Chris54
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"For you I bleed myself dry"
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« on: October 06, 2009, 07:58:22 AM » |
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Stargate Universe Season 1 'Air' (episodes 1 and 2, Air Part 1 & 2, were aired together as a 2 hour premiere)
The 2-hour series premier of Stargate Universe aired on Sy Fy last night. Based on the movie and two previous Stargate series (SG-1 and Atlantis), its aim was to be a new “breed” for both fans of the franchise and new viewers. The writers tried to make it so that new fans wouldn’t miss out on anything important, but some of their hints are so subtle that you have to listen carefully if you aren’t familiar with Stargate. This has a darker feel than the other two shows, and promises to be much more character driven rather than plot driven.
The episode opens to a ship exiting hyperspace, which cruises by, letting us get a better view. Once inside we see an open Stargate, which spits out a Lt. Scott, followed in close and chaotic succession by a line of people, a combination of civilian and military. As they come through the gate, the camera zooms in on our new leads: the Daniel Jackson/Rodney McKay for Universe: Dr. Rush, plus or computer/comic relief Eli. Following them are more soldiers and a Senator from California and his assistant. Dr. Rush walks away so he can observe the scene and smiles at the chaos below him. Finally, Colonel Young is thrown from the gate, flying out and lands across the room.
We flash back to a scene in which Eli is playing an online computer game with his friend, insisting he can beat it, while his friend argues it’s an impossible task put in by the programmers to mess with people. After he inputs the code and nothing happens, he quits and leaves. There is a knock on the door and outside stand Gen. Jack O’Neill and Dr. Rush who tell him that video game he beat had a top secret code imbedded in it, and he’s the first to solve it. They present him with a non-disclosure agreement, “And if I don’t sign this?” “We’ll beam you up to our spaceship”, replies Gen. O’Neill. Eli closes the door on them and begins walking up the stairs. There’s a flash of light (and the familiar Asgard sound) and Eli is now orbiting the Earth. Dr. Rush welcomes him aboard the U.S.S Hammond, and tells him they are off to another planet. He plops Eli in front of a TV, where a video featuring Dr. Daniel Jackson gives him (and new viewers) the rundown of what the Stargate is. He goes down to the mess, where he meets the Senators assistant, who we find out is also the Senators daughter. The two banter a bit, since Chloe went to Harvard and Eli went to MIT.
Back at the present, Lt. Scott and Eli begin looking around the ship, and after they open a door, they find Dr. Rush standing at a giant window, watching hyperspace flow go past. He explains that based on the console nearby (since this is the control room); the ship was launched thousands of years ago by a race called the Ancients. Lt. Scott explains to Rush that they have a lot of injuries and Rush needs to figure out a way to dial home.
Another flashback, this time to the Colonel’s kitchen where he is arguing with his wife about taking another tour of duty. He begins to get weak, and he looks up at her blurred face, she merges into the face of TJ the medic. As he regains consciousness, the ship comes out of hyperspace over a planet.
We go to a flashback with Lt. Scott and a woman having sex in a supply room. Scott’s radio comes on; the Col. Telling him to drop whatever he’s doing and report immediately. The two reluctantly stop; he dresses, kisses her goodbye and leaves. He comes down in time to greet Eli, Senator Armstrong and his daughter as they are beamed down from the Hammond. Dr. Rush welcomes them to Icarus base, which is on a planet with special properties that allow them to run a new Stargate to try and dial the 9th chevron (for those unfamiliar with the show, any gate address within our galaxy has seven chevrons, farther out, like in the Pegasus Galaxy where Atlantis is, have eight). They are not sure where a 9th chevron will take them. Rush explains the code Eli solved on the game was the formula needed to make the 9th chevron work. They try dialing but it will not lock, and Dr. Rush blames Eli’s math.
Back at the present, Sen. Armstrong and Lt. Scott are arguing over who is in charge; Scott insists the Col left him in charge and he wins the argument. The senator begins coughing and his daughter explains his heart problem. He complains of a headache and trouble breathing. Scott tells everyone that the life support is faulty and may stop working completely in the next few hours. The Senator collapses again, and the medic sees that he has internal bleeding, and the heart pills he’s been taking are making it worse.
We flashback to Rush and Eli working on the formula, arguing over whose fault it is that it won’t work. Eli offers other suggestions (wrong gate address, etc) which rush shoots down. Col. Young invites Eli to dinner and the go off, leaving Rush to start again. He takes a break and goes down to his room, where he opens a drawer in his bed side table and takes out a picture of himself with a woman. As he touches her face, he begins to cry. We go back to Eli sitting with the crew and Senator and his daughter. While they eat and talk, there’s a boom from outside and shaking. After a few others, the Colonel announces that the base is under attack, the soldiers are to go to their positions and the civilians are to get to the gate room in case of evacuation. Col. Young goes to a cell on the base and opens it, and announces to the occupant “Sergeant, we’re under attack, don’t know who don’t know why. Consider the charges dropped, go take your anger out on them.”
From the view outside we see a few massive ships (Al’kesh, for you SG-1 fans) and some fighters heading for the planet. Col. Young radios the Hammond asking who’s attacking. Col. Samantha Carter, the commander of the Hammond, answers that she believes it is the Lucian Alliance, but they didn’t introduce themselves before opening fire.
In the present, the Sergeant released from the cell has taken aim at Rush, because he wants to push a button that could fix the life support, but runs the risk of cause a massive overheating to the rest of the systems. Scott talks him down, Rush pushes the button…and nothing happens.
We flashback to an office at Icarus, with a woman who works for IOA (International Oversight Advisory, civilians who make sure the money put into the Stargate program is spent reasonably), Camille Wray and TJ the medic. They are discussing a scholarship that TJ has applied for and been accepted, but had not told anyone else. Camille tells TJ she thinks she’s taking the scholarship to protect someone, to which TJ replies that she had simply not decided until that point.
Back at the scene of the battle, people are waiting for news, while Rush and Eli discuss the 9th chevron. An energy spike within the core of the planet lets them know it will blow soon, so they have to evacuate now. The colonel has ordered them to dial Earth, but Rush believes this is his last chance to try the 9th chevron. Eli suggests that maybe the problem is with the 9th chevron itself, not the math. The final chevron of every dialing sequence is the point of origin, but what if in this case the 9th chevron is the Earth symbol, like a code. Rush takes over the dialing sequence, using Eli’s suggestion and is able to establish a wormhole. He insists he is doing this because they can’t risk dialing Earth; if the planet blows before they can shut it down the blast could be transferred to Earth. Meanwhile, the rest of the civilians are heading for the gate room, but a blast from above collapses one of the tunnels, trapping people, including the senator, behind the rubble.
Back to the present: Rush, Eli, and Scott are looking at a star map. A point blinks approximately where the Earth should b in the Milky Way, and Rush explains that this is the ships point of origin. A line moves from there to the Pegasus Galaxy, then quickly begins bouncing out further and further.
Scott “So those points are more stars?”
Eli: “No, those are galaxies.”
Scott: “So where the hell are we?”
Rush: “Several billion light years from home.”
A flashback to the evacuation of Icarus base: the tunnel in the hall has collapsed, cutting of Chloe from her father and more civilians. Col Young orders Scot to take over the evacuation, and bring supplies. They put c-4 on the debris and blow a hole to let the rest of the people through. We see that the Senator has been hurt.
Lt. Scott orders everyone to grab whatever they can carry and follow through the gate one at a time with a few seconds between each. He goes through. Everyone begins to follow, one at a time at first, then everyone rushing forward as the shaking on the base increases. Finally the colonel begins filling a crate, grabs it and runs through, just as an explosion blows the base, and the planet. From the Hammond Carter contacts Stargate Command and asks Col. O’Neill how many made it through to Earth. O’Neill says that none came through and the gate never opened. Carter tells him that the gate had been open for six minutes. “Well they didn’t come here” “Then where’d they go?”
Onboard the ship, in the present, Lt. Scott decides to search the ship in teams of three, warning everyone “not to touch anything”. Meanwhile, Rush sneaks off carrying a small case. He hides in a spare room, and pulls out a silver box with five black triangular stones. We see a shot of Stargate command, a man sitting next to a screen. Suddenly, Dr. Rush is in his seat, but his movements parallel those of the man, who is still visible on the TV.
Scott’s team has come to a door they can’t open, so they contact Eli, asking him if there is anything he can do from his end. He forces the door open, and they team realizes why it was shut: there is a hole in the ship and it is venting atmosphere. They figure this might be why the life support is failing, and there may be other holes in the ship that aren’t sealed off.
Everyone meets back up in the gate area, where Rush explains that the stones are Ancient long range communication devices, and that he has contacted Gen. O‘Neill, who has put him in charge. Everyone becomes upset not only because they weren’t told, but because they don’t want Rush in charge. Young slowly takes over, which relaxes everyone, and quietly tells Rush that he’s useful for now, but he needs to figure out a way to dial out, soon. Scott tells everyone to start going through the crates to try and find food. Wray has been staring at the Sgt. who had been a prisoner, and he confronts her. He asks what her problem is, and she replies that she’s wondering if he should be locked back up. He starts to go after her, and Scott pulls him away to help him search the ship.
While investigating the ship, Scott sees a small ball float out of a room; he follows it until Eli pops out of a room and explains that they’re cameras. Rush comes on the radio to tell him he’s found the life support problem. They find the filters, and they are oozing a black goo. Rush isn’t sure if there is a way to fix them. Scott demands he fixes the gate, and Rush asks him “What makes you think I won’t try?”
Meanwhile, another team has found a shuttle, and the door leading in is stuck open, and there is a hole in the shuttle itself that is venting atmosphere; the shields are keeping some in, but not enough. They can’t get the outer door shut, and the shuttle door will only stay closed if closed from the inside.
In his room, the colonel has woken up, as has the Senator in his room. Simultaneously, TJ explains what’s going on the Colonel, while Chloe explains what is happening to the Senator.
In the control room, the small group of main characters is trying to decide who should sacrifice themselves to close the door, since with it open they have about an hour of air left, but closed they may have a day; a day they can use to figure out how to fix the ship. Rush argues that they should choose someone who’s skills are least likely to be of use, they rest counter, saying they can’t ask someone to die for everyone else. The colonel has already volunteered but TJ and Scott refused, and since the colonel can’t walk at the moment because of his injuries, he was forced to stay in bed. Chloe then rushes in saying her dad is gone and she can’t find him. When Scott radios the Sergeant guarding the shuttle, he tells him the senator is there, and he’s armed. Sen. Armstrong argues that he’s going to die anyway, between his heart and the bleeding, so he might as well do something useful. He locks himself into the shuttle just as Scott and Chloe round the corner. Chloe pleads with her father to open the door. He turns in the chair and says goodbye, and Chloe continues to pound on the door as her father dies. She sits down next to the door and cries.
After a few minutes, she gets up and runs back to the control room, were she attacks Rush, blaming him for her fathers death. Rush look stricken and says he is very sorry, and know how hard it is when you loose someone. He tells her that her father’s death has given them the time they need, and that his trip could be the most important scientific discovery of man-kind. Chloe gives him a scathing look and leaves. Scott follows her and sits with her. He asks about her father.
Chloe: “Why do you want to know?”
Scott: “The man died so I could live. I’d like to know a little about him”
The two talk for a few minutes, until Scott heads to the gate room. The Colonel is up, and one of his men tells him he’s found the dialing sequence. They start the gate up, and try to dial home. Rush comes in and tells them to stop, because the gate could drain too much power. Col. Young accuses him of knowing how to dial the whole time but refusing, and Rush explains he was trying to figure out the systems first. The gate shuts down, and they drop out of hyperspace. He says he believes they must be near a planet and the gate will start dialing itself in a minute. When the colonel asks why, Rush replies that he has told the computer they are in trouble, and he believes that the ship was searching for a planet nearby that would have what they need. The gate starts dialing itself, and they decide to send the floating camera through. It sends back data, telling them there is oxygen, gravity, etc. They decide to send a team through, but notice a timer above the gate, saying the have just less than 12 hours to explore the planet before the ship jumps back into hyperspace. A team, including Lt. Scott, Eli and Dr. Rush prepare to embark.
But we’ll have to wait until next week to see the planet.
I'm still not sure how I feel about the show, since part of the draw of SG-1 (for me, anyway) was plot driven, with the character arcs contained in the main story. This feels darker. So we'll see how the season progresses. If you missed it, it will be airing everyday through Thursday on SyFy, or you can watch it on syfy.com
Did you watch? Is this the first time you've watched a Stargate show, or were you a fan before? What did you think?
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