A very happy birthday to Josh Blacker who played Sgt. Spencer in Stargate Universe and a “screaming man” in the Atlantis episode Vengeance. He has also appeared in Human Target, V, Blood Ties and Elysium. TwitterIMDBOfficial Site
Happy Birthday to John Aylward who was President Nadal in the Stargate SG1 episode Ethon. He also had recurring roles in The West Wing, Mad Men and House of Lies as well as guest spots on Fringe, Harry’s Law and Fairly Legal. IMDBSeattle Times Interview
Birthday best wishes to Dakin Matthews who played Maz’rai in the SG1 episode Stronghold. He has also appeared in General Hospital, Desperate Housewives, Devious Maids, Castle, Huff, The Good Wife, Voyager and Lincoln. IMDB
The very best of birthday wishes to Peter Deluise who wrote, produced, directed and on occasion appeared on all three live action Stargate series. He also starred on 21 Jump Street and Seaquest and has recently worked on Cedar Cove, Robsons Arms and Level Up. IMDBOfficial SiteTwitter
A happy Birthday to Paul Perri who was Dr Woods in the Stargate SG1 episode Frozen. He has also appeared in Caprica, Kingdom Hospital, Babylon 5 and Fritz. IMDB
Birthday best wishes to David Pressman who was a Lieutenant in the Stargate movie. He has also appeared in Independence Day, Alias, Newhart and Mr Sunshine. IMDBTwitter
A very happy birthday to Robert Patrick who played Col Sumner in Rising the Stargate Atlantis pilot. He also starred in The Unit, The X-Files and Terminator 2 as well as major recurring roles on True Blood and Last Resort. IMDBTwitter
Birthday best wishes to Corin Nemec who played Jonas Quinn in 26 episodes of Stargate SG1. He also starred in Parker Lewis Can’t Lose and appeared in The Stand, Ghost Whisperer and the cracking creature features Sand Sharks and Dragon Wasps. IMDBTwitter
Many happy returns of the day to Armin Shimerman who played Anteaus in the Stargate SG1 episode The Nox. He also played Quark on Deep Space Nine and appeared in episodes of Voyager, TNG and Buffy The Vampire Slayer. Armin’s resume is huge including dozens of voice performances and many guest spots on tv and movies. IMDBTwitter
Happy Birthday to Victor Favrin who played Chalo in the Stargate SG1 episodes Evolution I & II. Along with his acting he is also a stuntman and and stunt actor on tv and movies. IMDB
Birthday best wishes to Ken Kirzinger who was a Jaffa in three episodes of SG1 and a barman in Atlantis (Kindred II) as well as spots on Fringe, Smallville and Human Target. He is also a busy stunt performer in movies and television. IMDBTwitter
Many happy returns of the day to David Lovgren who was Darrell Grimes (Bounty) and Va’lar (Threshold) in SG1 & Kelore (Inquisition) in Atlantis. He has also appeared in Psych, Smallville, The L Word and had a recurring role as John Hogarty in Intelligence. IMDB
Catching up with the latest episode of Arrow this afternoon and while I knew David Nykl would be appearing in this season I did not know it was in the episode “Crucible” which aired in the US last week so once again a whoop of delight to see him on screen, not easily recognisable and of course the accent is different to his normal voice and that of Zelenka but always a pleasure to see him work. IMDBTwitterOfficial Site
It’s also good to know David will be appearing again and in a named character rather than just “the Russian” and despite a few misgivings the second season is holding up well although without the in your face impact of the first season when Arrow was really a major breath of fresh air into the TV superhero genre. Arrow Official Site
While exploring a new world the jumper lands at a small encampment where quite quickly the team are fired upon by primitive weapons, an aircraft arrives and gives aid and the team follow the aircraft to it’s base and a meet a fairly advanced society. Upon returning to the gate the jumper is fired upon once again and sustains damage and the team even with Ronon along are taken captive by the prisoners who inhabit the small island that contains the Stargate. Rodney is then encouraged to fix the jumper or one of his friends will be executed but that’s beyond even his talents however he is with some prodding able to enable the dialing computer.
Meanwhile Weir and her escort arrive on the world and open negotiations but the lack of results in recovering John and his team and the suspicious behavior of the Magistrate and the revelation that the prisoners some guilty of very minor crimes are going to be fed to the Wraith breaks down the talks and Weir and her team leave the city. Everything comes to a head when Wraith cruisers arrive above the island and the crippled jumper launches a drone which causes extensive damage and while a second fires on the island Weirs cloaked jumper dials the gate and allows John, Ronon, McKay and Teyla to escape.
We may have a problem
Condemned is an interesting episode and explores a solution to the Wraith problem which is unique at least in terms of a society making this decision and keeping it working for generations. Of course the supply of hardened criminals will dry up if the deterrent is that strong so as minor criminals are sentenced to the island the society itself becomes driven by compliance and obedience to dogma rather than a free thinking and living world. The island itself is now very much a dog eat dog entity, those sent there that are truly violent easily become dominant but it’s hard to see how they really got so well armed with limited resources but if they failed to bring down a jumper then that would be the story over very quickly.
The episode was wonderfully shot though, the island location looked very nice and different to a lot of what we’ve seen before and the stunt work for the fighting was exception again seeing Ronon let loose really dispels a myth that a big man can not be lightning fast and versatile in his fighting technique. It was also a show piece for Teyla as Rachel has perfected her action performance and it was only really John who was the comic relief but done so well with the stick and his knee. Again we see evidence that Rodney despite a huge streak of self interest does consider his companions more than worthy of his commitment and maybe even sacrifice, as Torrell says the way to motivate him is to threaten his friends.
Look who is is coming for dinner
Alas the end result is just an average episode despite the performances and production, that says more of the strength of the show and it’s second season rather than the story by Sean Carley and script by Carl Binder or the direction from Peter DeLuise. This weeks promo is from Trek News & Views a Star Trek podcast from our friend Colin and part of the Trek.fm network of shows, next week we will be back at Stargate Command and dealing with the Ori as they make their first major move in the episode Beachhead, hope you join us for that. If you want to get in touch with us or leave us a rating/review on itunes or stitcher we would be very grateful, till next week and watch that final step.
Happy Birthday to Jerry Wasserman who played Whitlow (Touchstone) and the Chief of Staff (Inauguration) in Stargate SG1. He has also guest starred on Smallville, Psych, Arctic Air, Cold Squad and Motive. IMDB
Birthday best wishes to Samantha Ferris who was Dr. Raully in two episodes of Stargate SG1. She also had a recurring role on Supernatural as Ellen Harvelle and on The 4400 as Nina Jarvis. IMDBTwitter
Many happy returns of the day to Katharine Isabelle who was Valencia in the SG1 episode Camelot. She has appeared on Earthsea, Cedar Cove, Being Human and in the upcoming See No Evil 2. IMDBTwitter
The very best birthday wishes to Robert Foxworth who was Chairman Ashwan in the Stargate SG1 episode Memento. He also graced our screens in other notable scifi series such as Enterprise, Deep Space Nine and Babylon 5. He was also the star of the glossy 1980’s soap Falcon Crest and has guest starred on Boston Legal, Jeremiah and Bones. IMDBBehind The Voice
The very best of birthday wishes to David Ogden Stiers who played Oberoth in Stargate Atlantis. He also played Gene Purdy in The Dead Zone tv series as well as his iconic role as Major Charles Winchester the 3rd in M*A*S*H on television. He has also guest starred on Star Trek TNG, Perry Mason and Murder She Wrote. IMDB
A very happy birthday to… Leon Rippy who was General West in the Stargate theatrical feature and starred in Saving Grace, Deadwood, Under The Dome as well as guest spots on Leverage, TNG and The Lone Ranger. IMDB
Jan Bos played Ambassador Sevarin in the Stargate SG1 episode Homecoming. Jan has also appeared on Psych, Reaper, Hellcats and The 4400. IMDBOfficial Site Michael Beach who guest starred on five episodes of Stargate Atlantis as Colonel Abe Ellis. He also starred in Third Watch as “Doc” appearing in 104 episodes as well as spots on ER and Under Suspicion. IMDBTwitter Daniel Bacon who was a Technician in Stargate SG1 & played Dr Watson in Atlantis. He’s also guest starred on The 4400, Psych, Arctic Air and Supernatural. IMDB Peter New who was a farmer in the Atlantis episode Off the Grid and has appeared on Fringe, Dead Like Me, Motive and a number of voice roles. IMDBTwitterOfficial Site
Many happy returns of the day to Dan Castellaneta who is of course the voice of Homer Simpson and many other characters on The Simpsons and on Futurama, he also starred as Joe in the SG1 episode Citizen Joe. IMDBBehind The Voice
A very happy birthday to Michael Daingerfield who was a Jaffa in the Stargate SG1 episode The Other Guys. He’s also guest starred on Arrow, Smallville, Psych and has done extensive voice work on shows such as Iron Man, My Little Pony and Pucca. IMDBOfficial SiteBehind The Voice
Birthday best wishes to Chelan Simmons who was Mara in the Stargate Atlantis episode The Tower. She also starred in The LA Complex and appeared on Kyle XY, Smallville, Wonderfalls and Supernatural. IMDBTwitter
It always comes as a pleasant surprise to see a familiar face appear on the television, I try to avoid casting news which is pretty much impossible these days so a huge grin appeared when Teryl Rothery appeared in the recent episode of Arrow “Broken Dolls” as “Jean” the hired gun attorney for the Queen family.
Many happy returns of the day to Robert Picardo who was Richard Woolsey in Stargate SG1, Atlantis and Universe and also The Doctor in Star Trek Voyager. He’s also starred in a lot of tv (Justified, Castle) and movies (Morlocks, Infiltrators) and guest starred on even more and has done lots of voice work. IMDBOfficial SiteTwitter
A very happy birthday to Elias Toufexis who was a Replicator in two episodes of Stargate Atlantis. He’s also guest starred on Lost Girl, Alphas, Eureka, Smallville and the upcoming Bitten. IMDBTwitterOfficial Site
Birthday best wishes to Carmen Argenziano who was Jacob Carter and Selmak in Stargate SG1. He’s also guest starred on House, CSI:NY, Castle, Swordfish and Bunheads. IMDBTwitterOfficial Site
Vala volunteers to travel with the rest of well sorta SG1 to a world that has been visited by a Prior, it turns out that she stayed on this world disguised as Qetesh. No one should really be surprised that her real motive was to reclaim a bunch of treasure she had acquired but Daniel is convinced that only the truth of the false gods is capable of combating the threat of the Ori who themselves are false gods. Of course after learning the truth the people immediately imprison Vala for crimes against them and while Daniel is defending her the Prior arrives and makes his position very clear. After he leaves the people start to fall ill and nothing Dr Lam and her team can do can cure the disease, even the healing device is only a temporary measure and when it push to comes the natives of the world bow down to the Ori and the Prior cures them all. Just before he turns to leave he stares at Daniel and tells him to relay this story to anyone that will listen and then walks away.
A losing battle
The Powers That Be is a very strong episode and really nails down what the Ori and their Priors are capable of doing along with the propaganda use of their actions both positive and negative. As with the Gou’ald the SGC and Earth are once again faced with very powerful beings but until the System Lords the Ori powers are at a level that does seem to be a step away from technology based thus enforcing the belief they have god like powers or are indeed gods themselves. It doesn’t hurt that the Priors for the time are preaching only the positive and backing it up, any opposition has a very difficult time to hold up examples of the Ori’s deceit or complicity and words are just words.
Get used to losing guys!
It was very interesting to see the former Administrator turned Prior arrive in the Milky Way, it was bad enough random Priors were appearing but his appearance had to be response to Daniel being on the planet, it certainly underlines how manipulative the Ori are at least until force is required to quell the dissenters. Greg Anderson who plays the Prior does a wonderful job with the writing his is given, by keeping some level of humanity (not seen in the other Priors) he is all the more threatening and competent. The use of the disease/plague is also a call back to the ultimate demise of the non-ascended ancients, you wonder if before they fled their home galaxy their conflict with who would become the Ori left a little seed which generations later removed them from the physical plane. This episode does a great job of opening avenues for the story to travel down.
Thanks for everyone who has been posting and using the Facebook, Twitter and G+ sites as well as regularly visiting this main website, it’s rewarding to see people making use of our efforts and the feedback we get is great. In that regard we got some discussion about Duet over on Facebook and continued chatter on Twitter about pretty much everything Stargate. This weeks promo is for the new Dune podcast which will be covering the entire literature aspect of the franchise on a monthly basis, the show hosts included Scott from the Scifi Diner podcast so you may be familiar with his voice:)
This was our 200th episode and it includes the results of the recent competition, they will be published on the site and other portals when everyone has been notified but we want to thank everyone for entering, at best there is a prize at worst you got to puzzle over four Stargate themed questions:)
Brad once again got up early and recorded with us, we had a lot of skype issues but we stood firm and got the episode recorded. We are still looking for more guests to come on the show, the schedule is rather sparse for the next few months so if you fancy joining us for an episode (SG1 or SGA) then get in touch and we’ll sort something out but until then take care everyone and don’t forget where you left the gate.
