New season premieres come up threes

The ninth season of Stargate SG-1 will begin with a 3-part episode, executive producer Joseph Mallozzi revealed in a message at GateWorld Forum. Companion show Stargate Atlantis will debut with “The Siege, Part 3,” finishing up the story begun with Season One’s 2-part finale.

Beware of some spoilers in the report below.

Little is currently known about the SG-1 Season Nine premiere, but the episodes will introduce new regular characters Lieutenant Colonel Cameron Mitchell (Ben Browder) and General Hank Landry (Beau Bridges). Vala (Claudia Black) will also return for the first five episodes of the season. The bounty hunter made her debut in Season Eight’s “Prometheus Unbound.”

Personal and professional issues will take Samantha Carter (Amanda Tapping) away from the S.G.C. for a few months. Tapping, whose baby is due next month, is expected to return full-time for the sixth episode of the season.

Actress April Telek has been cast as a character named “Sallis” for the Season Nine premiere’s second and third installments, according to the Internet Movie Database.

Season Nine will introduce a new enemy, and fans reporting from this past weekend’s official Stargate convention in Dallas, Texas tell us that they have a name: the Oree. Actor Michael Shanks (“Daniel Jackson”) reportedly told attendees that the beings are essentially Ancients who have turned evil.

Enemies old and new will be featured in the second season of Stargate Atlantis, starting of course with the central series baddies, the Wraith. “We’ll be learning a lot more about the Wraith in the coming year,” Mallozzi told fans at GateWorld Forum. The writers have also discussed a storyline involving the race that engineered the nanovirus (“Hot Zone”). “Hopefully, [we] will see them make an appearance in the second half of Season Two,” Mallozzi said.

“We’ll [also] be finding out a lot more about the Ancients in Season Two. … Brad [Wright] and Robert [Cooper, executive producers] have a whole, intricate backstory for the Ancients that they’re sharing with us piecemeal over the course of the year.”

“The Siege, Part 1” airs Friday, March 18 on The SCI FI Channel. The new seasons will begin this summer!

(Thanks to Lucas Henderson, Denise, Wass, and Andrew Clarke for contributing)