"Search and Rescue"
Atlantis: Season Five
First Aired: July 11, 2008
First Aired: July 11, 2008
After a conflict with Michael leaves several Atlantis personnel trapped, Colonel Carter leads a rescue mission — unaware that Michael is still nearby.
“Search and Rescue” Facts:
- Samantha Carter exits Atlantis in the show’s fifth season premiere, with actress Amanda Tapping departing the show’s main cast roster after one year. Tapping was offered a lucrative deal for Season Five, but turned it down to executive produce and star in Sanctuary for SCI FI Channel. (That show ran for four seasons.)
- Sheppard’s hallucination early in the episode is the first time we’ve seen Lt. Aiden Ford (Rainbow Sun Francks) since the character was evidently killed off in Season Two.
- Teyla’s baby is born in this episode, wrapping up the storyline necessitated by Rachel Luttrell‘s real-life pregnancy. (But that’s not her son Caden who appears on screen throughout Season Five — it’s baby actress Annalise MacCulloch.)
- Teyla’s baby is named Torren — after her father, she says. But the writers never explained the name change: Teyla’s father was named Tagan, having been name-checked at her intro in the show’s first episode. (One possible explanation is that Teyla’s reference to herself as “daughter of Tagan,” in a matriarchal culture, was in fact a reference to her mother.)
- The season premiere introduced Leela Savasta as Captain Alicia Vega. In the original casting sides she was written to have a much more prominent introduction, suggesting Vega might become a significant recurring character. But the final cut of the episode brought a much smaller role, and Vega was killed off in her very next appearance (“Whispers”).
“Search and Rescue” on GateWorld:
- Episode Guide
- Episode Transcript
- Fan Reviews
- Photo Gallery
- Screencap Gallery
- Discussion Forum
- Atlantis Season Five Podcast
- Interview with Amanda Tapping (2008)
- Interview with Rachel Luttrell (2008)
- Interview with Robert Picardo (2008)
- Interview with David Hewlett (2008)
- Interview with writer Martin Gero (2008)
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Aiden Ford’s character was “evidently killed off”? I disagree. More like he was dismissed by the producers and the writers. They didn’t know if they would bring him back at some point so they decided to kill him off in the most unclear way possible.
I never understood the decision to cut Ford. He was a great character and they could have done so much more with him.
First Rainbow Sun Francks got the boot, then Torri Higginson. I always had the feeling that SGA was not loyal to it’s key cast members.
After learning Ford would be written out at the end of Season 1, I got the feeling the show’s writers just didn’t have the creativity to make the show work. He was one of the FREAKING main cast of characters they created for the show. He was a great component and, while his tendency to name things always felt forced, I thought the character had a lot of potential. Unlike Sheppard, Ford was experienced with Stargate travel. He was young, but far from inexperienced or unskilled. But as time went on, as seen in the first season, they show became… Read more »