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Special Features
- SG-1 Director's Series
- SG-1 Beyond the Gate
- Featurettes, photos and production design galleries
- Audio commentary on selected episodes
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Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
The beat goes on for Stargate SG-1 in this five-disc set containing all 20 episodes from the show's eighth season. If that beat is now a bit more faint than in previous years, that's not particularly surprising when a franchise has been around this long; what's more, if Season 8 has some fairly odd aspects to it ("Threads," which appears to have been planned as the final episode of the entire series, is followed by two more in this set alone… not to mention an unexpected renewal that led to an all-new Season 9), that too isn't exactly unusual in the wacky world of series television.
Some significant changes are apparent in Season 8. Jack O'Neill (series star Richard Dean Anderson) has been promoted to Brigadier General and is now top dog (as he puts it, the guy who "spent my whole life stickin' it to the man" now is the man). The existence of the stargate, an artificially created "wormhole" through which one can instantly travel to different worlds light years away from Earth, is no longer a well-guarded secret. And Stargate Command itself now exists primarily to "develop new weapons and technologies to defend the planet" from our various alien antagonists--principally the "Replicators," relentless little bug-machines poised to take over not only Earth but the entire galaxy.
The rest of the SG-1 core cast (Amanda Tapping, Christopher Judge, and Michael Shanks) is intact. But whereas Anderson, who has steadily reduced his role in the show, wasn't much missed in Season 7, one wishes there were more of him this time around; O'Neill's general insouciance and aversion to techno-speak are a welcome antidote to the kind of sci-fi gobbledygook (discussions about "a time dilation field on the planet Hala" and such) that now threatens to take precedence over the action and fine special effects that distinguished earlier seasons. Most of all, while there are still all manner of villains (Anubis, Ba'al, the ever-present Goa'uld) to contend with, as well as a few good guys (the Asgard, the rebel Jaffa) to help our heroes fight the good fight, Stargate SG-1's writers and creators may be running out of steam. Hence we get an episode like the very peculiar "Citizen Joe," featuring Dan Castellaneta as an average guy who sees "visions" (i.e., clips from past episodes) of the SG-1 team in action and becomes obsessed with proving that the whole stargate project really exists; an uneasy combination of self-parody and self-congratulation, this episode, while not unamusing, sticks out like a sore thumb.
Bonus features include audio commentary (mostly by the various directors) on 19 of the 20 episodes, along with photo galleries and one featurette per disc. --Sam Graham
Product Description
The long-running sci-fi staple gets another installment with the complete 8th season. Alien worlds, strange allies and dangerous enemies abound as the SG-1 crew venture off into the unknown. 20 episodes on 5 DVDs. 2005/color/14 hrs., 36 min/NR/widescreen.
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
212 of 229 people found the following review helpful
Format:DVD
As I said in my review for Season 7 of Stargate: SG-1, I cannot think of any other show in history that has had more false endings than this. The writers were preparing for cancellation during both the sixth and seventh seasons, and the plans with those finales was to leave a cliffhanger to be resolved in an upcoming motion picture. However, the Sci Fi channel kept renewing SG-1, making the movie idea irrelevant. Finally, we get to Season 8. Richard Dean Anderson, who plays central character Jack O'Neill (who gets promoted to General this year) stated that this would be his last season as a regular, a spin-off series, Stargate: Atlantis started up, and the plotlines of the show had already started to be resolved in the previous year. So now the writers were absolutely convinced at the beginning of the year that Season 8 would be the final season. They decided to make this year kind of like a big send-off for the series (very similarly to Buffy the Vampire Slayer's final season). Strangely enough, SG-1 was picked up for a NINTH year, tying it with The X-Files for the longest running American sci-fi show.
The year began with the great two-part episode "New Order". With O'Neill still in stasis after the battle in Antarctica the previous year, Dr. Elizabeth Weir (Torri Higginson) is still in charge of the SGC. Sam Carter (Amanda Tapping), who becomes a Colonel this year, and Teal'c (Christopher Judge) try to contact the Asgard about O'Neill's condition when they encounter an old nemesis they thought was vanquished: the Replicators. Meanwhile, on Earth, Weir and Daniel Jackson (Michael Shanks) receive a very strange request from the Goa'uld system lords: they want to form an alliance with Earth. Now that Anubis is (supposedly) gone, the System Lord Ba'al (Cliff Simon) has been absorbing Anubis' armies, weapons, ships, and technologies in an attempt to rule the Milky Way galaxy. By the episode's end, Weir has left (on her way to Atlantis), O'Neill is now in charge of the SGC, and the now three-person SG-1 realizes that a big fight will be coming now that the Replicators have returned and the Goa'uld "government" is beginning to crumble.
The next couple episodes are fair; one of them exists only to show O'Neill adjusting to his new rank, one shows Teal'c trying to adjust to life outside the SGC, while the others are standard fare that could have occurred during pretty much any other season. Then we get the episode "Covenant", where a media mogul may have discovered evidence of alien life in our galaxy. Since this was supposed to be the final season, the promos for the episode made it seem as if the Stargate program was going to be revealed to the public (sadly, things didn't go quite as the promos promised, but it was still a good episode, and was left open-ended, so they may do a follow-up in Season 9).
In later episodes, we encounter a human-form Replicator that was constructed in the image of Col. Carter, a new character named Vala (Claudia Black) who caused some trouble for Jackson, and probably the greatest clip show EVER (I must say, the Stargate writers know how to use clip shows effectively). "Citizen Joe" has Dan Castellaneta (the voice of Homer Simpson, and one of Richard Dean Anderson's heroes) playing Joe Sullivan, a barber in Indiana who, due to an Ancient device, sees flashes of Stargate missions. Throughout the 8 years, he writes them down, forsaking his job and his family. In the process of the episode, inside jokes and cracks at some of the shows less-than-stellar episodes are made (Stargate can make fun of itself like no other), my favorite being about the mysterious Furlings. We know this race exists, but we've never encountered them. When one of Joe's customers asks about them, he responds that he's sure they'll pop up soon.
Everything leads up to the last five episodes, "Reckoning, Parts 1 and 2", the 90-minute "Threads", and the season finale (which was supposed to be the series finale), "Moebius, Parts 1 and 2", which bring the entire franchise full circle by, in a sense, going back to the Stargate movie that started it all. Huge changes are made in these episodes, which are all great, and have a big impact on what can happen in Season 9 (although, as I've said, the writers weren't anticipating going on for another season). Some of the best scenes in the entire series take place in these five episodes, and I must say that the way they ended "Threads" and "Moebius, Part 2" is just great.
While this wasn't the best season of the show (I haven't decided if I should award S4 or S7 with that honor yet), it was definitely one of the best. Even though some of its stand-alone episodes were just fair (a problem that plagued S5, which was the worst year, in my opinion), the episodes dealing with the larger story-lines were just fantastic. Even though I am very happy with S9 so far, this would have made a perfect ending to a great series. I am interested to see what will happen at the end of the series, see as how I believe that "Moebius" is the only way this show could ever end.
The year began with the great two-part episode "New Order". With O'Neill still in stasis after the battle in Antarctica the previous year, Dr. Elizabeth Weir (Torri Higginson) is still in charge of the SGC. Sam Carter (Amanda Tapping), who becomes a Colonel this year, and Teal'c (Christopher Judge) try to contact the Asgard about O'Neill's condition when they encounter an old nemesis they thought was vanquished: the Replicators. Meanwhile, on Earth, Weir and Daniel Jackson (Michael Shanks) receive a very strange request from the Goa'uld system lords: they want to form an alliance with Earth. Now that Anubis is (supposedly) gone, the System Lord Ba'al (Cliff Simon) has been absorbing Anubis' armies, weapons, ships, and technologies in an attempt to rule the Milky Way galaxy. By the episode's end, Weir has left (on her way to Atlantis), O'Neill is now in charge of the SGC, and the now three-person SG-1 realizes that a big fight will be coming now that the Replicators have returned and the Goa'uld "government" is beginning to crumble.
The next couple episodes are fair; one of them exists only to show O'Neill adjusting to his new rank, one shows Teal'c trying to adjust to life outside the SGC, while the others are standard fare that could have occurred during pretty much any other season. Then we get the episode "Covenant", where a media mogul may have discovered evidence of alien life in our galaxy. Since this was supposed to be the final season, the promos for the episode made it seem as if the Stargate program was going to be revealed to the public (sadly, things didn't go quite as the promos promised, but it was still a good episode, and was left open-ended, so they may do a follow-up in Season 9).
In later episodes, we encounter a human-form Replicator that was constructed in the image of Col. Carter, a new character named Vala (Claudia Black) who caused some trouble for Jackson, and probably the greatest clip show EVER (I must say, the Stargate writers know how to use clip shows effectively). "Citizen Joe" has Dan Castellaneta (the voice of Homer Simpson, and one of Richard Dean Anderson's heroes) playing Joe Sullivan, a barber in Indiana who, due to an Ancient device, sees flashes of Stargate missions. Throughout the 8 years, he writes them down, forsaking his job and his family. In the process of the episode, inside jokes and cracks at some of the shows less-than-stellar episodes are made (Stargate can make fun of itself like no other), my favorite being about the mysterious Furlings. We know this race exists, but we've never encountered them. When one of Joe's customers asks about them, he responds that he's sure they'll pop up soon.
Everything leads up to the last five episodes, "Reckoning, Parts 1 and 2", the 90-minute "Threads", and the season finale (which was supposed to be the series finale), "Moebius, Parts 1 and 2", which bring the entire franchise full circle by, in a sense, going back to the Stargate movie that started it all. Huge changes are made in these episodes, which are all great, and have a big impact on what can happen in Season 9 (although, as I've said, the writers weren't anticipating going on for another season). Some of the best scenes in the entire series take place in these five episodes, and I must say that the way they ended "Threads" and "Moebius, Part 2" is just great.
While this wasn't the best season of the show (I haven't decided if I should award S4 or S7 with that honor yet), it was definitely one of the best. Even though some of its stand-alone episodes were just fair (a problem that plagued S5, which was the worst year, in my opinion), the episodes dealing with the larger story-lines were just fantastic. Even though I am very happy with S9 so far, this would have made a perfect ending to a great series. I am interested to see what will happen at the end of the series, see as how I believe that "Moebius" is the only way this show could ever end.
39 of 40 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Finally the REAL complete Season 8 with the full length, 65+ minute "Threads"!
June 24, 2006
Format:DVD
As it states across the top that it is the complete eighth season, they have finally added the unedited Threads episode! With no mention of it on the outer box, I wonder if they are downplaying it and don't want to admit the previous blunder.
Anyway, this season was a very solid year for SG-1, and with the exception of the real dud, Avatar, where Teal'c gets stuck in a virtual reality device (oh, my, how many times have we had this storyline beaten to death in the sci-fi world), I enjoyed every episode. We had a healthy dose of humor injected episodes: Affinity, Prometheus Unbound, Zero Hour, and Citizen Joe. We had some team altering dramatics, including yet another death to an SG member. We had the return of old enemies (Anubis) and some new ones (the replicator Carter). And we also got an incredible finish of 5 startling epsidodes to end the season.
I think that the high quality of the scripts and dramatic episodes helped take your mind of the loss of screen time for Richard Dean Anderson. His moments in the series though, were key, and his presence was well known. Even with less lines, he always managed to throw in his dry wit, especially to Baal in the Reckoning two parter.
The series just keeps proving that it's high quality sci-fi, and well worth owning on DVD with the rest of the series. These new slimline cases are nice, but if you already have the chunkier ones, I see no need to buy these again, unless you are after the longer version of Threads in this Season 8 set.
Anyway, this season was a very solid year for SG-1, and with the exception of the real dud, Avatar, where Teal'c gets stuck in a virtual reality device (oh, my, how many times have we had this storyline beaten to death in the sci-fi world), I enjoyed every episode. We had a healthy dose of humor injected episodes: Affinity, Prometheus Unbound, Zero Hour, and Citizen Joe. We had some team altering dramatics, including yet another death to an SG member. We had the return of old enemies (Anubis) and some new ones (the replicator Carter). And we also got an incredible finish of 5 startling epsidodes to end the season.
I think that the high quality of the scripts and dramatic episodes helped take your mind of the loss of screen time for Richard Dean Anderson. His moments in the series though, were key, and his presence was well known. Even with less lines, he always managed to throw in his dry wit, especially to Baal in the Reckoning two parter.
The series just keeps proving that it's high quality sci-fi, and well worth owning on DVD with the rest of the series. These new slimline cases are nice, but if you already have the chunkier ones, I see no need to buy these again, unless you are after the longer version of Threads in this Season 8 set.
45 of 50 people found the following review helpful
Format:DVD
Season Eight of STARATE SG-1 was in many ways one of transition. Richard Dean Anderson was beginning to end his involvement with the show, but having him sorta in-sorta out upset the balance of the SG-1 team and created an absence at the heart of the show. Over the previous seven seasons, the four members of the SG-1 team had developed considerable chemistry and contributed uniquely to balancing the cast. Despite being a colonel, O'Neill excelled at shooting from the hip and injecting verbal anarchy into things. Sam was always great for the scientific take on things, while Daniel brought an equally scholarly but more historical and humane take on things. Teal'c, meanwhile, brought a Stoic, almost Spartan, slant to the show. But with O'Neill spending most of his time on base as the new head of SG-1, the chemistry was off. This was corrected in Season Nine with Ben Browder--who brought many of the same qualities to the show as Richard Dean Anderson--joining the cast. But in Season Eight, things just aren't quite right.
Not that this interfered with the writing. The ongoing saga of the struggle between humans and their allies against the Goa'uld and the Replicators reached new levels, with the good guys pretty achieving close to final victory against each. But for the first time a few of the episodes were a bit flat and uninspired. STARGATE SG-1's greatest virtue has long been the remarkable consistency of its writing and the continuance of the increasingly complex core mythology. It may have lacked the narrative richness of FARSCAPE or the depth of character development of FIREFLY, but it had the great advantage of producing a staggering number of very good episodes. If its peaks weren't as high as FARSCAPE, its valleys weren't nearly as low (as much as I adore FARSCAPE, which I consider the best Sci-fi series ever, it had some real clunker episodes to go along with some masterpieces). But in Season Eight, we saw for the first time some episodes that simply weren't very good. Luckily, Season Nine would see a return to form.
Hints of good things to come came in the episode "Prometheus Unbound," in which the character of Vala Mal Doran was introduced. Claudia Black, who plays Vala and who appeared on FARSCAPE as Aeryn Sun, is introduced in this episode in a way that pays homage to FARSCAPE. Just as John Crichton first thinks Aeryn Sun is a man before she removes the helmet of her solid black suit, so Daniel Jackson thinks she is a man before she removes her helmet. That is where the comparisons between the two characters end. If Aeryn Sun is disciplined, militaristic, self-denying, repressed, and stern, Vala is feisty, unscrupulous, slutty, tricky, and fun loving. It is as if Claudia Black decided she wanted to do her own version of FARSCAPE's Chiana. The episode is not one of the more important episodes in terms of narrative, but in terms of fun, it is hands down the best episode of the season. The chemistry between Daniel and Vala is great, not primarily sexually but interpersonally, as if each possesses in abundance the qualities the other lacks. Vala was easily one of the best guest characters in the first eight seasons of the show. Luckily, it was decided to have Claudia Black revive Vala as a fulltime character starting Season Nine, although that was interrupted by a real life pregnancy. She has, however, returned as an opening credits character in Season Ten. The show's writers have done, however, a very smart thing in keeping Vala more closely linked to Daniel Jackson than Col. Mitchell, played by Ben Browder. Though there have been a couple of subtle jokes passed between Black and Browder (such as Vala looking at him the first time she is in her presence and wondering if they had met before), the two have more or less been left un-paired. (For those who have not seen FARSCAPE, the series in large part revolved around the star-crossed romance between Black's Aeryn Sun and Browder's John Crichton. Their romance is not merely the great TV Sci-fi romance of all time, but makes many fan and critic lists of the all time great TV romances of any genre.) But in all this I anticipate Seasons 9 and 10.
The main plot developments in Season 8 centers on the victories over the enemies of the first eight seasons. In a way, it also largely ends the show as we have known it. I'm almost tempted to called Seasons 1-8 STARGATE SG-1 Part I and Seasons 9-10 STARGATE SG-1 Part II, so many things change. Season 8 is Richard Dean Anderson's last as a full time cast member, the final season in which the Replicators and the Goa'uld function as the major enemies (though Baal manages to survive, it isn't at all clear that the Goa'uld will ever manage to play a major role on the show again), and the beginning of the shift of the show from Egyptian and Norse mythology in the first eight seasons to Arthurian mythology in subsequent ones. After this season the show--called by many FARGATE for the changes in the cast--would focus on the Ori instead of the Goa'uld. There would be one further change in the show. For the first eight seasons, STARGATE told an ongoing narrative, but it did so through what were essentially self-contained episodes. In Season 9 it would become more and more serial in structure, with one episode more or less picking up on what happened the previous week. There is no question that the serial form is superior to the episode form. Network executives detest the serial form because it makes it difficult to attract new viewers. But given the extreme maturity of STARGATE, perhaps the Sci-fi Channel feels that the show is unlikely to attract new viewers and has permitted the transition to a serial in order to retain the viewers it already has.
So, in some ways this season is the ending of the show as we have known it. And a very good run it has been. What has kept the show going has been a willingness to continually grow and change. And I'm confident that it is what will keep the show going for a few more seasons.
Not that this interfered with the writing. The ongoing saga of the struggle between humans and their allies against the Goa'uld and the Replicators reached new levels, with the good guys pretty achieving close to final victory against each. But for the first time a few of the episodes were a bit flat and uninspired. STARGATE SG-1's greatest virtue has long been the remarkable consistency of its writing and the continuance of the increasingly complex core mythology. It may have lacked the narrative richness of FARSCAPE or the depth of character development of FIREFLY, but it had the great advantage of producing a staggering number of very good episodes. If its peaks weren't as high as FARSCAPE, its valleys weren't nearly as low (as much as I adore FARSCAPE, which I consider the best Sci-fi series ever, it had some real clunker episodes to go along with some masterpieces). But in Season Eight, we saw for the first time some episodes that simply weren't very good. Luckily, Season Nine would see a return to form.
Hints of good things to come came in the episode "Prometheus Unbound," in which the character of Vala Mal Doran was introduced. Claudia Black, who plays Vala and who appeared on FARSCAPE as Aeryn Sun, is introduced in this episode in a way that pays homage to FARSCAPE. Just as John Crichton first thinks Aeryn Sun is a man before she removes the helmet of her solid black suit, so Daniel Jackson thinks she is a man before she removes her helmet. That is where the comparisons between the two characters end. If Aeryn Sun is disciplined, militaristic, self-denying, repressed, and stern, Vala is feisty, unscrupulous, slutty, tricky, and fun loving. It is as if Claudia Black decided she wanted to do her own version of FARSCAPE's Chiana. The episode is not one of the more important episodes in terms of narrative, but in terms of fun, it is hands down the best episode of the season. The chemistry between Daniel and Vala is great, not primarily sexually but interpersonally, as if each possesses in abundance the qualities the other lacks. Vala was easily one of the best guest characters in the first eight seasons of the show. Luckily, it was decided to have Claudia Black revive Vala as a fulltime character starting Season Nine, although that was interrupted by a real life pregnancy. She has, however, returned as an opening credits character in Season Ten. The show's writers have done, however, a very smart thing in keeping Vala more closely linked to Daniel Jackson than Col. Mitchell, played by Ben Browder. Though there have been a couple of subtle jokes passed between Black and Browder (such as Vala looking at him the first time she is in her presence and wondering if they had met before), the two have more or less been left un-paired. (For those who have not seen FARSCAPE, the series in large part revolved around the star-crossed romance between Black's Aeryn Sun and Browder's John Crichton. Their romance is not merely the great TV Sci-fi romance of all time, but makes many fan and critic lists of the all time great TV romances of any genre.) But in all this I anticipate Seasons 9 and 10.
The main plot developments in Season 8 centers on the victories over the enemies of the first eight seasons. In a way, it also largely ends the show as we have known it. I'm almost tempted to called Seasons 1-8 STARGATE SG-1 Part I and Seasons 9-10 STARGATE SG-1 Part II, so many things change. Season 8 is Richard Dean Anderson's last as a full time cast member, the final season in which the Replicators and the Goa'uld function as the major enemies (though Baal manages to survive, it isn't at all clear that the Goa'uld will ever manage to play a major role on the show again), and the beginning of the shift of the show from Egyptian and Norse mythology in the first eight seasons to Arthurian mythology in subsequent ones. After this season the show--called by many FARGATE for the changes in the cast--would focus on the Ori instead of the Goa'uld. There would be one further change in the show. For the first eight seasons, STARGATE told an ongoing narrative, but it did so through what were essentially self-contained episodes. In Season 9 it would become more and more serial in structure, with one episode more or less picking up on what happened the previous week. There is no question that the serial form is superior to the episode form. Network executives detest the serial form because it makes it difficult to attract new viewers. But given the extreme maturity of STARGATE, perhaps the Sci-fi Channel feels that the show is unlikely to attract new viewers and has permitted the transition to a serial in order to retain the viewers it already has.
So, in some ways this season is the ending of the show as we have known it. And a very good run it has been. What has kept the show going has been a willingness to continually grow and change. And I'm confident that it is what will keep the show going for a few more seasons.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
I love Stargate. What more can I say?
I love Stargate. What more can I say? It never fails to keep me on the edge of my seat!
Published 4 hours ago by Deanna DeFilipps
5.0 out of 5 stars
One of the best Stargate seasons
If you could only watch two of the ten seasons, this would be one of them! The other would be season 7.
Published 6 days ago by Trish
4.0 out of 5 stars
really like the series.
have always been a fan. It's really cool to be able to watch the entire series at your pace, when ever you want to.
Published 7 days ago by Mario Mendez
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great show
Until this series started I thought Star Trek Deep Space Nine was the best Sci-fi series on despite what some critics said. Read more
Published 17 days ago by B. knight
5.0 out of 5 stars
Stargate SG-1 Season 8
It was great to watch the show again and become immersed in the Stargate universe again. The characters work so great together.
Published 17 days ago by Auntie
4.0 out of 5 stars
One of my favorite shows
SG1 is One of my favorite shows. The 8th season had its ups and downs but on a whole it was a good season. They should have ended the show with this 8th Season.
Published 20 days ago by Courtney A. McKenzie
5.0 out of 5 stars
Awesome series
Great to see that can get the entire season on dvd, great to go back and watch this series over again.
Published 21 days ago by Ty Thornhill
5.0 out of 5 stars
great
Great watching it what a good show love the actors I hope you will keep it around for a while
Published 22 days ago by trudy perkins
5.0 out of 5 stars
Stargate sg1 Great
Really great off world adventure and hidden attraction between main characters. This show offers something for everyone. It keeps you comming back for more
Published 23 days ago by N MAkela
5.0 out of 5 stars
EXCELLENT
Stargate is the best series. Wish it had run for eight more years. It is worth watching over and over
Published 26 days ago by Cynthia Jacobs
