These are the voyages of the starship Daedalus…
When did Stargate turn into Star Trek? When they got the Daedalus, of course. Only 18 days from Atlantis to Earth; not a terribly bad turnaround, and really changes the entire tone of Atlantis. They’re no longer cut off from home, no longer completely on their own, no longer the Wild West of Earth civilization. Frankly, it makes the show a little less exciting to know that they can so quickly bail.
That said, I loved the episode. The idea of the virus was clever, although as McKay noted, it had been done before on Stargate. Acknowledging that, though, made it a touch better; recylced plotlines r us! – but wait, don’t watch for the plot, watch for the witty dialogue and fabulous character interaction.
The characters have really grown into their own these last few episodes. David Hewlett as McKay had a headstart, being an on again, off again guest star on SG-1. He wore the role well from the beginning. The remainder of the cast, though, seems to be rapidly acclimating and knowing their characters; there is very little of the stiltedness that pervaded the early episodes of SG-1. In particular, I find Paul McGillian (Dr. Carsen Beckett) to be a little bit of wonderful. He’s the near perfect foil to McKay, and watching the two play off one another is a lot of fun.
I’m not talking about this particular episode much, am I? There really isn’t too much to say, since it is a recycled plot: virus uploaded to Daedalus, virus takes over Daedalus, reboot the systems several times while trying to figure out where the virus is hiding, kill the virus, the end. It wasn’t the plot that made this story interesting, it was character interaction.