Very good episode... not as good as SG-1, but thats okay.

I feel bad now that Meredith depleted the ZPM.

David and Kate Hewlett were superb together. They have an excellent dynamic, and I hope they bring her in again.

We had an update on the gate bridge, so its good they didn't simply drop that idea... course, now we know why it existed in the first place.... so TPTB could kill our ZPM.

Good episode, I am now even more likely to watch Stargate!

Like Marv said, an alternate reality and a parallel universe are just two different ways of describing the same thing.
Rod's name was exactly the same, Meredith Rodney Mckay, they both chose not to go by Meredith, but the writers were pointing out that the alternate Mckay was "cooler", so they gave him a leather jacket and called him Rod.

John Wayne's name was actually Meredith, but he changed it to something stronger.


That was Jean Claude Van Damme in 'Timecop'.

All of this talk about alternate realities is making me miss Sliders.

Really, I thought SGA was better that night...



I had a similar thought...

Excellent ep! Probably one of my favorites! Merideth! He, he, he. The team teasing Rodney about his experiences growing up! Too funny!

Thought they briefly discussed this whole bridging alternate universe thing regarding no cascading effects back in s9 of SG-1 ep 13

Well, that was one of my favourites too. They used to air it over here for a couple of months about three times, and never showed it until the end. It's a good thing you reminded me... there are a couple of shows I want to get in their entirety.

The explanation there was that the realities were so close together, with such a small amount of variation between them, that the Temporal Entropic Cascade failure would not apply. That idea seems odd to me, because it seems the more variations betweeen this reality and the alternate reality, the less likely it would be that a double exists. It would mean that:

-Where doubles have crossed over from really "close" realities TEC failure will not occur
-Where doubles have crossed over from realities somewhat "futher" from our own (ie they have a higher degree of variations such as in Point of View), TEC failure will occur.
- In realities even further away from our own, the degree of variation would be so great, that there would be no double at all, therefore TEC failure wouldn't even be an issue.

This seems to indicate a small window or range of possible realities where TEC failure would come into effect....but there is a flaw in the theory as seen in Ripple Effect

At least one of the realities affected in that episode had Martouf and Janet alive. Clearly this indicates a major variation between the realities at least equal to the alternate reality in Point of View where Kawalski was still alive (and Jack was dead). Which means TEC failure should have occured with the other double team member who came through from that reality with Janet and Martouf (I assume Teal'c & Daniel).

As this didn't happen I have an alternate theory to explain the lack of the TEC failure effect in both this episode & Ripple Effect. In both instances the bridge between the realities remained open throughout the episode. Perhaps it was the fact that the doubles were in a reality still linked to their own, which protected them from the effects of TEC failure.....

This post has been edited by Rogue Ashrak: Sep 11th 2006, 4:20 AM

That may be possible. But highly unlikely that TPTB have thought of this. In Ripple Effect the doubles were worried that they would be stuck here forever without the possibility of getting back to their own universes. They didn't even mention that TEC failure was an issue to most of them, and that this will get them much before remaining here for the rest of their lives. Now, I say that TPTB simply gave up the idea of TEC failure.

Ripple Effect bothered me, too. It just feels like a continuity problem to me... I'm working purely from memory here, but I seem to remember in "Point of View" in season 3 that the alternate Carter started getting sick because she was in the same universe as our Carter and realized that she had to go back. In general, though, I agree that the writers can do pretty much whatever they want with parallel universes. I just hope they maintain continuity... My $.02

I thought it was Marion?

Can't believe all ZPM's power are depleted, that can't be good. I really hope they will get one soon!

Meredith I can understand why Mackay never mention that before!

its sad to see our only ZPM go, but imagine the the gain if Mrs. Miller, Rodney, Sam, and the asguard can manage to discern and find a universe without any life, they could then have a nearly infinite and powerful power source. While yes they did fail, they also manage to succeed in creating the Zero point energy they needed. I have a feeling that this experiment will be heard from again after more research has been properly done.

It was nice to see them experimenting with new tech but damn those ZPMs are getting smaller
and smaller... At the end of the episode when they started that attempt to close the bridge that
ZPM was still over 60% full and they managed to waste all that power in a matter of seconds...

my opinions...

While watching the episode i always thought Rod was evil. When it got near the end i was thinkin he was gonna trick them all into sending Rodney into the other dimension.

... Now I think:



PS: Sif not just adopt SG1s mentality about 'this reality is the only reality of consequence'
Cut off the power so Rod dies, the connection severed, and with the zpm with lots of power still in it. Start up the device again ^^

This episode rocked. The most important thing about it in my opinion is that the atlantis team doesnt have a zpm anymore. Thta wil make very interesting episodes to come. But how come the zpm got depleted; they used 2,000 years of energy that fast?

It seems to me that people are underestimating the amount of power that was needed for what they did... They had to destabalize and shut down a power bridge between alternate universes under sub-space... I'm sure the Ancients didn't have stuff like that in mind when they created the ZPM system.

i like the he's a bad guy asurian thing...

but if he really was one... why not just blow the place to hell while he was there....??

i was thinking not, that way, but he was a bad guy, and convinced em to... send an enourmous amount of power through to their galaxy and they've taped it all and used it for themselves

In some ways I guess they had to drain the zpm, else...wouldn't they have just done the experiment again?

If they had a .000000000000000001% chance to hit an inhabited galaxy, surely you would try again. I mean the experiment seems to have worked very well other than the fact they hit an inhabited system:) so surely you would want another shot at INFINITE POWER!!!

While I generally was amused by this episode, I have to say it feels like an unformed first draft where the plot isn't really figured out yet that somehow someone has mistaken it for the actual finished script.

Why can't Atlantis do both plot and characters? Either there's a plot and then no one ever notices the characters, or there's a character episode that has no plot whatsoever.
And TBH, despite being a huge McKay fan, a huge Martin Gero's episodes fan, and a bigger fan of the combination (okay, other than Duet) - I didn't even like McKay that much in this one. I'm enjoying snarkastic McKay, arrogant McKay, condescending McKay. It makes him a very flawed human, and thus a great character - not to mention the extremely amusign one-liners. - I don't mind at all Rodney having regrets, it makes him even more human - only, when that happens, can they please not do it in a teenaged schoolboy way? McKay realising how everyone likes Rod better and what a better brother he is etc etc etc just turned him into an angsty schoolboy. I'd rather my McKay (yup! He's mine! All mine, I said! *manic laughter) to be less of a boy in his angsty moments, thankyouverymuch.

I actually really enjoyed the beginning. I thought the introduction to Jeannie was lovely, I really enjoyed the Carter scene (and the "cute Canadian way" bit, bwaha) - and they actually got Jeannie awed by everything around her quite well - not to mention Kate Hewlett was terrific the entire episode, even the bad parts - but the moment they stepped into Atlantis, it became hte most simplistic, boring, obvious plot ever - or rather, a poor substitute for plot, because you can't really expect me to believe the "he's fom a parallel universe and is so much cooler than me" bit is an actual plot, no. Unless it has a cool spin to it - or is made in order to do something for the character, a-la Red Dwarf (where I loved it) - it's pointless, boring, and isn't a plot! You can't base an episode on it!
Shoudln't they have been afraid of anthropic cascade failure, anyways?...
*nitpick*

Not much to say other than that - the bit I foudn most interesting in retrospect was the depletion of the ZPM... I do hope we get to see Jeannie again, although I'd love it to be in a better episode!

Yes, I agree with some of the McKay arguements... he was different than he usually is in episodes about him. But that doesn't mean he didn't have his character developed. We seen another face of McKay, and that is a breakthrough (if you like) in his character development.

The Entropic Cascade Failure part was discussed a few posts back in this thread. There is nothing to get TPTB out of this than their ignorance for this plot part. They simply scratched ECF from existance.

This post has been edited by KillerMarv: Sep 14th 2006, 8:09 AM

Wouldn't be the first time ....

on the whole, great episode. However I am finding in both SG1 and Atlantis they seem to be focusing/trying too much for this whole comedy thing recently (at least in the past 2 seasons). Whatever happened to the old-school SG1 where there was inherrent danger in each episode that made it thrilling to watch ... and then occassionally throw in the 1-liners that were most likely ad-libbed anyways. Bring back the old drama and stop trying so hard to put so much comedy into the shows! ( don't get me wrong, I like it. but sometimes it seems like they're trying too hard ...)

ECF - yeah, I know. I didn't have enough time to read everything the first time round but have since been educated ;) For their credit, it shoudln't kick in untiul 48 hours, so we can get bypass that by saying that the characters ignored that. Which would be stupid because at least 3 of them have read enough SG1 mission reports to know you don't mess with that.

As for Rodney - I agree he got further character development. My issue is that a) out of all the Atlantius characters, he's the only one who managed to actually get his character developed - even if by accident, and b) it's my own personal preferences but I just don't like that direction of him. I'd rather we didn't see that again. The whole heroic "no, I'll drain the ZPM in order to rescue my cooler self" got my eyes rolling, so hard they hurt ;) Thing is, it couldn have taken a differnet direction. What if Rodney only saved Rod in order not to be accused of his murder? What if he did decide to possibly save Atlantis by saving the ZPM and killing Rod? Some sort of an interesting spin..... but no. Sigh. I don't like characters that are too heroic. What I enjoy about Stargate is that the characters manage to be heroic and keep their humanity - and so far I thought they did an excellent job with McKay, but a couple more altruism streaks like that one and he'll truely turn into Ace McKay. Smoke me a kiffer?

With all my negative remarks, I forgot I actually had some good thing, other than the beginning. The bit in the end where they lie to Rodney about hating Rod and laugh at Teyla. With all the half-arsed attempts for a team moment in Sateda, it's now that I feel this team is actually a team. ;)

Oh, and yeah. I'm starting to wonder whether POaul McGillion is actually signed in for 20 episodes. C'mon, there must have been a way to find him a place in this one!

I think i've found a small nitpick.

When Rodney asks why he needs to pack up his toothbrush I'm sure that Shep says 'Carter needs your help' Why would Shep call her 'Carter' and not 'Colonel Carter'?

Yeah Shep is Colonel too but still...

Did anyone else hear this or am i going wacko?

I don't think they need to be formal when they refer to her like that, and I'm sure at least someone in Atlantis knows about the whole Carter-McKay thing from back in SG-1...