Amph Mankind's Greatest Ongoing Adventure: Stargate SG-1 (and Origins) (Spoilers Allowed)

They probably would have, eventually. The benefit of having such a long-running show is that almost every plot thread got an opportunity to be revisited/rounded off/concluded.

The downside is that they become more expensive to renew, due to raises, etc. SFC chased the North American genre record by sticking with SG-1, but ultimately led to the demise sooner than SGC on its own would have.

And, yeah, chasing BSG led to SGU replacing SGA sooner than expected (they figured they’d get a Season 6 hand-off season ala SG-1 Season 8). And, sadly, SGU was ended a season or two early as well- just as things were starting to peak, too.

 

Ehh…I tried SGU but couldn’t get into it. I was tired of the “grimdark.” Same reason I never finished BSG.

 

That was the starting point, but I think it began to open up more in the second season. Especially as the greater threats started to emerge. And the crossover plans they had for the future sounding promising. Not to mention the big mystery of series actually had an incredible premise behind it and I am still just damn curious to find out what they had in store as an answer.

 

I would disagree there- in fact, I think they stated it back then. Afterall, why would they reveal an original idea they might be able to use in a different, original project? Or be able to save for use in another Stargate series or film? We know Mallozzi (or was it Wright?) pitched a new series to Amazon recently. They didn't take it, but they've been thinking long term about renewal ever since SGU was cancelled (SGU video film pitches, Origins as a web test, Dark Matter almost being acquired to retroactively turn it into a multiverse spin-off, this latest pitch now, etc).

EDIT- Ok, looking it up, seems they had anticipated Season 3 likely being the final season. And that both Wright and Mallozzi knew the answer to the mystery, but didn't tell the writer's room since that crew could change between seasons. Mallozzi has since said that that particular storyline is Wright's baby and isn't comfortable revealing the story without Wright'a approval/involvement. But he has detailed other storyline plans the series had in the works.

 

I think it does- the show is anchored in the premise of the gate, after all. And that holds tremendous storytelling potential, as we've seen. SGA did very well for itself and essentially only ended because of a show-swap. SGU is the only series that ended because of low ratings instead of network politics and budgets.

The lack of new content seems pretty easier justified- MGM was in the red for so long that it couldn't fund new projects on its own, and Syfy didn't have any interest in the franchise anymore (not to mention the diminishing prospects of cable channels in general). Even Dark Matter, the closest thing we had to a 4th series, had to be made super on-the-cheap and still got cancelled early because of the split-network ownership deals that made the show possible to begin with.

And, since then, Amazon has only owned MGM for about a year. Which means that, unless they wanted to rush a product out, it's still a pretty reasonable timetable to be looking at pitches before diving into direct production of a new series.

And while the preceding Stargate streaming service didn't last terribly long, it ran its initial course. Just the fact that they'd try it at all, and support it with a new web series, at least shows some degree of faith in the property.

 

Master Replicas is picking up the Stargate die-cast license!

Most excellent! We know Eaglemoss has around 10 ships in the planning stages, but only 5 (maybe 6) reached production (and only 3 were ever released before EM went under). But, obviously, the franchise has many more to offer.

I would assume they'd pick up production of the initial ships, plus Prometheus, Puddlejumper, Dart & Destiny. The hopefully some gates, Atlantis, etc.

 

With the unreleased Prometheus Eaglemoss model finally coming this month, Gateworld has a small article that included a small bit of trivia (and concept art) that I never knew about:

Eagle-eyed fans have noted that the model appears to be based on the original Season Six design of the ship, when the two pods on either side were conceived to be some form of propulsion (as depicted in the original concept art below). In later episodes the pod openings were widened to reconceive them as F-302 hangars (seen in the Season Nine episode “Ethon”), implying a refit that was never mentioned on screen.​

That actually kinda explains why the ship is so damn ugly! The whole "office tower with weird arms" thing never made any design sense whatsoever, and was just plain awkward-looking in general. That it is was meant to channel, and sit above, those energy tracks as a propulsion system actually makes it make sense!

If they had stuck with that, I might have actually kinda liked the ship? It's almost like the cool energy beam drive that was used in the (very terrible) movie Supernova.

But, alas, since that is not the case, it remains an awkward ship. And while I will likely be buying almost the entire line of Stargate models from Eaglemoss/Master Replicas moving forward (already have my Daedalus and F-302), this will probably be the only one I'll be skipping. Because, well...

 

I don't mind ugly designs in that narrative sense, but making it too awkward kinda crosses the line for me. They should have revised the design when they dropped the beam-rail drive system idea, if they wanted it to look like a lab on top of an engine system. It feels unbalanced and without purpose.

I know it starts to look like other ships (especially Excalibur from Crusade) when you start moving pieces round, but those upper arms either should have gone, or the nacelles. Maybe stick one "hangar bay nacelle" underneath for fighters, or include an opening in (or behind) the nose.

 

You know, I never thought about if she always had fighter bays, or if it was a specific upgrade later on (and the CG model was just updated to reflect it later on). I guess the Antarctica battle blurs the lines since you can get the impression that the F-302s launched from her, but they could just have easily launched from a ground base and escorted her in. And it's been too long since my last rewatch to remember if any other episodes before Season 9 explicitly mention fighter bays or launches.

As for the design, the arms circle back to why the concept art was so interesting. With the visible rails for the nacelles, you can get the impression that the ship is really the arms and office tower sitting on top of a giant engine train. And that they needed to be elevated to stay above those energy rails/not interfere with them. Without the rails, you lose that perspective of the design's function and it becomes a weird, twisted caltrop shape. Like those WW2 "hedgehog" beach obstacles to deter invasions.

 

I could see it being rigged for space launch, not atmo launch. No runway needed there. Still, yeah, size is an issue. Might have to take the nacelle/hangar bay refit as a canon, offscreen event.

 

Dammit!

 

It literally wasn't, though- you may recall that Season 11 was supposed to be the original conclusion to the Ori storyline. So bits and pieces of that had be smooshed into Ark of Truth as a DVD movie instead to provide resolution (don't recall if Continuum was meant to be a Season 11 story also, or if that was just written when they shifted to specifically DVD movies).

 

I don't recall seeing this before, but stumbled upon the time One L met Two L's:



Also, we know what RDA's porn name and/or MST3K Space Mutiny name would be now: