I just started watching Stargate SG-1. Any fans?

[RH | 5,206]

So, while I was in my office wrapping my wife's gifts, I pulled an old DVD of a film I loved as a kid off the shelf and decided to watch it.  In fact, I bought the DVD, Stargate, second-hand and I don't think I even watched it.

Although it's no Star Wars or other blockbuster of it's time, I still enjoyed it.  Wanting a little more, I finally decided to give Stargate SG-1 a try.  I must be forgiven for not watching it when it aired.  We didn't have cable and years later when I had a chance to pick up the show, I never got a chance.

Well, yesterday I started watching it and I'm now about 1/4th of the way into episode 4.  It's... interesting.  I think I like it for what it is.  I almost couldn't take it though. The Gou'ald (or whatever they are called) had such horrible head gear compared to the OG movie, I almost had to "walk" out and let it go.  The only thing keeping me around is that I told myself it was 90s TV, not a movie so I shouldn't expect half the quality of the film.

So, are there any other fans?  Any non-spoilery details I should know, or would be fun to know going in?  I have over 200 episodes to catch up on.  A sci-fi show with 10 seasons in it's backlog had to have done something right.  What are you guys thoughts?

[Hammerfestus | 4,100]

I love SG-1.  I actually really enjoyed Atlantis too.  I actually got a buddy of mine to start watching recently.  The whole traveling through space to a variety of themed worlds where everyone magically speaks English always kind of gave me a Star Trek TOS vibe.  Plus Macgyver.  

[Tabonga | 2,533]

I have the whole series on DVD.  It is one of those cases where the series is much much better than the movie it is based on.

I also like Stargate Atlantis.  Stargate Universe not so much - its main plotline was actually pretty limiting in terms of what could be done plotwise - which is why I suspect it was dropped (with a major cliffhanger) at the end of the second season.

I haven't seen the Stargate Origins reboot so I can't comment on those.

[RH | 5,206]

58 minutes ago, Tabonga said:

I have the whole series on DVD.  It is one of those cases where the series is much much better than the movie it is based on.

I also like Stargate Atlantis.  Stargate Universe not so much - its main plotline was actually pretty limiting in terms of what could be done plotwise - which is why I suspect it was dropped (with a major cliffhanger) at the end of the second season.

I haven't seen the Stargate Origins reboot so I can't comment on those.

Wow! I had no clue there was so much follow up media! Since I didn't get a chance to originally catch SG-1, I've mostly ignored the series because I didn't want to miss anything. After SG-1, I'll definitely need to look into these other shows(?).

With all of that investment you've mentioned, makes me wonder why they haven't made another movie with a low barrier of entry to get back into the story. Right now we have Star Wars, MCU and some DC Comics stuff.  Movies need another "universe" to get into. I think Stargat could be a great one.

 

[Tabonga | 2,533]

3 minutes ago, RH said:

Wow! I had no clue there was so much follow up media! Since I didn't get a chance to originally catch SG-1, I've mostly ignored the series because I didn't want to miss anything. After SG-1, I'll definitely need to look into these other shows(?).

With all of that investment you've mentioned, makes me wonder why they haven't made another movie with a low barrier of entry to get back into the story. Right now we have Star Wars, MCU and some DC Comics stuff.  Movies need another "universe" to get into. I think Stargat could be a great one.

 

I think on something like that everybody gets creatively exhausted at some point in time and it just dies through lack of interest. 

ONe advantage with catching them later is you can watch them back to back in a close time frame,  We recently rewatched game of thrones over the course of a few weeks and the series was much more enjoyable that way.

[nrslam | 485]

I liked SG-1 bitd, at least until McGuyver left. Watched Atlantis and Universe, too, but with so many other choices out there I haven't felt the urge to rewatch them.

I'd agree that the SG-1 series was better than the movie.

 

[RH | 5,206]

2 minutes ago, nrslam said:

I liked SG-1 bitd, at least until McGuyver left. Watched Atlantis and Universe, too, but with so many other choices out there I haven't felt the urge to rewatch them.

I'd agree that the SG-1 series was better than the movie.

 

[TrekMD | 1,498]

Oh, I love the show.  I have the entire series. 

[twiztor | 918]

Stargate is my favorite non-franchise scifi movie. i tried watching the show a few times and found it pretty terrible.

for a great '90s scifi series, i recommend Sliders. the first couple seasons are awesome. avoid seasons 4 and 5 though.

[Tanooki | 5,113]

SG-1 is fantastic and Atlantis wasn't worth getting negative about either.

Sure they're TV, and the season you're into now was pretty low rent as they had no idea years later if a B-shlock old egypt alien movie would have traction as a TV show.  Once it turned into a hit after a couple seasons and got fanboy/girl traction which turned into online frothing over it, convention level stuff, pre-facebook(myspace etc) style sites around it the budget kept getting better.  It wasn't long before the visuals rivals or surpassed the movies easily and Atlantis took it up yet another notch coming parallel and after the fact (like how STTNG and DS9 overlapped.)

I ignored it thinking crap and knockoff tv cheese for ages.  I'm thinking it was a year year and a half ago now I decided I'd let it run as I do with video on my computer while I work to keep awake and sane.  I got sucked in and went through the shows that were/are present on streaming as I think it was on Netflix or Prime at the time, either way it never felt like it overstayed, the humor and softening up/sarcasm of ONeill was really amusing too, and I can easily see going back through it again.  I had gone off on this scifi run from every show of Trek, then that, Babylon 5, Andromeda, Farscape all one after another.

[RH | 5,206]

13 hours ago, Tanooki said:

 

I ignored it thinking crap and knockoff tv cheese for ages.  

I mentioned initially I didn't watch the show because we didn't have cable. But I too avoided this show for years because it looked soooo bad when it came out, and I remembered that from the teasers. I am watching it during work now too and I'm up to episode 7. It's a great show for this type of viewing and already I feel it's starting to get a bit better than the first few episodes. Not perfect, but I feel like the writers are starting to hit a stride.

Edited December 24, 2020 by RH

[avatar! | 1,936]

It's no Babylon-5, but it's pretty good. I think the first five or so seasons, they really had a decent story arc. After that, it kinda became silly and forgettable. I mean, there were plenty of bad episodes in the first five seasons, but overall it's better than most of the stuff today

[RH | 5,206]

Well, I'm already up to being half-way through season 8.  I binge it while working when I'm bug hunting, compiling, testing, ad naseum.  Holy cow, I love this show!

Thoughts so far...

Non-Spoilery

• If you are into Sci-Fi and have never seen this show, I highly recommend it.  It's much better than I thought.  I'll admit it's a little rough going at first, but they actors and writers get their stride soon enough.  Also, the graphics are a bit cheesy, but they get a lot better by about season 3.
• To me, this is a lot like Star Trek: TOS.  Yes, it's a completely different premise, but it is totally has the "to explore strange new worlds" vibe.
• The Replicators legit freak me out. I have two and a half seasons left and I really want that arc to end.  They're totally stressing me out!

Spoilery

Spoiler

• I nearly cried when Janet died.  I honestly thought they were going to kill O'Niell and revive him by the end of the season.  I've not been reading up on the show at all, so I was clueless.
• Speaking of killing of characters, WTF was that season about where Michael Shanks mostly left.  I did read up on details about that, and it sounds to me that they really couldn't work out his contract.  Then he couldn't get work... haha.
• I felt that the first episode was super weak in the way that Teal'c joined the crew. "Finally, I see a group of people I believe can defeat the ga'ould. I flip now!"  Fortunately they helped set that up a bit with a flash back of Teal'c's life and Breatak's training of him.  That helped a LOT because it was an aspect of the setup that bugged me for a while.
• Also, why didn't Teal'c's family ever come to live with him.  I never felt like they made a strong case for it, especially after his wife died.  Why didn't his son come and live with him.  Sure, Teal'c wanted his son to be raised as a brave Jaffa and living life underground would have suuuuucked but... man, that just felt like straight-up abandonment.
• I was pissed when they killed Sha'ra.  I was even more pissed when they nuked her home world (drawing a blank, can't recall what it's named.)
• Typically bottle episodes suck but I loved Episode 100 - Wormhole Xtreme.  This was also the episode where I learned that David Deluise is the son of Dom Deluise, as is his brother who was the bad guy from Encino Man and was also one of Wayne's buddies in Wayne's World.  This also explained why Dom Deluise was randomly in one episode.

Last, a question for you guys who have watched everything.  Do you recommend that I start watching Atlantis?  The end of season 7 was the setup for Atlantis.  I'm thinking about binging that one after I finish SG-1.  However, if their stories criss-cross (and it seems they might) I could split my viewing up and try to watch the shows in chronological order.  That's a bit more work than I want, though, but I guess it could be fun.  Thoughts?

 

[SailorScoutMandy | 782]

@drxandyand I started it a few weeks ago. Great show , tho teal'c always looks constipated

[RH | 5,206]

7 minutes ago, SailorScoutMandy said:

@drxandyand I started it a few weeks ago. Great show , tho teal'c always looks constipated

[drxandy | 3,279]

Yessss we just finished the first season, it's so easy to binge watch. Saw the movie way back when but never dipped into the series and it's really good for sure.

[RH | 5,206]

Just now, drxandy said:

Yessss we just finished the first season, it's so easy to binge watch. Saw the movie way back when but never dipped into the series and it's really good for sure.

Yeah, don't read my spoilers above. There's a lot of ground to be covered, and I mention some big moments.

[drxandy | 3,279]

Just now, RH said:

Yeah, don't read my spoilers above. There's a lot of ground to be covered, and I mention some big moments.

Oh don't worry I skipped right over haha, thanks for the heads up

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

You should definitely watch Atlantis.  Personally, I enjoyed that series more than SG-1, but most likely due to all the rough edges that had to be worn down or shaved off from the very beginning of that series.  "Why do all of these proto-civilizations all speak English" still pops out of my mouth every time I rewatch it, lol.  Stargate Universe is also really good, although it takes a few episodes to really get settled into, as it starts out very much more character driven than dilemma/tech of the week like the other two shows were, but it quickly finds its footing.  No spoilers, but there's no semi-firm ending for that one--still worth watching though.