Tonight, Mitchell appears to be O’Neill-Lite, with perhaps a touch more history/education. Really, I think O’Neill-Lite ist just about the worst direction they could go with the character, so I hope his smartass nature gets tempered or at least changed so that it’s different. I don’t want to dislike him, but he needs to stand out on his own and genuinely be a strong character or it’s just not going to work. Right now, the southern boy version of O’Neill just isn’t working for me.
Now, Bridges as Landry makes a general that I can believe; (I will admit that O’Neill as general was never quite believable). It’s nice to see him getting some more lines and further character development; he’s a softer version of General Hammond.
As for Daniel… can we slow him down? Maybe let him share some of my sedatives? Cuz really, boy – BREATHE! We don’t need two fast talkers, and McKay had the role first. That said, poor guy. He always seems to get these gigs where he gets to single-handedly piss of an entire race of beings that think they’re gods.
The Ori are interesting, and Julian Sands was fabulous. The whole “the Ascended are the bad guys, we’re the good guys, we’ll kill you if you disagree” is not a terribly convincing line. I do enjoy the whole “flames are bad because it’s part of the Ori religion, so they’re going to be hellfire and damnation and all that is bad in this new galaxy”. I do have to wonder at any politicalness to the crusades overarching theme of this new badguy, though; subtle message or blunt 2×4? A very subtle balancing act done at the end, though, to appease any hardcore Christian that might still be watching the show.
Storyline, Origin didn’t terribly excite me. It wasn’t as godawful as last week’s episode; the overall silence and lack of focus on Vala helped quite a bit (what can I say, I can’t stand the character). I quite liked the resolution of the Daniel/Vala probelm though – Teal’c and Mitchell I buy being teammates more than anything else, and that was a very clever way to get out of that particular bind. I also admit to enjoying the new religious twist/brimstoney effect, although I do recall that in previous seasons the particular Hell myth was linked to a Goa’uld. I suppose the answer will be that said Goa’uld just appropriated an Ancient/Ori myth, but it’s still a touch convenient to be able to redo this particular mythos with more dramatic effect.
The final three minutes were rough in an unexpected way. There was an awkwardness between Daniel and O’Neill (which I suppose was to be expected), and I still haven’t heard them explain where O’Neill went off to – perhaps I just missed it that first episode. Time to go bug other fans and find out.
It was also nice to see the storyline spread out more among the entire cast of characters, Lexa Doig included. It is an ensemble show, after all. Mostly it seemed that this show was designed to further the overall season plot and introduce a few more people. I can handle that; it had some clever lines, and there was an obvious point to it. Nothing bad, nothing great.
Oh, and Lou Gossett Junior? Just looks scary.