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Stargate SG-1 Season 3 Boxed Set by Andy Mikita, Bill Corcoran, Brad Turner, Chris McMullin, David Warry-Smith
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DVD Cover InformationActor: Amanda Tapping, Christopher Judge, Don S. Davis, Michael Shanks, Richard Dean Anderson Director: Andy Mikita, Bill Corcoran, Brad Turner, Chris McMullin, David Warry-Smith DVD: Region Code 1 Audio: Spanish (Unknown); English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 5.1 Format: Box set, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen Picture Format: 1.78:1 Running Time: 776 minutes DVD Release Date: 2003-06-17 Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated) Studio: MGM Domestic Television Distribution
Movie Reviews of Stargate SG-1 Season 3 Boxed SetMovie Review: Another great season for one of Sci-fi's best TV shows Summary: 5 Stars
Season Three of STARGATE SG-1 continued the excellent precedent established in Season Three by each week continuing the story of Stargate Command's exploration of the universe via wormholes created by an ancient system of stargates. I have for several years been especially interested in the way that post-HILL STREET BLUES television shows negotiate issues concerning narrative (that being the first non-soap to be structured around ongoing story arcs). The approach that STARGATE takes in Season Three is fairly unique. Most shows tend not to wrap up all narrative tension each week and frequently pick up in one episode what happened in the previous one. Most episodes of STARGATE in Season Three begin with a relative ignorance of what happened in the previous episode and ends by resolving most of that week's narrative tension. Contrast this with FARSCAPE or BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER or LOST where episodes frequently begin by referring to what happened in the previous week's episode. Nonetheless, STARGATE does not resemble any other shows that resolve most narrative issues each week, in that most Season Three episodes refer to previous episodes. Most shows employing the long narrative format deal with several threads in each episode. STARGATE usually deals with one thread, but loves to pick up on stories from one or two previous episodes. Season Three on the other hand featured very few episodes that were completely stand-alone. I'm not aware of another show that so consistently in any one season used such a method. Even in Season Two STARGATE tended to let episodes run over from week to week.
What makes STARGATE so satisfying to watch is the way they keep picking up on previous episodes and bringing characters and races back for expansion of their story. My lone complaint with the show is that it is not a character driven show. By this I mean that the show does not primarily emphasize the way characters change over time, but the plot and story. In this way it more closely resembles THE X-FILES than FARSCAPE or BUFFY. Another way of putting it is that on STARGATE the characters exist more for the stories than the stories exist for the purpose of telling you about the characters. My preference is for character development over plot, but that doesn't mean that I can't love both. Sometimes you just need a good yarn, and STARGATE certainly provides that.
The show does so many things well, but I wanted to mention just one. One of the things I have been working on for a couple of writing projects is the way women have been portrayed on TV in the past two decades. Maj. Samantha Carter has to be one of the most positive portrayals of a female character on all of television. No matter what else female characters in ensemble casts are used far, they usually are used as eye candy or sex appeal. Without implying that Amanda Tapping is unattractive, her presentation on the show is always as an enormously competent professional and the show avoids sexualizing her. She is an attractive woman, but her physical assets are never emphasized on the show. Even better, the show never stresses her gender. We take so completely for granted Carter's competence that issues of her gender never emerge on the show. And by having none of the characters on the show--except in a few patriarchal cultures they visit in their travels--treat her as anything other than a fellow professional of the highest competence, the show helps in patterning the thinking of countless fans. I wonder how many 12-year-old boys and girls have had their thinking about gender subtly molded by this show. In conjunction with a host of other shows that have emerged since the early 1990s, I can't help but hope and believe that in an age when there has been little political advancement of women, much progress has been made in thinking positively about women in all kinds of situations as a result of shows like this.
Season Two may have had slightly stronger ongoing story arcs than Season Three, but this season was blessed with some truly excellent individual story arcs. One in particular pleased me in that it starred an actor who I have often disliked in the past: Dom DeLuise. I had often wondered if Peter DeLuise, who has directed a huge number of episodes of STARGATE, was related to Dom and it turns out that he is his son. Together father and son make this one of the funnier episodes on the show, and Peter even steps in briefly to portray his father when Dom, playing, Urgo, turned himself into a much younger man dressed in a uniform, asking if they prefer him looking like that.
DARK ANGEL fans should take note of episode "Pretense," in which there is a trial to determine whether the Goa'uld Klorel will be removed from Skaara's body. Klorel is defended by the Goa'uld Zipacna, who is played by Kevin Durand. DARK ANGEL fans may recognize the name but not the face, since Durand in heavy make up played Joshua, Max's dog boy friend, in Season Two of the series.
All in all, this was another great season of one of TV's finest Sci-fi series.
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