(S01E15) The plot of The Game sounded kind of cheesy at first. The idea of a civilization style game that actually controls a world initially put me off a bit. I had a hard time getting into the show because of it. Once the situation escalated a bit, it was much easier to get into things.
The show hinges on ethical questions, and it lets us know it almost immediately. Since Atlantis lacks the clear cut Prime Directive of STNG, they've been able to explore some interesting quandaries. They certainly don't consider themselves above others, but they don't try to impose themselves on other cultures either.
What the heck were they thinking when they marched Rodney through a village that had his picture on the friggin' flag? That seemed a bit wreck-less. The team isn't known for being timid, but that was a little beyond. I'd think that some further observation would have been a good idea.
I was a bit concerned when Elizabeth caught the others playing the game. There were almost too many possibilities for plot twists. Another village? Conflicting orders? I kept wondering if they were really going to let the people escalate their conflict. They weren't that advanced, so I even wondered if they'd be better off relocating them to separate continents or even separate planets.
Here's my main problem with the premise. Just how did those villagers end up just as they were specified in the computer? Were they actual humans? Were they synthesized into adults - that would certainly explain the one-track minds.
Once it got rolling, it was a pretty good episode. I didn't realize that something was wrong until both sides were apparently surrounded by the others. I have to penalize it a bit for lack of reasonable background explanation.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
5-12-2007 @ 4:16PM
Hylo said...
I liked this episode. It was a lot of fun but by no means spectacular. Sheppard and McKay have such great chemistry so pitting them against each other was a nice touch. There was also soe nice, subtle, political commentary in the episode too.
I think episode exemplified how you can have a lot of humor and comedy in an episode but still keep it serious and keep the focus on the drama, something SG-1 miserably failed at this week.
To answer your question of how this Ancient game influenced the people. This game was set up to test out different ways to build a society to find the optimum method. The ancients either created humans on that planet or moved some there and then posed as gods and instructed the people who to proceed with building their society by feeding them information and advise through the game console, shall we call it. The ancients started them off and they stayed that way for 10,000 until McKay and Sheppard started playing against each other and caused all the problems.
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5-12-2007 @ 6:09PM
Tim_A said...
As soon as I saw the game table, I said "Shall we play a game... a game of thermonuclear war?"
I knew exactly where it was going... But still it was fun to watch the Villagers channel McKay and Shepard's attitude towards gameplaying into war.
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5-12-2007 @ 6:46PM
Ian said...
I will NEVER play another SIM game, ever.
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5-12-2007 @ 9:52PM
David said...
Blah... bad episode, a 5? Please.... 4 tops.
Possitive note, much better than SG-1.
And are the writers trying to make the Anients bad guys? Honestly, they seem to do more good than bad.
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5-12-2007 @ 10:13PM
malren said...
"wreck-less"
Oh my god. What can anyone say about a person that actually published a blog post with that "word" in it? In fact this entire "review" seems like it was written by a 12 year old.
WTF?
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6-24-2007 @ 7:38PM
clgbutterfly said...
Well my husband and I had a riotious laugh watching them play Civ. I pretty much knew where the plot was going, but it was fun to watch. The little jokes were alot of fun. Nearly all the women in Rodney's world had short blonde hair. Shepard's men looked like medieval thugs. I have to agree it is the fun episodes that keep me coming back.
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