Long Suffering Spouse and I recently found Stargate SG-1 on Netflix.
We used to watch that show all the time. We started watching it again on Netflix. We found we still liked it. Naturally, therefore, it is being removed from the streaming service effective today. Anything we like is discontinued and/or canceled.
There are hopes to revive the show, according to recent news accounts. If the show does come back, a central premise of the old show will be discarded: This time, the Stargate program will no longer be a secret.
That was always one of the least believable aspects of the show anyway -- and I say this fully cognizant of the fact that the show was a splendid and unapologetic mashup of science fiction and ancient Egyptian (and Norse) mythology, complete with parasitic monster "snakes" who inhabited, and possessed, many of the bad guys (and some of the good guys, too -- Teal'c for one, and all the Tok'ra).
Ben Franklin said (correctly, I believe) that two people can keep a secret -- as long as one of them is dead. Yet, somehow, a few leaks notwithstanding, despite hundreds if not thousands of people directly involved in the program, who knows how many other members of the Deep State (the show really was ahead of its time on this) trying to horn in on the alien action, and hostile politicians concerned about costs and benefits, viewers were supposed to accept that the Stargate program remained a deep, dark secret. Even with alien invasions and battles in Earth orbit -- the vast majority of the world's population never had a clue.
But while the continued secrecy of the Stargate program was pretty hard to believe, it was not the most unbelievable aspect of the show.
No... the least believable aspect of the show was the premise that all this ancient alien hardware, often buried beneath rubble, or in a glacier, for thousands of years, nearly always worked. Network connectvity was never an issue. Just dig out the gate, dust off the DHD, and off we go! In one episode, the Stargate on one planet was hit squarely by a meteor, buried in rubble, and still worked like a charm.
And the alien equipment never needed updates.
The SG-1 team would come under heavy fire, race back to the gate, dial home, and -- after a big whoosh -- there was the wormhole straight back to the base.
Never was there an announcement before the whoosh: "An update is available for this Chappa'ai. Would you like to download this now, or postpone it to later?"
Once chevron 7 was locked, where was the video? You know... the one that said, "Your wormhole will begin after these ads."
Occasionally power went down -- at the base -- because human equipment powering the Gate failed. But if there was power available, there was always the appearance of blue, standing water -- never the spinning circle of doom like you and I get every other time we turn on our computers. Never once, after the intrepid SG-1 team dialed in, was there a message saying, "Your Chappa'ai has encountered a problem and must restart. Information is being collected about this failure to send to the Ancients."
Faster than light travel? No problem. Little gray men impersonating Norse gods? Totally understandable. Flying pyramids? Advanced aliens wearing suits of armor? All good here. But this Ancient technology always, always working? Impossible!
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