Afterthoughts: "Search and Rescue" (Stargate Atlantis 5x01)

Aired: Friday, July 11, 2008 on Sci Fi. This is the premiere of season 5.

New regulars: The season 5 regular cast is introduced in the opening credits: Joe Flanigan (Lt. Colonel John Sheppard), Rachel Luttrell (Teyla Emmagan), Jason Momoa (Ronon Dex), Jewel Staite (Dr. Jennifer Keller), Robert Picardo (Richard Woolsey), and David Hewlett (Dr. Rodney McKay).

Guest stars: Amanda Tapping (Colonel Samantha Carter) is now a special guest star: though Carter is in command for this whole episode, Woolsey appears at the end to inform her she's been removed. Connor Trinneer (Michael) and Kavan Smith (Major Evan Lorne) appear in several scenes near the front of the episode, but then vanish. Mitch Pileggi (Colonel Steven Caldwell), seen only twice last season because of scheduling conflicts, again commands the Daedalus. Patrick Sabongui (Kanaan), the father of Teyla's child and now one of Michael's hybrids, recurs from "The Kindred" (4x18-19). New supporting cast member Leela Savasta (Captain Alicia Vega) makes a brief appearance but is not introduced, though her excellent marksmanship is. Rainbow Sun Francks (Aiden Ford), last seen in season 2, makes a very brief appearance at the top of the episode in a short dream sequence.

Creators: Directed by Andy Mikita. Written by Martin Gero.

The episode: At the end of season 4, Sheppard and his team were trapped when they got to Michael's facility before Michael and Teyla and the facility, booby trapped in case of discovery, collapsed around them. Now it turns out a badly wounded Sheppard is trapped deep in the rubble with Ronon; elsewhere McKay is trapped with Lorne. Carter and Keller arrive with a team to recover survivors with the Daedalus a few hours away, but the booby-trap had send a pulse to Michael and he arrives first, just as McKay and Lorne are rescued. Falling back to the jumpers, Carter is forced to wait for the Daedalus as Michael's hybrids start to dig Sheppard and Ronon out. At the last minute, however, the Daedalus arrives and beams them to safety. Doing so forces the ship to drop their shields during a firefight with Michael's ship, damaging the Daedalus. Sheppard refuses medical care and insists on going on the mission to rescue Teyla, which involves mounting a 302 fighter attack on Michael's ship, inciting the release of a squadron of darts; a cloaked jumper will sneak into the landing bay as the darts exit. They find Teyla just as she is about to give birth; McKay is forced to help with the delivery while Sheppard and Ronon destroy the ship's hyperdrive to prevent Michael from jumping away with them. The baby is delivered, but the jumper is gone (Michael guesses there are Atlanteans aboard, but the scene where the jumper is taken, presumably by Michael, seems to be missing); they then encounter Kanaan, who convinces them to upload into a dart, which Sheppard then flies back to Daedalus. Caldwell is now able to destroy Michael's ship. Back on Atlantis, Teyla names her son Tagan John Emmagen, after her father and Sheppard – she tells John that she had never doubted he would save her. Meanwhile, Carter, returning to the SGC for a mission to witness the Goa'uld extraction of the last clone of Ba'al (events recounted in the DVD film Stargate: Continuum), is informed by Woolsey that the IOA feels someone with a "different skill-set" is needed in Atlantis, and that he in fact will be replacing her.

Afterthoughts: The main throughline of this episode is Teyla's faith that Sheppard will rescue her and Sheppard's urgent need to do so, but there's a lot more going on. This is a nice showcase for Carter as a commander, appropriate as this is her swan song: she's making tough and effective decisions and standing up to Caldwell to make the rescue happen. There are also several tribute lines – Sheppard says he respects her more than any other commander he's had, McKay says she should get a medal for the job she's done in the past year, and so on; these feel genuine coming from the characters even though they're obvious acknowledgements of Carter's farewell episode as commander. On the other hand, I feel like the Michael character, so compelling in his early episodes, has become a little unreal: his scheme to use Teyla's son to affect the future seems half-baked, and he's not given much time to give much meaning to it; he's in danger, in my opinion, of turning into a stock villain, which is a waste of Connor Trineer and of the time invested previously in the Michael character. Vega makes a nice debut, though it's played very subtly in the midst of crisis.

Next week: Keller is infected with an alien parasite, so new commander Woolsey pulls Carson Beckett (Paul McGillion) out of the freezer to help.