SGA - 'First Strike' mini review

[wraithfodder]

Okay, I quite enjoyed this episode... 

One tidbit, not spoilerish. Sheppard tells McKay he once (really, just once) flew a V-22 Osprey. That's a bit chopper, a VTOL (vertical take off and landing) chopper - http://www.navair.navy.mil/v22/ - I keep wondering, hmm, why just once? If you learn to fly one of those.... whoa....

Rest of spoilerish stuff below the cut-----

Overall, great episode. I must admit the otherworldly SPX on SGA blows SG1 out of the water (okay, bad pun). It's one of the allures of the show and gives it a true sci-fi feel.

I loved the drama of this episode, though not necessarily the end where Elizabeth has sustained a head injury (what? no massive bleeding from cuts from flying glass??? I digress). I'm not fond of Weir being booted and Carter coming in, but can't do anything about and just hope the writers actually evolve Carter correctly.

Sheppard's "Fantastic Four" talk with Ronon and Teyla. Her withering look of "I'm not invisible." Poor Shep can't win ;)

I was watching with a friend who watched both SG1 and SGA together and said "wow, The Final Solution and Iraq in two hours." Definite WWII parallels in SG1 with the eradication of an entire race, but SGA was so much like Iraq - weapons of mass destruction (building ships), we'll bomb them and that will take care of the problem, etc. I hadn't even really noticed the first time I watched, but yeah, the parallels are there, but I'll end here cuz I don't want to turn this into political stuff.

But when Ellis charged in with his plan, I was with Rodney - uh, like hello? it's like throwing rocks at a hornet's nest. Yup, they sure got stung but bad. Did snort when he beamed up Rodney, chair and all if I recall correctly!

Overall, good episode and I'm looking forward to part two, except for when we lose Weir to plot devices. Sigh...

Comments

[anjak-j.livejournal.com]

As I recall V-22s are mainly the domain of the USMC and the USN - USAF currently has 3 - and many trained crews died in the testing of them, which has been going on since the late 80's. There is still much dispute about the safety of them. They were only formerly introduced as operational hardware in 2005, and not until 2006 by USAF - by which time, John would have been in Atlantis...

So I assume he got to test pilot one.

I think sometimes storylines draw some interesting parallels to historic events. DS9 is one that took me a while to realise. I think that viewers don't always think that much about what they are watching - and to be fair, some people watch not to think to much...

First Strike was a good ep, really impressed me after last season's closing ep, which was awful. I'm looking forward to the next part, if only to see how things are going to be handled...

[wraithfodder.livejournal.com]

Well, the writers don't exactly research what choppers are exclusive to the USAG as his bio lists him as flying everything under the sun, and in choppers used not in the USAF. Hmmm...

Yes, "First Strike" was far superior to season 2's cliffie. Well, about 2.5 months (estimate) till we see part two.

[anjak-j.livejournal.com]

If they had researched it properly, they'd have found that chopper jockeys mainly operate in every military force BUT the Air Force. I suspect from the list of helo hardware in Rising that they'd intended Sheppard to be Army - especially since his character bio lists his father as an Army Colonel and families usually follow on into the same arm of the forces. Another of those great "WTF were TPTB thinking?" mysteries...

Next SGA depends on whether they expect Canada to stand down its usual start in late August / early September. I hope they leave it alone to be honest, because the quality of Skiffy TV rips after being spoilt by TMN ones makes my eyes bleed.

[tringasolitaria.livejournal.com]

I like miss_porcupine's interpretation that John was a special forces pilot, thus all the extra training. It's not been stated on the show, but it hasn't been disproved either, so that's kind of what I believe until the writers joss it. :)

I don't know if you've read her novelization of the first part of The Rising. It's one of my favorites as far as establishing background on Sheppard. Here's the link if you're interested.

http://www.offpanel.net/dmz/sga/novel.html

[tringasolitaria.livejournal.com]

*embarrassed* Just ignore me - I realized you probably had already seen the fic, since it's been recced at both stargateficrec and stargategenrec.

Sorry about that!

[parisindy.livejournal.com]

i really liked that story to it was brilliant!
wish there was more of it!

i won't comment on first strike... its was the straw to my camel