Stargate Atlantis

Stargate Atlantis is a spin-off of the television series Stargate SG-1, which was based on the film Stargate (1994). It premiered on the US Sci Fi Channel on July 16, 2004. In this new series an outpost of the legendary city of Atlantis, a city of the creators of the Stargate, is found in the Antarctic, opening access to a new galaxy for humans to explore. After last year's cliffhanger season finale (for Stargate SG-1), Stargate Atlantis premiered with "Rising", a much awaited movie-style two-part episode.

Summary

See Stargate for a more general summary of the universe this series is set in, and Stargate SG-1 for how events have transpired to get the plot to Atlantis.

The series follows the adventures of a group of scientists and marines that have taken a one-way trip to the lost city of Atlantis in a distant galaxy. Like the SG teams of Stargate SG-1, the new team's use of the Stargate has brought humanity into contact with other cultures, some human and some alien, some friendly and some quite hostile.

Spoiler warning: Plot or ending details follow.

Races

• Ancient: A historical, technically highly advanced race that once existed on Earth and possibly other locations in the Milky Way galaxy and the builders of the Stargates. The Ancients moved from Earth to the planet in the Pegasus galaxy (see The City below), taking their spacefaring city Atlantis with them, in order to spread new life. In the new galaxy, they faced an enemy that, for the first time, matched their capabilities, and overwhelmed them in numbers. Besieged in Atlantis, the remaining Ancients retreated to Earth, possibly passing the legend of Atlantis to the Greeks. A small fraction of the Terrestrial human race still carries the gene expression of the Ancients ("Ancient Technology Activation", or ATA), which allows them to use Ancient technology, most prominently Maj. John Sheppard of the Terrestrial human expedition team. Dr. Carson Beckett of the Terrestrial human expedition team is experimenting of transferring the gene expression by means of in vivo retroviral gene therapy.

• Athosian Human: Human from the planet Athos in the Pegasus galaxy. The Athosian humans are likely to be the human life that has been "spread" by the Ancients after they moved to the Pegasus galaxy. The Athosians were once technologically advanced and still possess advanced technology, but due to the threat by the Wraiths, were living in a pre-industrial culture on Athos. The leader of the Athosian humans is Teyla Emmagan. No Athosians are known to have ATA.

• Terrestrial Human: Human from the planet Earth in the Milky-Way galaxy. The multi-national Terrestrial human expedition team in the Pegasus galaxy consists of a civilian and military branch, with the latter one also called as "security teams". The leader of the Terrestrial humans in Atlantis is Dr. Elizabeth Weir, the leader of their military branch is Maj. John Sheppard.

• Wraith: This hive-based species is the race that defeated the Ancients long ago, and is currently the main enemy in Stargate Atlantis. They maintain thousands of worlds populated by humans as a source of food, and they feed off the life force of other beings. The Wraith follow a cyclical feeding pattern: they lay in a dormant/hibernation stage for many years or generations, then sweep through the Pegasus galaxy to "cull their human herd" then stop when there are just enough surviving humans to maintain a breeding population for the next culling cycle. They have pale skin, black eyes, and either white or red hair (in the case of the "Wraith Queen" seen in the pilot). They are tough to kill due to the amazing power to regenerate; emptying a P90 clip into a Wraith will stun it, but within a matter of less than 2-3 minutes it will be back on its feet. They appear to have a psionic type ability, which they use to confuse their enemies. They have ships known as "Darts" which are designed to travel through the stargate, as their stargate, unlike most, is in orbit around their planet. Wraith hand-weapons are Stunners, designed not to kill a target, but to temporarily paralyse them for later culling. Their technology is highly advanced and rivaled that of the Ancients. The Wraith civilization appears to center around massive "Hive-ships". One was seen in the pilot, although because it had been laying dormant for centuries it was overgrown with trees. Intelligence recovered from a downed Dart flight-computer revealed that there are over 60 Wraith Hive-ships in the Pegasus galaxy.

• Genii: Humans from a planet in the Pegasus galaxy. To outsiders, they appear to be simple farmers, resembling the Amish of Earth. In truth, the Genii actually possess a technological level roughly equivalent to that of Earth in the 1930's: they have elecricity, primitive television viewscreens, and mass-produced firearms. Generations ago, survivors of a Wraith culling took refuge underground bunkers left over from forgotten wars, and there rebuilt their civilization, expanding outwards into a massive series of secret underground facilities. Most importantly, the Genii have centered their efforts to fight the Wraith on a program to develop a fission bomb, to be delivered to Hive-ships. However, the Genii had not yet discovered how to make an effective trigger mechanism that would create an implosion, or an effective means of separating U-235 from U-238, when the Atlantis expedition encountered them. The Genii were angered that the Atlantis team had woken the Wraith from their hibernation early, but agreed to help each other. A resulting joint Genii-Atlantis mission backfired, resulting in the death of a prominent Genii leader and the failure of the Genii's attempts to plant a fission-bomb in Wraith Hive-ships (although the Atlantis team feels that there are so many--over 60--that the Genii's plan would only have destroyed a few). The Genii now count themselves enemies of the Atlantis expeditionary team, and are determined to obtain C4 explosives from the Atlantis team in order to build an effective trigger mechanism.

The City and Technologies

The city of Atlantis in the series is a snowflake-shaped, giant spacefaring platform with skyscrapers on it, with lower buildings in the six outlying sections, and the highest building in the center. The "gate room", the center of operations of the expedition crew, is located in the central building. The shape of Atlantis is therefore unlike the one described in Plato's Critias. In the beginning of the first episode, Atlantis sits on the floor of an ocean, several hundred feet deep. Due to an energy shortage, the autonomous city ignited its engine and resurfaced. In contrast to Plato's Timaeus, Atlantis did not sink in destructive "earthquakes and floods", but rather did so in a controlled fashion with a protective shield, keeping the city still intact underwater.

Location. Atlantis in this series is located in the "Pegasus galaxy", which is being referred as a "dwarf galaxy in the Local Group". However, as there exist two dwarf galaxies with in the Pegasus constellation, the Pegasus Dwarf (also called Pegasus Dwarf Irregular) and Pegasus Dwarf Spheroidal, it is not clear which galaxy is meant.

Puddle jumper. One of the five shuttlelike spacecrafts discovered in the city of Atlantis, all of them with high maneuverability and hovering vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) ability. The vehicle is designed for travels trough the Stargate, equipped with Ancient drone weaponry and a stealth device allowing complete invisibility (also called a cloaking device within other science-fiction works). This one spacecraft has been designated as the Puddle Jumper by Maj. John Sheppard.

Teleporters. There is also a matter teleporting "lift" in Atlantis, possibly working with a similar principle as the Stargate and the ring transporters (from Stargate SG-1). The teleportation concept is related to the experimental quantum teleportation that exists.

Zero-Point Module (ZPM). ZPM is an Ancient power source, with which they power their cities and outposts. While the energy output is huge and significantly larger than Naquadah generators, it appears that the ZPM is based on an irreversible thermodynamic process and will ultimately reach its maximum entropy limit. The concept of ZPM is derived from the physical concept of zero-point energy, which appears in quantum field theoretical calculations as infinite, and that of vacuum energy. In the reality, however, as the concept of infinities arising within physical calculations is not unusual and even appears in calculations of classical mechanics that are well-known not to be infinite in their energy, most field theorist believe this to be an artifact of the way of calculation itself. Furthermore, because of the E = mc² equivalency of energy and mass, the vacuum energy content has been measured in the universe to be extremely small and unlikely to be a useful power source.

Mobile Analytic Laboratory Probe (MALP). The Stargate Command MALP is a remote controlled probe designed to collect environmental data of the other side of the Stargate, which is used to determine possibly hazards for further exploration by human teams.

Ancient Technology Activation (ATA)/In Vivo Retroviral Gene Therapy. Ancients use a specific gene expression that possibly generate specific chemical transmitter through the skin as a key to their technology. In the Atlantis expedition team, experiments began to employ the in vivo retroviral gene therapy to transfer the Ancient gene expression to humans. In reality, there has been experimental in vivo retroviral gene therapy. But despite some success, e.g. in treatment of lung cancer, it is believed to be extremely dangerous, with serious side effects including leukemia.

Cast

ST = Security Team member

	Major Characters
•	Dr.	Elizabeth Weir (Earth, US)	–   Torri Higginson
•	Maj.	John Sheppard (Earth, ST/USAF)	–   Joe Flanigan
•	Lt.	Aiden Ford (Earth, ST/USMC)	–   Rainbow Sun Francks
•	Dr.	Rodney McKay (Earth, Canada)	–   David Hewlett
•		Teyla Emmagan (Athos)	–   Rachel Luttrell
	Recurring Characters
•	Dr.	Carson Beckett (Earth, SC)	–   Paul McGillion
•	Dr.	Peter Grodin (Earth, UK)	–   Craig Veroni
•	Dr.	Zelenka (Earth, CZ)	–   David Nykl
•	Dr.	Kavanagh (Earth, US)	–   Ben Cotton
•	Dr.	Corrigan (Earth, US)	–   Ross Hull
•	Dr.	Simpson (Earth, US)	–   Fiona Hogan
•	Sgt.	Bates² (Earth, ST/USMC)	–   Dean Marshall
•	Sgt.	Stackhouse³ (Earth, ST/USMC)	–   Boyan Vukelic
•	Sgt.	Markham4 (Earth, ST/USMC)	–   Joseph May
•		Halling¹ (Athos)	–   Christopher Heyerdahl
•		Jinto¹ (Athos)	–   Reece Thompson
•		Wex¹ (Athos)	–   Casey Dubois
	Dead Characters
•	Col.	Marshall Sumner² (Earth, ST/USMC)	–   Robert Patrick

¹ The first Athosians the Earth team met ("Rising"): the adult – Halling, the older child – Jinto, the younger child – Wex.
² In the embark scene at Stargate Command ("Rising"), when the first four people are about to cross the gate, the person to the left of Sumner and Weir.
³In the Wraith ship scene ("Rising"), the person Maj. Sheppard radioed for a diversion.
⁴ The pilot, next to Stackhouse ("Thirty-Eight Minutes").

Episodes

• 1.01 "Rising, Part 1"
• 1.02 "Rising, Part 2"
• 1.03 "Hide and Seek"
• 1.04 "Thirty-eight Minutes"
• 1.05 "Suspicion"
• 1.06 "Childhood's End"
• 1.07 "Poisoning the Well"
• 1.08 "Underground"
• 1.09 "Home"
• 1.10 "The Storm"
• 1.11 "The Eye"

Below are names for future episodes in season one.

• "The Defiant One"
• "Human Error"
• "Santuary"
• "Hot Zone"
• "Before I Sleep"
• "The Brotherhood"