Stargate Universe: “Time”
Stargate Universe gave the franchise writers and fans alike a brand new sandbox to play in, with new characters and a new tone. And while that first run of 10 episodes in particular has its bumpy spots, even critics tend to acknowledge one episode as the best of the bunch.
But most fans probably don’t know there is a bonus scene that never aired on television — and if you’ve come to the show via DVD or streaming, it’s not there either. Now, 15 years later, we’d wager most viewers today have never seen the coda to this story, which features Brian J. Smith’s Lt. Matthew Scott and David Blue’s Eli Wallace and is officially canon.
The episode is “Time,” which shocked audiences when it first aired in the fall of 2009. This episode is a time-twister, as Destiny‘s crew gate to a jungle planet and find one of their own kino camera balls lying on the ground — full of footage from the first time they were here. As some of them watch the footage back on the ship, events on the planet begin to play out again. That includes a dreary rainstorm, vicious alien creatures, and a Stargate that begins to malfunctioning.
Eli finds one of Destiny‘s kinos on an alien planet. From “Time”
When they see footage of their own horrible deaths, it’s obvious that the clock is ticking: can the crew change their actions and avoid their fate this time? The episode is like a sci-fi horror version of Groundhog Day.
“Time” has a beautifully ambiguous end, as Lt. Scott falls to his knees in the rain and addresses the kino recording device. He plans to throw the kino through the Stargate, where he knows it will land in the past to be discovered by Destiny‘s crew again on the next loop. He and his friends were not able to survive — but if he gives them enough information for the next time, perhaps they will.
“Please believe me,” he says. “You don’t have much time. Act now, or you are all going to die.”
The episode ends, and the credits roll. And while it left viewers with enough information to figure out what will happen next (on the next loop Destiny will find the new recording, harvest the cure from the creatures, and survive), some said that it felt like the cliffhanger of a two-parter … one where the story’s conclusion never came.
SGU‘s producers, however, anticipated how the ambiguity might land — so they wrote and filmed one more scene to connect the dots. “New Kind of Crazy” streamed exclusively online at MGM’s official Stargate Web site as a bonus webisode, and as far as we can tell it’s one of only a handful of Kino shorts that were actually left off the DVD and Blu-ray releases. Fortunately it’s on YouTube today, and you can watch it right now:
“Time” was written and directed by Robert C. Cooper, who told SciFiNow magazine that the episode “all kind of gelled for me when I spun the ending and the way that the structure of the story was. There were some complaints that it was a reset to zero in that the characters didn’t get to grow or learn anything, but I don’t get that criticism. They still have the kinos and were able to observe everything that they went through. I think one of the most interesting dynamics in the episode was watching them watch themselves.”
In the 3-minute webisode, Matt and Eli (with an assist from Sgt. Riley) record a new kino log reporting what happened after “Time” faded to black: our version of the characters did indeed find that second kino (alongside the first one from the first loop), with Lt. Scott’s recording from the end of the episode. This gave them enough information (and enough time) to find the cure for the parasite in their drinking water and avoid their grim fates on the planet.
Robert C. Cooper directs actor David Blue in the first season episode “Time.”
Cooper was right: the episode didn’t really need this small piece of denouement. The shock ending is engaging, prompting the viewer to puzzle out what must come next as the credits roll. It’s a bold and fascinating creative choice, one that demonstrated how SGU would push the narrative envelope and take risks.
Want to watch all 34 Kino webisodes? Here’s the complete YouTube playlist.
What did you think of the episode “Time”? Had you seen “New Kind of Crazy” before now? And is the coda better left out of the finished episode? We want to hear it in the comments below!