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List Price: $49.96 | | Label: MGM Domestic Television Distribution
Salesrank: 27664
Released: May 22, 2001 |
| Our Price: $43.99 |
| Used Price: $11.53 |
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MPAA Rating:
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
Hollywood's film archives overflow with the carcasses of dismal movies based on lame '60s and '70s television shows, a syndrome that shows no sign of abating. But here's evidence that the reverse effect, turning a movie into a TV series, can have surprisingly positive results. Indeed, based on the 21 episodes produced for the first season of Stargate SG-1, it could be argued that this show is significantly better than the 1994 feature it's derived from.
The central conceit of the original Stargate--the existence of an artificially created "wormhole" through which one can travel to different worlds light years away from Earth--was an intriguing one. In seizing on the obvious possibilities for expanding on that premise, series executive producers-writers Jonathan Glassner and Brad Wright have smartly retained some of the film's basic elements (its amalgam of myth and theoretical hokum, or the ongoing clash of wills between scientists and soldiers), while adding a variety of fresh ideas (including new characters, new locations, and a welcome dose of humor, much of it supplied by Richard Dean Anderson, MacGyver himself, who replaces Kurt Russell in the central role of Colonel Jack O'Neill). The result is a show with multidimensional heroes and villains and consistently compelling story lines (many of them introduced in the pilot and carried forward through subsequent episodes) balancing excellent special effects and production values. All this and full frontal nudity, too (at least in the aforementioned pilot). Who can resist?
The first season is spread out over five DVDs; the 100-minute pilot shares the first volume with two other episodes, while discs 2 to 5 contain anywhere from three to five shows each. Sound and visuals (in widescreen format) alike will take full advantage of any home system's capabilities. But aside from language and subtitle options, bonus features are limited to brief featurettes that play like commercials and provide little in the way of background information or insight (there are no features at all on the first disc). Then again, if you really want to know what that symbol on Teal'c's forehead means, or why the nasty, parasitic Goa'ulds look a lot like the fledgling stomach monsters in the Alien series, there is no doubt a Web site out there just for you. --Sam Graham
Stargate SG-1 Season 1 Boxed Set Reviews:
Sets the tone for the whole series 
2008-05-04 - I have just gone back to have another look at season 1. I own all ten seasons, and wanted to look back over how it all began. This season truly sets the tone for the entire series. We meet important villains and friends, but more importantly, we learn of the whole conscience of the SGC.
As the series takes off, each character is slowly fleshed out while the "situation" of the story is deepened as well.
One of my favorite episodes is the Torment of Tantalus, which asks the very important question, What good is knowledge if you can't share it with anyone?
Stargate SG1 is a sci-fi series that strikes the perfect balance between comedy and seriousness.
What television can be...
2008-03-27 - This is one of the best Sci-Fi TV series ever and my list of them is very short. The acting is very good and the episodes are well written. With a little work each one could stand on its own as a movie. The characters are well played and consistant with themselves and each other. The end of the series with the tenth season was probably a good choice.
Through the Stargate 
2007-09-04 - Most TV shows spun off from movies are uninvolving and uninteresting ("Blade," anyone?), and hopefully die and are forgotten.
That wasn't the case with the spinoff of the 1995 movie "Stargate," an okay science fiction movie that spawned an excellent television series, "Stargate SG-1." The first season is not nearly as brilliant as the ones that followed it, but it's a welcome change from distant space operas -- excellent writing, acting, and a sense of humor about itself and its characters.
The Stargate has been inactive for a year -- until it is activated, and a bunch of Egyptian-styled warriors come through and kidnap a young officer. General Hammond (Don S. Davis) pulls Jack O'Neill (Richard Dean Anderson) out of retirement to learn what really happened on the planet of Abydos, and where these mysterious aliens have come from.
O'Neill and a small team go to Abydos and find Daniel Jackson (Michael Shanks) who has been learning about a vast network of Stargates over the past year. But when Daniel's wife Sha're and brother-in-law Skaara are abducted by the same warriors, O'Neill, Jackson and Air Force scientist Sam Carter (Amanda Tapping) use the Stargate to venture to where they're being kept.
What they find is an alien race who inhabits human hosts, the Goa'uld, and their ruthless slave warriors, the Jaffa. Carter, O'Neill and Jackson are captured by the powerful Apophis -- but to escape, they must have the help of an unlikely ally: Teal'c (Christopher Judge), Apophis' First Prime. Since Earth has now annoyed the Goa'uld, several exploration teams are formed to go through the Stargate and find weapons and allies.
And SG-1 -- Carter, O'Neill, Jackson and Teal'c -- encounters some very strange problems: a plague that turns people into savages, a people who live only a hundred days, a Viking planet, a Stargate explorer stranded since 1945, a little girl turned into a bomb, the seductive Goa'uld queen Hathor, and coming back as robots. And when the military shuts down the SG program, Daniel reveals that the Earth is about to be destroyed by Apophis' armies...
The first season of "Stargate SG-1" isn't the most impressive, though the last three episodes hint at the series' future greatness. And thankfully, it drops the usual space opera stuff -- instead we get Stargates, real military, and a very plausible reason why everybody in the galaxy (more or less) looks just like us.
It's graced with kitschy Egyptian-styled sets, lots of shoot-em-up action from Marines and Air Force, and plenty of planets influenced by Earth cultures, like the Minoans and the Vikings. Best of all is the snappy dialogue, mostly from the tart-tongued O'Neill ("Temperature--ground 1700 degrees Fahrenheit. Air--seems to be in pockets, ranging from 1500 degrees down to 200." "Sounds like LA").
And the makers add some poignant and/or warm scenes, such as the eager Abydonian teenagers celebrating with O'Neill and his pals, Teal'c reunion with his outcast family, or Sam bonding with a doomed little girl. All the characters get these moments, which really makes them seem human.
Instead of Kurt Russell's suicidal O'Neill from the movie, Anderson does a quirky, disrespectful, pop culture-lovin' guy with a hidden tragic past -- his "Cold Lazarus"double role is one of the best of the show. Tapping and Shanks are also great, as an enthusiastic geek and a smart, capable military woman. Sadly Judge gets shortchanged as the stern, honorable Teal'c, but he's brilliant when he's spotlighted.
The first season of "Stargate SG-1" is not the best of the series, but it's still a solid, imaginative sci-fi story with some great writing and even better acting. A must-have for sci-fi buffs.
One of the best Sci-Fi series ever produced
2007-05-25 - We own the first nine seasons (soon to buy season 10) and absolutely love them. This is a treasure in our DVD vault.
Awww yeah 
2007-05-25 - Ok, I'm going to go against the tide here and say that the full frontal nudity scene in the pilot episode was pretty much the high point of the whole thing. I had heard good things about this show, but honestly, if this show was a book I'll bet it would have a cheeseball painting on the cover of a tough looking dude with a scar and maybe a futuristic eyepatch, a tough babe showing cleavage, and a spaceship. Maybe a dragon, for good measure. And some lasers. Maybe a big, forboding claw-like hand framing the whole thing like it's getting ready to grab everyone. Ug.
Since the nudity was the only part worth watching, I will instead review that: As nudity goes, this is classic nudity - completely gratuitous, lovingly framed, and remaining on camera far longer than is necessary. The character in question is credited as 'Dark Skinned Woman' which is accurate, but probably should have been 'Naked Woman' since that was the only reason she was on camera. The part required no acting skills, but it did require naked skills, and the actress portraying Dark Skinned Woman had that in spades. If there is any justice in this world she will win an Oscar. I don't care if this was a TV show - an Oscar I say!
Yeah, so this was terrible. Sorry to all the fans, I know you love the show, but to anyone else thinking of dipping a toe in just be aware this material falls somewhere between Doctor Who and Independence Day. Think SciFi Channel's 'The Invisible Man' meets the original Star Trek. Nothing wrong with that per se, but yeah.
