After having watched the two hour pilot there are things to like and things to worry about. The introductory story was simple enough with the group getting stranded on the ancient ship Destiny, and facing immediate difficulties once there. In truth some of it felt a bit like a rehash of the beginning of Atlantis, though in fairness the troubles facing these characters are a bit more logical.
On a distinctly negative side, they seem to expect the audience to know more about Stargate than their writers. Early on they rely on an ancient communication device to get a message to Earth. Unfortunately it is not well explained and only people intimately familiar with the other series are going to understand this readily.
At the same time it becomes depressingly obvious that the writers don't really know the current state of the Stargate universe. Dialogue tells us early on that a planet they are going to is 21 light years away. It then takes long enough to sit around, chat, and have a meal to get there by ship. The ship in question should have been able to make that hop in about ten seconds. Later that ship is present and the only thing standing between our new characters and the attack which leads them to flee through the gate unprepared. The problem is, the human ship, the Hammond, should have destroyed the attacking ships in three seconds flat. Any viewer who recognized the communication device used earlier would know that. So right off they cheat the audience in establishing their desperate situation.
At this point, a bit of a wait and see approach is necessary. There isn't much to the characters yet, though given time that may change. Hopefully though, they will start giving their audience a little more credit. If the writers continue to expect the audience to know Stargate while not knowing it themselves, the series is going to fall flat on its face.
As of episode four, there doesn't really seem to be any improvement on the bad points. Obstacles for the characters have gone from believable to a farce. Yes the ship that's been traveling for hundreds of thousands of years at speeds faster than light is suddenly running out of power. Evidently a little life support and a stargate that can be charged off truck alternators have taxed a power system that must be generating hundreds of terawatts. This is exactly the kind of BS that leads to incredibly bad science fiction.
On the character front, the show is clearly in a lot of trouble. Put simply, there isn't a single one for the audience to actually like. The best characters are simply those who are less annoying than others.
Some people have complained that the series looks too much like the new Battlestar. I kind of thought it sounded like a rip off when the creators were spouting the wonders of their original photography style, but I didn't really care. If it had been done well I wouldn't have minded. Unfortunately it hasn't done it well, and more than anything, the only thing the show is right now is dull. Maybe by episode ten we'll actually meet a bad guy. We'll see if I can hold on that long as a viewer.
On a distinctly negative side, they seem to expect the audience to know more about Stargate than their writers. Early on they rely on an ancient communication device to get a message to Earth. Unfortunately it is not well explained and only people intimately familiar with the other series are going to understand this readily.
At the same time it becomes depressingly obvious that the writers don't really know the current state of the Stargate universe. Dialogue tells us early on that a planet they are going to is 21 light years away. It then takes long enough to sit around, chat, and have a meal to get there by ship. The ship in question should have been able to make that hop in about ten seconds. Later that ship is present and the only thing standing between our new characters and the attack which leads them to flee through the gate unprepared. The problem is, the human ship, the Hammond, should have destroyed the attacking ships in three seconds flat. Any viewer who recognized the communication device used earlier would know that. So right off they cheat the audience in establishing their desperate situation.
At this point, a bit of a wait and see approach is necessary. There isn't much to the characters yet, though given time that may change. Hopefully though, they will start giving their audience a little more credit. If the writers continue to expect the audience to know Stargate while not knowing it themselves, the series is going to fall flat on its face.
As of episode four, there doesn't really seem to be any improvement on the bad points. Obstacles for the characters have gone from believable to a farce. Yes the ship that's been traveling for hundreds of thousands of years at speeds faster than light is suddenly running out of power. Evidently a little life support and a stargate that can be charged off truck alternators have taxed a power system that must be generating hundreds of terawatts. This is exactly the kind of BS that leads to incredibly bad science fiction.
On the character front, the show is clearly in a lot of trouble. Put simply, there isn't a single one for the audience to actually like. The best characters are simply those who are less annoying than others.
Some people have complained that the series looks too much like the new Battlestar. I kind of thought it sounded like a rip off when the creators were spouting the wonders of their original photography style, but I didn't really care. If it had been done well I wouldn't have minded. Unfortunately it hasn't done it well, and more than anything, the only thing the show is right now is dull. Maybe by episode ten we'll actually meet a bad guy. We'll see if I can hold on that long as a viewer.
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