Dr. Rush is able to unlock the bridge of Destiny but doesn’t tell anyone that he has access. He is also able to fix systems on the ship with relative ease and which stupefy the rest of the scientists on the ship. He can control Destiny’s stops and directions. As he relaxes on the bridge, unobserved by anyone else, his mind brings him visions of his wife, who begins to debate with him. Furthermore, she believes he has no intention of sharing this information with the rest of the crew.

Camille Wray talks with Ginn, the lady who killed Dannic. Ginn tells Wray about how she came to be forced to join the Lucian Alliance, as on her homeworld, the Alliance are feared warlords. Two years ago, Ginn was forced into serving the Alliance at gunpoint, with the threat that her family would be killed if she didn’t comply. Wray reaches the conclusion that Ginn had no choice but to serve. As food rations are made even more smaller to accommodate the Lucian Alliance team who decided to stay onboard the ship, the crew begin grumbling. To leave them on a planet or to keep them onboard is debated by Wray & Col. Young.

Rush decides to stop at a planet, marked in a red X on the system, ignoring the hallucination of his wife who doubts the wisdom of it. The crew needs food and they have to search the planet for it. The gate on the planet does not seem to work, so Rush tells the crew that they have to take a shuttle to the planet and get the gate working again. A team of Scott, Greer, Riley, Vanessa James, Dunning, Dale Volker, Park, TJ and Eli are to go down to the planet. Riley has plotted a course to the gate, and Scott launches after being given confirmation by Young. Due to volcanic activity & turbulence caused by reasons unknown to the crew, the shuttle loses power and crashes down. As the come to, they see that Riley is pinned to his console and he can’t move his legs. The efforts of the group to move the console off  him are in vain as he screams in pain.

As they can’t fly the shuttle anymore, finding & repairing the gate is top priority. They find the gate buried under rocks & gravel and dig it up. Riley won’t b able to make it as they dial the gate and connect to the Destiny. Young goes to meet the team on the planet and speaks to Riley. The injured Riley begs to be killed so he doesn’t have to suffer anymore. An emotional Young uses his hands to suffocate Riley and lets him pass away in the shuttle. Telford and Wray present Varro with the list of prisoners to remain on the ship. There are nine in total, Varro, Ginn, and Simeon among them. The rest are sent through the gate to the planet, while Destiny goes back into FTL. A large gathering is held in Brody’s bar, where Greer leads a toast to Riley. As the episode ends, Destiny comes out of FTL and moves towards a large object in space right ahead in front of it.

Season 2 started almost 2 months back and I’ve been downloading all the episodes and watching them within a couple of days that they are shown in the US/Canada. Torrent is a heaven sent for fans of this & other shows which aren’t shown in India. Anyway, I hope that those of you who do get this show on your tv channels are engrossed in what I think is the best tv show in the last few years. I like this a lot more than BSG but not as much as I love Stargate Atlantis and the Star Trek shows. But I think that over time SGU will be lauded as one of the best shows ever on tv.

So when we revisit the crew of Destiny, TJ is unconscious and hallucinates that she is back on the planet where some of the crew stayed behind on. Robert Caine greets her and TJ sees that she is not pregnant but has delivered her baby girl. However, in reality the shot that hit her cause a lot of bleeding and her baby died.

Chloe finds that her wound has mysteriously healed and that she is no longer bleeding. Eli lets Scott & Greer in through the airlock. Meanwhile while Telford recovers, Kiva however dies from their gun fight and Dannic takes over command of the Lucian Alliance. Sympathetic Varro has Camile Wray, Dale Volker, and two others use the long-range communication device to call in doctors to treat the wounded. What follows is a big struggle for control of the ship with Dannic willing to use force to get his way. However when Dannic tries  to kill Telford for his defiance, Ginn shoots him in the back first, killing him.Rush & crew gain control of Destiny once again and frees all the rest, The sympathetic Alliance personnel are allowed to stay onboard the ship while the remainder of Kiva’s team are moved to an uninhabited planet.

As we start the episode we find out that Col. Young had a plan to get Col. Telford back from the brainwashing. The deprivation of oxygen releases the hold that the Lucian Alliance had on him. Young explains the situation to the crew. The gate room is sealed and all nearby corridors are put under guard. The civilians are told to stay in their quarters if and when the invasion occurs.

The Lucian alliance evacuates from their stronghold & enter the agate room of Destiny, watching by the crew. Over the intercom, Young informs the Alliance forces that they are surrounded and locked in, and that he can vent the atmosphere at any time. He demands they lower their weapons. Kiva has Telford confirm that Young can do this, then has her men open the doors using devices which override the locks. The Alliance forces move out from the gate room and begin their assault on the crew. In the ensuing fight, both sides take hostages, Eli & Chloe get separated from the rest of the crew.

Chloe gets a bullet in her leg and so relies on Eli to carry her part of the way. The two parties try to negotiate for exchange of hostages. Meanwhile Telford acts as a spy for the Destiny crew while trying to keep it away from Kiva and her team. The standoff between the Lucian Alliance and the Destiny Expedition continues, but a problem arises which threatens the safety of both groups as we start the continuation of Incursion and the final episode of season 1. TJ, a hostage, being a medic is made to tend to the wounded Lucian soldiers. The Lucian Alliance chose a poor time to dial in. The team shows him a sensor scan of a nearby binary pulsar: a rotating neutron star and a white dwarf orbiting a single point in space. It is emitting high levels of gamma radiation and x-rays. Furthermore, the white dwarf is stripping off material from the neutron star and creating an accretion disk, which it plows through during its orbit every 46 minutes, 37.4 seconds, creating an even greater radiation burst.

Meanwhile a Lucian agent Varro, shows that he is a decent man even if he is with the alliance and talks to TJ while she treats his wounds. The science team has devised a plan to protect the ship. The shields on the side of the ship facing the pulsar are severely depleted, but the shields on the opposite side are much stronger. By rotating power from one to the other, it will buy the time they need to fix the FTL drive. Without access to the primary systems, however, the emitters have to be reset manually on the outside of the hull. Scott and Greer prepare to go outside the ship. Telford is caught by Kiva as he helps the Destiny crew and they both shoot each other. Shooting in the infirmary wounds TJ, threatening the life of her unborn child. Young has to surrender to the Alliance to buy time for Scot & Greer; the soldiers and civilians are separated and put in rooms. Dannick who now assumes command, thinks he has to deal with the problem by executing all the military personnel.

As the episode and the season ends, we see a defiant Col. Young refusing to kneel down in front of Dannick and his men. What will happen to Scot & Greer? Will TJ & her baby survive? And Telford, Chloe & Eli? Stay tuned for season 2.

Dr. Rush has residual images of being in Col. David Telford’s body and sees the number 314. He sees himself giving files about the Icarus project to the group. They have a Tel’tak parked in the area, which leads Young to suspect the Lucian Alliance. He goes to tell Col. young about these images. Young explains that Telford spent a year undercover in the Lucian Alliance. Eight months in, a Lucian Alliance attack on a Tau’ri Base killed 37 people, which Telford knew was coming but did not report. Telford claimed it necessary to protect his cover, and was let off the hook. However, knowing that the Goa’uld have brainwashing technology, and that the Lucian Alliance have much of their technology, it’s possible he was compromised. Scott points out that no one can be trusted if that’s the case.

Rush offers to switch bodies with Telford and make contact with the Lucian alliance. While Young agrees to this, he also speaks with General O’Neill and has Rush followed. Rush is dropped off at Morrison’s home, tailed by Daniel Jackson. Rush make contact and is picked up in a van. Rush is brought to the meeting site. Another SUV drives in and a woman steps out. She recognizes that Rush is not Telford, since he didn’t use the proper code word when reporting in, and demands to know who he is. Rush denies her accusations, but when she asks him for her name and he can’t answer, he is knocked unconscious. She deactivates the cloak on her Tel’tak and has Rush dragged inside. Daniel calls in the strike team, but they are too late.

In order for them to find out where Rush is being taken, Col. Young interrogates Col. Telford. Young orders Brody to vent the atmosphere in Telford’s room. Eli and Wray separately argue against it, but Brody complies. Telford has five minutes until he suffocates, unless he talks. Telford doesn’t believe he’ll do it, but Young insists that this is for the greater good and doesn’t back down. Telford refuses to talk, demanding to be released.

The episode ends on this cliff hanger!!

On the Destiny, some of the crew are being affected by hallucinations so strong that it’s affecting their judgment and impairing their day to day activities. Lt. James hallucinated that Lt. Scot has sex with her and then leaves her behaving rudely saying that he cannot be with her. She demands that he chooses between her & Chloe but he brushes her away. She lifts a lamp and hits him on the back of the head with it and is horrified that she has killed him. Dale Volker who has claustrophobia is unable to open the door to his quarters and starts yelling. As others later open the door he chalks it off as a simple malfunction but in the hallway he finds himself trapped within walls that didn’t exist a while back.

Lt. Scot imagines that he sees his son Matthew running in the hallways and chases after him. Dunning starts scratching at an itch and gets panicky feeling that a snake is inside him and is cutting himself to get it out. Greer imagines that he sees Wray conspiring with other civilians to take over the ship and starts to spy on her. Rush sees shadows but when he approaches it there is no one there. As TJ examines the ones affected it soon becomes apparent that the ones affected have all been on a planet recently and suspects that something affected them there. Just then, T.J. radios Young, telling him she has found the cause. T.J. presents Young with what she has found; a tick-like bug is embedded in Scott’s scalp, just above the back of the neck. She passed it over on her first examination because it is so small. T.J. speculates that the ticks inject a venom causing the hallucinations, and believes that removing them is the way to solve the problem. Scot is first to go and he reacts violently at first. The tick goes from him and jumps onto Chloe, who while passing another section of the ship sees her dead father.

Meanwhile Greer sees Wray & Rush talking privately and says that he will not let the two of them conspire to take over the ship. It is Eli who finds Chloe talking to what she thinks is her father. Rush finds himself in a tank filling with water and then suddenly he is out of it but sees a blue alien stalking him. Using the venom from the squiggly alien, TJ is able to remove the ticks from the others and they are killed. Rush prevents Greer from killing Wray, although she gets a deep wound. Scot then subdues Rush who is still seeing more blue aliens and TJ clears everyone from the ticks. As the episode ends, Destiny drops out of FTL and dials to a planet that seems habitable. Young decides to send out a team, not letting the tick incident deter him. He radios Scott and orders him to ready his team.

During a meeting in the gate room Col. Young confirms to the rest of the crew that Destiny is flying across the void between galaxies. This means that Destiny won’t make any Stargate connections any time soon, so Young is imposing strict food and water rationing. Rush then informs Young that Destiny will fall short of her next jump and is beginning to conserve energy. He also suggests getting in touch with a scientist back on Earth, Amanda Perry, a quadriplegic who might be able to assist them in increasing the FTL drives’ efficiency.

Initially Vanessa James volunteers to switch bodies with Amanda but she is soon spooked by the effort it takes to use the ventilator and move in a wheelchair, so Camille Wray takes over. Camille is willing to get used to the difficulty just to get to spend some time with her lover in their home. As Amanda gets to work with Rush and the others, the ship is rocked by a violent explosion. Perry and Rush are working in the gate room, when the Stargate starts dialing in. Concerned, Rush radios Greer to send a team in.

Quickly, Greer and other military personnel prepare themselves and run to the gate room. By the time they arrive, Greer tells the two to leave, but Rush assures him that they don’t need to be concerned. To his surprise, Chloe, Eli and Scott make it through. When they lower their weapons, Greer and Scott joyfully reunite. Eli tells the others how  he noticed Destiny’s address on the bottom of the kino. Then they discover a robot who makes repairs on the ship and can fix the damaged sections which got affected by the explosion. While they wait, Brody introduces his moonshine, which he made in his lab, to the others who all relish the opportunity to have some alcoholic drink no matter how bad it is.

While taking a break from working, Amanda and Rush let their mutual attraction for each other get the better of them and they kiss. However Rush stops it as he says that he just had to go through his wife’s death again and cannot go  through with it. They do comfort each other. They also discover how the sabotage happened – when Lt. James freaked out, she left the stones with cleansing it; a blue alien also took the stones at their end and switched bodies with James and sabotaged the ship. Franklin, still in a catatonic state since using the chair, now briefly speaks to state that he wants to be led to the chair. The reason is that the alien ships start to attack Destiny and by using the chair Franklin can guide Destiny away from the aliens. However, he vanishes once the work is one.

Amanda and Rush say their goodbyes and she switches back into her body while Camille bids her lover farewell and rejoins the crew back on Destiny.

So when we left the series Chloe, Eli, Greer & Scott were stranded on the planet due to the tunnel caving in and Destiny moved back into FTL and left the system. Lt. Riley finds out that soon Destiny will be out of range of the planet that the 4 are stuck on and unless something is done soon, they will be lost forever as Destiny will be heading out of this Galaxy and onto the next. Within minutes of this explanation power shuts down in systems of the ship.

According to Rush, he believes the ship is going into a power saving mode, though life support is still fully operational; Rush says he will find a way to work around the problem, though Brody suggests they shouldn’t, since Destiny must be doing it for a reason. Meanwhile, Riley believes the power loss may be due to the fact that Destiny is old and that the computers are malfunctioning. Meanwhile, on the planet the 4 lost ones realize that they only have enough water for 2 days and will have to dig out from the tunnels to search for more. Eli deduces how to reach Destiny by drawing three overlapping circles; they can’t dial straight to Destiny, but if they can reach gates in between, they can catch up to it. However, there is a 50/50 chance they will go the wrong way and run into planets they already visited.

While trying to get out, a part of the tunnel caves in on top of Greer, knocking him unconscious  and he is separated from the other 3. By the time he comes the other have made their way on without him as they can’t contact him. Greer frantically manages to dig his way out and tries to catch up with them. Scott, Eli & Chloe make it outside the tunnels and go to the Stargate and dial out to another planet; Greer just misses them as he comes out of the tunnels. The other 3 encounter a dinosaur like creature on the first planet that they enter and leave immediately.  On Destiny, while rescue attempts are being made to find their lost team members, TJ informs Young that she is pregnant and that he is the father. As Greer waits at the planet’s Stargate he is met by Lt.James and team and they bring him back to Destiny.

Although Greer is returned back to the crew, they still haven’t been able to get Eli, Chloe and Scott. As the ship moves back into FTL, Greer retires sullenly to his quarters. And the 3 lost crew know that they have just missed dialing to Destiny’s stargate and perhaps can never find their way back to them.

The repository of knowledge chair which was deemed to be highly dangerous and which Col. Young had asked everyone to stay away from proves to be too tempting for Dr. Rush. Taking Brody’s help Rush  finds a way to modify the chair in such a way that no harm comes to those using it, and this is the only way to unlock control of Destiny. Young is upset but Brody says that with or without his help Rush was gonna use the chair.

Meanwhile Rush is led to a visionary quest in his mind – he is back on Earth and in his house. He meets his ailing wife but goes about his way as he is aware that this is just an illusion. While at the university teaching his class, Rush sees a lot of Ancient symbols streaming in front of him. in his home office, the walls are completely plastered with papers full of notes and calculations, as well as a whiteboard filled with more calculations. Then Daniel Jackson comes to meet him at the university to talk about the Stargate program.

Rush already knows what Daniel wants to talk to him about; the Stargate program. He apparently knows what he is about to be told about the ninth chevron and the Icarus project. He admits that this already happened; he is experiencing a vision of what already happened two years ago, a side-affect of what he is trying to accomplish in the present. Young wants Rush removed, but Brody says that only Rush can disengage the interface safely; if he is forced out, it could kill him. Brody also reveals that they created a buffer to slow down the transfer of information and limit it to a small portion of his memory center; Rush is having a semi-lucid dream whilst gathering the information. Once he finds enough clues, he will simply have to walk through a certain door, and he will return, hopefully unharmed. Since T.J. believes he is stable for now, Young allows the experiment to continue, but orders Brody to pull the plug should that change.

By this time Destiny comes out of FTL near a planet and Lt. Scott, Greer, Chloe & Eli set out to explore it with just 6 hours showing on the clock before the ship goes off into FTL again. On the surface near the gate they find some ruins which does not look to be of a highly advanced culture. They go into a network of tunnels and run into a giant spider which Greer kills by shooting his machine gun. However the tunnel collapses sealing the team inside and Young sends another team to dig them out. Although they try to blast a new opening, it only makes things worse and Scott orders the team to go back to the ship and leave his group behind.

On the ship Rush comes out of his vision after saying goodbye to his wife. He has learned a lot about the ship while on his vision but not enough to stop the ship. As the countdown ends, Destiny takes off into FTL leaving Eli, Chloe, Scott & Greer on the planet and stuck in the dark tunnels.  Rush tells Young that he will work on gaining the controls of the ship in order for Young to get back the team stranded on the planet.

The tensions after the unsuccessful attempt by the civilians to take over the ship haven’t completely died down. Col. Young in an attempt to cool things down has ordered the soldiers to try and bridge back relations with the rest and himself tries to patch things up with Dr.Rush. Suddenly Destiny drops out of FTL and into normal space but there are no planets nearby and the stargate hasn’t dialed either. They notice that there is star in front of them; one similar to Earth’s sun and which Destiny was not aware off. It was the proximity to the sun’s gravity which caused the ship to drop out of FTL.

Because of this, Destiny is now performing a parabolic course around the sun, which will take a few weeks. By the time Destiny leaves the system, it will resume its course. Rush also makes another discovery; there’s a planet almost identical to Earth in size and climate orbiting the star, and it’s within shuttle range. In investigating the reason Destiny did not know about this system, Rush and Eli can find no glitch. A team comprised of Scott, Greer, T.J, and Dr. Caine take the shuttle to the planet and land near some woodland. They exit the shuttle to check the surrounding area. T.J. takes a sample of water from a stream and tests it’s purity. Discovery of a kiwi like fruit brings excitement to the team and they bring back supplies of plant life.

Rush has calculated that Destiny is going to jump back into FTL in four weeks, two days, and seven hours, and suggests they use the time to send some people on the planet. So it is decided to let a team go down to the planet for that duration in a shuttle and stock up on supplies; when the Destiny comes back into range the team will join them back. Once on the planet Lt. Scott hands out jobs & assignments and pitching of tents and shelter. As the weeks pass the people on the planet have a great time and are enjoying the outdoors, playing make-shift soccer matches and swimming in the lake. They also discover a strange & alien looking obelix which emits a strange light & radiation towards the end of the month. By this time, Lt. Scott gets the team to ready their supplies and head on their way back to Destiny – but there is a catch. Some of the people don’t want to leave the planet!

The team becomes divided and has arguments as to whether the aliens who created the planet & the obelisk would be hostile or not and that staying back would mean death. Finally, T.J. admits she is pregnant, a fact only previously known to Chloe, and she can’t bear the thought of raising her child on Destiny. Scott reports the problem with Young, who is adamant that they return. Scott tells him that, in total, eleven people have decided to stay, including Caine, Chloe, T.J., and himself. Later, Young tells the news with Rush and Wray; Scott believes he has the obligation to protect those on the planet, and wonders what to do with them. Wray believes they shouldn’t force them out of the planet; Rush believes otherwise, since they can’t risk any more losses. He believes Young should retrieve those who wish to return, and then have the rest rounded up by force. Young however, has another plan in mind.

Young decides to take the damaged shuttle which can land on the planet but will not be able to make it out of orbit again. He lets some people who want to stay, stay back on the planet provided that all the military personnel come back with him to Destiny. He will give the people who stay back on the planet the damaged shuttle for shelter and fly-overs. Most of the military personnel come as ordered, and he convinces T.J. and Scott that the crew aboard the ship need them just as much as those on the planet will. Caine and about six other civilians remain behind, while everyone else comes back without incident. Chloe decides to come back to Destiny. The ship soon jumps into FTL again and the crew, minus 7 who stayed back on the planet, enjoy a feast in the mess hall.

After Space, the divisions between the crew of the Destiny becomes very obvious and to the forefront. Chloe suffers a nightmare that brings back her memories of the abduction by the blue aliens. Camile’s people join Rush and tae advantage of the absence of Young & Scott – who have taken a shuttle to take a look at the ship’s hull & to dislodge & destroy a alien fighter, which has docked on Destiny – and take control of the ship.

Rush has control of most of the vital systems. He seals off a series of doors, creating two separate sections of the ship; one side has the civilians, while the other contains the military. Young, Scott and Greer are with Eli in the control interface room, which is on the military side of the ship. There, Eli discovers that Rush stopped the transfer prematurely, preventing him from taking control of the ship’s life support. Young radios Rush and notes that he has his full attention, and wishes to hear Rush’s demands. Rush asks that all military personnel are to relinquish their weapons, and submit to civilian authority, since he believes that Young is running the Expedition like a military dictatorship. When Young points out that Eli has control of life support, Rush counters with the fact that, since their side of the ship is much larger, and they have the hydroponics lab that is supplying some oxygen, it would take three days for the air supply to diminish completely. By this time, dehydration would claim those on Young’s side, and no side would win.

Slowly and methodically the military takes back control of the ship. It is also discovered that the blue aliens had placed a tracking device into the flesh of Dr. Rush. Using some of the venom of the alien on the planet that they had visited, TJ removes the tracking device from Rush and destroys it. After the ship jumps off into ftl, Young orders all the civilians back to their quarters. His brief talk with Camile indicates that the struggle for power isn’t done and that leaving Rush on the alien planet wasn’t a good idea.

A week passes by after the events of Justice (in reality for us a few months as the network wanted to wait until after the 2010 Olympics had ended) and Col Young is coming to terms with his decision of leaving Dr. Rush on the barren planet. Camille suspects that Young may have killed Rush due to tensions between the two and she confronts the former about it. When Young decides to report to Earth by using the communication stones, instead of his mind being switched with the body of a Stargate Command personnel,  Young finds himself on an alien spaceship!

He watches a blue alien on a platform in the ship. Meanwhile the alien who is now in Young’s body attacks the crew of Destiny. The stone is replaced and the minds are reversed back. What we later find is that Dr. Rush took one of the stones with him and he was found by the blue aliens on the barren planet, when he accidentally triggered a distress signal on the deserted ship on the planet. The aliens have probed Rush’s mind and are now interested in Destiny.

After the ship drops out of FTL drive, they see the aliens mothership following them and soon attacking them by using several smaller ships. One of the smaller shuttles breaches Destiny’s shield and cut a hole on the ship. They abduct Chloe and then take off in their ships. . Scott requests that they send the shuttle back out to retrieve Chloe, as the ship hasn’t tried to depart. Young denies the request. He also believes that the attack may have been a distraction to take prisoners. He wants to rescue her his way, by using the communication stones.

Once again Young uses the stones and switches bodies with an alien on the ship. In the blue alien’s body, Young explores the huge ship and finds to his surprise, a tank in which a very much alive Rush is kept. He frees Rush and convinces the scientist that he is Young. Meanwhile, Young’s body is kept restrained but the stones stop working due to the influence of the alien’s devices. Now the alien on the ship attacks Rush, who overpowers and kills it.

The alien ship begins to attack Destiny again, this time more aggressively. Knowing through Rush that Chloe is also on the ship, Rush goes in search of her and rescues her. Having learned the layout of the vessel, he takes her to the fighter bay. Meanwhile, Greer and Scott, having yet to launch the shuttle, notice that the fighters are retreating again, except for one. Rush and Chloe are in it and climb back aboard the Destiny and reunite with the crew.

In the mess hall, Rush tells Eli, Chloe, Scott, and Volker that after he was able to “free himself” from the “rock slide”, going along with Young’s claim, he entered the crashed ship, and began checking the systems and explains how the aliens found him. Later Rush & Young agree to put aside their differences for the sake of the crew. In the final scene, Rush meets with Wray in the hydroponics room. They both agree that Young is dangerous, and Rush points out that he was nearly killed when he tried to do something about it. She assures him that “Next time will be different.”

Justice is the 10th and mid-season finale of the first season of Stargate Universe. Spencer is found dead in his quarters, seemingly like a suicide with however one issue: there’s no gun. Greer, who found the body, reports back to his superiors and an investigation is on. Colonel Young has everybody meet in the Gate room, and announces their findings to the crew. Eli, Brody, Matthew Scott, Lisa Park and Vanessa James were playing poker in the Mess hall at the time of the murder, meaning they have an alibi, so they are put in charge of the investigation.

Eli & Scott find the gun in Col. Young’s room! Despite it being obviously a plot to undermine his authority, Young steps down as commander of the crew and puts Camile in charge. A hearing is called for with Camile prosecuting and Chloe defending. While the investigation is going on, Rush comes to Camile and asks that he will report to her but wants complete control of his science team. She agrees. Later Franklin sits in the chair and he is found convulsing and two electrodes stuck on the sides of his head.

Rush is berated by Young as being too scared to sit in the chair and hence encouraging Franklin to test it out. Destiny meanwhile comes out of FTL and the crew plan to visit a planet for supplies and anything useful. By then the Kino’s files, which have been tampered with, is recovered via backup by Eli and Young watches the screen as Dr. Rush is clearly shown removing the gun from Spencer’s room and placing it in Young’s quarters to frame him. The rest of crew is shown only Spencer committing suicide – not the part in which Rush enters the scene.

Camile relinquishes command to Young who decides to join the team that has gone down to the planet and confront Rush. The away team has found an alien vessel lying on top of a small hill. Their attempts to enter it is in vain but Rush wants to keep trying. Young sends everyone back to the Stargate and stays back with Rush in order to confront him. A scuffle occurs and when Rush refuses to agree to stop, Young head-butts him unconscious….and leaves Rush on the planet. As he steps through the gate into Destiny, he tells the others that a landslide caught Rush and that he was unable to save him.

The others do not believe Young, especially Eli, Camile and the scientists. However the crew settles back as the go to FTL. Later Rush is shown regaining consciousness and realizing in horror that he has been left behind on the barren planet.

The episode stars with Chloe doing yoga in the observation room. Lt.Scott and the military men led some of the others in a physical training session. We also see Dr. Lisa Park getting intimate with one man and then later on ignoring him and having sex with another. TJ is worried about Spencer’s mental health.

Rush has Eli use the kinos to help search new sections of the ship that they have recently opened up. They discover the chair (pictured above), which is known as a Repository of Knowledge and connects to a person through nero-circuitry and may hold the master code to the ship’s systems. Meanwhile Col.Telford has struck a friendship with Col.Young’s wife Emily.

TJ is asked by Young to do pysch evaluations of everyone as he is worried about the crew. Using the stones, Scott goes to see the girl he got pregnant and finds out he has a son. He tells the girl that Scott wants to transfer his pay to her account so she can quit exotic dancing and go back to school, but the proud girl refuses. Camille Wray meanwhile, in the body of a young Caucasian soldier, goes to meet her lover Sharon. It takes little convincing for Sharon that the young lady in front of her is Camille.  They enjoy a day of good food, wine and sex.

Young finds out that Telford is visiting Emily and confronts the two. Emily says that he is just her friend but she also believes that Young is having an affair with a woman on the ship (believed to be TJ). Before Young can attack Telford, the latter has someone removed the stones, thereby severing the link. Later on Earth, Volker arrives in another body via the stones. Telford is seen exiting a house. He’s then assaulted by an airman. It is revealed that it wasn’t Volker but Young using the stones all along, so that he could assault Telford.

Rush is caught in a lie – in order to get someone to sit on the chair and activate the neuro-link, he falsified data about a planet, one year away, from where they can dial Earth. The brief happiness in the crew is brought down to a sudden death when they learn that the data is false. Thus ends a bad day, as Young puts it.

Episode 8 is my least  favourite of the 10 that the makers of Stargate : Universe have aired so far. The reason – it features that demon of all sci-fi franchises; alternate realities!

I hate the multiple alternate realities concept as a plot in any sci-fi series. I can barely stand time travel as a plot even though it has given us some funny & memorable episodes across shows. But alternate realities is a multi-headed monster child that doesn’t hold much appeal for me. And Time hasn’t changed my mind at all. Also it looks heavily influenced by the Alien movie franchise!

An away team from the Destiny explore a jungle planet and find a kino lying near the stargate there. When they play the video they are horrified to see that they are watching themselves come to the same planet in a different timeline. They went to the planet to find any suitable fruits and food nearby and see if it is safe to eat, or even edible, and then take them back to Destiny. An illness plagues the travelers and they are forced to quarantine themselves on the planet.

The kino records the team falling sick and waiting as the time passes and it gets dark. Then a heavy rain fall on the jungle while more of the away team falls sick. And then the alien creature starts to attack: first Brody and then Chloe are killed as the rest shoot at the creatures. This is when we are made aware that these scenes are being watched on the Kino viewing room. Apparently solar flares interrupted with the stargate and caused the the wormhole disruption, which redirected the wormhole back in time to the same location. The footage shows what would happen if normal conditions applied. Now that they found the Kino when they arrived, they changed the timeline.

We then see people dying on the planet, people dying in an alternate version on the ship due to an illness caused by something in the planet. There is a tender moment when Eli sits near a dying Chloe. TJ discovers that the venom from the alien creature cures the illness that the people caught on the planet Hoth (from two episodes earlier). In order to fight the virus, they need to catch one of the creatures; alive. A team consisting of Young, Greer, Scott and Spencer go through the stargate to the planet to capture one but they are all soon killed with the exception of Scott.

Scott dials the Stargate, and waits for the event horizon to flutter. During that time, he takes out a Kino and records a message, summarizing everything that is going to happen to the Destiny in our reality.He explains that they got a virus from Hoth, and that the deadly creatures are their best chance for the cure. He also explains they live in mounds, so they can find a live specimen during the day without getting attacked. After he sees the Stargate is malfunctioning, he prepares to send it though so that the team from our reality will find it and heed his warning. Before ending the transmission, he begs them to believe him, and urges them to act fast or everyone will die.

The episode ends here.

After the last episode, the IOC informs the Col. Young & Camile Wray that they may have found a way to bring the crew of the Destiny back home. An IOA operative Strom (played by Carlo Rota) then admits to Wray that he didn’t want to talk to Nicholas Rush, since the IOA is not convinced he wants to return home. The plan is to drain the ship’s power so that it will go to the nearest star and use that power to dial Earth via the stargate.

Young, Eli and Chloe use the communication stones to visit their loved ones while inhabiting other people’s bodies. Chloe and Eli go to a nightclub with Chloe’s friends and she finds out that things were not all what she seemed. Eli is meanwhile happy that girls seem to notice him (although it is someone else’s body) and is thrilled when a girl asks him to dance.

Young meanwhile visits his wife and after initial resistance, he makes love to his wife Emily using Col. Telford’s body. There is a scene in which, when the ship drops out of FTL, it causes a brief disruption in the communication stones’ link and the bodies swap back to their original ones during that gap. Hence Telford momentarily finds himself in bed making love to Emily. Seconds later, they swap bodies again. Both Telford and Young in particular shocked.

However the plan to drain the power and using the star’s energy to power up & dial the stargate doesn’t seem to be working, with a malfunction occurring  and Col. Telford and his two associates bail out by using the stones and returning back to their original bodies on Earth. The crew of the Destiny are told by Young that their return home will be through another way and that it will take some time. Rush had setup the whole thing; he knows that the plan will not work and they’d all die even if he didn’t stage the malfunction. He also couldn’t risk warning anyone because he didn’t know who to trust.

The crew of the ‘Destiny’ find out that their water supply has been disappearing mysteriously. Col. Young posts soldiers to guard their supply, some of which they initially think had evaporated when they entered the star. However that theory is soon ruled out. Young asks Dr. Rush about the possibility of dialing Earth from their Stargate but the scientist replies that as ‘Destiny’ is very old it could only charge upto 40% of it’s actual capacity when it entered the star.

Meanwhile Eli is asked to spy on the rest of the crew to see if anyone is stealing the water. As tensions start to mount, the ship dials the gate of an icy cold planet which has potentially a large supply of drinking water in the form of solid ice. Lisa Park and two other scientists have worked on repairing two Ancient environmental suits and Young & Lt. Scot are given plasma cutters to cut off huge blocks of ice which can replenish some of their water supplies.

Spencer is caught hoarding two cans of water and several energy bars, which he protests that he took before they entered Destiny. However the rest of the crew know that he was holding out on them to satisfy his own needs before the others.  Tamara Johansen meanwhile confronts an alien entity that resemble swarms of flies and which had followed Lt.Scot from the desert planet. These flies are the culprit, draining the water supply. Unfortunately Gorman provokes the swarm by firing at them and they retaliate by cutting his skin several times. After losing a lot of blood, he dies in the makeshift infirmary. Tamara lures the bugs into a barrel of water and they toss the barrel through the stargate into the ice planet.

Meanwhile Scot & Young have brought back a lot of water which will suffice for the time being. They almost lost Scot when he fell into a crevasse and it was with Col. Young’s help that he was able to pull himself back up again before the Destiny entered FTL again.

Stargate: Universe follows a more continuous style of flow to the series rather than the more normal episodic or different story type versions as compared to SG1 or Atlantis. The first 3 episodes were in fact 3 parts. The same follows for episodes 4 & 5 – part one is Darkness and part two is Light – very appropriately named as you will soon find out.

A day after the life support has been fixed (which was at the end of episode 3), Dr. Nicholas Rush attempts to repair other systems on the Ancient ship Destiny. Tired & shaken an exhausted Rush snaps at others when they ask for his opinion and finally has a nervous breakdown. The crew discover 90,000 liters of water which is good enough to loosen the reins of rations. The systems are being drained of power which is a major concern. The crew meanwhile decide to record individual messages on the Kinos in case someone discovers the ship years later.

Lt. Scot is ordered by Col. Young to work on the working shuttle and Adam Brody is fetched to translate the controls from Ancient to English to help the process along. While Chloe takes a shower Eli is confronted by many of the crew who want him to be their man within the military personnel and Rush and inform them of any developments. Soon many systems start failing due to lack of power and finally the FLT drive also stops. Destiny approaches a star system.

A now calmer Rush enters into the shuttle with Young, TJ, Greer and Scott. Rush remarks that some of the stickers with the translations Brody added were backwards. With the ship going to pass through a gas giant (which Scott names Big Bertha), they will use its gravity to slingshot the ship deeper into the star system, hopefully finding out if any of the planets are habitable. They have six minutes until this happens. By then, they have to spread the word for everyone to brace themselves for the upcoming turbulence.

The plan works, however Rush notes that the trajectory has altered more than they expected and Destiny is headed straight for a giant star and what they know is instant doom!

Espiode5, Light, starts with the crew looking at an inevitable crash into the star and despite 3 planets nearby they have no way of altering the ship’s course. However the second shuttle is working and it has power and can sustain 17 passengers. Col Young, as leader of the mission, announces to the crew that they are to have a lottery to decide who are the 13 people selected to go on the shuttle – he has already decided that 2 people must go by default – Lt.Scot as only he can fly the shuttle and TJ as she is the only medic.

Young has already decided to exclude his own name from the lottery and later Dr. Rush also decides to do the same. Eli watches in pain as Scot & Chloe go hand in hand to be alone, where they kiss and then make love. In Chloe’s mind, she is saying goodbye as she doesn’t believe that she will be going. Meanwhile two of the 3 planets are rules out – one is too hot and the other too cold. That leaves the 3rd which is harsh and it will be tough but they will be able to survive there.

At the predetermined time the remaining 13 are called out and they enter the shuttle along with TJ and Scot. The rest of the crew retire to their quarters and wait for the inevitable death as the ship reached the star. A little later Rush comes out of this quarters and notices a system coming online – the ships’ shields are protecting it and the crew from burning up and the ship is also drawing in power from the star! Lights start coming on everywhere in the ship and power is being restored. The ship actually is programmed to approach a star to recharge it’s power.

Now the crew on board the Destiny inform the shuttle of the situation and after a tough maneuvering, Lt. Scot is able to land the shuttle back onto Destiny and the jubilant crew is reunited. Although he initially commends Dr.Rush on his bravery & sacrificing his chances on the lottery, as the scientist dismisses it, Col. Young suspects that Rush knew all along that the ship had a plan to recharge all along.

The third live action series that sprang forth from the original movie Stargate is Stargate : Universe. The first 10 episodes have been aired live in the US, UK & Canada. I don’t get it on cable tv here in India as of yet, but I am able to download them from torrent files.

When the series opens we seen a huge & long Ancient ship, which we later learn was named Destity, emerge from hyperspace. One by one the characters drop through the stargate built into the ship, tumbling as they all flee destruction. Flying equipment hits the stumbling survivors, some injured and bleeding. We see the brilliant scientist Nicholas Rush (Robert Carlyle), Colonel Everett Young (Louis Ferreira) and Lt. Matthew Scott (Brian J Smith). There’s Eli Wallace (David Blue), Lt. Tamara Johansen (Alaina Huffman), Sg. Ronald Greer (Jamil Walker) & Chloe Armstrong (Elyse Levesque) whose Senator father sacrifices himself to save the rest.

The survivors are from the Icarus Base, on a planet many light years from Earth, where they they tried to use the planet’s unique radioactive core to power a Stargate and dial the 9th Chevron which has eluded them so far. The planet is attacked by alien ships and the base is evacuated through the Stargate onto Destiny just before the planet explodes. Thus our cast is lost on a million year old Ancient Ship and they have no way of dialing Earth and returning home.

Tensions run high as most people don’t trust Dr. Rush who assumes command as the Col is injured. Supplies are short and the ship’s life support systems aren’t functioning properly. They find a holographic log of the ship’s journey. This map shows Destiny’s original departure from Earth millions of years ago and its passage through numerous galaxies, placing them currently several billions of light years from home. They also find that a ruptured hull on one of the ship’s shuttles is causing the air to leak out and that the CO2 scrubbers need to be cleaned.

Chloe’s injured father Senator Armstrong (Christopher MacDonald) sacrifices himself by sealing himself in the shuttle, buying the rest of the reluctant crew some more time of breathable air by stopping the air leak. The ship stops near a planet and the crew see that they have 12 hours before the ship’s FTL drive starts up again. A seven member team is sent to find supplies or help on the planet. If they don’t make it back in 12 hours, the ship will leave without them and they have no means of getting back.

Dr. Rush, Eli, Lt. Scot, Sg. Greer, a soldier and 2 scientist search the desert planet for an area where the sand contains gypsum, to make a solution that can scrub the CO2 scrubbers and get breathable air working again on the ship. The team split up into two but the two scientists and the soldier want to try one of the other planets. They dial the stargate and enter the portal but a returning Greer shoots Frankin (a scientist) in the arm, preventing him from leaving.

Lt. Scot finally finds the needed substance and they arrive just back in time to reach the gate and exit into the ship. The crew has lost two members already. However as the ship leaves orbit, the CO2 scrubbers are clean and the pure air starts pumping in much to the relief of the crew. We see the survivors breathing easily as life support returns to normal and the immediate danger of death via asphyxiation is averted. But the crew is heading into the unknown with no way of reaching Earth.