Stargate Atlantis: "The Kindred" Part 1

Not my favorite storyline
We finally see Kanan--no Kanaan onscreen.

The father of Teyla's unborn baby finally appears.

In "Be All My Sins Remember'd," he was Kanan (the same name as the Tok'ra symbiote Jack O'Neill was blended with in SG-1 Season 6 episode "Abyss"). Now he's Kanaan (a belated last second spelling tweak?)

Tomato. Tomatoe.

Not having met Kanan--er, Kanaan until this episode, he didn't strike me as being particularly memorable or charming. Intellectually, I know he's supposed to be important to Teyla since she reveals that she's known him since childhood and he shares the same ability to detect the Wraith as she does. Emotionally, he wasn't built up for me to connect with him.

Teyla receives dreams of Kanaan (an ability she's never had before), telling her to search for signs of him on the planet Croya. The dreams are so lucid and clear that it feels like an oversight when Kanaan doesn't say where he actually is. I wonder how the dreams would've been if Teyla and Kanaan had walked walked through a marketplace that she vaguely recognized and Kanaan had said something cryptic about how important the planet Croya is?

At the same time, Keller reports to Carter and Team Atlantis that a new illness is spreading througout the Pegasus galaxy that kills 30% of the humans it infects and all the Wraith who feed on them. Keller also knows already that it's a variation on the innoculation developed by the Hoffan people in Season 1 "Poisoning the Well" to make humans toxic to the Wraith.

Teyla goes to Croya, where she finds a man selling Athosian jewelry. She gets him to show her where he found the trinkets, but a dart beams her up on the way to the stargate. A set up.

Meantime, Todd the Wraith sets off a subspace beacon to signal Sheppard to come to a meeting, where they trade info on the Hoffan protein for the location of Michael, the Wraith-Human hybrid, who by process of elimination must be behind the latest attack on the Wraith.

Teyla wakes up on a Wraith ship, where she finds Michael staring at her. He shows her that the feeding orifice on his right hand is gone thanks to genetic engineering and tells her he sent the dreams, posing as Kanaan, has plans for her baby, says he created a new uber race to replace the Wraith by mutating the Athosians, and displays Kanaan, who's a brainwashed Wraith-human hybrid.

With Todd's help, Sheppard and Lorne take their teams to a planet, where Michael may have a base. Caldwell transports them on the Daedalus. After he beams them to the base, a Wraith cruiser jumps out of hyperspace, and he commences to skirmish with just conventional rail gun batteries. Sheppard and Lorne's teams have an average fire fight with some Wraith worshipping humans armed with single shot hand stunners. No contest.

The Wraith cruiser (presumably with Teyla on board) flees into hyperspace when the Daedalus belatedly uses its Asgard beam weapons and Sheppard and Rodney find Beckett in a holding cell.

Beckett is wondering what took them so long, and things cut out at this point to be continued next week.

Lots of telling and infodumping in this episode with no drama.

Kanaan, unseen for 4 years and newly invented this season, has no impact and is a victim rather than an active character.

Beckett is supposedly the real Beckett even though he was killed in Season 3 "Sunday." I'll wait for the explanation on how this is possible.

It was nice to see Beckett again, but I don't feel that he should've been "killed" in the first place.

Carter and Teyla had a small bonding moment when Carter let Teyla go to Croya even though she thought it was a trap, telling Teyla to call her Sam. Moments like this were few and far in between this season. And ultimately irrelevant since Carter was around only part time and will not be a regular character next year.

Compared to other season finales and two-parters, this story leaves me uninvolved and skeptical.

Stargate Atlantis: "Midway"

Average
Teal'c versus Ronon Smackdown

I hadn't been looking forward to Teal'c and Ronon coming together because I was more focused on Daniel Jackson coming to Atlantis and the Weir-Carter debacle of Season 4.

I'm not necessarily against Teal'c and Ronon meeting, but Teal'c's character doesn't have a dramatic need to come to Atlantis. With SG-1 supposedly disbanded (again), Teal'c's priorities lie with taking care of the Jaffa nation.

Anyhow, Teal'c comes to Atlantis to coach Ronon on handling a xenophobic IOA interview. The two share some fisticuffs, end up in a draw, and then get caught up in a Wraith attempt to take over the Midway Station and infiltrate the SGC. When Teal'c and Ronon follow the first Wraith wave to Earth, Sheppard and Rodney come onto Midway with a few teams of marines and swap the station with Wraith reinforcements a few times before blowing up the station and escaping in a puddle jumper. On Earth, Teal'c and Ronon save the SG-C. Ronon then passes the interview of the IOA stiff who originally wanted to find an excuse to get him out of Atlantis. And Ronon flies back to Atlantis on the Daedalus to pick up Sheppard, Rodney, and a few survivors who were going stir crazy after a couple weeks in the puddle jumper.

On a surface level, this episode was a definite step up from the fillers of the last few weeks, full of superficial action and thrills. But that's just it. I feel this episode has little beyond the surface.

After three years of Teyla faithfully serving Atlantis and Ronon for two (not to mention Teal'c's 10 years on SG-1), there's suddenly one man, Coolidge, who's taking it on himself to review whether nonEarth humans can serve on Atlantis/SGC teams.

When Teal'c and Ronon meet, do they have to fight? What interpersonal conflicts do they have that'd motivate the fight? And when they do, how can they go one hour when full contact matches usually end in a few minutes? On a scale of 1-10 with 10 being the highest, why do the Atlantis marines spar with Ronon at a 4, while Ronon revs up to 12?

Teal'c looks trim and his new long hair-style is dashing. But he didn't seem like himself in this episode, particularly when he told Ronon he would "very much" like to have a blaster such as Ronon's. As Master Bra'tac taught, it's not the weapon, but the heart that makes a Jaffa.

Kavanaugh, a recurring scientist character, who was formerly stationed on Atlantis returns to demonstrate that he's not only cowardly, but incompetent. He somehow doesn't know that using the system bypass feature to override the lockouts put in place by the Wraith trigger Midway station's self-destruct.

When the Wraith first come onto the station, Dr. Lee and the rest of the staff do nothing to seal off the control room and send an alert to the SG-C and Atlantis. There are no anti-intruder defenses and hardly any Air Force airmen stationed to resist a hostile take over.

Since the Wraith are capable of jury rigging a Pegasus stargate to access Midway and then override a security lockout of Midway's systems to reach the SG-C, why bother pumping Lee for the password? When did the Wraith learn how to read English? The Wraith commander who took over the station had a not so clever conversation with Sheppard in which he promised to bring Sheppard "a world of hurt." Would a Wraith channel an ECW smack-talking wrestler?

When Sheppard took back the station briefly, why did the Wraith open the control room and how did the Wraith who had Sheppard and his team in a crossfire miss?

The Atlantis marines and Wraith exchanged a lot of weapons fire without worrying about damaging sensitive equipment and causing breaches in the Midway station hull that'd bring on explosive decompression.

When Rodney and Lee decide to vent the atmosphere, the Wraith commander who'd gotten the information on Midway from Todd who'd hacked Rodney's database in Atlantis attacked Sheppard before getting shot and suffocated. What did the Wraith commander (with no name and personality) hope to accomplish? With the oxygen also totally vented while he fought the Wraith, how did Sheppard get himself into a pressure suit that requires the help of at least one other person and several minutes to enter?

It would've been nice to see Carter leading a team onto Midway at Sheppard's side, but that's not in keeping with her impersonation of Weir. It was strange seeing Walter in the SG-C control room without Landry (or SG-1) hovering over his shoulder.

If the Wraith had taken over the SGC, what could they have expected to achieve without the support of a fleet of hive ships in orbit? How would they have held out when the US military realized that the SGC was compromised, sealed it off, and directed a nuclear strike at Cheyenne mountain?

As Teal'c and Ronon swept the base for Wraith, they came across Coolidge, who unlike everyone else in the base was reviving from the Wraith stun wave that knocked everyone out. How? And why did Teal'c and Ronon listen to Coolidge when he demanded to be taken to a radio to contact the US military, which decided to set off a tactical nuclear warhead at the base. What did Coolidge hope to accomplish?

Even though the Earth episodes of Season 4 strike me as SG-1 installments with the Atlantis cast, the Wraith seeking to reach Earth is a legitimate Atlantis storyline. "Midway" struck me as being rushed, though, and in need of more development, providing enough material for two episodes, like the Genii take over of Atlantis in Season 1 "The Storm" and "The Eye."

Additionally, I find the IOA to be a weak and annoying antagonist on the homefront unlike the NID when it was run by Colonel Mayborne, who tried to take over the SGC during the first few seasons to aggressively exploit the Stargate and acquire alien technology at all costs and no scruples. I constantly find myself wondering what the producers find so fascinating about the IOA?

It was good to see fallout from Todd's collaboration with Atlantis earlier this season. With the conclusion of this episode, we know there's at least one faction of Wraith with sensitive information on Atlantis and likely the SGC as well. Until the Midway station is rebuilt, its loss will complicate the movement of personnel and supplies while Atlantis' one ZPM is at less than full capacity.

If one overlooks the superficial characterizations and logic loopholes, then "Midway" is definitely a popcorn blockbuster of an episode.

Supernatural: "Jus In Bello"

"Series classic"
The stakes ante up...

A couple of Season 3 plot threads begin to come to a head in this episode.

Trailing Bella for her theft of the Colt in "Dream a Little Dream of Me," the brothers Winchester track Bella to her latest hideout. Except it's empty--and Agent Henricksen comes busting in (thanks to a tip from Bella) with backup to finally nab 'em.

As the brothers cool their heels in the local hoosegow waiting for transportation to maximum security prison, over 30 demons come to kill them. After Henricksen is possessed and freed, he becomes a believer in demons and other things that go bump in the night.

It was interesting to see how Henricksen bonded with Dean and Sam, which made his death at the end more tragic and poignant. Henricksen would've been a great ally and convert to the hunter ranks, but now the brothers'll have to get by on their own, like they always have. Thegood thing is the Feds now think they're dead, giving them room to maneuver without pesky law enforcement stiffs trying to arrest them.

As the brothers, Henricksen, and the local cops struggled to stay alive, Dean and Henricksen focused on keeping safe the sheriff's secretary, Nancy. A sweet girl and a virgin.

When Ruby came to help out, she was understandably upset to learn that they'd lost the Colt. But she comes up with a plan, cast a spell to destroy every demon in 1 mile, including herself.

The cost?

Cutting out the heart of a virgin.

Sam considers it (another sign of his slipping to the Dark Side), which bothers Dean to no end. But Dean and Henricksen veto that course, making Ruby leave 'em to their fates and bemoaning that she picked the wrong side in the demon war to support.

Dean strikes on an alternative plan, let the demons into the jail and fight 'em off.

Brilliant?

Somehow it works. The brothers and friends break the demon seals--then reseal them and cast a spell that offs all the demons and saves their hosts. Except for one who got away before Nancy could finish laying down a line of salt.

After Sam and Dean leave, a little girl comes in, looking for them. When Nancy asks her name, she says "Lillith" and casts a bright white light that blots out everything.

Ruby visits Sam and Dean, bringing to their attention a newscast of the jailhouse being blown up with the presumed loss of everyone there. Ruby gives the brothers charms to hide 'em from Lillith and warns they better listen to her next time and be willing to do what it takes to come survive.

"Jus In Bello," acceptable practices while in war, is the perfect title for this episode.

The only quibble I had with this episode was the demon possessing Henricksen's boss (the first one on the scene), Deputy Director Steven Groves. He kept up the FBI director act--until he tried to blow Dean away with a silenced 9 millimeter. Nice play on Dean and Sam playing law enforcement, but why pretend when he had the brothers alone and why not fry 'em with flame from his fingertips, snap their necks with a snap of his fingers, etc.?

I can hardly wait to see what'll come next in the next few episodes. The brothers have to decide how ruthless they have to be in fighting the demon war and Sam may have to consider stepping up to take Lillith for the role of the demon messiah in order to "save" Dean from going to hell.

If Dean does, though, I feel the writers are talented enough to get good mileage out of this storyline and keep it going for a lot of episodes. Maybe all of Season 4?

Here's hoping the CW renews the series for next year.

Breaking WOTF update:

I got a voicemail today saying I'm actually a Semi-Finalist eligible to get a crit from K.D. Wentworth.

This was a surprise...

I'm looking forward to poring over K.D. Wentworth's thoughts before I fire the story off to Baen's Universe--or Analog. :-)

Hailing frequencies closed.

WOTF Results

I just got a letter in the mail today telling me that my "Ra-Gho-Zu" short SF fiction story placed as a quarter-finalist in the 1st qtr of the WOTF 2008 contest. My name will be posted in the WOTF blog sooner or later.

They're calling quarter-finalists "Honorable Mentions" now. It's still the same thing. We don't get anything except a credit on a short story/novel cover letter to an editor at the most.

Quarter-finalist in 2006 and a quarter-finalist in 2008 again... Unlike the first time, I also get a certificate (and a footnote mention in the WOTF blog).

I could keep on submitting to WOTF except I have to move beyond short stories and onto novels I need to write. Short story publications don't earn fiction writers very much. Reputations are made with novels, which pay better (even though few novelists earn enough to go without a day job). I will go to plan B now: shopping my story with likely short fiction markets (one at a time since simultaneous subs are frowned on).

Two candidates that stand out to me are Jim Baen's Universe and Analog Science Fiction & Fact.

On with the grind.