For a while I wondered why Bill Lee was being observed by both a guard and a camera and wondered what on Earth he’d been up to. Then I realised that he was actually waiting for someone from the expedition to jump into his body. That must have been why Young was so determined to get the case in the first place – they must have had a standing arrangement that in case of crisis and with no other way of communicating, somebody from Icarus (probably Young himself) would use the stones. However, if – as he later claimed – Rush already knew about the stones, why didn’t he – or Johansen who also knew about the stones – make any effort to get the case during the evacuation from Icarus? I would have thought that they’d be the number one item taken through the Gate.

I noticed that James, Scott’s sexual partner, calls him ‘Leftenant’ instead of ‘Lootenant’. Is that a Canadian thing? I know the English use the former pronunciation but she doesn’t have the accent.

I realise that it moves the plot along, but Scott’s stupidity at insisting that Eli should open a door which is flashing red is not exactly a glowing testament to the intelligence of the Stargate military who are, after all, supposed to be the best of the best. Then again, this is the lieutenant who couldn’t keep his pants on while he was on duty ...

Rush and Scott have a strange idea of keeping the others safe. They tell them to disperse and find their own places to hang out for a while. At that time nobody knows how to operate any ship-wide communications and not everybody has a radio. Eli has already said that the ship goes on forever, so what happens if later they find that they can only oxygenate part of the ship or there’s some other emergency that requires everyone to be together? It’ll take the military a week to round everybody up!

During the inventory of all the cases brought through from Icarus, it’s good to see that someone thought of the really important stuff and sent a whole case of duct tape!!

OK, I’m going to try not to rant for too long about the use of Warfarin in this episode, but as someone who’s taking the stuff at present, I’m here to say that no Warfarin user would ever just chug a pill every time he feels ill. The senator takes pills as if they will have an instant effect and ease his pain, but they don’t work that way. Warfarin is a blood thinner, not a painkiller, and you have to take a very specific prescribed dose each day. If he’s chucking pills down his neck whenever he feels like it, it’s no wonder he’s so sick!

How did the senator get from his room to the shuttle bay? He had no idea where it was, and both Greer and Franklin were already at the bay so he can’t have hijacked one of them to take him there.

I’m glad the senator died, if only because it’ll give Chloe a chance to spend future episodes doing more than simply whining, “Dad? Dad!” all the way through them!

After Rush has tried to persuade Young not to dial the Stargate, and then everyone’s enveloped with a shimmer and the engines start to shut down, Young sends out a radio message asking if anyone’s near the observation deck. How does he know about it? I can’t imagine that Scott or Johansen would have thought to include information about it when they were telling him about what had happened so far.

Why will Destiny only stay in a location a certain amount of time before jumping back to FTL? Even if it’s an automatic programme while it’s pootling along on its own, shouldn’t the Ancients have programmed in an override that people can activate once they’re actually on board?

When the kino starts sending back information from the planet, neither it nor anyone on the crew mentions whether a working D.H.D. has been spotted there.

When Rush and Young are discussing who should go on the away mission, Rush says, “Palmer is a geologist – obviously she should go. Franklin and Brody are the best of the rest of what we have.” Young replies, “Franklin goes. The others stay.” So why is Palmer on the away team?

It looks like I may be completely wrong in my pre-season assertions that Destiny is going to jump between alternate dimensions. I must have read that somewhere, or maybe it was an early idea from the producers which was then changed. I imagine that the recurrence of characters like Jack O’Neill and Colonel Telford will come about by people using the stones to communicate with Earth.

I think this series has promise, though I’m still not convinced that even the clever Ancients could have designed a Gate programme that could track a ship wherever it is in the known universe and form a wormhole to it. And if the ninth symbol is nothing more than a ‘secret password’, how can the other eight symbols possibly locate a roving object?

I’m also concerned that the flashbacks may become a regular thing, thus turning Universe into Lost (in Space)

According to my ‘boss’ at Gateworld – or at least, he’s the guy who posts my transcripts! – he’s had a sneak preview of the next episode and he reckons it’s even better. I just hope that TPTB keep the series realistic. Obviously they’ll deal with the need for sustenance, and ways of replacing or recharging batteries for their radios when they’re on away trips, and ways of defending themselves when the bullets start running out – but unless they find a hidden wardrobe on the ship, or travel to some fantastic planet or abandoned base in the near future, their clothes ought to start falling to bits and the women should run out of make-up quite quickly. If the women have constant costume changes and everyone’s still looking glossy and perfect with great coiffeured hairstyles at the end of the season, I’ll be peeved.

If the women have constant costume changes and everyone’s still looking glossy and perfect with great coiffeured hairstyles at the end of the season, I’ll be peeved.

Hey, if they could do it on Gilligan's Island....

a thought: at the end of part II they send an away team to the address, but how is the team going to get back? the whole working premise of this show is that it takes 9 chevrons and a one of a kind power source to reach this marvalous ship, so how can the away team simply gate back to it from whatever planet they go to?

also, when they jumped out of hyperspace they mentioned that 4 addresses came up on the viewscreen. really? only 4 working gates in that particular galaxy? remember gate addresses can connect anywhere in the galaxy, relative distance shouldn't be a consideration. so why is the ship only showing them 4 possible addresses?

I suppose it is not a nit. just an annoyance but in the beginning of the episode they remark that the ship is hundreds of thousands of years old. then later they remark that it has been roaming through space for thousands of years. well which is it? thousands or hundreds of thousands? if I say the package will get there in a few days and it takes 100 days to get there well that is a pretty big margin of error no? Also Dr. Rush referred to the ship as "truly ancient" and noted that it was hundreds of thousands of years old. well coming from a civilization that has been around for tens of millions of years I think a few thousands centuries is pretty lightweight stuff :D

when trying to sooth Cloe, Dr. Rush claims that he isnt to blame. that he didn't create the situation. I hate to disagree but yes you did, you aborted the evacuation to earth and re routed everyone to the Destiny simply because you wanted to satisfy your scientific ego. you couldn't bare the thought of loosing your only chance to prove yourself right and you doomed dozens of people to a living hell. It is a wonder no one has flushed him off the ship yet.

Accidentally posted this on the first board when it belongs here. You can delete that part of the post on board 1, Callie. (Sorry about the mistake & extra work for you.)

A politician sacrificing his life for the sake of others...
Okayyyyyyy... there is suspending your disbelief & then there is suspending your disbelief by the neck until it's dead, Dead, DEAD!
Okay, maybe not ALL politicians are corrupt beaurocrats out for themselves, but the odds that one of the few just happened to be in this group is amazing.

BTW the TV Tropes page for Universe listed a nit I was embarrassed to have missed. Mainly an alternate way they could have shut the doors without any sacrifice. (Note the TV Tropes page has some info on upcoming episodes so if you want to avoid spoilers, don't click the link.)

Callie - I’m glad the senator died, if only because it’ll give Chloe a chance to spend future episodes doing more than simply whining, “Dad? Dad!” all the way through them!
Yeah, now she'll be whining, "Dad, Dad! Why did you kill yourself!" ;-)

shouldn’t the Ancients have programmed in an override that people can activate once they’re actually on board?
If they were responsible they would have, but when have the Ancients ever been written that way? ;-)
Presumably the time limit is because the ship was intended to seed other planets with colonists & wouldn't require them to come back.

how can the other eight symbols possibly locate a roving object?
Maybe that information is passed along the same way the stargates update their location every so often? The ship, presumably, is following a pre-programmed route at a regular speed until the team gets sent there.

Don F - they send an away team to the address, but how is the team going to get back? the whole working premise of this show is that it takes 9 chevrons and a one of a kind power source to reach this marvalous ship, so how can the away team simply gate back to it from whatever planet they go to?
Wasn't the 9-symbol address only for reaching it from the Milky Way? Presumably once it's within a normal 7-symbol range it could be reached by a normal address.

ScottN - if they could do it on Gilligan's Island....
Just sit right back & you'll hear a tale, a tale of a mighty trip, that started in our galaxy & went to an Ancient ship,

(If anyone wants to rewrite and/or continue it, go ahead.)

Love the Gilligan's island diddy!

and good point about the gate address only needing 7 symbols within that galaxy.

now here is hoping for the away team's sake that the address they used to gate to the ship is the same address you would use locally. because TECHNICALLY the address of the ship should change every time it moves in space. sure would stink for the away team.

an alternate way they could have shut the doors without any sacrifice
The Gateworld Forum also discussed this: use a Kino or, hell, even a long stick!

I liked the comment on TVTropes page which backed up mine about naming the base Icarus, but I hadn't previously recognised the ultimate irony that the base really did die in flames!!

only 4 working gates in that particular galaxy?
That seems likely, as the only Stargates will be those dropped by the Ancient ships which preceded Destiny. Maybe they only planted Gates on a few planets in each galaxy until the Ancients went out to check the area out more thoroughly - except, of course, they never did because they were too busy ascending.

There's been a lot of discussion on Gateworld (which I couldn't follow properly because of my number blindness) about the amounts of years mentioned, particularly in relation to Destiny's departure. I recall somebody pointing out that the Ancients weren't on Earth at the time when Destiny was alleged to have left the Milky Way, so the map ought to have started from Pegasus.

here is hoping for the away team's sake that the address they used to gate to the ship is the same address you would use locally
Indeed, and how this ship can keep the same address wherever it goes still makes no sense to me. Destiny and its unchangeable address was built thousands hundreds of thousands of years a long long time ago and yet in all the time that's passed since then, the Ancients were never able to shift this concept to planets, so much so that the entire Gate network has to do a correlative update every few hundred years.
I also imagine that, amazingly, nobody dialling Destiny from a planet will ever struggle to work out what the planet's Point of Origin symbol is.

I was also wondering, ever since the team went through the Gate at the end of the episode, how they would get back. How will they know the address? I doubt a single one of them has ever dialed a Gate before now; how would they even know the correct sequence? Or does it even matter so long as you get the last one correct?

Just for fun. Given that Daedalus/Apollo can get to Pegasus in 4 days using the ZPM (as opposed to 21 days without).

They're 7.5 Billion l.y. from Earth. Therefore it would take:

7.5 Billion l.y. from Earth * 4days/2Million l.y. * 1 year/365 days = 41 years (OK, 41.1 years), to return home using an Asgard hyperdrive and a ZPM (if they had either).

If they have an Asgard hyperdrive, and no ZPM, then it would take rougly 5.25 times longer, or 215.75 years.

I doubt a single one of them has ever dialed a Gate before now; how would they even know the correct sequence?

Eli knows the correct address, and I'm sure that some of the SGC guys who went know how to use a DHD.

I also imagine that, amazingly, nobody dialling Destiny from a planet will ever struggle to work out what the planet's Point of Origin symbol is.

This also occurred in SG-1 and SGA. All these places that they're visiting for the first time, and nobody worries about finding Winnie (see the "How do stargates work" board for the explanation of Winnie).

The mention of Gilligan's Island by Scott brings up a point, namely this premise, a group of humans stranded alone, far from home, has been done before. Science Fiction television has tackled this concept at least twice as far as I know. Forty-four years ago, Irwin Allen gave us Lost In Space, and more recently, in the late 1990's, we had Star Trek: Voyager. There are two major differences that this show has from those two previous ones.

1. This group is stuck a lot farther away from Earth than the Robinson family and Voyager crew were.

2. In both LIS and Voyager, the ship they were on was their own ship. On this show, the ship is alien, and these poor suckers are just along for the ride.

I never really got into Stargate, I mean I know what it is and know who the characters are, but I was never a big follower. However, I will give this show a chance.

I have no problem with the Senator sacrificing himself to save his daughter and the others. It's nice to see a politian who is not a greedy slimeball for a change on TV

I forgot to mention earlier that I am Canadian and pronounce the rank as "lootenant". However, I have also heard it referenced the other way, especially when I was in the Air Force myself. Did Rodney ever use Ford's rank? and if so, how did he pronounce it? I do say "zed" and not "zee".

Another show you could remember was Space:1999 they got taken for a ride too lol

Re: Tim_m's post
Tim, you forgot Seasons 1-7 of Red Dwarf, which debuted in the U.K, before Star Trek:Voyager, who had Dave Lister (who is possibly the last human) trying to return to Earth, along with a hologram, who gained a "Hard Light Drive", before a certain EMH, that allowed him to move automonously...

Point well taken. However, I tend to regard Red Dwarf as a comedy, rather than real science fiction. It was a very funny and well written show, however, you really can't compare it to more serious science fiction shows like this one.

Space 1999 is valid. In fact, this show has more in common with 1999 in that the humans here have no control over the ship (like the people of Alpha had no control over the direction of the Moon).

Although the Robinsons and the Voyager crew were lost in space, at least they had control of their respective ships.

1. I disagree that a comedy is not "real science fiction".
Sure the rules with comedy are looser than drama, but in some cases they can be more scientifically accurate than some dramas. (Voyager & Enterprise, for instance.)

2. I seriously doubt Voyager was actually lost. I have an astronomy book that shows pictures of stars 60,000 light years away & DS9's pilot indicated that Starfleet had been sending out probes which sent back information (which is how Sisko & company knew they were in the Gamma quadrant the first time). Janeway & company knew they were in the Delta Quadrant & the general direction where the Federation could be found. It's more like being in a city you've never been in, but you can see landmarks that allow you to figure out approximately where you are.

Don F - Love the Gilligan's island diddy!

Well, I guess this lot is not really lost in regards they seem to know where they are. The problem is that they're a LONG way from Earth. By comparsion, Voyager was just across town!

Even if they found a way to turn the ship around, it would take them thousands of years to get back to Earth at their present speed. The Stargate is obviously their only hope.

I hope that ship has bathroom facilities

Re: Tim's last post
But if such facilities exist, will they have to ration them...?
(I'm thinking of a certain episode of Voyager, where they only have 1 toilet working, for some reason (power drain ?). As a result thay have to "ration" them)...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVRIPUCmR2s

Deleted scenes from Air - when Rush used the stones to contact O'Neill. From the uncut DVD.

That's interesting footage, and it's a shame they removed it before. I especially enjoyed watching Rush getting his ass handed to him by Jack O'Neill.

Indeed. O'Neill was awesome, there.