SGA 5x20 "Enemy at the Gate" Talkback (Series Finale)

[Zac Naloen]

So, the thing that honestly got me, is when did Ronin get a girlfriend? I'm pretty sure I watched every episode this Season, and I didn't recognize her at ALL. I mean, there she is with the whole gang, in the final shot of the series, Jennifer, Rodney, John, Teyla, Woolsey, Beckett, Ronin, and Ronin's random chick. Would she have become a main character in Season 6?

Christ open your eyes, she's been in the show since This Mortal Coil.

[NecronLord]

Here's a question mark, why the frack when they realized they could gate onto the Hive, didn't they just send a nuke? They MUST have had one on hand SOMEWHERE. Or hell, even just all their Naquadah reactors rigged to overload or SOMETHING. Or hell, fire Atlantis's drones THROUGH the stargate at the hiveship and tear it up from the inside...or something.

As mentioned, both sides were being retarded there. Woolsey didn't just send the heroes (TM) he sent them through without even sending a MALP through to see if the wraith were dead. For all he knew, he was sending Teyla, McKay and Ronon to go 'splat' against a wraith iris.

[Crazedwraith]

So, the thing that honestly got me, is when did Ronin get a girlfriend? I'm pretty sure I watched every episode this Season, and I didn't recognize her at ALL.

That's Amelia Banks, a gate technician, who's been in the background for a while and had some moments with Ronon in "The Prodigal"

She usually doesn't look as hot as that, when she's got her hair in a bun and is all uniformed up.

I'm dead certain they slapped that scene in for all the shippers out there that were so pissed about "McKeller."

[Darksider]

I'm dead certain they slapped that scene in for all the shippers out there that were so pissed about "McKeller."

As far as i'm concerned, "shippers" can go jump of a cliff and die.

They are the part of any fandom that I despise the most. How goddamn useless is it to obsess over who is going to do the horizontal mombo?

Bring on more explosions goddammit!

[Vympel]

That was just awful from beginning to end. The Dart vs 302 battle was the worst.

[JME2]

As far as i'm concerned, "shippers" can go jump of a cliff and die.

Or in this case, jump from the balcony of Gate Operations into the San Francisco Bay...

[Crazedwraith]

Did anyone else think it was strange that Beckett controlled the entire damn ship from the chair? I mean he had to handle flying and shooting and everything at once. We've seen people do similar things in the Aurora class as well. It seems a very poor design.

[Braedley]

Some perspective on some of the things that people have been bitching about. Just to let people know, I haven't thoroughly read the thread, so if some of these things have been said before, I apologize.

1) Nukes on Atlantis: They don't have any, live with it. Yes, a naquadah reactor creates a nice big bang, but it's nothing compared to a naquadriah enhanced nuke (no, not mentioned specifically on screen, but it's a reasonable assumption). Even a secondary explosion involving the gate probably wouldn't do enough, remembering of course, that the gate would have to be inactive for 2 reasons. Reason 1 being that you don't want to be on the other side of a gate during a nuclear explosion, the second being that active gates are damn hard to destroy.

2) Not detecting Shepherd's 302: The number of satellites that orbit earth number probably in the millions. NORAD tracks something on the order of 10,000 artificial satellites (ranging from flakes of paint that fell off Saturn V's to the ISS. Okay, maybe larger than flakes of paint, but you get the picture). If we just consider those items 15 cu ft or larger (the size of a typical bar fridge) you're still talking about close to 1000 objects. It's not hard to imagine that a powered down fighter would get lost in all that, especially considering that many of the objects that sized are giving off some sort of EM.

3) Atlantis' splash down: They landed in the middle of the middle of the Pacific (yes, two middles is intentional). There's nobody there, apart from a handful of oil tankers and cargo ships. And a few mostly uninhabited islands a few hundred miles away. And they acknowledged the merchant vessels were there. As for getting Atlantis to within view of San Fran, I don't know exactly. I'll speculate that it involved the entire Pacific fleet of aircraft carriers, but of course, I don't know for sure.

4) The explosion of the Hive ship: As others have said a bunch of secondary explosions is good enough for me. You've got a hell of a lot of power running through the entire ship, and I'd be surprised if more than a little wasn't being stored in something resembling a capacitor. Plus, you have darts and the gate each making a nice pop as they're destroyed. Granted, individually they won't be near as big as the presumed naquadriah enhanced warhead, but when you add them up, you should get something spectacular.

As for my feelings of the episode, I think it was a bit rushed, and could have used an extra half hour at least, the wormhole drive was a cop out, and area 51 not having it's own squadron (I am right in assuming that that squadron of 302's wasn't out of area 51, right?) of 302's should have been addressed. On the whole, I think it's a much more fitting end to the series than many other shows *cough* SG-1 *cough*, and was enjoyable enough that the plot holes didn't really bother me while I was watching it.

Also, I'd like to point out that I totally called McKay's line when he first say Cavanaugh. Okay, maybe not called it, but rather thought the exact same thing before the words came out of his mouth.

[Sky Captain]

Most I liked how they blew up in a low Earth orbit a fucking 11 km warship massing probably few billion tons in an explosion probably powerful enough to outshine the sun, create an awful lot of space debris and yet nobody seemed to notice. It really broke my suspension of disbelief.

[Zac Naloen]

Yep, because we totally saw the aftermath...

[CaptJodan]

3) Atlantis' splash down: They landed in the middle of the middle of the Pacific (yes, two middles is intentional). There's nobody there, apart from a handful of oil tankers and cargo ships. And a few mostly uninhabited islands a few hundred miles away. And they acknowledged the merchant vessels were there. As for getting Atlantis to within view of San Fran, I don't know exactly. I'll speculate that it involved the entire Pacific fleet of aircraft carriers, but of course, I don't know for sure.

That's certainly a new and unsupported theory (and illogical) theory. I'm guessing you're basing this on the little display of them TRACKING Atlantis (with the path they had already taken in those dots) and assume that was where they landed, rather than where they were at the moment they reestablished contact. Two things.

1. It doesn't track with what is said. "You'd better alert the Navy, it's going to be close." suggests strongly, especially after where we see where they are, that Woolsey means they'll be landing close to a populated area. His statement doesn't make sense otherwise.

2. If we go by the display's symbol of Atlantis' touchdown point, it is closer to Pearl Harbor than San Fran. You're suggesting an operation likely even more massive than just quarantining San Fran of hundreds of ships towing Atlantis (if it's even possible to tow something the size of Manhattan, I'm sure it'd be a huge operation), but looking as if they are towing nothing behind them, and going to a base a hell of a lot farther away than the closest naval base.

It also doesn't really handle the why. Out in the middle of the Pacific, Atlantis disrupts fewer lives than sitting right off the edge of a major city, and is less likely to be detected. A smaller force for quarantine with the excuse that some "falling satellite" or something fell into the ocean * would be easier and make more sense than deliberately parking your major city in the middle of a high traffic area and shutting down a major port for no reason. You're just adding additional stupidity to an already stupid-heavy episode.

*I'm sure that excuse might not be the best one, though at this point, their "cover stories" are all hollow and unbelievable. Take only as an example, not as the best or even a particularly convincing cover story for the events we saw.

[Zac Naloen]

I imagine the cover story would be something along the lines of "We had a near earth collision with an asteroid, a piece crashed into the ocean near San Francisco"

Stupid just like all the other cover stories.

Then when people debunk it they'll outfake it using advanced tech.

[Balrog]

2) Not detecting Shepherd's 302: The number of satellites that orbit earth number probably in the millions. NORAD tracks something on the order of 10,000 artificial satellites (ranging from flakes of paint that fell off Saturn V's to the ISS. Okay, maybe larger than flakes of paint, but you get the picture). If we just consider those items 15 cu ft or larger (the size of a typical bar fridge) you're still talking about close to 1000 objects. It's not hard to imagine that a powered down fighter would get lost in all that, especially considering that many of the objects that sized are giving off some sort of EM.

I thought the main point of contention was that he blasted a hole in their landing bay door, flew through the hull and landed with no one bothering to check for twenty minutes, not that they couldn't pick him out in orbit flying with power off. Which is just silly, along with a whole host of other things people have already pointed out about this episode. After the last two SG movies, my hopes that the SGA one will be good are not high, esp. if this finale is indicative of what's to come.

[Braedley]

3) Atlantis' splash down: They landed in the middle of the middle of the Pacific (yes, two middles is intentional). There's nobody there, apart from a handful of oil tankers and cargo ships. And a few mostly uninhabited islands a few hundred miles away. And they acknowledged the merchant vessels were there. As for getting Atlantis to within view of San Fran, I don't know exactly. I'll speculate that it involved the entire Pacific fleet of aircraft carriers, but of course, I don't know for sure.

That's certainly a new and unsupported theory (and illogical) theory. I'm guessing you're basing this on the little display of them TRACKING Atlantis (with the path they had already taken in those dots) and assume that was where they landed, rather than where they were at the moment they reestablished contact. Two things.

1. It doesn't track with what is said. "You'd better alert the Navy, it's going to be close." suggests strongly, especially after where we see where they are, that Woolsey means they'll be landing close to a populated area. His statement doesn't make sense otherwise.

2. If we go by the display's symbol of Atlantis' touchdown point, it is closer to Pearl Harbor than San Fran. You're suggesting an operation likely even more massive than just quarantining San Fran of hundreds of ships towing Atlantis (if it's even possible to tow something the size of Manhattan, I'm sure it'd be a huge operation), but looking as if they are towing nothing behind them, and going to a base a hell of a lot farther away than the closest naval base.

It also doesn't really handle the why. Out in the middle of the Pacific, Atlantis disrupts fewer lives than sitting right off the edge of a major city, and is less likely to be detected. A smaller force for quarantine with the excuse that some "falling satellite" or something fell into the ocean * would be easier and make more sense than deliberately parking your major city in the middle of a high traffic area and shutting down a major port for no reason. You're just adding additional stupidity to an already stupid-heavy episode.

*I'm sure that excuse might not be the best one, though at this point, their "cover stories" are all hollow and unbelievable. Take only as an example, not as the best or even a particularly convincing cover story for the events we saw.

You're right, I didn't take the dialogue into consideration, and only based my assertion on the tracking display. OTOH, Woolsey could have been talking about one of the many volcanically created islands that litter the mid Pacific. Obviously, further watching will be needed to fully resolve this.

2) Not detecting Shepherd's 302: The number of satellites that orbit earth number probably in the millions. NORAD tracks something on the order of 10,000 artificial satellites (ranging from flakes of paint that fell off Saturn V's to the ISS. Okay, maybe larger than flakes of paint, but you get the picture). If we just consider those items 15 cu ft or larger (the size of a typical bar fridge) you're still talking about close to 1000 objects. It's not hard to imagine that a powered down fighter would get lost in all that, especially considering that many of the objects that sized are giving off some sort of EM.

I thought the main point of contention was that he blasted a hole in their landing bay door, flew through the hull and landed with no one bothering to check for twenty minutes, not that they couldn't pick him out in orbit flying with power off. Which is just silly, along with a whole host of other things people have already pointed out about this episode. After the last two SG movies, my hopes that the SGA one will be good are not high, esp. if this finale is indicative of what's to come.

There was contention early in the thread about whether the Hive should have blasted Shepherd's 302 out of the sky as soon as it noticed it had reached orbit. Blasting a hole in the side of the ship was also in contention. I didn't think he had another missile, because I thought each 302 was outfitted with 2 nukes and that was it, so that did leave a little brain bug for me, although I suppose it's possible that they also had some Sidewinders and/or Sparrows/AMRAAMs or derivatives.

[CaptJodan]

You're right, I didn't take the dialogue into consideration, and only based my assertion on the tracking display. OTOH, Woolsey could have been talking about one of the many volcanically created islands that litter the mid Pacific. Obviously, further watching will be needed to fully resolve this.

Or we could just invoke Occam and call it like it seems to be. I certainly cannot explain why they would go for San Fran instead of Pearl or Midway, and I can't imagine the engineering feat it would require to tow a Manhattan sized city across the ocean. On the other hand, I can see them going "whoops, we're going to SF, raise the cloak", hence "we managed to raise the cloak in time before landing right in front of the bridge" rather than "we managed to get the cloak raised right before the Navy shoved us right in front of this bridge here".

For the record, the Atlantis picture is on the north west corner of the Hawaiian islands. Given the incredibly low resolution of the picture, and the fact that the symbol of the city takes up a good 100 miles across, easy, I think it's next to impossible to ascertain if it's close to any of those tiny volcanic islands, but from what limited way I can judge, I'd say no.

There was contention early in the thread about whether the Hive should have blasted Shepherd's 302 out of the sky as soon as it noticed it had reached orbit. Blasting a hole in the side of the ship was also in contention. I didn't think he had another missile, because I thought each 302 was outfitted with 2 nukes and that was it, so that did leave a little brain bug for me, although I suppose it's possible that they also had some Sidewinders and/or Sparrows/AMRAAMs or derivatives.

This was something I noticed as well, but with everything else, it just didn't seem important to mention. However, now that it's been mentioned....

My question is, where were they? True, they supposedly had nukes, but we get a superb FX shot of Sheppard's ship as it dives for the deck and is being shot at by the darts about 23 minutes into the episode of the underbelly of his ship. You can clearly see he only has one missile left. He fires one at the bay door (the mystery missile) leaving the one on his wing to blow up the hive. So....yeah a slight FX goof I guess.

[Braedley]

Well the question arises, why would each 302 fire off a perfectly good nuke just to have each hit a single dart, and then blow everything in the combat airspace to smitherines. It just doesn't make sense. It looks like the nukes were about the same size as AMRAAMs, but I can't be sure without a proper scaling, so is it possible that one or two Sidewinders (which are smaller than AMRAAMs) were mounted on each of the hardpoints along with a nuke?

[CaptainChewbacca]

I imagine the cover story would be something along the lines of "We had a near earth collision with an asteroid, a piece crashed into the ocean near San Francisco"

Stupid just like all the other cover stories.

Then when people debunk it they'll outfake it using advanced tech.

That's a pretty good explanation that will work if the IOA can get all their top scientists to go along with it. Of course, any academic on the outs with the government won't be fooled, but it'll be one of those crazy conspiracy things that just kinda hangs around. There was minimal damage to the earth itself (from what we saw), so my guess is that people will be shocked/upset/surprised for a few weeks, then some celebrity will get a DUI and an embarassing mugshot and they'll forget about it.

[Revy]

Finally saw this. A bit 'Meh', too rushed, really should have been a two parter. I have a lot of random thoughts to throw out.

1. The super-class Hive was NOT used in the war against the Ancients, at least not as far as we know - Todd tells us the idea of combining Ancient power devices with Wraith organic tech has always been tricky, and he has only recently been working on it, and one of his lead scientists only just made the breakthrough (the one that turned against him and made off with it). So super powered Hive ship is a recently developed thing it seems.

2. Wormhole drive. Wtf. That and a number of other things we DIDNT get to see onscreen makes me feel cheated. Godammit, why the hell wasn’t this a two parter with those scenes in? I'd have wanted to see the two 304's engage it as well. But ... wormhole drive. Eh. All I can guess is that it's going to be key to the film and/or Universe series.

3. 1 ZPM on the Hive - says who? No one knows how many ZPM's were powering that thing 'cept Todd, and he was tight lipped. Everyone kept saying that the Hive was adapting to the use of it's ZPM (singular) but they were pretty much guessing, because earlier Todd said he recovered quite a few ZPM's from Asuras, and he refused to say how many. The super Hive may well have had three or more plugged in for all we know. Or just the one. Either way, if it had several that could go a long way to explaining how it was able to so thoroughly outclass everything.

4. Atlantis did better than I think people credit it - yes it had 3 ZPM's, but had just gated Sheppard to the Milky Way, had just flown from one galaxy to another (at presumably top speed) and then used a power intensive wormhole drive. Then it engaged in a fight with a supercharged Hive, and it's shields were not only being drained by the Hive's weapons fire but by the atmosphere as well (someone even says as much). On top of all that, Atlantis' shields were never actually breached. Despite someone trotting out the 'We cant take another hit!' spiel (I think they were simply panicking) no shots were seen to penetrate the cities shields AND they stood up to an entry into the atmo AND still maintained enough power to switch over to cloak. Pretty damn impressive if you add all of it up.

4. The Chair to Area 51. Uh-huh. What about the SGC? It's at the bottom of a mountain, one that even has a convenient shaft leading to the surface for you to launch the drones AND supports Norad, which is responsible for tracking all these alien ships. The SGC seems like the perfect place to put it unless some other international and secure location springs to mind.

5. Should have let Ronin stay dead. Actor wanted to leave at the end of the year anyway, and I've never especially liked him.

6. Sheppard wants to be a martyr. How many times has he tried to go Kamikaze now? Two? Three?

7. It's been said Atlantis didn't have a nuke to send through the Gate to the Hive. Maybe not, but they did have 3 ZPM's which can quite easily be turned into bombs, either powerful enough to flatten a solar system or weak enough to blow up a city (the three Rodney overloaded on the Asuran city ship only destroyed the ship itself). Unplug one, rig it to overload, chuck it through the gate. Problem solved. Hell, they were even concerned in this very episode that Todd may have done just that with the two ZPM's he gave them.

8. The Wraith weren't defeated altogether. I didn't think they would. Any ideas on how the film will unfold? And if it involves gene therapy and/or a retrovirus I'm going to shoot myself.

[Crazedwraith]

Another random thought: we've seen it before but I love how Atlantis Ascends through space, rather than going through horizontally like all the other ships.

[CaptJodan]

Well the question arises, why would each 302 fire off a perfectly good nuke just to have each hit a single dart, and then blow everything in the combat airspace to smitherines. It just doesn't make sense. It looks like the nukes were about the same size as AMRAAMs, but I can't be sure without a proper scaling, so is it possible that one or two Sidewinders (which are smaller than AMRAAMs) were mounted on each of the hardpoints along with a nuke?

Well, at this point, I can only say that there's some kind of FX glitch. When Sheppard is dogfighting with the Wraith on Earth, he's left with only a single missile. Flash forward to when he reengages his engines, and he's reequipped, carrying 4 missiles (he apparently used the rearm cheat). He fires one at the bay doors, leaving three, though we never get another look at just how many he's left with after that.

We've only seen one type of missile, and the missile they fire at the darts is the same one we're supposed to treat as the nukes....I guess. I suppose this means that, somehow, these "nukes" have a "conventional" and "nuclear" mode? Seems far fetched, but that seems to be what is implied in the episode.

[CaptJodan]

4. Atlantis did better than I think people credit it - yes it had 3 ZPM's, but had just gated Sheppard to the Milky Way, had just flown from one galaxy to another (at presumably top speed) and then used a power intensive wormhole drive. Then it engaged in a fight with a supercharged Hive, and it's shields were not only being drained by the Hive's weapons fire but by the atmosphere as well (someone even says as much). On top of all that, Atlantis' shields were never actually breached. Despite someone trotting out the 'We cant take another hit!' spiel (I think they were simply panicking) no shots were seen to penetrate the cities shields AND they stood up to an entry into the atmo AND still maintained enough power to switch over to cloak. Pretty damn impressive if you add all of it up.

I'm still of the opinion that this shows how poor a ship Atlantis is, that it's a city that can fly, not a ship that acts as a city. The very fact that the survival of the people inside depends upon an active system like a shield helps sell how poor a ship it is.

As for their shields never actually being preached, and MY "we can't take another hit" spiel, you need to remember that if the shields fail, they die instantly. I'm sure they were looking at the percentages of their shield system and watching how each hit took a little bit off the shields ability to protect them. So they obviously knew how much shield they had left before complete failure. This is something they should really keep an eye on, as it is their only means of survival.

General question: Has there ever been a discussion of air recycling in Atlantis, or is the city basically dependent upon the air they take with them on a journey?

[Chris OFarrell]

I am actually happy that Atlantis was shown to not be a Battleship'o'doom in space, but a...well...cityship.

It makes sense that if the city is on the ground and able to 'turtle' that it would be a far tougher nut the crack then flying around like they do here. It also -though I am *sure* the writers didn't think of this when they wrote the episode- makes a great deal of sense for why Atlantis didn't just make a run through the Wraith blockade 10,000 years ago. It might well have been that during the takeoff sequence the Wraith could have poured enough firepower in to break through the shield and kill the city, so they had no choice but to abandon it.

And as for Shepards magical rearming...

I managed to somehow drag myself back to watch the horrible horrible horrible F-302 v Dart fight again (and fondly remember when in 'No Mans Land' ONE of Sheppards missiles took out about 8 darts without even trying) and Sheppard does a nice roll for the camera before one of the darts knicks him. We see the big nuke missile (much bigger then an AMRAAM) then later we do have the four AMRAAM's back without any sign of the nuke.

Seriously, that is just lazy.

[Vertigo1]

Honestly, I was disappointed with the SGA finale. There were so many brain bugs in this one (mainly because it was rushed as hell) that it was downright a slap in the face to the fans. This should have been stretched out like the season 1 finale. (ie: Big ass threat is out there, and its on its way! We are SO SCREWED!!!!)

This would have been done better if they spread it into three parts: Todd showing up alerting them of the "super hive". Maybe include some "specs" of the ship to kill time with some dialogue, and as a wink/nod to SW "A New Hope". Sheppard and co go out in the Daedalus to intercept the ship, and after a slug-fest, get disabled in the process. The wraith ship then jumps and makes its way towards Atlantis. The episode ends with the wraith ship opening fire on Atlantis while its cloaked.

Part 2:

Opens with the wraith ship bombarding Atlantis from orbit, doing further damage to the city. (show them still repairing sections of the city still damaged from the first ep of season 4) Atlantis drops the cloak and raises its shield before the wraith ship can do any massive damage to the city. The wraith ship launches darts towards the city, and Atlantis launches her F-302 squadron. Cue space, and air battle over the city. After a lengthy fight, the combination of the 302's, and the city's railguns, take out the darts. Just as the wraith hiveship is about to open fire on the city again, the signal from the alternate timeline reaches the hiveship, and it abandons its attack. The hiveship jumps away, and the atlantis crew discovers where it is headed. End part 2.

Part 3 (2 hour finale):

Once Atlantis knows where the hiveship is headed, they immediately dial Earth and send a warning. While this is going on, the Daedalus jumps into orbit with some of her systems patched up. Sheppard and co beam down to the control room, and Sheppard gets ordered to Earth to man the chair platform in Antarctica. The rest of the team interrogate Todd, and learn of the two other ZPMs he has stashed away. They retrieve them, and McKay installs them into the power grid. The Daedalus lands on the city, which in turn takes off and jumps into hyperspace to pursue the hiveship.

Meanwhile, Earth dispatches the Apollo and the Tsun Zu to engage the hiveship at the edge of the galaxy. While Sheppard is being debriefed (en route to the Antarctic base) Carter makes a comment that the Oddessy is on a secret mission, and she doesn't have a clue what its about. (tie-in for the new movie) Switch back to the Apollo and Tsun Zu, which emerge from hyperspace directly behind the hiveship. Both deploy the horizon missile, which partially disables the hiveship's sublight capability. The hiveship, in turn, destroys the Tsun Zu, and leaves the Apollo disabled in space. The Apollo contacts the SGC, alerting them to the results of the battle.

SG-1 (minus Carter) goes through the stargate, and travels to Chu'lac (the new location for the Free Jaffa High Council) to call in some markers. Switch back to Atlantis, which due to the damage done by the hiveship, emerges from hyperspace not too far from the Apollo. The Apollo's crew is transported to Atlantis, which makes repairs to the hyperdrive. (no bullshit "wormhole" drive cop-out here) They make a temporary patch, and off Atlantis goes into a series of hyperspace jumps. (to prevent the patched drive from being destroyed for good)

Switch to Earth, which has the Hiveship arriving earlier than expected. Area 51, and the Antarctic base scramble 302's along with the newly constructed George Hammond (formerly the Phoenix) which is powered by the ZPM that was onboard the Oddessy. Slugfest ensues, and just as things start getting tough for the Hammond, a massive fleet of ha'taks emerge from hyperspace and start to pound the living hell out of the hiveship. However, even thought they are doing damage to the hiveship, its still not enough to prevent them from entering orbit and firing on the surface. (and like with previous hive attacks, they activate their own stargate, which prevents the SGC from using theirs) Cut to Sheppard leaping into the chair platform and sending up a hail storm of drones towards the hiveship.

Cut to Atlantis emerging from hyperspace over the Alpha site. The alpha site alerts Atlantis that the wraith arrived early, and that they lost contact with Earth. McKay brings up the wraith tactic of blocking gate travel, and that they would need another gate to do that. Caldwell then suggests gating a nuke on-board the hiveship with a time delay fuse.

Cut to the Hammond, which is barely holding on. Slugfest continues as the ZPM is nearly depleted from having to maintain the current output from the asgard weapons and shields. Suddenly, the hiveship erupts in a massive explosion as the nuke that Atlantis gated in detonates. The allied fleet mops up the remaining darts just as Atlantis and Daedalus emerge from hyperspace. However, complications from the battle in Pegasus manifest, which not only knock out they hyperdrive, but prevent Atlantis from altering her trajectory sufficiently to keep her from entering Earth's atmosphere. Atlantis enters Earth's atmosphere and eventually lands between the mainland US and Hawaii. Episode ends with the SGC hooting and yelling ala NASA control center in Apollo 13 style.

[NecronLord]

Yeah, I would have split it into three episodes, too. I also wouldn't have pulled my punches; at least one of the Earth ships would have simply been destroyed. Probably the Apollo, because while I like the captain, I dislike the name. You can in fact create rather more 'why did they leave' tension if the Daedalus evacuates via transporter... "Why aren't they sending Darts to round us up?"

[Zac Naloen]

Didn't they find out midway through the season that would be the last ep?

I reckon they did a hasty rewrite to make it not a cliffhanger. Early rumours were that it would be a cliffhanger iirc.

They should have just cliffhangered it and done a big movie in my opinion.