SGU: Air Part 3 (Episode 3)

SGU Episode 3 “Air Part 3” Spoiler potential: High Firstly the location for this episode was great, it was nice to see an alien world that wasn’t the Canadian woodland variant. I think it was really smart to strand them on the destiny without disconnecting them from Earth, on SGU one of the first things that gets done is establishing contact with Earth, in Atlantis we were cut off but it didn’t seem to bother people right away, which made it somewhat unbelievable, Voyager oversold it somewhat – it seems more realistic to me that we remain in regular contact – it opens up opportunities for story development that will be interesting to explore. I think, as people watch these episodes the biggest problem is going to be that they seem, episode by episode, messy – and we’ve somewhat been conditioned to believe that in TV this is a bad thing, were three episodes in and we have only a very limited understanding of where we are, why were there and how long we can survive… we have only met a fraction of the crew – three episodes in and we have more questions than answers – that’s unusual for stargate fans Traditionally, in Stargate there have been three types of episodes, those that begin and end in their own 45 minute window, those than continue into a second or third part or those that tie up most of the loose ends and then just finish It would be easy to get to the end of the Air three parter and be let down, there is a lack of closure that we have become accustomed to – and I’ll admit that I got to the end of this episode feeling a little short changed – but on reflection I think that was more due to conditioning than it was due to the episode itself. SGU is going to be a marathon, not a sprint – over the next 17 episodes were going to be spoon-fed developments, none of them are going to be neat and tidy – that’s exciting to me The episode on its own, there are some nice developments, we get to know Matthew Scott a little better and we get a taste of something familiar, or something that was designed to seem familiar – a swirling in the sand, manifestations of past memories, the water from nowhere – ascended ancient ahoy! Or something very similar. I feel that, as good as the episode was I want to learn something from every character we decide to spend time with and unfortunately, I feel I’ve learnt very little from Greer – but im trusting in this new format that doesn’t give me, the viewer exactly what I want when I want it to provide for me later down the line – I feel that Jamil Walker Smith plays the character well and that the character has significant potential but, given how much time he has had on screen compared to others he is largely unknown, we know Scott, Eli, Rush and Young the best, you would expect we would know Greer as well as them, however I feel I know more about the type of person TJ or Camille is than I do Greer, he was introduced as being in the brig, but since then nothing he has done couldn’t have been done by a random officer and no explanation has been given via character interaction or flashback to explain why he is the way he is, my honest opinion here is, he was introduced and just left hanging while Characters like Camille and TJ were not introduced well but, we got more opportunity to get a feel of what they are about – in the past the shoot first ask questions later character has been alien, which has meant we’ve been introduced to them part way through an episode and had a certain understanding or acceptance for them not quite fitting right away – Greer is a human, from earth and he made it onto an off world SGC base which, if nothing else should speak to the fact that he has some level of significant skill or importance to make up for the equally significant lack of people skills, but we weren’t given any indication of that – which I’m choosing to find unsettling, while remaining optimistic that it will be corrected as the season progresses Perhaps this is part of what new stargate is going to be about, not getting the neat introductions to everybody, not knowing who, why and how instantly – in trusting that every character given a proper introduction so far has been introduced well and that eventually, all of the characters will get the same treatment The ship, shuttle or pod leaving the destiny at the end, was unexpected – lots of questions about that that im sure wont be answered right away, where it came from and when it connected to the destiny being the most prevalent.