alien spacecraft leaving the hull of the Destiny. I love cliffhangers. It’s one reason I haven’t thrown my remote at Flash Forward yet. The destiny is a big ship and I still think the castaways are still roaming around the thing like it’s a cruise ship. Hell, there could be big toothy beasts around every corner in there. I like that we may be seeing the dark side of the ship in some fashion or other in the coming weeks. In the end, we got the life saving goop back to the Destiny and we only lost a few bit characters that (maybe) Stargated themselves to the planet of the flesh eating plants or something. Life is till tough aboard the ship. You can’t eat sand and judging from next weeks preview, even if you could eat sand or sentient dust devils, there’s about to be no power to cook with. Drama is fun! It’s time to up the suspense and danger on SGU. Even on the desert planet of the alcoholic Priests, where they were all in apparent imminent danger of death, I didn’t feel any real suspense or threat to the characters. This isn’t a Disney production. Bring some heat. Well that’s all for now. See you next week.
Written by endymi0n
Just a guy in passionate pursuit of all things FI. Got news? endy (at) scificool.com
about 5 months ago
This was written by drama queens–either female or gay–who have no interest in science fiction but learned writing by watching daytime soap operas.
They also know nothing of science fiction, or fact for that matter. Soldiers hallucinate after 7 hours in the desert?
A soldier smashes his rifle into the back of the expedition's leader after a bitchy argument and nothing happens to him?
We wanted to know what happened to the 2 people who went through the gate to another world–that was a great opportunity to add some action–did they die in a world of poisonous gasses, get attacked by strange creatures, explode in a vaccuum? What a wasted opportunity.
They need to fire the writers and bring in some real science fiction writers and dump the alcoholic-mom type daytime soap opera drama and over-acted grief scenes.
I have the complete SG1 boxed set–I'll be passing on this one.
about 5 months ago
@BadDog: Spot on. This show is beyond lame, it's just screams gayness.
There is a reason why stuff like doors and mugs maintained the same basic shaped over thousands of years: They just work.
And SGU doesn't work. SGA works, SGU doesn't, and SGA was killed because someone in a board room decided he has to prove himself by being totally different.
I still had hope after ep1 and ep2, but after watching ep3, that hope is gone.
I've looked everywhere and the only defense the supporters of SGU can come up with is “they're trying something new”
LOL, the problem was never “trying something new”, the problem is they killed SGA so they can use try this piece of crap attached to the SG brand.
This is the equivalent of FIFA changing the football rules, forbid running and allow players to use their hands at all times in the next worldcup.
There's nothing wrong with the new stuff by themselves, but if you destroy what was good and replace it with something totally lame, you will be ridiculed.
SGU is now the offical soap opera for gay and lesbians.
about 5 months ago
Are you trying to say that conversations and interpersonal relationships are only interesting to gay and lesbian soap opera watchers? Compared to the horrific amount of cheese in the previous two series this one seems top notch. I really enjoyed the movie, but couldn't get into the series before this one. Most of the people who are complaining seem to say that they want to watch more action. I would rather have these struggle elements over direct action for action sake any day.
about 4 months ago
The plot made sense what we are seen is how these characters are very different, most in that no matter what we are seen here in the show, all these people where picked to go off world, and that in it self means they have potential. 7 hours in what looked like 130+ degree with limited water intake will put even soldier trained in desert survival in a hard place, they guy are not those type of soldier, so for me it makes sense he was seen icons of what he believes in. The desert devil was different that is for sure, nice touch at something even stranger to come. The two who went over would have been nice to see if they are still alive, but to me its another religious icon of say Adam and Even. The two who went to the other world are basically dead from a plot point of view. No real reason to show one man and one women on a primitive planet with no way to dial out, and a clip or two of amo.
about 4 months ago
Good grief!
While the previous episodes were a hopeful plunge into a darker and more character driven series than the two other installments (SG:1 and SGA), this one was a cry for help in my opinion.
Never have I seen such overacting as in this episode and I’m thinking of course of the angry dude as well as bad actress mother of the bad actress girl. Cheezers, that was embarrassing to watch. Fortunately, the mother is still on earth and angry dude cannot be the driving force in all the following episodes; therefore I’d say it still has a chance to recover.
Mind you, I’m not saying that Greer’s story can’t be interesting to tell, but I totally agree with Dog earlier that his action should have some form of repercussion otherwise it’s just a bunch of bullies running around and telling the ones with no guns what to do. But then again, nobody seems to mind that mystic/bad scientific guy tried to hijack the crew/passengers earlier either, although in his defense he’s trying to save the ship and maybe its occupants too, who knows.
Three fairly strong characters (at least in the company of the rest of the passengers) as far as I can see; Rush of course, since he is the antagonist and protagonist in one and also the Colonel as he seems to be the quiet type with no flaws thus far. Not sure about young tech guy yet. He can act at least but unfortunately can also have been written either way; think Wesley, if you dare. Hopefully it will be more of a Beckett/McKay character, but it’s still early, and the way he seems eager to push every button within arm’s reach there’s a bit of a scary element within.
I’m no fan of the ship. It does not correlate with what I’ve seen earlier from Lantean design, although it is a very old ship, but it looks too similar to Star Treks Cardassian ships and in particular the Lakat-class.
I was very surprised that they stopped searching the ship after what seems to be five minutes. I guess it really didn’t stop there but they found a door which was marked with a red symbol on the controls, opened it and found a big room with a hole in the window. End of search! Nothing like crew quarters, galleys or even engine rooms in the vicinity. They must have found other compartments, I mean; it’s a gargantuan of a ship. But no, Needless to say they found a room for the Colonel and for the rest? Let’s all sleep in the room we stumbled in to when we got here. So here we are: 50 or so assorted characters, presumably with equally diverse motives for joining SGC but no one seems to be even remotely interested in their environment, go figure.
Even so I’m going to give it a season before I’m giving up. Mind you, I’m a bit of a sci-fi buff. Got both series on disc and the first season of SG:1 was no shining star either, not to mention SGA’s first! What a turkey. They got it together nonetheless, with a plunge into the “Why oh, dear lord, why!” now and then, but let’s face it: which show hasn’t got those?