Not that long ago, Dr. Rodney McKay and Dr. Daniel Jackson had a heart-to-heart conversation that went something like this in Martin Gero’s “First Contact”:
DANIEL
I’ve…spent the majority of my professional life being ridiculed for my theories—most of which turned out to be correct, by the way. I’m kinda used to it, Rodney.[McKay slumps back in his chair and sighs.]
MCKAY
Doesn’t that bother you? I mean, no vindication, no recognition, no…credit?DANIEL
Well, I could say the same thing about you. The discoveries you’ve made, you…probably could’ve won the Nobel Prize five times over by now.MCKAY
(relaxing)
Too true. So, I guess none of us signed up to get famous, huh?DANIEL
(deadpan)
No, we did it for the money.[Daniel grins. McKay snickers.]
MCKAY
Good one.
(sobering)
Wait a minute—you don’t get paid more than I do, do you?
Tonight, Gero continues to address McKay’s insecurities and lack of vindication, as well as his envy of those who make more money than he does for his work, in “Brain Storm”, an episode which he also directed. McKay gets an invitation from an old science rival of his, Dr. Malcolm Tunney, portrayed by Talk Radio‘s Dave Foley, to witness the activation of Tunney’s new invention.
“Publically he’s very successful, which McKay finds incredibly galling, because McKay is like a hundred times more successful than he is, but he can’t tell anybody that,” executive producer Joseph Mallozzi told SCI FI WIRE. “He’s really annoyed. McKay wants to find out what this guy is up to. He takes this guy up on his invitation, and he invites Keller along as his date.
“They are picked up in a Lear jet and taken to this remote location where Tunney informs them that he’s been working on his own green initiative: the means to eliminate greenhouse gases by creating a bridge to alternate universes and sending the heat out that way. Which sounds incredibly familiar to McKay, because he invented it back in ‘McKay and Ms. Miller.’”
Several of science’s great minds meet at the “Carl Binder Memorial Theatre” (see Mallozzi’s weblog for the in-joke of naming this fictional location after the still living writer-producer Carl Binder and for more behind-the-scenes pictures at the high school gym location shoot), including real-life astrophysicist Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson, who makes a cameo appearance. To top it off, Bill Nye (The Science Guy) also got an invitation! “They turned out to be a lot of fun both in front of and away from the camera, regaling the rest of the cast and crew with stories of their empirical exploits. They seemed to be as happy to be there as we were to have them,” Mallozzi wrote.
“Martin told us it was really fun having Bill and Dr. Tyson on set because they are incredibly knowledgeable about the scientific world,” script coordinator Alex Levine wrote in his scifi.com blog. “And they are both engaging and were very friendly with the crew and other actors. At one point, one of the grips asked Dr. Tyson if we really ever landed on the moon. Well, instead of sloughing him off, Dr. Tyson waited for a break in the action, went over to him, and explained the scientific evidence that backs up our lunar landing.”
After all of his invitees are settled down in the auditorium, Tunney turns on his device … and then things go terribly wrong! Tune in tonight at 9 pm (repeat at 11 pm) on the Sci Fi Channel to see how fortunate everybody is that Dr. Rodney McKay knows how to use his brain, even when in the face of a storm.
Preview Video – Beware of Spoilers! –
Solutions Coverage –
- Episode Guide (includes spoilers and links to other articles of interest about the episode)
- On site forum: SGA S5 Discussion Board
- Live Journal
[Images from MGM. Transcript excerpt by Aurora Novarum for the Solutions Stargate Wiki.]