It’s not unusual for the creative team behind a cancelled series to have some idea of where they wanted to go next. But for better or worse, we don’t always get to hear about those plans. (Sometimes it’s painful to know what we missed out on!)
When Stargate Atlantis ended in 2009, it was on a note full of potential. And, as writer and executive producer Joseph Mallozzi explained on a recent podcast, they knew where they were heading: Back to Pegasus, with a time travel twist.
On Dial the Gate, Mallozzi explained that series co-creator and executive producer Robert C. Cooper had suggested that the show’s final season get an extra two episodes—episodes they would’ve used to either set up a sixth season or an announced standalone movie, Stargate Extinction. They didn’t get those episodes, and season five ended like it did, with Atlantis in the sea outside San Francisco.
Mallozzi and Paul Mullie were commissioned to write a script for Stargate Extinction, which was announced but never made. Previously Mallozzi has shown a few pages from the script. On the podcast, though, he went into some detail about what would have happened, saying, “Atlantis is going to make its way back to Pegasus, and en route they end up experiencing engine problems. And they end up stranded between Pegasus and the Milky Way in another galaxy.”
The team would have encountered an alternate version of the Wraith Todd, “who has designs on the planet, and designs on Atlantis.” The story, Mallozzi said, would have been Teyla-centric.
Some of the elements from Extinction wound up in Stargate Universe, as Mallozzi explains in the clip below:
Last year, Mallozzi said in a blog post that he expects there to be some sort of Stargate revival in the wake of Amazon buying MGM: “In a best case scenario, an executive familiar with the franchise, and its amazing fandom, will recognize the huge potential there and fast-track his series. In the worst case scenario, someone else is brought in, 20 years of canon gets wiped out, and the fans get screwed.” Co-creator Brad Wright told SYFY Wire, “I can’t imagine Amazon not doing something with the franchise, or empowering MGM to do something with the franchise for [them].”
If you’d like to revisit Stargate Atlantis, it’s currently streaming on Hulu.
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