Written: 2006-09-01.

Put yourself in the year back into the year 2006 and examine the state of the science fiction television genre. It was a depressing time. Here's a list of relevant shows in alphabetical order:

State of shows in the science fiction television genre as of 2006

• Andromeda: Was never a very good show to begin with and its quality got significantly worse as it developed until it was canceled in 2005.
• Babylon 5: This was a controversial show, which deserves its own article. But despite whatever everyone thinks of B5, most agree that it should have ended with season five and that the TV movie continuations (at least the ones not directly connected with the root story) were superfluous and constituted an overall drop in quality. By 2002, the series quietly fizzled out after the failures of the TV movies.
• Battlestar Galactica: The only shining star of this era of science fiction storytelling. But even though BSG was utterly fantastic, even it was beginning a downward spiral in both ratings and quality by 2006, ironically just after an all time high with the Admiral Cain trilogy.
• Earth: Final Conflict: Like Andromeda, quite lackluster. The show fizzled out relatively quickly due to the high turnover rate of the cast. Since none but one character remained constant throughout the series, it significantly lacked storytelling direction. The fifth season killed the show in 2002 with its radical new direction; circle of fan alienation complete.
• Farscape: Was a great show, but it had way too much filler, and way too much Star Wars style "The Force" type plot devices with characters like Zhaan and Stark and their mysticism. The show got progressively better, however, but unfortunately the Sci Fi channel decided to axe it right when it was getting good in 2003. Luckily, however, we got an extension providing a mostly proper ending in 2004.
• Firefly: The saddest story in all of science fiction. This show was easily the best science fiction show on TV, with only Star Trek and later Battlestar Galactica (2003) eclipsing it. Fox canned it without giving it a proper chance, and fans were extremely lucky to get a Farscape style plot wrap-up film years later.
• Stargate Franchise: I'll talk about the Stargate franchise in a bit.
• Star Trek Franchise: A very depressing period for Star Trek. Star Trek's glory days were long over, ending at around 1999. It died a miserable death at the hands of UPN right when Enterprise was getting good in 2005.

There are only two currently running science fiction shows as of 2006. Battlestar Galactica, which we really can't complain too much about, and the Stargate franchise. Stargate on the surface seemed to fill a void left over by Star Trek TNG. It featured light hearted, action packed, quirkily comical, entertaining science fiction stories and cultivated a rich fictional universe. The series' innocent charm is ultimately what led everyone to ignore a show stopping, fundamental flaw in its premise: everyone inexplicably speaks English. What a silly issue, yes? The issue is commonly explained away with "it's a TV show, and they lack the time to have Daniel Jackson translate each new alien language during each episode." This "explanation" however thoroughly avoids the question. Common actual answers to the question of why all the aliens speak English is "they don't," implying that either the language is translated by Daniel off screen and the show's dialogs should be interpreted as simply stylized to make the plot more exciting, or that the Stargate physically implants some sort of universal translator into travelers. Another explanation is that the Stargate team inadvertently seeded English to the Milky Way by traveling back in time to ancient Egypt and teaching the locals English in the episode Moebius.

These explanations are clever, but none are plausible. There are numerous episodes in which the "stylized" argument fails. Especially episodes in which immediately upon traveling through the Stargate, the team is attacked and instant communication with a totally alien culture is both necessary and accomplished with ease. Daniel would not have had time to translate off screen. The universal translator argument is nonsensical because if that were the case, then it would translate the Goa'uld language too (among others). The Moebius explanation fails to account for how humans in the Pegasus galaxy could have learned English, since their civilizations predated the ancient Egyptians that SG1 taught English to. There you have it, the three most common explanations debunked. In fact, there isn't a single way to rationalize this that isn't completely contradicted by established canon or doesn't stretch suspension of disbelief beyond the breaking point.

One might be inclined to accuse other science fiction shows of having the same problem, but if you pay close enough attention to their plots, you'll see that that's not the case. BSG features no aliens, nor does Firefly, Star Trek has the universal translator, Farscape has translator microbes, and so on. Every other science fiction show besides Stargate addresses this issue head on.

Again, the issue is commonly explained away with "it's a TV show, and they lack the time to have Daniel Jackson translate each new alien language during each episode," and most fans just accept this blindly. Gateworld pretty well confirms this by saying this in its FAQ: "It's a sacrifice that the producers make in order to tell a new story on a new planet every week, and actually have alien characters who someone can understand." Though in addition to not at all being a satisfactory answer, this "explanation" only brings to the forefront yet another fundamental flaw in Stargate's writing. Stargate is based on the idea that every new episode constitutes a new planet explored. However, the very idea of spending only a day or two exploring a new planet, each with its own unique culture splintered off and isolated from Earth from different countries at different times merits far more than the glossed over excuse for exploration than the Stargate franchise allows. Strictly speaking, they should have spent several multi-episode arcs at each planet they visited, instead of doing Star Trek style "planet of the week" exploration. In addition to fixing the language problem, it would have allowed better, more fleshed out stories to be told over the course of a season, reducing filler, and making the story more captivating.

As a result of this mindset among Stargate's writers, the show is high on filler, low on long term plot advancement, and the premise doesn't make sense. Why would anyone want to watch such a show? Well, because like I said before, the show is charming. Bloody charming. Hypnotic even. You sit, you stare, you don't much care that things don't much make sense because guns are firing, the special effects are pretty, and the jokes are funny. I must admit even I will continue to follow the show until it's finished, largely because I enjoy the character writing. But I hope it finishes soon, because Stargate represents both the last surviving vestige of second generation science fiction and harbors all of the worst aspects of the second generation of science fiction: too much filler, (mildly) bad writing, rampant technical problems, and general lack of realism. To see this, compare Stargate to Battlestar Galactica. BSG averages 20-30% filler per season. Stargate averages 70-80% filler per season. BSG's technical problems are isolated, minor, and mostly possible to rationalize. Stargate's are broad, sweeping, and show stopping. BSG is committed to realistic science fiction. Stargate regularly challenges suspension of disbelief. BSG is stunningly original. Stargate recycles Star Trek episodes regularly.

I strongly celebrated the news when I heard that Stargate SG1 was being canceled, its 10th season being its last. I can only hope the rest of the franchise follows. Because when Stargate finally dies, the second generation of science fiction will hopefully die with it, and all science fiction created thereafter will hopefully be a continuing dramatic arc driven story instead of a collection of mostly formulaic reset button episodes each week. I wish science fiction writers would stop treating their audiences like they have ADD; as if they cannot follow a continuing dramatic arc driven story. We can handle it. We want more stuff like DS9's Dominion War arc. We want more stuff like BSG. Forge us the third generation of science fiction by doing away with tired formulaic tripe like Stargate!