Atlantis Sunk

Less than a year after the original Stargate series made the jump to direct-to-video movies, Stargate: Atlantis seems to have gotten the ax.

It won’t be completely gone right away, though. Thanks to the odd way the Sci Fi Channel breaks up its seasons, the current (fifth) season will run through January some time. Then there’ll be a two hour movie some time later in 2009. There may be other movies after that.

According to a quote over at Multichannel News:

“We’re excited to tell Atlantis stories on a bigger canvas,” Brad Wright and Robert C. Cooper, co-creators of Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis and currently executive producers on Atlantis, said in a statement. “The successes of the two original Stargate [direct-to-video] movies The Ark of Truth and Continuum have shown us the opportunities that the movie format offers. We have plans for both SG-1 and Atlantis to remain vital as we expand the franchise.”

I can’t exactly say I’m sad to see Atlantis go. I’ve always found it to be more than a little uneven as a show. There have been some really solid episodes, but there have been just as many that left me scratching my head wondering “How the heck did they no see how bad this was before they spent all that money making it?” Somehow, they managed to never get their characters quite as vibrant as SG1 did in the same time frame.

Which, I suppose, is one of the reasons SG1 lasted a decade and Atlantis only five years.

For those die-hard Stargate fans, though, there’s little reason to really despair. There’s already a new series that’s been pitched and it’s been promised to be bigger and better than either of its predecessors.

Stargate: Universe, while it has an unfortunately silly title, seems to be based on a good concept. According to the GateWorld website, the premise focuses on a project the Ancients (you know, the race that built the gates, fought the Wraith, created the Replicators, ascended into two warring camps and did all sorts of other questionably intelligent things) started and just kind of let run. That project? Seeding the entire universe with stargates using an automated ship. That ship’s been out there, bouncing along for thousands of years at this point. The second part of that project? A second ship following it to explore the areas around the new gates.

That could be interesting. Kind of a return to the Star Trek idea of “new worlds and new civilizations” being found using a starship. With the extra added bonus that, thanks to the gates, you could easily arrange cameos from favorite characters from the previous two series.

Of course, I’m not going to hold my breath on this show getting made, let alone made well. As a third generation derivative being run by the same people that ran the previous two incarnations of the franchise, it automatically has a lot of baggage to deal with. As we’ve learned with the Star Trek and Star Wars franchises the temptation to apply the same formulas to incompatible ideas is hard to resist. But I’ll wait to at least hear that the series has a green light before I fully rip into it.

In other SG news, it looks like the Stargate Worlds MMORPG is still on track. I can’t imagine it will do exceptionally well if there’s no series to tie into, though. I know I’d be willing to play it… if I had the time and money. And  maybe my own group of friends to put together into a solid SG team. (I’ve signed up to maybe get in on the beta of the game, just for fun.)

So, there you have it. We’ve gone from a little movie that got a big following to a series that started on a pay cable network, segued into syndication and then was picked up by a regular cable network and spawned a spin-off with a bigger scope to an online game and, possibly a third series with an even larger scope than its predecessors. Here’s hoping it doesn’t just leave a bad taste in a lot of fans mouths.