Farewell, General Hammond!

Very Tragic. He fit the role very well and should have been the one to end the series. (:(

Yes, it's a great pity about that, I was very sad to hear that...and the timing for the latest movie (continuum) mean't that I knew that this was THE LAST time I'd see him in action in a new Stargate production when I watched the movie. Quite sad...

I personally held this opinon of Continuum. Maybe I'm just not much of a sci-fi guy.

I just recently finished re-watching Twin Peaks on DVD. Don Davis played Air Force Major Garland Briggs, which I'd totally forgotten by the time I saw some SG-1. I still thing Twin Peaks is one of the best shows ever, and the foreshadowing for Don Davis' career is, well, spooky.

The Wikipedia page for Twin Peaks doesn't even mention Davis by name, althought it does mention Major Briggs and I think he was a pretty important, if only occasional, character. If you don't know the older show, Major Briggs worked for Project Blue Book and was abducted by aliens (extradimensional, not the space ship kind). He was tagged and tortured, but I guess that didn't affect his clearance for SGC...

I rather liked Continuum (giant fleet of doom!!!), but I wish the series had continued just a little bit longer so that they could have spread it and the ark of Trth out more. They seemed rushed.

Hammond was born to play that part. Richard Dean Anderson + Hammond "made" the series what it was. He will always be remembered.

I agree, they added considerably to the Stargate program, Hammond will be missed...

A Ja'far salute for Hammond of Texas!

I must say that I do agree that Sg-1 seemed a bit rushed towards the end, but especially the demise of the Asgard bugged me and I found it kinda sad that they chose to kill that part of the storyline. They never answered what happened to the ancient Asgard that was salvaged from that crashed ship on one of the protected planets (the one where Anubis kidnapped Thor) and why could the Asgard not live on in some kind of robotic or artificial body? They seem good at surviving being downloaded into Goa'uld computer systems lol

Wow, I'm now interested in watching Twin Peaks...thanks Gw Swicord

Anyway, I will miss the Hammond / O'Neill coalition as well as our little grey friends...but especially the real actor Don Davis, at least his legacy will live on for many years to come...

very unfortunate. obviously for the family and friends of Don Davis. the SG franchise in general seems to be in decline.

That was probably one of the "saddest" episodes, but they handled it so well, too. Thor was just casually walking about even as they were hours away from blowing themselves up to leave nothing to scavange. The Asgard were undoubtedly one of my most favorite story arcs in SG1. And one of my most favorite episodes is "Thor's Chariot", the very first time you see the Asgard mothership enter a planet's atmosphere and start beaming away all the bad guys

Yes that was an episode (Thor's Chariot) that really conveyed the true power of the Asgard...I also loved that one. I also loved the episode where Jack gets transported to the Aida galaxy and meets the Asgard face to face, I believe it was called 'The fifth race'. In a (rather admittedly strange) way I wish I could erase my memory of those episodes and rewatch them again for the first time, 'cos it was really really fun...it's still fun to rewatch them, but I do, of course, know what's gonna happen

Fair warning: it is not at all like SG-1, nor any other "normal" show I've ever seen. David Lynch is a co-creator, so it is a little bit like Blue Velvet meets the X-Files, except the X-Files probably couldn't have happened without Twin Peaks carving a path. Damn fine coffee, though.



I've noticed several folks around here say about the same thing. I'm a weird "friend" of the SG-1 show. The original film is one of my top SF faves from the late 20th. In most ways, SG-1 was a 10-year letdown for me. But they kept the idea of megascale SF TV alive, occasionally had good ensemble show moments, helped out some Farscape refugees, and eventually spawned the Atlantis show, which I think is overall a bit better written and acted than SG-1 was.

But maybe if they can settle into a couple of fallow decades, we could see something impressive like the differences between the theatre film version of Dune and the first two (and hopefully not last) installments of the TV miniseries version that Sci-Fi Channel produced. A sort of Stargate Next Generation, built to be long format but with much higher production values than its ancestor show.

I don't know, to me Atlantis is certainly flashier, but much less coherent. Stargate, until the last few seasons, basically ran with a continuous storyline: the Goa'uld are bad guys, and we get to fight them. True, the Replicators popped in here and there, and the Asgard, but the show was still centralized around a common story. Even though the main bad guys changed later, they still kept the feel, for the most part.

Atlantis is a mess in that regard. At first it's the Wraith that's the bad guys. Then the Replicators. Then Replicators fight Wraith. Then a bunch of renegade Wraith. All while the Jennai keep coming up with plots to take over Atlantis. Now the new season started and there's no bad guy at all. Meanwhile, main characters disappear and come back on a whim. Wier, Ford, the doc.. there are so many casting changes that it's starting to lose coherency.

I enjoy the show, but I wouldn't say it's better written than SG1 was. SG1 had consistency going for it, and some very memorable characters. Is there anything really memorable about Atlantis' characters? Save Sheppard, Ronin, and McKay.. not really. There are no memorable bad guys, either. In SG1 you could easily point to Anubis and say "Oh, he was awesome", and Bhaal with his army of clones, always getting in the way. Nothing like that exists in Atlantis

The only thing it really has a leg up on over SG1 is the effects budget But then, SG1 did take a few seasons to really get going, the first few years were really not too great, with a few select episodes.

By the time season 10 came around, viewership had dropped drastically. Probably due to the departure of Richard Dean Anderson as a regular (mainstay). Continuum may be the last of the Stargate SG-1 for a while, and elements of it are being incorporated into Stargate Atlantis.

After all, SG-1 has been about SG-1 team fighting off bad guys, and after the Ori were defeated, where do you go from THAT? Ba'al is the only Pest left (Continuum). The Asgard declared the humans to be the Fifth Race in Unending (last episode).

Don Davis will be missed, but, his legacy in SG-1 will live on.

Yeah, I definitely don't disagree that it was SG1's time to end. Wiping out an evil ancient race is just about as far as you can go on the "bad guy" ladder, there wasn't much left for them to come up with that could be badder

that's what i'd really like to see out of the franchise, frankly. i had a discussion along very similar lines towards the end of season 4 of Atlantis. i have to agree with Annatar that Atlantis has suffered numerous problems.

i think the biggest one was simply timing. Atlantis was barely getting on its feet while SG1 was on its last legs. they even sort of admit in several places that the ta'ri re-made the galaxy, killed all the bad guys, and managed to do it all while keeping their planet's population blissfully unaware. as pointed out, not really anywhere else to go.

on the other hand, the SG mythos allows for intergalactic travel (and not just milky way to pegasus). i find it hard to believe they'd run out of potential bad guys in a strictly matter-of-fact way. but the thing is, SG1 operated on the same kind of good/evil plot tension as Star Wars. would you make a Star Wars movie after defeating the Emperor and restoring the Republic? (well, i think Lucas intended to, actually).

what i see happening in season 5 of Atlantis gives me a little hope for the series. with Weir and now Carter out, Woolzy's filling the role of comic relief and the show seems to be bearing down on Shepard, Tayla, McKay and Ronin as the main characters, closely corresponding to O'Neil, Jackson, Carter and T'ilk (the humorous and supernaturally lucky leader, the cultural expert, the technological expert, and the muscles that are fun to look at... okay, maybe that part's just me).

also in the most recent epi of atlantis, they travel to some random parallel universe and see an enemy they haven't seen in this one. i'm hoping that enemy becomes more regular, since they seemed both powerful and enigmatic (perhaps if for no other reason, they were only glimpsed breifly).

but... i dunno. i'm still hoping for a new Trek series.

How about the 200th show (was it 200?), where they finally meet the furlings, and they are high-tech Ewoks, but then you realize that they were only kidding???

They better not make any of the versions they suggested as part of the context for the show...

Oh, and has anyone ever seen on Saturday morning a few years back, the cartoon: Stargate Infinity... ...The cartoon stargate only had eight symbols!!!

Long live the (rest of the) original SG1 team :CONGRAT:

The new enemy is supposed to show in mid season (Atlantis). For the moment, it seems to be held until after the olympics, along with the other friday night shows on SciFi channel.

Carter understands Asgard technology better than anyone else. So she has her hands full with that.

Jackson understands the Ancients (Alterans) and other cultures better than anyone, except the Asgard, Nox, and Furlings.

Running joke in Atlantis: nobody has asked what the Ancients called the ZPM....

I'm bummed. He was a great character and a great actor.