Stargate SG-1 (TV Series) Space Race (2003) User Reviews

Shady Dealings

[claudio_carvalho · 7/10 · 1 January 2018]

Warrick visits the SGC and offers access to the ion engine technology to General Hammond. In return, he wants to borrow the naquadah generator to win a space race in his planet. Samantha Carter offers to be his partner in the dangerous race and he accepts the offer. However there are shady dealings in the competition that jeopardizes Sam and Warrick.

"Space Race" is a funny and entertaining episode of "Stargate". The "gung ho" of Amanda Tapping is remarkable and she seems to have fun in this episode with a lovely smile most of the time. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Space Race"

To the races

[Calicodreamin · 6/10 · 23 March 2022]

Decent episode, though a bit lacking in effects, it's got a fun and fairly lighthearted storyline. The acting was good and the creature makeup felt authentic.

Fast and furious

[owlaurence · 9/10 · 16 June 2010]

Now come on, we're in the middle of a season, we can afford to spend some time on a comedic, light-hearted episode! There has to be an upside to traveling around the galaxy, after all, and I for one won't begrudge the characters a chance to have fun. How can you not laugh, watching Carter and Teal'c come up with ANY excuse to participate in that race? And there IS something to be gained from that rather silly race, even though the Ion-whatever is clearly only a pretense.

Besides a fun race and some really good lines, this also reintroduces a really nice character from Forsaken, and allows Earth to really bond with an alien world -- and it's not as if there were too many of those left. Despite the oddities, this world feels the most familiar so far, so I hope it will not get blasted to oblivion too. Last but not least, it has been a very long time since the last Carter episode, so it was high time she got her share of the spotlight. She's usually so serious, I really enjoyed watching her have fun for once.

Wonderfully campy episode

[very-jaded · 9/10 · 1 November 2018]

This episode plays out like the old Wacky Races (1968) cartoons, with over the top villains, cheating, a not-very-tense near-death incident, and a come-from-behind finish. Amanda Tapping has fun, Christopher Judge gets captured, and Michael Shanks and Richard Dean Anderson rescue him. And the sportscaster announcing the race adds the perfect touch.

This episode is a fun break in an otherwise dark season.

Fun and a nice break from the more serious episodes

[sclancy · 9/10 · 8 January 2020]

I loved this episode. It had a similar tone to the "Wormhole X-Treme!" episode.

It was fun, campy, and nice to see Carter enjoying herself. I was waiting for everyone to sit back and break out a six-pack after the race!

I don't understand the hate by some of the other reviewers. So it didn't really advance the story line. Who cares? What's the harm in doing something different?

Have Fun!

[Doc_Rancher · 10/10 · 11 March 2015]

A nice lighthearted episode. We see another side of Major Carter, but not one that's out of character. If you watched the series carefully you know she likes motorcycles and drives an old sports- car. Since she also loves studying alien technology even in her free time (at least more than fishing) what would be more fun to participate in a race and studying alien technology at the same time? I found it very nice to see her having some fun. Yes, there are more serious problems than studying ion-propulsion-systems, but from time to time I like and need a more lighthearted episode and see that the people I learned to like (the SG-1-team) have some fun. Maybe for some viewers it seems strange that there's a whole civilization living without fear of the Goa'uld, but they once won against them and it's not so far fetched that if they leave them alone and have no Naqahdah it's not worth fighting them at least as long as the Goa'uld have other problems. And this civilization is a nice mirror to think about our own. Racism, greed, manipulation, but also helping one another and gaining something through it.

The only bad thing is that the next episode is "funny", too, but not in a good way like this one.

What a joke

[mcgyver212 · 1/10 · 19 February 2008]

As I watched this episode I was close to thinking that Stargate had 'jumped the shark'.

It was as though Jack and Daniel had other things to do this week, and they could only get a handful of others to be apart of the show and this is the junk we get.

I mean come on...Daniel has just come back from the ascended...still trying to get his memory back. The Tok'ra and earth are having troubles. General Hammond is about ready to leave. Our X302 is across the galaxy...stranded. Teal'C is having trouble adapting to his tratonin (meds instead of his symbiote) There are a thousand ways the show could have gone, but instead they thought that the best thing to do was to have Sam involved in a space race. Are you kidding me?

That being said, Jack (RDA) had one of his best lines, and that is what gave the show even a 1 on my rankings.

Muirios: We had it translated into your language. Jack: (looking over Sam's shoulder): That's not our language. Sam: That's my language...sir. Jack: Ohh...of course.

Take my advice...skip this episode and go right to the next one...it is a waste of time.

Dion Johnstone magically Metamorphs into Alex Zahara

[XweAponX · 10/10 · 31 August 2014]

This sequel to the 6th season episode "Forsaken" might be too lighthearted to have happened in the same universe. In fact, it would seem that for this episode, SG-1 appears to have crossed from the Red Fringe Universe into the universe of Star Trek- circa Voyager 7th Season, Also, Carter never struck me as being the Vinny Diesel type, with a 10-second car. But here, she has a 10-second spaceship, or actually "Warrick's" spaceship, which we have also previously seen, part of at least in "Forsaken"- the Cerebus, aka the ship which used to tote dangerous prisoners around.

Anyway, this episode does have Scott Macdonald in a great character role, as a scurvy pirate-type racer who assists Carter and Warrick when they get in a space-jam. What I loved about this were the fake commercials from the "commentators" during the race.

Since part of Stargate/Homeworld Command's mandate is to collect cool stuff that can be used to beat the crap out of the Goa'Uld, then this episode is important as Carter gets the specs for this planet's ion-propulsion system. But she has to work for it, even almost became space particles because of it.

I wonder who is better engineer, Carter, or Scotty from Trek?

The only thing that really bothered me was with the change of actors for Warrick, the Warrick here is not the Warrick who survived years being hunted by thugs. This Warrick is a dismal failure when we see him again, but thanks to Carter and SG1 saving his alien buttocks again, he gets a better job. And Carter gets her magic ion engine. This episode also takes huge successful stabs at xenophobia, isolationism, and racism- something else I would expect from a Trek show, but the Stargate franchise was in no way inferior to the Trek franchises of the 90's- especially when making social statements.

It's like we're in a completely different show

[HardLight · 3/10 · 30 September 2013]

Stargate has been primarily a sci-fi geeks only show, so when I say that the whole tone of this episode seems awfully out of place most won't get me, but if you step back from this and look at it objectively, things seem to point to stuff more akin to Firefly or Farscape more than Stargate.

We get so many strange right turns in plot that we shouldn't really be happy, like Sam as a gear-head? Other than that one scene where she was tinkering with a motorcycle in the SGC(How'd she get that in there btw, and why?) there's no evidence that she likes speed and thrills, it stinks of forced plot convenience to me.

The 'sport program interludes' that just seemed to be in there to make some sort of social comment on how consumerism 'is evil' and the forced racism problems between the 'pure bloods' and 'half breeds' is bad writing IMO.

The visuals not withstanding, this is a bad episode and something that-when you think about it-just shouldn't work in the Stargate universe(an entire civilisation with ships and weapons comparable to the Gou'ald that weren't wiped out or enslaved, don't buy it).

Like a Bad Video Game

[fcabanski · 2/10 · 14 September 2015]

You'll miss nothing important by skipping this episode.

This episode is like a bad, make that very bad, video game. It's complete with fake news show, over the top cardboard characters, bad video game cut scene acting, and generic views of a generic futuristic city complete with a monorail.

It centers around a generic space race. It's filled with clichés:

• Bad guys sabotage the hero's ship and many other ships. - One of the supposedly bad guys turns out to be a good at the core, gruff teddy bear scoundrel. - The heroes try to help others, showing they aren't only out for themselves. - Generic, humorous commercials play during the generic TV news show (race coverage). But they aren't funny.

The only serious part of this "humorous" episode is the ridiculously simplistic message about xenophobia/racism.

I'd rather suffer an eternity of gruesome deaths and resurrections in a sarcophagus than have to watch this episode.

One of the worst episodes (excluding seasons 1, 9 and 10)

[tomasajdari · 1/10 · 27 June 2018]

Yes, there is not a single redeemable thing about this episode. Rubber-head aliens only add insult to (our) injury. Nothing of importance happens anyway, so:

Avoid!