Stargate is honestly the greatest Sci-fi series of all time and i will fight you on this
Samantha Carter and Janet Fraiser are two of the greatest female role models in scifi canon. Both are brilliant, super competent at their jobs, not sexualised but not desexualised, and they’re friends with and support each other. Both are ranking members of the US airforce, and have a core belief of helping people and doing the right thing. But they’re both human. They get to be fallible, they get to be angry, and frustrated, and sad, and flustered, and it never invalidates their abilities or importance.
Daniel Jackson is the scifi hero we all deserve. He’s kind, gentle, and so damn excited about learning. Just learning more. His life has been so crap any other show would have turned him into a broody mess but no, not Daniel. Even at his lowest and sourest, he still desperatly wants to help others, to preserve other cultures, and save people. He literally dies for it. Multiple times. He’s a scifi explorer who honestly loves exploring. He truly loves it
And then Jack again could have been the most grizzled anti hero imaginable (hello movie!jack), but instead we have this kind, kooky, sarcastic space hero who just wants to be everyone’s dad and protect people from bad things. But at the same time he never folds on his principles, or who he is.
Teal’c could have been this hostile angry alien, or this overplayed goofball who doesn’t ‘get’ humanity. But instead they gave us someone serene and gentle, but proud and fierce. Someone who actually believed that they might loose their fight against his oppressors, but was willing to die trying, and willing to help others along the way.
And finally general Hammond. He could have been an obstructive burocrat, a pencil pusher with no respect for the other races they encounter, but instead he is the most sensible and level headed man in the series. and he cares This is a man who has the president on speed dial 2, behind his granddaughters, but he will miss his granddaughters recital if one of his team is missing in the field. This is a man who loves his team so much that he all but admits he would rather have Teal’c die than hand him over to the tortures of the goverment when he goes evil, because he ‘won’t do that to him’. He never over plays it into incompitence though. He is always logical and practicle about his decisions. This is a man who continously strives to do the right thing not just for his people, but for his planet, and his galaxy.
I could write a billion love letters to this perfect series that is an example of how amazing Sci-Fi can be if you just have characters who care.
