System 13

After staying up until 3AM this morning watching, I can now say that I’ve watched all of Stargate SG-1, Season 1 [amazon]. There were more than a few episodes in this first season that were, in all honestly, pretty bad. Some of them simply oozed with cheesiness, and I’m still not overly fond of the (in my opinion) silly voices that Apophis and his son have. In fact, a lot about the  Goa’uld came across as cheesy to me. When talking to my friend Joshua (frequent commenter here), I often joke about the uniforms that the Jaffas wear, with the giant snake heads with glowing eyes.

So, here’s the question: am I going to keep watching the series? You bet. While a lot of season 1 struck me as cheesy, all in all, it was an enjoyable show. The final four episodes – Tin Man, There But For for The Grace of God, Politics, and Within The Serpent’s Lair – were great. A lot of season 1 suffered from episodes that were all self contained; there was no solid overarching plot. Sure, we knew the Goa’uld were “out there”, but many of the episodes simply consisted of SG-1 going to a planet, finding a problem, solving the problem, and coming back home. The last four episodes switched gears however, and got back into the Goa’uld plotline.

I read an interesting review of season 1 at amazon, which basically said this: season 1 wasn’t great. In fact, the bulk of the episodes could be considered mediocre. However, a lot of shows get off to a bumpy start, until they’ve introduced and established the main characters, and the makers have decided exactly where they’re taking the show. While season 1 of Stargate SG-1 wasn’t great, it was fair, and at least a lot of fun to watch. More importantly, it laid the foundation for following seasons to build on. I’m looking forward to watching those seasons.