Stargate In Significantly Fewer Seasons, Season 7: Counterstrikes

While I was living in the intolerable flesh oven of Mesa, Arizona, I worked for a family who obsessively watched Stargate. I liked the family, and I liked the episodes, but it was the  fifth or sixth season, and things were constantly being explained to  me. Things I probably didn't need to know.

I'm not sure what possessed me to trackdown the movie, and start to watch the series it inspired, but I've decided to do another condensed series chronology a la my Star Trek and Doctor Who recommendations. I'm aiming for ten seasons of ten episodes each, but there's always some wriggle room.

Stargate is basically Star Trek where Earth is the ship most episodes originate from. There's a ton of classic sci-fi tropes, conspiracy theories, and completely incorrect science. For this chronology, I'm focused on interesting character studies, cool (even if technically incorrect) science, and drama that isn't quite melodrama (despite the swelling Stargate theme). I've left out some major episodes that introduce characters and plots that come up later because I care more about where a story goes than when it  begins. But each of these episodes should be easy to follow,even if you've never seen any previous episode.

Season six gave us two concurrent warfronts as SG1 battled the Ori, and Atlantis went from battling The Wraith to having to deal with The Replicators. Season seven gets us deeper into the conflict on both fronts.

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Season 7:
Counterstrikes

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Episode 1: Counterstrike
(Jackson, Carter, Teal'c, Bra'tac, Mitchell, Val, Landry, Harriman, Adria)

Having spent the previous six seasons fighting for their freedom from the Goa'uld, the Jaffa have decided they are not going to sit around and wait for the Ori to enslave or kill them, and they're not going to wait for us Earthlings to act, either. Is this the end of the alliance?


Episode 2: The Quest
(Jackson, Carter, Teal'c, Mitchell, Val, Merlin, Adria, Ba'al)

Is this the beginning of a new alliance? The weapon necessary to defeat the Ori is protected by a...dragon?A super unlikely teamup with The Most Cloned Goa'uld Ever and Val's Very Difficult Daughter get together. Maybe there's hope for the future?


Episode 3: The Shroud
(O'Neill, Jackson, Carter, Teal'c, Mitchell, Val, Woolsey, Landry, Adria)

The Ori colonize planets by sending Proctors with doomsday messages to convert the natives. But there's a new proctor with a new approach making the rounds. It's....Daniel Jackson? Are we in dark time line territory?


Episode 4: Sunday
(Weir, McKay, Sheppard, Teyla, Dex,  Zelenka, Chuck, Lorne)

After all the SG1/Ori drama, it's time to check back in with Atlantis, where it's a nice and calm day with no Wraith or Replicators. Just the residue of something Ancient that certainly won't blow up in their faces. At least not literally. 


Episode 5: First Strike
(Weir, McKay, Sheppard, Teyla, Dex,  Zelenka, Keller, Chuck, Lorne, Ellis, Oberoth)

Pre-emptive strikes are usually bogus reasons for going to war with a perceived threat. So when a new ship arrives from Earth and tells Weir and Atlantis they're going to launch a pre-emptive attack on The Replicators, they are not welcomed as heroes. 


Episode 6: Adrift/Lifeline
(Carter, Weir, McKay, Sheppard, Teyla, Dex,  Zelenka, Keller, Lee, Ellis, Chuck, Oberoth)

The....uhhh....pre-emptive attack didn't go well, and now Atlantis is at war with The Replicators, and they're going to need to find an entirely new way to defend the city.

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Episode 7: Dominion
(Jackson, Carter, Teal'c, Mitchell, Val, Landry, Adria)

A "chicken cordon bleu of enemies" is created when Adria is captured by Ba'al and implanted with a Goa'uld symbiote. We don't know whether or not the Ori were destroyed by Merlin's weapon, but a new superrace of two of Earth's largest threats can't be good.
 

Episode 8: Unending
(Jackson, Carter, Teal'c, Mitchell, Val, Landry, Harriman, Thor)

The Asgard are ready to ascend their entire race, which means they are finally willing to give all of their technology and knowledge to Earth. Unfortunately, right after the exchange is made, the Ori show up. This was the last ever episode of SG1, though there are two movies, and several cameos of the original cast waiting in season eight.


Episode 9: The Seer
(Carter,  McKay, Sheppard, Teyla, Dex, Woolsey, Keller, Chuck, Todd)

Carter is the new head of Atlantis. Teyla is pregnant. The Wraith are still a threat. SO Teyla brings a pyschic to see how Atlantis can survive going forward.


​Episode 10: Be All My Sins Remembered
(Carter,  McKay, Sheppard, Teyla, Dex, Zelenka, Keller, Caldwell, Ellis, Chuck, Todd)

We end the season with the alliance between Atlantis and a faction of The Wraith against, well, other factions of The Wraith. It wouldn't have been a bad ending for the entire series, but we still have two more seasons to go.