I’m slightly miffed today that Tivo failed to record Stargate SG1 - normally such a reliable machine, my Tivo has suffered recently as a result of a botched hard-disk upgrade hack. As a result of my own shoddy geeking I have therefore been deprived of my bi-weekly fix of this truly bad program.
I both love and hate Stargate SG1: It is a spin-off from the forgetable 1990’s space-opera ‘Stargate’ in which Kurt Russel’s character has been replaced with former star of McGyver, Richard Dean Anderson.
Anderson’s character in SG1 is quite a contrast to his 80’s unarmed secret-agent. In SG1 he is a gun-toting, figeting, technophobic bufoon… actually this is rather refreshing because most sci-fi characters do not have any personality at all. Richard brings an unusual note of comedy to a mostly dreary genre.
Week after week the same team of six or so characters save the world from a seemingly endless stream of superior alien foes. SG1 is like a lower-budget version of Star Trek - feeble special effects, wooden acting and cardboard sets. However this series does have one substantial redeeming quality - it does not take itself as seriously as Gene Roddenberry’s namby-pamby vision of the future.
So without my weekly fix I am left to ponder the eternal Stargate SG1 questions such as:
* Why do all the male aliens end up falling in love with tech genius ‘Major Sam Carter’. To some extent, this is a gender reversal of Shatner’s role in the original Star-trek with one critical difference - ‘Carter’ manages to retain her clothing in every episode I have seen.
* How does ‘Teal’c’ get to look so macho and yet so gay-sexual at the same time (if I have not offended my homosexual readers, please tell me if my gay-dar is malfunctioneering). I have been assured by gay sci-fi fins that he is intended as a ‘gay-interest’ character.
* Why do all the aliens speak perfect American English?
* How did RDA’s character get to be a colonel despite being a figeting bafoon?
* Dean Stockwell was better in “Quantum Leap”, dont you agree?
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