Tonight’s episode of Stargate Atlantis, “Missing”, was written by Carl Binder and directed by Andy Mikita. Script coordinator Alex Levine wrote in his scifi.com blog, “Missing is almost a two-hander, as Teyla and the good doctor Jennifer Keller dominate the screen time. But really, it’s an action packed character study of two strong women in a terrible situation. Personally, it’s the character stuff that interests me the most, although I’m also a sucker for big special effects sequences. But when you get to watch a new character, like Keller, go through events that really bring out what she’s made of, that’s when it gets exciting for me. And I think, also, that the character stuff is why people tune in week in and week out.”
Executive producer and co-showrunner Joseph Mallozzi talked with MSN TV Blog about Dr. Jennifer Keller: “She really is the fish out of water, and we really explore that in the episode called “Missing”. She goes off to New Athos with Teyla just to do some checkups on some local Athosian kids and things go horribly awry. Her idea of roughing it was the summer camp she used to attend as a kid. She finds herself on the run for her life, kind of a city girl in the back country with only Teyla there to protect her. Teyla has her hands full with her and is a little impatient with her. I think this episode is our Thelma and Louise episode, if you could call it that. So that’s a fun episode that explores the character. She’s obviously well-educated, she’s young, very capable, but at the same time a little naive just in terms of her expectations regarding the Pegasus galaxy. She’s an interesting character that we get to know more of in “Missing,” and then we explore a lot more in the back half of Season Four.”
Mallozzi told a behind-the-scenes tale in his personal blog about how Jewel Staite, who plays Keller, braved crossing a rope bridge built especially for the episode. “Director Andy Mikita assured her that he wouldn’t need much from her. He would yell ‘Action!’ and she would start walking across the scary-as-hell bridge – maybe two or three steps – at which point he would yell ‘Cut!’ and she could turn around and head back to the relative safety of solid ground. Jewel was game. So Andy yelled ‘Action!’ and Jewel started walking. And walking. And waiting for someone to yell ‘Cut!’. And walking. And walking…past the halfway point of the bridge. What a trooper. Apparently, heights aren’t a problem for Jewel as she performed most of the rope bridge stunts herself including the…well, I don’t want to give it away. Check out [the] episode and watch for this memorable sequence.” This memorable sequence might be where Keller ends up dangling from the bridge as seen in the previews put together by MGM and Sci Fi (look for links at the end of this article).
Keller is accompanying Teyla to New Athos to treat the Athosians, just like Dr. Carson Beckett used to do. She’s not comfortable with going off-world, and is especially uneasy because Beckett’s shoes are incredibly big to fill. Still, she packs her medical supplies and lots of lollipops for the kids. Immediately upon arrival at the village, Teyla senses something is wrong. Her people are missing, and in their stead, they encounter the primitive tribesmen of the Bola Kai, a new villain met by the Expedition in the Pegasus Galaxy. And according to Levine, they’re “pretty cool” when he added to “look for the lollipop shot, you’ll know what I mean when you see it.”
Levine wrote, “Carl [Binder, writer] said the genesis of the story was that he wanted to take some of our characters and isolate them from their technology, so it’s basically a survivor scenario.” In this environment, we’ll see the warrior side of Teyla emerge. Mallozzi said in the MSN TV Blog interview, “You see the true warrior come out. We’ve seen the noble warrior, the leader, sort of the forthright, clear-minded, powerful role model if you will that we’ve established in previous seasons. One of the things we set out to do in Season Four is say, ‘Well let’s see the dark side of that.’ Because as a warrior, she kills people. We demonstrate Teyla as an individual, where she’s a warrior who makes use of her skills, but when it’s life or death, she has to make decisions that are shocking.
“We’ve got this one sequence where she takes on a bunch of warriors, she kills a bunch of them and one takes off. She chases him down and kills him. And Dr. Keller is horrified. [Teyla]’s like, ‘This is reality. If he gets away to his band, he’ll give us up. I had no choice but to kill him.’ That’s an aspect of the Teyla character that we wouldn’t have seen the first two or three years but is a reality if she were in that scenario. If she were in that scenario, that’s exactly what she would do. It was an opportunity to see a bit of the darker side of her and some of the other characters as well.”
Levine did say this episode was “action-packed”, and to attest to this, viewers will see the fighting side of Teyla’s nature come on full force. Those interested in the behind-the-scenes production process of Stargate may be interested in visiting the MGM site to view the featurette “Anatomy of a Fight” wherein stunt and fight coordinator James “BamBam” Bamford takes the viewer through the step-by-step process of filming a fight scene for this episode.
Mallozzi added in his personal blog, “It’s an episode that explores the darker facet of Teyla’s warrior persona, and also sets up one of this season’s major story arcs.” Witness the beginning of this arc by tuning in tonight at 10pm Eastern on the Sci Fi Channel. Take note that the schedule is still a bit off as Battlestar Galactica: Razor “flashback” scenes are being shown during Flash Gordon. Also, take note that although the scifi.com schedulebot doesn’t reflect a change in Sci Fi Friday’s line-up, TV Guide has listed that Flash Gordon has been moved to 8pm, with a repeat of last week’s Atlantis episode, “Tabula Rasa”, at 9pm.
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