Stargate In Significantly Fewer Seasons, Season 8: Continuum

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 seven saw the end of the main SG1 story, and a more in-depth Atlantis storyline. This penultimate season will see the end of what we've come to know as Stargate, there will be one more season but it will mostly feature entirely new characters, and it is hella darker than what we've experienced so far. So enjoy this final fun sci-fi season with O'Neill, Jackson, Carter, Teal'c, Weir, Sheppard, McKay, Mitchell, Hammond, Harriman, et. al

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Season Eight:
​Continuum

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Episode 1: Midway
(Carter,  Teal'c, McKay, Sheppard, Teyla, Dex, Lee, Chuck, Kavanaugh)

Wraiths on a plane! Ok, in a stargate. This might have been a sort of ho-hum formulaic Atlantis adventure except for the first time Teal'c meets Dex and the two of them don't precisely hit it off. There's also the fun, never before been explored interactions between Sheppard, McKay, and Lee from SG1, but the Teal'c/Dex interactions are the true highlight. If they'd killed every other character in the universe off and turned the final Atlantis season into a Teal'c/Dex buddy cop show, they would have been renewed for an additional ten seasons.


Episode 2: Search & Rescue
(Carter,  McKay, Sheppard, Teyla, Dex, Woolsey, Keller, Caldwell, Lorne)

Atlantis crew members get trapped under rubble during a mission, Michael's hybrids attack, Teyla is having her baby, and Carter is replaced as Atlantis's first in command. Her replacement is familiar but unexpected. Dun dun dun?


Episode 3: The Ark Of Truth
(O'Neill, Jackson, Carter, Hammond, Mitchell, Vala, Landry, Harriman, Ellis, Merlin, Adria)

The end of the Ori storyline! This is sort of a neat little bow to the final few seasons of SG1 with a bit of fan service. It's pretty good, but not the stellar ending that the series deserved. Still, it's nice to know how the storyline would have panned out if they'd had another season.


Episode 4: Continuum
(O'Neill, Jackson, Carter, Hammond, Mitchell, Vala, Landry, Harriman, Apophis, Ba'al)

This is the sendoff the show deserved. The Jaffa track down the final Ba'al clone and invite SG1 for the ceremony where they remove and kill the final Goa'uld symbiote. But, uhhh...Ba'al had some serious plans for this, yo. It's an alternate timelin/time travel adventure with all of the major players from the series except Bra'tac. It's hugely fun with a definitive ending that isn't doom and gloomy nor does it completely shut the door on the characters if they ever decided to do have another run at it.


Episode 5: Daedalus Variations
(McKay, Sheppard, Teyla, Dex, Zelenka, Lorne)

Continuing with alternate timeling adventures, a small crew of SGAtlantis finds an alternate version of the Daedalus ship and hop on it, only to find that it's continually jumping to different dimensions. Can they get back to original flavor Atlantis, or will this be used as a cool device to bring back Weir, Carter, and other characters who have moved on from the series?


Episode 6: Ghosts In The Machine
(Weir, McKay, Sheppard, Teyla, Dex, Woolsey, Zelenka, Chuck)

Oh shit! Weir IS back. Kind of? Maybe? Ummm...Replicators are certainly back.


Episode 7: First Contact/The Lost Tribe
(Jackson, McKay, Sheppard, Teyla, Dex, Woolsey, Caldwell, Keller, Zelenka, Todd)

All Daniel Jackson has wanted to do since season four is get to Atlantis. And while he did get to spend some time there in season six, this is his first adventure with members of the Atlantis staff. And they discover a whole new alien race who will change every...aren't there only a couple of episodes left? Wouldn't this be easier if they turned out to NOT be an entirely new race? Oooh, ooh! Or they could be the blue people from Deadalus Variations. Who even were those aliens?


Episode 8: Prodigal
(McKay, Sheppard, Teyla, Dex, Woolsey, Zelenka, Lorne, Michael)

Michael the Hybrid has been a pain in the tuchus since his inception. He's now invaded Atlantis to steal Teyla's baby. I mean, also to destroy Atlantis, and kill everyone, but mostly to get the baby.


Episode 9: Vegas
(McKay, Sheppard, Woolsey, Zelenka, Lorne, Todd)

This is a weird episode. I mean Very Weird. Especially so late in the series. Instead of a Stargate episode, it's a CSI Las Vegas episode.  No, really. The zippy transitions, rock and roll cliche soundtrack, the visual flash over the clues. It's totally CSI Las Vegas but with Sheppard as the detective, Kellar as the morgue technician, and McKay and Woolsey as FBI agents. It's completely weird. But it does invovle the Wraith, and it does have very severe consequences that set up the final episode. But, like, imagine if the second to last ever episode of the X-Files had been Law & Order Area 51 with Mulder as the district attorney, Scully as the morgue technician, Skinner as a judge and The Lone Gunmen as the detectives who find the body of Cigarette Smoking Man. It would have been weird, right?


Episode 10: The Enemy At The Gate
(Carter, McKay, Sheppard, Teyla, Dex, Woolsey, Beckett, Harriman, Zelenka, Caldwell, Ellis, Lorne, Kavanaughm, Todd)

This is it. The end of Stargate Light. Thanks to the wacky Las Vegas episode, the Wraith learned the location of Earth, and they're going there for a feeding frenzy unless the Atlantis crew can stop them. Or if Carter can stop them from Earth's Stargate Command. Someone has to stop them or the whole Stargate franchise will be forced to become all mopey and dark.