SGA Rant Incoming
Apr. 19th, 2024 09:52 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
annavereSo I watched 'Sunday.' It took me a while to figure out my thoughts on it and put them into words. Best summed up in the phrase "snatching defeat from the jaws of victory" because this was actually close to being great, except for all the rampant stupidity and something vaguely akin to sadism with Carson being so nice to everybody who refuse to go fishing with him. So, this made me angry but since I like to lead with the positives...
Various old show spoilers and some degree of profanity behind the cut.
What's great? The structure, for one. I always admire a non-linear design, even if in this case it was used to cruelly toy with the audience over and over and over and over again. Good form is good form, and with a different resolution, all would have been well and the replay value would have been astronomical.
Also, a treasure trove of character detail regarding sweet things like hobbies and friendships and opinions on dating and commitment issues that made me want all kinds of fic. Elizabeth practically had a panic attack (a super composed one, of course) when trying to have a nice lunch with Random Guy, and it's so easy to read into that the scars left from Simon (who I kind of hated) or even that she's in love with Sheppard and she can't move on just yet. This stuff forms a large portion of the episode. It would have been a lovely change of pace...
And the main plot could have been used to just injure Carson on the edge of the blast range. Simple, effective way of gathering all the characters at his bedside telling him how much he means to them after blowing him off all episode. Sweet, touching, a trifle manipulative, but it's television - it's all manipulative.
OR he could have died a hero, since they were set on getting rid of him. The cobbled-together by-numbers demon Nazi plot on Angel, which contradicted crucial bits of lore, came out of absolute nowhere and thankfully disappeared back into the same, is one of my least favorite episodes of that entire show, but dammit, they had to write out Glenn Quinn and they gave Doyle a heroic exit, the one part of that episode I cannot fault. This scenario? I just don't see the heroism here. Carson put more people at risk (himself, his surgical assistant and the bomb squad guy) and got two people killed instead of one. I was right there with McKay yelling at the screen about the idiocy of trying to save someone who could literally blow up at any second, no countdown, no estimate, no nothing.
And it wasn't using Carson's character flaws to create a tragedy, because obsessively following the Hippocratic Oath was never his flaw before this episode: breaking it was. Being the most cuddly mad scientist on television could have been his fatal flaw, and I'd tip my hat to the dramatic skill of it, even if it didn't make me very happy to witness.
Third option would have been to make his death be truly shocking, which is clearly what they were aiming for here, but the trick to pulling that off is to make it feel impossible to escape, the inexorable hand of fate, an opponent who outclasses them, something, anything. Tessa on Highlander pulled that off. It was cruel and awful and unfair and came out of nowhere. This lacked all such artistry. This was Carson skinny dipping in shark infested waters, with warning signs posted and lifeguards yelling "DUDE, that's a SHARK!" and that's not good drama, that's rampant stupidity pretending to be drama. It's a clown in a trenchcoat.
These characters have been in the Pegasus Galaxy for three years. They have quarantine procedures, which would have rendered this plot null and void had anyone except me remembered that little factoid. Just a couple episodes ago, Rodney got hit with an energy beam whose effects only manifested several hours later - that's just how Ancient bio-weapons work. And then as part of the non-linear effect, Carson waves away the guy complaining of pain in his stomach before it's revealed that he knows this guy was exposed to radiation and there's just no logic in play here. This is the one person in Atlantis even "my-day-off" Carson would not wave aside just then.
They wanted to kill Carson Beckett. They went about it as badly as they could. The constant chain-yanking reminded me of Tara's death on Buffy, although (unpopular opinion) I was never one of the people who got angry at 'Seeing Red' because I was too busy being angry at 'Entropy,' so in terms of personal reaction it's more reminiscent of the death of Beth on The Walking Dead: senseless, illogical, insulting, and accomplishing fuck all while pretending it's a heroic ending. I can learn to find the bitter poetry in a variety of character deaths, but this?
Congratulations, Carson: You joined the "died for nothing" club and now I'll have to make do without your lovely Scottish accent.
I'm not happy with this. Boo, hiss.
Various old show spoilers and some degree of profanity behind the cut.
What's great? The structure, for one. I always admire a non-linear design, even if in this case it was used to cruelly toy with the audience over and over and over and over again. Good form is good form, and with a different resolution, all would have been well and the replay value would have been astronomical.
Also, a treasure trove of character detail regarding sweet things like hobbies and friendships and opinions on dating and commitment issues that made me want all kinds of fic. Elizabeth practically had a panic attack (a super composed one, of course) when trying to have a nice lunch with Random Guy, and it's so easy to read into that the scars left from Simon (who I kind of hated) or even that she's in love with Sheppard and she can't move on just yet. This stuff forms a large portion of the episode. It would have been a lovely change of pace...
And the main plot could have been used to just injure Carson on the edge of the blast range. Simple, effective way of gathering all the characters at his bedside telling him how much he means to them after blowing him off all episode. Sweet, touching, a trifle manipulative, but it's television - it's all manipulative.
OR he could have died a hero, since they were set on getting rid of him. The cobbled-together by-numbers demon Nazi plot on Angel, which contradicted crucial bits of lore, came out of absolute nowhere and thankfully disappeared back into the same, is one of my least favorite episodes of that entire show, but dammit, they had to write out Glenn Quinn and they gave Doyle a heroic exit, the one part of that episode I cannot fault. This scenario? I just don't see the heroism here. Carson put more people at risk (himself, his surgical assistant and the bomb squad guy) and got two people killed instead of one. I was right there with McKay yelling at the screen about the idiocy of trying to save someone who could literally blow up at any second, no countdown, no estimate, no nothing.
And it wasn't using Carson's character flaws to create a tragedy, because obsessively following the Hippocratic Oath was never his flaw before this episode: breaking it was. Being the most cuddly mad scientist on television could have been his fatal flaw, and I'd tip my hat to the dramatic skill of it, even if it didn't make me very happy to witness.
Third option would have been to make his death be truly shocking, which is clearly what they were aiming for here, but the trick to pulling that off is to make it feel impossible to escape, the inexorable hand of fate, an opponent who outclasses them, something, anything. Tessa on Highlander pulled that off. It was cruel and awful and unfair and came out of nowhere. This lacked all such artistry. This was Carson skinny dipping in shark infested waters, with warning signs posted and lifeguards yelling "DUDE, that's a SHARK!" and that's not good drama, that's rampant stupidity pretending to be drama. It's a clown in a trenchcoat.
These characters have been in the Pegasus Galaxy for three years. They have quarantine procedures, which would have rendered this plot null and void had anyone except me remembered that little factoid. Just a couple episodes ago, Rodney got hit with an energy beam whose effects only manifested several hours later - that's just how Ancient bio-weapons work. And then as part of the non-linear effect, Carson waves away the guy complaining of pain in his stomach before it's revealed that he knows this guy was exposed to radiation and there's just no logic in play here. This is the one person in Atlantis even "my-day-off" Carson would not wave aside just then.
They wanted to kill Carson Beckett. They went about it as badly as they could. The constant chain-yanking reminded me of Tara's death on Buffy, although (unpopular opinion) I was never one of the people who got angry at 'Seeing Red' because I was too busy being angry at 'Entropy,' so in terms of personal reaction it's more reminiscent of the death of Beth on The Walking Dead: senseless, illogical, insulting, and accomplishing fuck all while pretending it's a heroic ending. I can learn to find the bitter poetry in a variety of character deaths, but this?
Congratulations, Carson: You joined the "died for nothing" club and now I'll have to make do without your lovely Scottish accent.
I'm not happy with this. Boo, hiss.
no subject
Date: 2024-04-21 10:01 pm (UTC)Welcome to the club. That episode could have been brilliant, but it was such bullshit.
I feel that it really ended with Carson and Rodney fishing as the sun set behind them and everyone had a lovely day. Because the day was saved. Surely nothing at all bad happened that day. Because fuck that episode.
Even SG1 made Heroes goddamn better than that and I hated that one. Because Janet. Good God.
no subject
Date: 2024-04-22 03:26 pm (UTC)Carson and Rodney having a lovely time fishing. A perfect image. I can see it so clearly in my head that it must be what really happened.
no subject
Date: 2024-04-22 03:54 pm (UTC)Right? We were all so so happy with it up until the end. (Okay, some of us were staring at Dr. McBlandface and working our way around the shipping options because uh. Surejan.gif, what is wrong with you writers, that you think Elizabeth will settle for that guy, but okay!)
Like. Seriously. Dead via exploding tumor? Are you for fucking real?
We have had so many discussions of the bullshit, the union shenanigans going behind the scenes, the absolute utter downhill slide in cast happiness after this episode, the surrealism of everyone ignoring Carson, who was the most friendly person on the entire city, the utter--
You know what? You know exactly how I feel. And clearly the series ended with Carson and Rodney having a lovely time fishing because everything was perfect that day.
(I may link some folks here, if you are okay with that.)
no subject
Date: 2024-04-22 10:46 pm (UTC)I had a brief hunt for information on why they wrote Carson out, just to confirm that it wasn't the actor wanting to leave. I tend to temper my criticism if there's ameliorating circumstances and I didn't see any in this case.
no subject
Date: 2024-04-22 10:53 pm (UTC)Oh no, it was not Paul McGillion wanting to leave. I would also have done the same! And let you know. None of the SGA regulars who were written out wanted to leave.
no subject
Date: 2024-04-22 11:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-04-23 12:14 am (UTC)None of the recurring characters either, for that matter.
Prepare for the shitshow, for real.