Robot of Sherwood

I have a confession to make. Before last weekend (when I started watching Capaldi's first season), I had only ever seen one episode of Doctor Who! Shameful I know. It wasn't that I had no idea what Doctor Who was or what it represented, I did. And being the geeky sci-fi fan that I am, I knew an incredible amount about a series I'd never seen! Of course some people understand when I tell them it was the first episode of "modern Who" with Christopher Eccleston, then they tell me to try again with David Tennant or Matt Smith. And I always said "sure, one of these days". How many years has it been?

What finally got me to give it another go (other than the fact that I LOVED Capaldi as Richelieu in the BBC's Musketeers last year), was the title of this episode and the obvious subject matter. "Robot of Sherwood"?! Was the time-travelling Doctor going to visit one of my favourite swashbuckling heroes?! How could I not watch this?! (of course to be rigorous I did start with the previous two "season 8" episodes... and will definitely continue watching from here on out)

SG-1: Camelot

Season 9 finale! Which of course will end on a cliffhanger... *sigh* :p

Walter Bishop Meurig

So while the rest of their allies (Tokra, Jaffa, Asgard) are searching for the new "supergate" the Ori will use to invade our galazy, SG-1 heads to the planet whose coordinates they discovered via the phase-shifting device in Arthur's Mantle. They're hoping to discover the anti-Ori weapon Merlin had created. They arrive in a small medieval town and are greeted by Meurig (John Noble!!!), the local Governor, who welcomes them "to Camelot (!). Past and future home of Arthur and his knights." :o)

The town is awaiting the return of Arthur and his knights who set off on a quest to find the Sangraal (a.k.a. Holy Grail). They believe that he will return once someone succeeds in pulling the sword from the stone... because yes! There is a sword in a stone in the centre of Camelot!!! :o)

"Only he who is pure of heart and true of spirit can pull the sword from the stone."

SG-1: Crusade

Season 9, episode 19. An episode which is pretty much all preparation for the Season finale.

We finally get to see Vala again (she was presumed dead after having been caught in the explosion that destroyed the Ori's supergate in episode 6 - Beachhead), but she's in Daniel's body! It's those crazy communication stones again!

Vala (in Daniel's body) sneaks up on Cam in the men's locker room!

The others see Daniel, we see a very pregnant Vala who's been living in a village in the Ori galaxy all this time. She was taken in by one of the villagers, Tomin, and married him when she discovered she was somehow pregnant! Something impossible she says as she "didn't do any of the necessary bits". She asks the others (Sam, Cameron, Teal'c, General Landry) if they've ever heard of anything like this before, and from the meaningful looks we fully expect some to reference the Virgin Mary. But Teal'c jumps out with Darth Vader (big laughs!) and then Cameron counters with King Arthur!!! Apparently he's been reading up on Arthurian Legend and studying all those books they found under Glastonbury Tor.

In the end the connection is severed, Vala is back with the Ori supporters (barely convincing her husband not to kill her after he kills the two "rebels" she was with), and our Galaxy is preparing for the massive Ori invasion fleet she warned them about. Sam, Cam and Daniel convince General Landry that the best thing for them to do is to go searching for the mysterious weapon developed by Merlin to kill ascended beings. But that will be for the next episode, and post! ;o)

Elements from Arthurian Legend:

• Just the one reference to Arthur's mysterious conception, which according to Legend was brought about by Merlin having "enchanted" the Queen, Arthur's mother. Our stories tell us she was enchanted to believe she was laying with her husband the Duke of Cornwall, when in reality it was Uther Pendragon. Here Cam implies Merlin's influence for an "immaculate" conception...

SG-1: Arthur's Mantle

Season 9, episode 18 starts out with Colonel Samanth Carter working in her lab on an Ancient device found in Glastonbury when Dr. Daniel Jackson, Teal'c and Col. Cameron Mitchell discovered the truth about the mythical Avalon in the season première. As she tries to calibrate something a bright light shines out and she and Cam disappear from our screens. And so another crazy Stargate adventure begins! :o)

Sam out of phase!

It turns out that the device has shifted Sam and Cam into another dimension (apparently there are 11 of them according to string theory, don't ask!), slightly out of phase with ours. This means they can see and hear everything, but can't touch anything or communicate with anyone as no one can see them! 

Cameron: "That was an alternate reality, this is an alternate dimension. Hell, all I need is a good time travel adventure and I've scored the SG-1 trifecta!"

SG-1: Avalon

The two-parter Avalon is the opening episode of Stargate SG-1's 9th season. In it they had to establish new characters General Landry (hew head of Stargate Command) and Col. Cameron Mitchell (new head of SG-1).  These introductions include some very cool flashbacks to the battle above Antarctica 2 years before (in which Mitchell is supposed to have saved SG-1 in an F-302) and some great reparté between the two newcomers. ("I'm here to join SG-1" "Colonel, you're here to LEAD SG-1")

They also had to introduce us to the new "big baddies" of seasons 9 and 10: the Ori, basically "evil Ancients". And in so doing we ended up discovering an alien element to the Arthurian legend! ;o)

Stargate SG-1: seasons 9 & 10

The Stargate SG-1 series picked up the story about a year after the events in the film Stargate and during 8 seasons gave us the adventures of the flagship team SG-1 lead by Col. Jack O'Neill (2 'l's please!) acompanied by Samantha Carter (astrophysicist in the Air Force), Daniel Jackson (anthropologist/archaeologist) and Teal'c (Jaffa). 

Teal'c, Jack, Sam and Daniel