Beware of spoilers for the episode below!
“We came up with an idea where I get stuck on a planet that has a different time ratio, and I actually age faster,” Flanigan revealed. “I go through the threshold and I’m waiting for McKay and the rest of the team to go through, and they don’t come through. And a year goes by and I’m stuck on this planet with these other people, and I’ve got a beard and everything else and I’ve become sort of the de facto sheriff.
“And McKay shows up and only five minutes has gone by in his world. And, of course, I say, ‘Where the hell have you been?’ And he says, ‘What are you talking about? It’s only been five minutes.’
“And it’s a planet of people who are going to ascend. And the Ancients went onto this planet and to get away from the Wraith they put it under a different time dilation device, a different time ratio, and they ascended. And there’s a group of people who weren’t capable of ascending, and those are the people we deal with.”
“Epiphany” wasn’t the first idea that Flanigan pitched to the show’s producers. “I had an idea for ‘The Man Who Would Be King,'” the actor said. “It was me and McKay discovering Z.P.M.s and becoming greedy and kind of drunk with power. And I thought that that would make for a great episode. And I got the standard reply that I always get when I pitch a story, which is, ‘Oh, we did that on SG-1, Joe. Episode 157 … haven’t you seen it?’
“And so we had to come up with an episode that obviously hadn’t been done, which is very difficult because Stargate has been on the air for a few thousand years.”
Executive producer Brad Wright is writing the teleplay for “Epiphany,” which is expected to go before cameras shortly after the cast and crew return from their summer hiatus in July. The episode will likely air in January on The SCI FI Channel.
Season Two premieres July 15 in the U.S.