SGA roundup
I kind of love Gmail's targeted advertising. It used to be convinced that all I ever wanted were shin splint cures and yarn (neither of which I have ever bought), but somehow over the last few months it shifted to exclusively pitching vanity presses (publish without an agent! See your novel in print!). Except for one persistent ad for the "O'Neill Captain Jack," which is apparently a very ugly shoe. You have NO IDEA how much that amuses me.
So, I watched through SGA 5x03, and then got turned off and didn't watch any more. I wasn't swearing off my show, just... enjoying writing a lot, and not brimming over with enthusiasm for it. But, since apparently The Shrine is the best episode in the history of everything (I am still unspoiled! I have no idea how I managed this), and miriad nudged me, I thought I should catch up.
SGA 5x03, the one where Satedans are actually Klingons
Okay, there was a lot to love here.
Most of which can be summed up with: WOOLSEY! My crush on Robert Picardo grows and grows. I love the thing with the doors, I love the suit and the red wine, I love his actual competence and leadership. I love his people skills, and the way they seem so plainly learned out of a book but are nevertheless so genuine. I love the Yorkie conversation (Quite a lot like Rodney with the kidney stone thing, no? Men trying to empathize with Teyla and making it All About Them in hilarious rambly ways? There must be something to do with that idea...)
Other things to love: Ronon and Teyla are still friends. Teyla's dilemma was handled in a way that did NOT make me want to throttle the writers and beat their heads into things. Hey, I'm damning with faint praise here, but it's all I got.
Rodney in the bath! "I'm not taking a bath with you." John snark! Jokes about John on his knees! Feeding the slashers! Rodney has now spent more canonical time sitting beside sickbeds than every other character put together.
Okay, I did my best, I'm out. Things not to like: WTF with "True Satedan Honor?" Did Satedans become Klingons when we weren't looking? Oh, right, yes they did.
Look, Ronon is The Way He Is because he spent SEVEN YEARS AS A RUNNER, and the show constantly underplays or downright forgets about that. Sure, some of his value system comes from before- but from specifically being a soldier in his culture, not just "his whole culture is that way." Hell, two seasons ago the show was able to give us some absolutely wonderful flashbacks of a technologically advanced, recognizable, not terribly alien Satedan culture with a Ronon who was recognizably the same character yet far different from the one we know.
But then the writers forgot all that, and needed some shorthand, so all Satedan culture is monolithic and Klingon.
Look, if they had ALWAYS intended to portray Satedans that way, then I would not object (well, I would, but for different reasons). But this was just a lazy shorthand, Othering Aliens in Five Minutes Or Less, and, yes, it has a lot to do with how Ronon looks.
Fucking pisses me off.
Also: I can read torture porn, but I can't watch it. Too much with the hurt, not enough with the comfort. Jason Momoa hit it out of the park, of course, but that was a lot of gratuitous.
SGA 5x04, the one where it turns out somebody on the SGA staff can actually write (OMGWTFBBQ, eh?)
DUDE. There was a STORY. And it was interesting and exciting and well-paced and well-exposited and original.
*flails*
MY SHOW DIDN'T SUCK! In fact, it actually kind of utterly rocked.
Wonderful, balanced team interaction with absolutely wonderful use of secondary characters. I don't even remember specific character moments (even though I know that I LOVED everybody) because I was so busy watching the PLOT. I do not even know what to do with that.
Except! John's little bout of self-congratulatory narcissism. Made of win.
(The hold is full of boxes that say "Do not ring transport" on the sides. Little details like that fill me with love.)
Who took my show and replaced it with this?
SGA 5x05, the one without Tori Higginson
Look, I get that the lack of TH was not the writers' fault, and I get that they HAD to do something with the massive dangling loose end, and... why did it have to be so made of fail?
Okay, that is not fair. This was classic Atlantis, in that everything about the plot was stupid and everything about the characters was wonderful.
The flying monkey conversation! The camaraderie! The banter! *love* Rodney hanging a lampshade on the "at least we still have inertial dampeners" made the hard-SF fan in me LOL.
Rodney and Radek bickering! I loved that scene more than I can possibly tell you. And Radek's little bout of telepathy when the radios cut him off from Rodney. I missed their interaction more than I realized- Rodney/Radek really is my Subversive Pairing in this fandom. I just wish we had seen them solve something together- I miss the talking over each other.
Woolsey! Okay, let's try that again: Woolsey! With the getting shut in a far tower by the city herself (is there Woolsey fic about his status as an outsider so far?). And then with the bluffing, and the fact that after four episodes he is already a better leader than Elizabeth or Sam ever were, and the fact that Robert Picardo has crazy acting chops and I am madly in love and would probably hit that.
Uh, sorry. Where was I?
Right, that gets us to 9 minutes into what I thought was going to be a fabulous, squeeful episode, then it suddenly turned Made Of Fail. Because then we were faced with 15 straight minutes of having our characters stare at screens, watching or hearing painfully slow monotone exposition of things we will not possibly care about, completely with a full-on "As you know, John" flashback.
FAIL.
I mean, all the character reactions were pitch-perfect, and Rodney was all "I made this mess, I have to clean it up" Boy Scout. And character continuity, with Rodney's desire to believe (like with Carson) and Ronon's hatred of doubles (like... always) and Teyla being all diplomatic without trusting her an inch. And Woolsey having a spine when it counts and making the perfect decisions.
So why did the plot just kind of suck so bad?
To be honest, the more I think about it, the less I hate it. The plot idiocies aren't actually any worse than their normal, and Elizabeth's character development, becoming the leader of a new people and splitting loyalties and having to make such a hard decision when those loyalties conflict- could possibly be considered "really well done." I just wish it hadn't been exposited/paced so badly.
Ronon is really looking bad these days. I thought it was just continuity from episode 3, but it's still going on. Is that just me? Is Jason sick? Because I was getting an overwhelming "pale and drawn and tired" vibe from him, not helped by how much more unkempt he's been this season. Is it just me?
Overall, my feelings about SGA remain exactly the same: mountains and mountains of boudless love for the characters, very little for the show as show. A few fic wants, but no new bunnies (just the ones I was already nurturing: the Ronon/Keller, the John/Rodney/Radek, the Sam/Rodney, the alien POV. What is up with my non-McShep fic ideas in this fandom?) So the Shrine will be next, and hopefully I will be all caught up Friday, and maybe there will be some restored squee?
So, I watched through SGA 5x03, and then got turned off and didn't watch any more. I wasn't swearing off my show, just... enjoying writing a lot, and not brimming over with enthusiasm for it. But, since apparently The Shrine is the best episode in the history of everything (I am still unspoiled! I have no idea how I managed this), and miriad nudged me, I thought I should catch up.
SGA 5x03, the one where Satedans are actually Klingons
Okay, there was a lot to love here.
Most of which can be summed up with: WOOLSEY! My crush on Robert Picardo grows and grows. I love the thing with the doors, I love the suit and the red wine, I love his actual competence and leadership. I love his people skills, and the way they seem so plainly learned out of a book but are nevertheless so genuine. I love the Yorkie conversation (Quite a lot like Rodney with the kidney stone thing, no? Men trying to empathize with Teyla and making it All About Them in hilarious rambly ways? There must be something to do with that idea...)
Other things to love: Ronon and Teyla are still friends. Teyla's dilemma was handled in a way that did NOT make me want to throttle the writers and beat their heads into things. Hey, I'm damning with faint praise here, but it's all I got.
Rodney in the bath! "I'm not taking a bath with you." John snark! Jokes about John on his knees! Feeding the slashers! Rodney has now spent more canonical time sitting beside sickbeds than every other character put together.
Okay, I did my best, I'm out. Things not to like: WTF with "True Satedan Honor?" Did Satedans become Klingons when we weren't looking? Oh, right, yes they did.
Look, Ronon is The Way He Is because he spent SEVEN YEARS AS A RUNNER, and the show constantly underplays or downright forgets about that. Sure, some of his value system comes from before- but from specifically being a soldier in his culture, not just "his whole culture is that way." Hell, two seasons ago the show was able to give us some absolutely wonderful flashbacks of a technologically advanced, recognizable, not terribly alien Satedan culture with a Ronon who was recognizably the same character yet far different from the one we know.
But then the writers forgot all that, and needed some shorthand, so all Satedan culture is monolithic and Klingon.
Look, if they had ALWAYS intended to portray Satedans that way, then I would not object (well, I would, but for different reasons). But this was just a lazy shorthand, Othering Aliens in Five Minutes Or Less, and, yes, it has a lot to do with how Ronon looks.
Fucking pisses me off.
Also: I can read torture porn, but I can't watch it. Too much with the hurt, not enough with the comfort. Jason Momoa hit it out of the park, of course, but that was a lot of gratuitous.
SGA 5x04, the one where it turns out somebody on the SGA staff can actually write (OMGWTFBBQ, eh?)
DUDE. There was a STORY. And it was interesting and exciting and well-paced and well-exposited and original.
*flails*
MY SHOW DIDN'T SUCK! In fact, it actually kind of utterly rocked.
Wonderful, balanced team interaction with absolutely wonderful use of secondary characters. I don't even remember specific character moments (even though I know that I LOVED everybody) because I was so busy watching the PLOT. I do not even know what to do with that.
Except! John's little bout of self-congratulatory narcissism. Made of win.
(The hold is full of boxes that say "Do not ring transport" on the sides. Little details like that fill me with love.)
Who took my show and replaced it with this?
SGA 5x05, the one without Tori Higginson
Look, I get that the lack of TH was not the writers' fault, and I get that they HAD to do something with the massive dangling loose end, and... why did it have to be so made of fail?
Okay, that is not fair. This was classic Atlantis, in that everything about the plot was stupid and everything about the characters was wonderful.
The flying monkey conversation! The camaraderie! The banter! *love* Rodney hanging a lampshade on the "at least we still have inertial dampeners" made the hard-SF fan in me LOL.
Rodney and Radek bickering! I loved that scene more than I can possibly tell you. And Radek's little bout of telepathy when the radios cut him off from Rodney. I missed their interaction more than I realized- Rodney/Radek really is my Subversive Pairing in this fandom. I just wish we had seen them solve something together- I miss the talking over each other.
Woolsey! Okay, let's try that again: Woolsey! With the getting shut in a far tower by the city herself (is there Woolsey fic about his status as an outsider so far?). And then with the bluffing, and the fact that after four episodes he is already a better leader than Elizabeth or Sam ever were, and the fact that Robert Picardo has crazy acting chops and I am madly in love and would probably hit that.
Uh, sorry. Where was I?
Right, that gets us to 9 minutes into what I thought was going to be a fabulous, squeeful episode, then it suddenly turned Made Of Fail. Because then we were faced with 15 straight minutes of having our characters stare at screens, watching or hearing painfully slow monotone exposition of things we will not possibly care about, completely with a full-on "As you know, John" flashback.
FAIL.
I mean, all the character reactions were pitch-perfect, and Rodney was all "I made this mess, I have to clean it up" Boy Scout. And character continuity, with Rodney's desire to believe (like with Carson) and Ronon's hatred of doubles (like... always) and Teyla being all diplomatic without trusting her an inch. And Woolsey having a spine when it counts and making the perfect decisions.
So why did the plot just kind of suck so bad?
To be honest, the more I think about it, the less I hate it. The plot idiocies aren't actually any worse than their normal, and Elizabeth's character development, becoming the leader of a new people and splitting loyalties and having to make such a hard decision when those loyalties conflict- could possibly be considered "really well done." I just wish it hadn't been exposited/paced so badly.
Ronon is really looking bad these days. I thought it was just continuity from episode 3, but it's still going on. Is that just me? Is Jason sick? Because I was getting an overwhelming "pale and drawn and tired" vibe from him, not helped by how much more unkempt he's been this season. Is it just me?
Overall, my feelings about SGA remain exactly the same: mountains and mountains of boudless love for the characters, very little for the show as show. A few fic wants, but no new bunnies (just the ones I was already nurturing: the Ronon/Keller, the John/Rodney/Radek, the Sam/Rodney, the alien POV. What is up with my non-McShep fic ideas in this fandom?) So the Shrine will be next, and hopefully I will be all caught up Friday, and maybe there will be some restored squee?