The Stargate franchise began in 1994 with the feature film, Stargate, starring Kurt Russel and James Spader, surrounding an Ancient Egyptian stone ring containing hieroglyphs for star coordinates that when entered into a portal called the “Stargate,” enters up a wormhole that leads to another dimension. Originally broadcast for its first five seasons on Showtime, SG-1 picks up the military’s adventures and exploration of the Stargate where the film left off. The team begins using the Stargate to explore alien planetary systems in search of technology and allies to defend Earth against a vicious enemy known as the Goa’uld, who parasitically prey upon the human race.

For ten seasons and over 240 episodes, SG-1 kicked off on Showtime in 1997, where it would spend the next five years as one of the network’s most watched series.

Despite its rabid fan-following, many critics claimed that the characters and plot were so poorly developed, the show would never garner attention outside the science fiction community. In 2002, the series was picked up by the SciFi (Syfy) channel, airing in the Friday night slot until 2007, when the series was finally canceled in its tenth season. Ten seasons. You hear that critics? Ten years is a number that very few successful shows can boast in this day and age, especially in the science fiction genre.

To throw a little more salt into the wounds of the critics, SG-1 was nominated for a variety of awards, including seven Emmy’s. Out of thirty nominations in a variety of categories, the series won nineteen awards over the years, including two Gemini awards. It is also believed that the longetivity of the series is comparable to cult favorites like Star Trek and Doctor Who, which just goes to show that you can’t trust a critic no matter how convincing they sound.

Despite viewer and fan disappointment in the 2007 cancellation, the Stargate franchise expanded to include two popular spin-off series, Stargate Atlantis and Stargate Universe, and a number of films to pad and further the storyline. Diehard fans also began to speculate the existence of an actual “Stargate” device, which led to the creation of the fansite, GateWorld, which still features up-to-date news, cast interviews, podcasts and a complete Stargate “wiki” filled with articles and terminology. Of course, in this day and age, storylines never seem to stop where the creators intend, as the throngs of fanfiction writers have created thousands of stories exploring the series and its favored characters, which can be found for free all over the Internet.

As mankind continues to daydream of the possibilities of life beyond his little solar system, shows like SG-1 will rise to the glory of cult status because they venture to promote possibilities outside mundane existence. They also propose the facing of enemies beyond man’s greatest adversary, his fellow man, insisting the necessity of setting aside personal beliefs and cultural differences to band together as men to ensure the survival of the species.