Just two gates?
Stargate Atlantis being called a ‘hit’ is probably an understatement. Fans follow the show religiously; you can almost compare it to the old Star Trek type of feel. There are conventions, get togethers, all sorts of things for fans to continually be excited about the show. MGM pulled two of the best episodes out of their Stargate hat for the Stargate Atlantis – Fans Choice blu-ray; they are truly something to behold.
Fans will love how the first episode in the blu-ray is the first episode of the series. “Rising” gets a feature length treatment to it (nearly two hours) and introduces the cast of characters that are going to be along for the series ride. You’ll see how it all began without commercial interruption. Obviously it should be interrupted by commercials, but they actually take out the fade in/out from the episode and truly make it feel like one 88 minute long movie. Now, since it’s the fans choice, I can’t be that critical of it. I do understand that the laughable effects are a mixture of low budget and a niche-esque feel. Quite frankly, it does look better than the original movie, but it does have that less than believable feel about it. Joss Whedon’s Buffy has had better make-up and effects, but doesn’t have the polished charm that Stargate Atlantis brings. For a premiere, “Rising” does go above and beyond what it’s asked to do. It introduces strong characters through mysterious means. The main character, Lt. Colonel John Sheppard just makes it into the series by happenstance (wow, that’s an actual word?). The series begins by a group of scientist discovering a chair that reacts the ancestry of descendants from Atlantis and Sheppard just happens to be one of the strongest. The single episode also introduces us to the Atlantis occupants and to the Wraith, who are pretty scary enemies that feed on people. If I had to vote this episode as weak to strong, it would fall somewhere above the middle. The series does carry over some characters, but you can tell who is new and who is not. Not bad for an introduction, but certainly could have been a lot stronger (see Dollhouse for details of ‘strong starts’).
Now, for the extended version of “Enemy at the Gate”, it’s a really strong episode. While it seems unlikely that at this point in the series the Atlantis crew couldn’t expect something to go dreadfully wrong and the Wraith end up at earth, it happens. When a rogue Wraith steals technology to build a large ship (that is tough to bring down) to warp back to earth, the crew must stop it before it attacks and devours the inhabitants of the big blue planet. This episode was tense to watch, and more than improvement over the previous (previous as in the paragraph above, I know the two episodes didn’t go together). You can tell that there had been some strong character bonds between the first episode and this one. New characters were added and new plot points filled in. This episode clearly demonstrated how far the show had come and how strong of a story it had built. One of the better episodes that probably deserved a bit more time (it only runs 46 minutes), it had to be the capper for a season.
These two episodes are damn good, with the latter being the strongest.
Gateway to Blu-ray
There is no denying that the HD version of this show looks remarkable. Sure it exploits special effects more so than the SD version, but it still looks gorgeous. One thing about television, which always makes me scratch my head, is that they do lighting so much better than films. I’m not sure why, but television always looks a lot more vivid than films. Stargate Atlantis is no exception to this. While you have more manmade locales, you still have some gorgeous environments to make one happy. The audio is great as well, but the video is far superior.
As for features, none.
My only complaint with this blu-ray, outside of the lack of features, is that MGM only included two episodes. If I was a fan of the series, would it be worth $29.98 to pick up a couple of episodes that offer a tad bit more, but still are nearly the same as the originals? That’s your call, for me I wouldn’t do it. That’s a lot of money that I could spend on something else with a little more substance to it.
