SFTV Re-Views: _Stargate: Atlantis_, 5.6
5.6: "The Shrine"
This is a weird place to start (and maybe even finish until the next series) but that's what happens when you haven't done one of these for just over four years and decide to start. It's good craft: _in media res_! Oh, wait, that's for the fiction, not the review _of_ the fiction. Anyway...
After the supremely unsatisfying continued mishandling of the Weir Situation in 5.5, this is Atlantis' "Flowers for Algernon" episode and, while it's pretty clear what's going to happen generally and we've done this sort of thing too much with everyone and especially with McKay, the early parts of it are still great and the latter part will do.
We open with McKay obviously being not right as he talks into a camcorder and find that, on a problematic mission prior to our open, he's contracted a brain parasite which is shutting down his brain and will soon kill him. My favorite sequence in the whole episode is when, maybe midway in his life's course, McKay finds himself alone and panicked that everyone's left him, so pounds on Shepherd's door, screaming, and waking him up. Shepherd then invites McKay to the pier for some beers. McKay asks, "I drink beer?" and Shepherd says, "Lots." In a way this is simultaneously nice and mean, but the scene on the pier is great and ends perfectly.
This is in flashback on the way to the shrine because, meanwhile, Ronin has told everyone about the possibility of McKay being restored to himself for a day prior to death so that he can say goodbye in his right mind. There is a lot of well-done strife where the team and McKay's sister more or less want this to happen and Dr. Keller doesn't. My favorite drama is where everyone is various shades of gray or even (as in this case) all good, but just in opposition. Eventually, Keller gives way to McKay's sister and they all go to the now Wraith-controlled world of the Shrine and (surprise, surprise!) science and good tools save the day.
Some of this hits close to home, in a way, and I'm a sucker for "Flowers for Algernon" and so on, so I may be over-rating it, but I liked it a lot, despite "been there done that" and the speed and convenience of the end.
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Page created: 2024-10-15 Last changed: 2024-10-15