Things picked up a bit last night with the return of Atlantis. Before the holidays I was less than pleased with how things were rolling along, and they seemed to save the best for later as last night's episode was pretty good for Atlantis. Good story, better interaction between the characters and finally some plot development that seemed to go somewhere.For the first time, I felt like Sam was in charge. Her exchange with one of the other Colonels was great, putting her foot down and defending her team. The quick exchange of Col -Col-Col as introductions was deadpan on... thankfully they are maintaining some of the humor that I expect with SG programs, and they delivered several times last night with Rodney and the Wraith scientist and later with F.R.A.N.
I was ecstatic that they finally acknowledged the Teyla pregnancy.... seriously though, trying to hide it in all the shots and using props (loved the flak jacket and hold the rifle in front of you all the time routine) was getting a bit tiresome and that is finally in the open. I assume this means the actress (Rachel Luttrell) is pregnant in real life?
Anyways back to the big story, Replicants destroying all humans, a deal with the devil is made and Atlantis teams up with the Wraiths against their common foe (very Art of War) and we get additional forces from the Travellers who join the fight. Of course this is great for Sheppard, who gets to team up again with his too hot friend/foe Larrin. These 2 have smoking hot chemistry and you know will end up together eventually.....
Rodney creates F.R.A.N (Friendly Replicator ANdroid), who is designed to attract all of the other Replicants and fuse them together into one big blob, and then they can destroy them all together. I find it slightly disturbing that this is a humanoid looking weapon (similar to terrorists that blow themselves up..) and although the concern is raised the plan goes forward, warts and all. After all, they are already teamed up with one of their enemies and it appears that the rules need to be more flexible in times of war and that in it's self is still kind of disturbing. SG doesn't seem to have "Prime Directive" orders like Star Trek, and I wonder if that is because it is less futuristic (obviously) and meant to be more "real"... or is it just a reflection of a nation at war? Anyways I never wax long on issues like that with Atlantis because it's not Battlestar Galactica and I don't expect to get that intellectual about an episode.
Anyways plan goes into action, things don't turn out quite as expected and luckily they can super implode the Replicant blob into the center of the Replicant world and blow everything up. There is a pretty cool space battle sequence, F.R.A.N is frightening and childlike about her destiny and it all goes kablooey at the end. There was some very nice special effects and the status quo seems to be back in effect as the Replicants are destroyed and the Wraith have disappeared. I didn't understand for the life of me why they didn't try to salvage the ZPMs from the Replicant world before teleporting out as these things seem to be always in high demand and it seems like Atlantis needs a new one every couple of weeks but that was just me ranting...
To my surprise, we see the Replicant Weir and her group at the end of the episode, checking out the destruction and I am happy to see her still around.... but is this good or bad?
