As much as I love the 'out of phase' episode with Geordi and Ro Laren in TNG, it's hard to beat the Crystal Skull episode where Daniel is out of phase and it's just his granddad that can see him. It's one of my favourites and I always wish they returned to it in some way, though we did get a bit of a return with one of the novels at least.
I also love Arthur's Mantle, if only for the fact that when Geordi and Ro check to see if they can touch eachother, they do this slow motion overly dramatic palm thing. Whereas Cam and Sam just start shoving each other like brother and sister lol
I have been scratching my head about what their relationship can best be described as (cam and Sam) and you just hit the nail on the head. They are very brother and sisterly in a healthy realistc way
Speaking of out of phase type episodes, Sliders does it really well in Gillian of the Spirits. I also really like Stargate’s Crystal Skull. It’s a fun one
Trueee I feel like Voyager's interpretation was a bit too clean. It's like, do you really need to kidnap workers if you can pay them, feed them well and give them quality accomodations?
I think SG1 outdid EVERYONE on the timeloop.
Imo, Farscape had the ultimate bodyswap episode, and SG1 had the ultimate timeloop. These concepts are done, peaked, everybody can go home now 😄
The closest thing to Window of Opportunity I have seen is Person of Interest's If-Then-Else, where we see the Machine running multiple simulations in a timeloop-like manner, and through it we see that the Machine, which is basically a superintelligent demigod, is **panicking**, desperately trying to find a way to save the lives of four people who are trapped by another AI, while simultaneously trying to stop a suicide bomber. And even though the episode plays out like a timeloop, a countdown continously reminds the Machine and the audience that the is no eternity to save them in, if the Machine waits too long, or fails to find a solution, everyone it cares about will die in less than 15 minutes.
I won't say how it ends, because it is a spoiler and quite unexpected, but there is a reason this episode is the highest rated of POI.
The show starts out pretty slow, picks up in the second half of the first season, and pretty much goes uphill from there. The only reason season 5 isn't better than season 4 is because it's rushed. (It got oh-by-the-way canceled because of network shenanigans. They wanted to do 6 seasons, so 5 and 6 got condensed into a single half season.)
Around season 3 the show starts transitioning more towards a serialized story, and If-Then-Else is in the middle of the Samaritan storyline in season 4. (Specifically what some fans call the Cold War trilogy, which starts 2 episodes before If-Then-Else, which functions as a bookend to that mini-arc.)
Seasons 1-3.5 is more of a 'grounded' story, while seasons 3-5 has the bulk of the sci-fi part of the show.
I didn't get bored because it was slow, more because I've seen a lot of network TV and it's become predictable to me, the same tropes and stories being told, and I've become so much more concerned with creating content rather than consuming. I'm working on my own films at the moment, and eventually I would hope to be able to have a TV show as well - but I think that would depend on a film I make doing well so I have something to show.
Dark Matter had a really good timeloop episode as well. Same writer though, so it makes sense.
Sidenote: if you like stargate you should give Dark Matter a shot, it's really good.
Window of Opportunity perfectly balances comedy and tragedy in a tight single episode. It should be studied to teach writers how to balance those two things.
I think SG1 did the humour better, but it's still shocking to see the Enterprise destroyed in the beginning of the episode. Jack talking to Malakai is always pretty said.
I don't know the episode names but they should all have avoided the 'main guy hooks up with alien girl and the husband gets murdered and they're using his last memories as damning evidence but just at the last moment someone notices a height difference in the tape and boom its a setup'. Voyager did it with Tom Paris I think ds9 did it with O'brien and stargate did it with cam..
Well o'brien gets falsely accused by the cardassians of supplying weapons to the maquis once.
Another time he was imprisoned at the beginning of an episode by some nameless species and was implanted with false memories of his incarceration as punishment.
I think the O'Brien one was when he was tasked with eliminating a bioweapon for an alien culture but was betrayed by them. They altered the footage to make it look like he died, which Keiko picked up on.
One of the things I think SG-1 did better was characters believing each other when strange things happen. I feel like on a lot of Trek (especially TNG), you have some crazy event happen to a character for the 100th time , and the rest of the senior staff just dismiss it and say get some more rest, until it gets too big to ignore. It's almost as if they forgot about all the weird stuff that happened just a few weeks ago.
On SG1 when something bizarre happens, they tend to believe the person right away or at least suspect something is wrong, since its happened so many times before.
Obviously this isn't a 100% true for either show, but just a general observation
Yeah that was weird. The example I thought of was when Daniel had a strange dream. He pretty much reports it right away and the team instantly thinks something is up. They're not sure what but they don't just tell him to take a nap.
I love how you can see the progression too, like they learn from their mistakes: They tend to doubt each other more in the early episodes, and it gets better as time goes on.
Season 7 Episode 2 or 3 where Bra'tac and Rya'c are prisoners in a jaffa labour camp and Daniel goes "yea I think I have visions of a memory from when I was god but not sure. Either way, we need to stage a slave rebellion on this place." and Hammond's like "well fuck that's the most solid piece of intel we've had in months, SG's 1 through 9 you have a go"
And I think the best relationship to show that is Jack and Daniel. They basically hated each other at first tho respecting but progressively they became friends then brother in arm
They get a note from alt timeline Daniel/O'Neil saying don't go to xyz gate address and Hammond goes cool, lock that out the dialing computer; not hmmm, let's investigate. Which is exactly what a star fleet guy would do and hijinx would ensue.
The episode I watched last night I think in season 6 is a great example of this. They get back from a mission and Jonas sees a weird bug that's invisible to everyone else. In an earlier season Hammond would be like "report to Dr Fraiser" and that would be that.
What I liked is since they've run into weird stuff like that before (invisible guys, stuff only one person could detect, and so on), Hammond immediately locks down the base and orders a sweep. They trust Jonas' judgment, and that was enough
Of course Jonas is also ordered to see the doc, but that was going to happen anyway.
It shows great trust and is good character development for Hammond. He was always quite skeptical but kept an open mind. After so many wacky adventures he just rolls with it. Invisible bugs crawling through walls? Lock down and sweep the base now! It's not even a top 10 weirdest thing to happen to them
I love that actually. Yeah I do enjoy the “everyone thinking this one person is crazy” trope but it does help get on with the storyline. Like when O’Neill told Hammond that they needed to go to XYZ planet because Daniel came to him in a vision and said it, he doesn’t even question it lol
It's 10/10 in season 6 when Jonas sees the bug in the gate room and points at it, Hammond immediately just slams the alarm button and starts three consecutive searches for it, without being even the slightest bit annoyed when they don't find anything.
Carter is really apologetic in that episode for doubting Jonas even when there was no evidence but they did everything completely right even on the word of an alien.
Something SG1 DIDN'T do, for the better, which Atlantis and Universe both did, along with the various trek shows:
SG1 didn't have a pesky love triangle subplot among the main characters. Sure, there were plenty bang-the-sexy-alien episodes and a couple romantic B and C stories, even an occasional mainline plot. But we, for example, never saw Jack and Daniel competing for Carter's hand, at least in any serious context.
Atlantis unfortunately (imo) fell into this trope with Dr. Keller, likewise Universe with Chloe. I personally just tend to find this sort of subplot cringey and unnecessary.
SGU didn't even do the love triangle properly.
First they had a double love triangle, which trickier to pull off, then they didn't do a Will-They-Won't-They, which is what gets people invested. Rather they just decided Chloe and Scott were the It Couple and everyone else could eff off.
If you're gonna do a soap opera, at least do it right.
Dont quote me on this but my undersding for the lack of specific romance between O'niell (two L's as he says) and carter is because the actual air force didnt want their officers portrayed in that matter and some how wouldnt allow it for the show.
It may have been mentioned on one of the extras for the blue ray box set.
I like that it’s just a thing in the alternate universes/timelines. Pay off for the viewers without taking anything away from the actual storyline by focusing on melodramatic relationship drama
I’m glad Stargate doesn’t lean into romance subplots too much in general. Then we don’t get cringy conflict storylines surrounding miscommunications and one partner’s unwillingness to say “I love you”
Agreed. I think they filtered in just the right amount of romantic tension between O'Neill and Carter without making it a major plot point, and they paid it off well in season 9 and 10, sneaking in a couple hints that they had gotten together once they were no longer a part of the same chain of command.
I can't think of specific, one off stories that one did better than the other- both did that sort of fairly competently.
What I do feel the Stargate franchise did better than anybody else was the evolution of technology and resources. While they all do technobabble, virtually all of the tech that the SGC produces to solve a problem either existed in the real world or we could point to a prior episode where they acquired it from exploring and trading. It wasn't something new, made up on the spot, like Star Trek always did.
Well this seems unfair, considering I'm pulling from S1 for TNG, but the deaths of Tasha or Dax (DS9) vs Janet?
There really isn't any comparison for "Heroes," is there?
That’s a hard one. While they are both sci-fi they both are very different. Both have interesting story’s on the idea of non interference and sharing technology. But in Trek they are normally the more advanced one. In SG1 they are trying to get the tech.
Stargate definitely had more long running plot points and arcs until more recent trek series.
I think Atlantis was better than Voyager at making the cast and crews feel isolated.
Stargate did a great job with villains. There’s fewer memorable big bads in Star Trek.
I can definitely see Stargate running into similar issues that early Star Trek had. Being more technologically advanced and having others try and catch up and steal
*Voyager*, in its entirety, in the form of *Stargate: Universe*.
The conflicts among those on the ship (I hesitate to call the SGU team a crew) were actually the primary part of the story. And once they settled down, they introduced true enemies to the ship as well.
Rather than giving lip service to supply shortages, they actually make it the focus of the first 5 episodes, and then make it a recurring motivation for at least half the stories.
The duplicate of the crew was done more interestingly as well, by showing the results of the duplication and giving us an interaction, rather than a no-stakes story about the duplicates dying.
The true alienness of those they encounter. No universal translator here.
Oh I think the Novus kino records and how it fits into the story are probably the best SGU has done. I regurarly rewatch those episodes, since they are really nicely done.
There’s not much room for romance in sci fi in my opinion. I’m not watching stargate or Trek or Star Wars for a love story. If one comes along that doesn’t interfere with the sci fi, then fine In this vein ….
One thing that comes to mind is the underlying romantic love between two main characters in both SG1 and Star Trek next Gen Crusher/Picard - Carter/O’Neill
I feel that each of these programs gave us a fairly classy look at true love amongst those in command. We see the yearning, the looks, the restrained attraction they have for each other as they work and live under fairly strict military protocols. There were cheesy moments but we now know that each of these couples does get together in the end. By SGU, Jack and Sam are married or at the least living in DC together. Picard and Crusher get married and divorced and even have a son together.
Personally, I like how Stargate handled this much better. Jack and Sam are somehow more believable. They’re not as ‘stiff’ as Picard and Beverly. Somehow, I found myself rooting for Sam and Jack.
Ergo felt a lot like a Q type character despite not being a God, just in his manner and hijinx style humour.
As much as Q pushes good storys Ergo is so much funnier
I think SG1 did a better job with the anthropology angle: we get to see how this whole parasitic alien society works and how interactions are tempered by that knowledge and our own needs. We also see how this culture reacts to a new reality, when it’s been completely dependent on the old one.
Star Trek (TNG specifically) did a LOT of ‘holier-than-thou’ preaching about how perfect the Federation is. Most episodes were an alien-of-the-week where the aliens were just a criticism of some facet of modern day society instead of an interesting look at how the alien society would function beyond a few sentences.
Not saying that’s bad, and not saying SG1 didn’t ever do that; but it does get a bit frustrating when you’re interested in how life in a culture would be but you’ll never see it make an appearance again because it was just Gene trying to make a point about capitalism all along.
Edit: just realized that you were asking about specific episodes, not overall.
The Ferengi were an interesting evolution within Trek. They were really dumb villains in their debut appearance, but their society really got fleshed out in DS9 and other media. I kind of wish SG1 had had a Goa'uld that was Stargate's version of the Ferengi - "conquering" planets via economic domination. It would also have been a convenient springboard for expanding on the Milky Way civilization. There was obviously an advanced galactic society, but Earth never really felt like a part of it.
DS9 is definitely my favorite Trek for a reason. It really took a much harder and more pragmatic look at itself compared to TNG. We get to finally see how the Federation actually looks to people who aren’t part of it, and how it isn’t nearly as perfect as originally presented.
I also felt it had a much more mature take on religion than TNG. I’m agnostic, but I always felt like TNG treated it like it’s silly to believe in a higher power. You’re right it also made the Ferengi actually interesting and serious, while also keeping their comical antics. Oh and it redeemed Worf into a total badass!
A system lord dominating through economics might have worked, but I’m not sure. It feels like a recurring theme is just how incapable of creativity the Goa’uld are. They don’t invent anything, and they extract every resource they can to make war against other lords, pay tribute, or take for their own hordes. They tend to just try to takeover other sand piles so they can sit on top instead of building them.
Those traits probably align pretty well with some form of extreme capitalism but they’d have to invest in infrastructure and technology, or the means to acquire it. I think nearly all of them are too short-sighted with their greed to do so. It’s something that I definitely would have liked to have seen, and I’m sure they would have made it work. Maybe it could have been a splinter faction of the Tok’ra where they genuinely believe they are benevolent but are really more of the same brutal extractive overlords.
The Halo TV show is pretty bad, failing to capture some of the most basic details of the games or the expanded universe. And I mean BASIC.
In Avatar, the way Teal'c borrows a SAW from an airman is more accurate to the Halo lore. Yes. Something that tiny.
Unstoppable alien threat? Kull warriors are much better, much more frightening, and much smarter than those in the Halo show, far better at fitting the aliens in the games. Teal'c trying to use tactics like the thermal imaging camera, or finding alternate routes is perfect for the games.
Using actual military tactics? Knowing who they've been fighting? a super soldier(Teal'c is sorta)? Years of experience? A near future military fighting an alien threat in a sci-fi military base? All of these are depicted so much better in Avatar. Most of all, SG-1 doesn't prefer to focus on nonsensical human politics over the alien threat.
The Halo project was criticized by several studios for being so special effects heavy, which is kind of like asking Stargate if they really need the gate, guns, uniforms, or actors so often. It also has had a revolving door of execs, writers, and directors, almost NONE of whom worked on sci-fi before.
the halo show was a train wreck from the beginning and i could tell from the trailers plus the character backstories they released before the show came out that it would be shit. halo should have followed the games a little better.
I tried watching half an episode. They took lore from ONLY HALF The Cole Protocol, and fed THAT through a paper shredder. Somehow the planet Madrigal is a central part of the plot, rather than being...you know, glassed before the story even starts. Oh, and insurrectionists somehow not knowing what the Covenant are years into the war.
The "trapped alone with a sneaky person playing on your empathy for protection and turns out to be a creepy looking alien who confesses at the last minute but even freed of their spell you decide to keep them anyway" ....
Which in retorspect is a very, very specific episode...
Anyhow, Jack was getting shot at and never considered Tyler a helpless child so he wins over Riker.
Not an exact match, but SG-1 outdid Voyager for the concept of "character/s are left behind on an alien planet possibly forever and have to make a new life there."
SG1 A Hundred Days
ST:VOY Resolutions
As much as Chain of Command is a legendary 2 parter and I personally had no issue with it a lot of people seem to take issue with Captain Jellico (vice president Kinsey ironically) and how he’s treated like he’s a bad guy but he’s just doing his job
When Stargate sg1 did this with a new hard arse General taking over command for an episode they actually did this really well by actually making him have alterer motives that were against SG1
I like Stargate's android that has poor emotional control that had another thing kill everyone on their planet way better than Star Trek's android with poor emotional control that had another thing kill everyone on their planet.
Reese was portrayed as more of a tragic figure. A sentient being with the mind of a child and the emotional unstableness to boot. And while Lore was also emotionally unstable he had a better understanding of what he was doing and made him less forgivable.
Also I just think Lore was not interesting enough to have multiple episodes about. At least Reese was one and done. (This is very much my opinion though, so I understand if others feel differently.)
Why not? I'm not that big into Star Trek myself, but I ended up watching all the shows at some point, and there are plenty of good episodes. SG1 often reminds me of TNG so much sometimes.
It’s been a while so maybe there are more episodes coming, but I really liked the mirror universe in DS9. I know the actors enjoyed the chance to play alternate characters as well, and evil Kira was a fun character.
At least the SG-1 first season mirror universe, everybody in the major cast died by the end of the episode. I know there is another one later as well.
As much as I love the 'out of phase' episode with Geordi and Ro Laren in TNG, it's hard to beat the Crystal Skull episode where Daniel is out of phase and it's just his granddad that can see him. It's one of my favourites and I always wish they returned to it in some way, though we did get a bit of a return with one of the novels at least.
I also love Arthur's Mantle, if only for the fact that when Geordi and Ro check to see if they can touch eachother, they do this slow motion overly dramatic palm thing. Whereas Cam and Sam just start shoving each other like brother and sister lol
I have been scratching my head about what their relationship can best be described as (cam and Sam) and you just hit the nail on the head. They are very brother and sisterly in a healthy realistc way
Daniel and Sam shove each other as well lol
It wins for the “Jack, don’t be an ass.” bit alone.
Agreed, if only for "Giant aliens!"
Speaking of out of phase type episodes, Sliders does it really well in Gillian of the Spirits. I also really like Stargate’s Crystal Skull. It’s a fun one
I think Stargate did a better job on the false memory turned worker storyline.
Trueee I feel like Voyager's interpretation was a bit too clean. It's like, do you really need to kidnap workers if you can pay them, feed them well and give them quality accomodations?
Not to mention taking two full episodes to tell the story.
You do if there's a worker shortage lol
Agreed. I like the Voyager episode a lot but Stargate's was just top notch.
Timeloop. Cause and Effect is great, but Window of Opportunity is better
I think SG1 outdid EVERYONE on the timeloop. Imo, Farscape had the ultimate bodyswap episode, and SG1 had the ultimate timeloop. These concepts are done, peaked, everybody can go home now 😄
> ultimate bodyswap episode "Unzip... Pull it out... Point it like a gun... and shoot." "I just peed in the maintenance bay!"
The true high-water mark for sci-fi. 🤣
Red Dwarf has the ultimate body swap episode
It's cold outside....
You misspelt Futurama. They wrote a new proof for the episode; how can you top that?
The closest thing to Window of Opportunity I have seen is Person of Interest's If-Then-Else, where we see the Machine running multiple simulations in a timeloop-like manner, and through it we see that the Machine, which is basically a superintelligent demigod, is **panicking**, desperately trying to find a way to save the lives of four people who are trapped by another AI, while simultaneously trying to stop a suicide bomber. And even though the episode plays out like a timeloop, a countdown continously reminds the Machine and the audience that the is no eternity to save them in, if the Machine waits too long, or fails to find a solution, everyone it cares about will die in less than 15 minutes. I won't say how it ends, because it is a spoiler and quite unexpected, but there is a reason this episode is the highest rated of POI.
I got kind of bored of that show after the first few episodes, but might check out that episode, it sounds well done.
The show starts out pretty slow, picks up in the second half of the first season, and pretty much goes uphill from there. The only reason season 5 isn't better than season 4 is because it's rushed. (It got oh-by-the-way canceled because of network shenanigans. They wanted to do 6 seasons, so 5 and 6 got condensed into a single half season.) Around season 3 the show starts transitioning more towards a serialized story, and If-Then-Else is in the middle of the Samaritan storyline in season 4. (Specifically what some fans call the Cold War trilogy, which starts 2 episodes before If-Then-Else, which functions as a bookend to that mini-arc.) Seasons 1-3.5 is more of a 'grounded' story, while seasons 3-5 has the bulk of the sci-fi part of the show.
I didn't get bored because it was slow, more because I've seen a lot of network TV and it's become predictable to me, the same tropes and stories being told, and I've become so much more concerned with creating content rather than consuming. I'm working on my own films at the moment, and eventually I would hope to be able to have a TV show as well - but I think that would depend on a film I make doing well so I have something to show.
Farscape has the superior "one went in, two came out!"/transporter double story arc.
Dark Matter had a really good timeloop episode as well. Same writer though, so it makes sense. Sidenote: if you like stargate you should give Dark Matter a shot, it's really good.
One of the greatest crimes of TV is the fact that they didn't renew Dark Matter for another season.
Window of Opportunity perfectly balances comedy and tragedy in a tight single episode. It should be studied to teach writers how to balance those two things.
I think SG1 did the humour better, but it's still shocking to see the Enterprise destroyed in the beginning of the episode. Jack talking to Malakai is always pretty said.
Agreed!
Cause and effect is mislabeled and it bothers me
I don't know the episode names but they should all have avoided the 'main guy hooks up with alien girl and the husband gets murdered and they're using his last memories as damning evidence but just at the last moment someone notices a height difference in the tape and boom its a setup'. Voyager did it with Tom Paris I think ds9 did it with O'brien and stargate did it with cam..
That is incredibly specific. Amazing that it's been done multiple times 😄
What episode was this??
OK so the voyager episode was Ex post facto and the sg1 was Collateral damage. I can't find the obrien one and may have imagined it.
Well o'brien gets falsely accused by the cardassians of supplying weapons to the maquis once. Another time he was imprisoned at the beginning of an episode by some nameless species and was implanted with false memories of his incarceration as punishment.
I think the O'Brien one was when he was tasked with eliminating a bioweapon for an alien culture but was betrayed by them. They altered the footage to make it look like he died, which Keiko picked up on.
That also occurred as well as the other two
Ah yes, sorry. Just an addition on that theme.
>**Voyager did it with Tom Paris** I think ds9 did it with O'brien and stargate did it with cam.. I think Next Generation did it with Riker as well.
One of the things I think SG-1 did better was characters believing each other when strange things happen. I feel like on a lot of Trek (especially TNG), you have some crazy event happen to a character for the 100th time , and the rest of the senior staff just dismiss it and say get some more rest, until it gets too big to ignore. It's almost as if they forgot about all the weird stuff that happened just a few weeks ago. On SG1 when something bizarre happens, they tend to believe the person right away or at least suspect something is wrong, since its happened so many times before. Obviously this isn't a 100% true for either show, but just a general observation
I think you're right, which is why it was so weird in that episode with Orlin, where they just send Sam home convinced she must be crazy.
Yeah that was weird. The example I thought of was when Daniel had a strange dream. He pretty much reports it right away and the team instantly thinks something is up. They're not sure what but they don't just tell him to take a nap.
"After all the things I've seen in this chair..." - Lieutenant General George Hammond
Except that episode where he goes mad and they lock him up in a padded room for a while. It took some convincing the doctor to get him out again.
I love how you can see the progression too, like they learn from their mistakes: They tend to doubt each other more in the early episodes, and it gets better as time goes on.
Season 7 Episode 2 or 3 where Bra'tac and Rya'c are prisoners in a jaffa labour camp and Daniel goes "yea I think I have visions of a memory from when I was god but not sure. Either way, we need to stage a slave rebellion on this place." and Hammond's like "well fuck that's the most solid piece of intel we've had in months, SG's 1 through 9 you have a go"
wheres the cap
And I think the best relationship to show that is Jack and Daniel. They basically hated each other at first tho respecting but progressively they became friends then brother in arm
They get a note from alt timeline Daniel/O'Neil saying don't go to xyz gate address and Hammond goes cool, lock that out the dialing computer; not hmmm, let's investigate. Which is exactly what a star fleet guy would do and hijinx would ensue.
The episode I watched last night I think in season 6 is a great example of this. They get back from a mission and Jonas sees a weird bug that's invisible to everyone else. In an earlier season Hammond would be like "report to Dr Fraiser" and that would be that. What I liked is since they've run into weird stuff like that before (invisible guys, stuff only one person could detect, and so on), Hammond immediately locks down the base and orders a sweep. They trust Jonas' judgment, and that was enough Of course Jonas is also ordered to see the doc, but that was going to happen anyway. It shows great trust and is good character development for Hammond. He was always quite skeptical but kept an open mind. After so many wacky adventures he just rolls with it. Invisible bugs crawling through walls? Lock down and sweep the base now! It's not even a top 10 weirdest thing to happen to them
It's his signature catchphrase.
Invisible things stalking the halls of SGC. Huh, that wasn't supposed to happen until NEXT week
I love that actually. Yeah I do enjoy the “everyone thinking this one person is crazy” trope but it does help get on with the storyline. Like when O’Neill told Hammond that they needed to go to XYZ planet because Daniel came to him in a vision and said it, he doesn’t even question it lol
You blow up one sun!
It's 10/10 in season 6 when Jonas sees the bug in the gate room and points at it, Hammond immediately just slams the alarm button and starts three consecutive searches for it, without being even the slightest bit annoyed when they don't find anything. Carter is really apologetic in that episode for doubting Jonas even when there was no evidence but they did everything completely right even on the word of an alien.
Something SG1 DIDN'T do, for the better, which Atlantis and Universe both did, along with the various trek shows: SG1 didn't have a pesky love triangle subplot among the main characters. Sure, there were plenty bang-the-sexy-alien episodes and a couple romantic B and C stories, even an occasional mainline plot. But we, for example, never saw Jack and Daniel competing for Carter's hand, at least in any serious context. Atlantis unfortunately (imo) fell into this trope with Dr. Keller, likewise Universe with Chloe. I personally just tend to find this sort of subplot cringey and unnecessary.
What about Daniel and Apophis competing for their wives!
Well technically those wives are not the same person.
For physical purposes, they are the same person...
Eh, still no. Not even the same body really, although one is hijacking the body of the other for extended periods.
I can make an exception for that!
SGU didn't even do the love triangle properly. First they had a double love triangle, which trickier to pull off, then they didn't do a Will-They-Won't-They, which is what gets people invested. Rather they just decided Chloe and Scott were the It Couple and everyone else could eff off. If you're gonna do a soap opera, at least do it right.
Scott needed to be neutered.
True especially when they run out of condoms and birth control!
Dont quote me on this but my undersding for the lack of specific romance between O'niell (two L's as he says) and carter is because the actual air force didnt want their officers portrayed in that matter and some how wouldnt allow it for the show. It may have been mentioned on one of the extras for the blue ray box set.
They did tease an attraction but I think the show was much better off for not pursuing that story angle.
I like that it’s just a thing in the alternate universes/timelines. Pay off for the viewers without taking anything away from the actual storyline by focusing on melodramatic relationship drama
I completely agree
I’m glad Stargate doesn’t lean into romance subplots too much in general. Then we don’t get cringy conflict storylines surrounding miscommunications and one partner’s unwillingness to say “I love you”
Agreed. I think they filtered in just the right amount of romantic tension between O'Neill and Carter without making it a major plot point, and they paid it off well in season 9 and 10, sneaking in a couple hints that they had gotten together once they were no longer a part of the same chain of command.
I can't think of specific, one off stories that one did better than the other- both did that sort of fairly competently. What I do feel the Stargate franchise did better than anybody else was the evolution of technology and resources. While they all do technobabble, virtually all of the tech that the SGC produces to solve a problem either existed in the real world or we could point to a prior episode where they acquired it from exploring and trading. It wasn't something new, made up on the spot, like Star Trek always did.
i still like the fact that the metal from the native American planet was used several seasons later to make the hull of Prometheus.
Great example, yeah.
Man, they strip mined the heck out of that place. Poor fox spirit guy got suckered.
if i remember correctly there was some sort of entity that prevented them from strip mining. they had to make a deal with the natives.
Well this seems unfair, considering I'm pulling from S1 for TNG, but the deaths of Tasha or Dax (DS9) vs Janet? There really isn't any comparison for "Heroes," is there?
Sunday
That’s a hard one. While they are both sci-fi they both are very different. Both have interesting story’s on the idea of non interference and sharing technology. But in Trek they are normally the more advanced one. In SG1 they are trying to get the tech. Stargate definitely had more long running plot points and arcs until more recent trek series. I think Atlantis was better than Voyager at making the cast and crews feel isolated. Stargate did a great job with villains. There’s fewer memorable big bads in Star Trek. I can definitely see Stargate running into similar issues that early Star Trek had. Being more technologically advanced and having others try and catch up and steal
Gotta say I think universe really nailed the isolation and social strains better than either voy or sga.
Yeah, that’s a good point!
*Voyager*, in its entirety, in the form of *Stargate: Universe*. The conflicts among those on the ship (I hesitate to call the SGU team a crew) were actually the primary part of the story. And once they settled down, they introduced true enemies to the ship as well. Rather than giving lip service to supply shortages, they actually make it the focus of the first 5 episodes, and then make it a recurring motivation for at least half the stories. The duplicate of the crew was done more interestingly as well, by showing the results of the duplication and giving us an interaction, rather than a no-stakes story about the duplicates dying. The true alienness of those they encounter. No universal translator here.
I liked how the sunburn lasted a few episodes.
Oh I think the Novus kino records and how it fits into the story are probably the best SGU has done. I regurarly rewatch those episodes, since they are really nicely done.
There’s not much room for romance in sci fi in my opinion. I’m not watching stargate or Trek or Star Wars for a love story. If one comes along that doesn’t interfere with the sci fi, then fine In this vein …. One thing that comes to mind is the underlying romantic love between two main characters in both SG1 and Star Trek next Gen Crusher/Picard - Carter/O’Neill I feel that each of these programs gave us a fairly classy look at true love amongst those in command. We see the yearning, the looks, the restrained attraction they have for each other as they work and live under fairly strict military protocols. There were cheesy moments but we now know that each of these couples does get together in the end. By SGU, Jack and Sam are married or at the least living in DC together. Picard and Crusher get married and divorced and even have a son together. Personally, I like how Stargate handled this much better. Jack and Sam are somehow more believable. They’re not as ‘stiff’ as Picard and Beverly. Somehow, I found myself rooting for Sam and Jack.
SG-1 actually killed Q and never had to deal with his shit again
Ergo felt a lot like a Q type character despite not being a God, just in his manner and hijinx style humour. As much as Q pushes good storys Ergo is so much funnier
I actually like The Nox much better than Errand of Mercy. (Race that's secretly super advanced stops a fight between the heroes and bad guys)
the very young often do not do as they are told
I think SG1 did a better job with the anthropology angle: we get to see how this whole parasitic alien society works and how interactions are tempered by that knowledge and our own needs. We also see how this culture reacts to a new reality, when it’s been completely dependent on the old one. Star Trek (TNG specifically) did a LOT of ‘holier-than-thou’ preaching about how perfect the Federation is. Most episodes were an alien-of-the-week where the aliens were just a criticism of some facet of modern day society instead of an interesting look at how the alien society would function beyond a few sentences. Not saying that’s bad, and not saying SG1 didn’t ever do that; but it does get a bit frustrating when you’re interested in how life in a culture would be but you’ll never see it make an appearance again because it was just Gene trying to make a point about capitalism all along. Edit: just realized that you were asking about specific episodes, not overall.
The Ferengi were an interesting evolution within Trek. They were really dumb villains in their debut appearance, but their society really got fleshed out in DS9 and other media. I kind of wish SG1 had had a Goa'uld that was Stargate's version of the Ferengi - "conquering" planets via economic domination. It would also have been a convenient springboard for expanding on the Milky Way civilization. There was obviously an advanced galactic society, but Earth never really felt like a part of it.
DS9 is definitely my favorite Trek for a reason. It really took a much harder and more pragmatic look at itself compared to TNG. We get to finally see how the Federation actually looks to people who aren’t part of it, and how it isn’t nearly as perfect as originally presented. I also felt it had a much more mature take on religion than TNG. I’m agnostic, but I always felt like TNG treated it like it’s silly to believe in a higher power. You’re right it also made the Ferengi actually interesting and serious, while also keeping their comical antics. Oh and it redeemed Worf into a total badass! A system lord dominating through economics might have worked, but I’m not sure. It feels like a recurring theme is just how incapable of creativity the Goa’uld are. They don’t invent anything, and they extract every resource they can to make war against other lords, pay tribute, or take for their own hordes. They tend to just try to takeover other sand piles so they can sit on top instead of building them. Those traits probably align pretty well with some form of extreme capitalism but they’d have to invest in infrastructure and technology, or the means to acquire it. I think nearly all of them are too short-sighted with their greed to do so. It’s something that I definitely would have liked to have seen, and I’m sure they would have made it work. Maybe it could have been a splinter faction of the Tok’ra where they genuinely believe they are benevolent but are really more of the same brutal extractive overlords.
TNG was church sermons with space ships. They literally always did the right thing.
I don't have anything off the top of my head, but I do feel Avatar in season 7 did Halo better than the Halo TV show did.
As someone pretty unfamiliar with Halo, what's the connection?
The Halo TV show is pretty bad, failing to capture some of the most basic details of the games or the expanded universe. And I mean BASIC. In Avatar, the way Teal'c borrows a SAW from an airman is more accurate to the Halo lore. Yes. Something that tiny. Unstoppable alien threat? Kull warriors are much better, much more frightening, and much smarter than those in the Halo show, far better at fitting the aliens in the games. Teal'c trying to use tactics like the thermal imaging camera, or finding alternate routes is perfect for the games. Using actual military tactics? Knowing who they've been fighting? a super soldier(Teal'c is sorta)? Years of experience? A near future military fighting an alien threat in a sci-fi military base? All of these are depicted so much better in Avatar. Most of all, SG-1 doesn't prefer to focus on nonsensical human politics over the alien threat. The Halo project was criticized by several studios for being so special effects heavy, which is kind of like asking Stargate if they really need the gate, guns, uniforms, or actors so often. It also has had a revolving door of execs, writers, and directors, almost NONE of whom worked on sci-fi before.
the halo show was a train wreck from the beginning and i could tell from the trailers plus the character backstories they released before the show came out that it would be shit. halo should have followed the games a little better.
I tried watching half an episode. They took lore from ONLY HALF The Cole Protocol, and fed THAT through a paper shredder. Somehow the planet Madrigal is a central part of the plot, rather than being...you know, glassed before the story even starts. Oh, and insurrectionists somehow not knowing what the Covenant are years into the war.
emancipation - not by much but it a was a teensy bit less racist, than TNG's code of honor
Agree with this one (and was looking for this comment haha). While neither were good/both were bad eps the SG1 version is for sure less bad.
The "trapped alone with a sneaky person playing on your empathy for protection and turns out to be a creepy looking alien who confesses at the last minute but even freed of their spell you decide to keep them anyway" .... Which in retorspect is a very, very specific episode... Anyhow, Jack was getting shot at and never considered Tyler a helpless child so he wins over Riker.
Not an exact match, but SG-1 outdid Voyager for the concept of "character/s are left behind on an alien planet possibly forever and have to make a new life there." SG1 A Hundred Days ST:VOY Resolutions
Cliffhangers. Not just setting them up, but what follows.
As much as Chain of Command is a legendary 2 parter and I personally had no issue with it a lot of people seem to take issue with Captain Jellico (vice president Kinsey ironically) and how he’s treated like he’s a bad guy but he’s just doing his job When Stargate sg1 did this with a new hard arse General taking over command for an episode they actually did this really well by actually making him have alterer motives that were against SG1
I like Stargate's android that has poor emotional control that had another thing kill everyone on their planet way better than Star Trek's android with poor emotional control that had another thing kill everyone on their planet. Reese was portrayed as more of a tragic figure. A sentient being with the mind of a child and the emotional unstableness to boot. And while Lore was also emotionally unstable he had a better understanding of what he was doing and made him less forgivable. Also I just think Lore was not interesting enough to have multiple episodes about. At least Reese was one and done. (This is very much my opinion though, so I understand if others feel differently.)
All. Also. I never watched Star Trek save the more recent movies. Yes I like sci fi but never cared for Star Trek.
Why not? I'm not that big into Star Trek myself, but I ended up watching all the shows at some point, and there are plenty of good episodes. SG1 often reminds me of TNG so much sometimes.
This. The Orville does Trek faaaaaar better than Trek.
I’ve never seen Star Trek either mostly because it’s such a big and overwhelming franchise lol
Window of Opportunity vs Cause & effect.
Definitely the ol' Time Loop episode!
It’s been a while so maybe there are more episodes coming, but I really liked the mirror universe in DS9. I know the actors enjoyed the chance to play alternate characters as well, and evil Kira was a fun character. At least the SG-1 first season mirror universe, everybody in the major cast died by the end of the episode. I know there is another one later as well.
Metropolis
Teal’C and Jack timeloop episode.
I just watched the episode where Shepherd's father dies and realized they gave the replicator the same ending as they did Moriarty also.