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Conceptual origin
The idea of the Stargate was invented by the writers of the original feature film of the same title, Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich. Similar devices have been seen in previous fiction, but the complete conception of a Stargate, as seen in the Stargate canon, is quite original — though there has been contention as to whether they plagiarised the idea from a previous script submission.• The Stargate was further developed conceptually by the creators of the spin-off television series Stargate SG-1, Brad Wright and Jonathan Glassner.
The concept of a Stargate is based heavily in theoretical physics (and Astrophysics), particularly that of black holes and wormholes. A wormhole is a warping of spacetime that causes space to become "folded", supposedly allowing for "shortcuts" through space. Although these may exist in reality, it is not widely held to be true that any such phenomenon could safely transport a human being,• as such wormholes would most likely be created by excessive gravity which would destroy any potential traveller.•
The idea of a "portal" for travellers has been seen often throughout the history of both fantasy and science fiction, often taking a similar form, a device or magical object shaped as a regular or irregular closed geometric form filled with a water-like, rippling puddle that represents the boundary point between two locations (see below: common envisioning). The Stargate picks up on this conception, emphasising the "watery puddle" for the sake of an alien mystique, and explaining it all in terms of advanced technology.
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Operation
The film Stargate rushed very quickly over how a Stargate actually works and is operated, but the subsequent television shows go into this area in a great amount of detail. In SG-1, it is explained that a Stargate's destination is not fixed, but is singled out by a process known as "dialing".•
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Dialing
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Each location served by a Stargate has its own unique "address", which is a combination of seven or more non-repeating symbols appearing on the dialing Stargate.[ | Screenplay. "seven symbols chosen from a pool of 38 non-repeating candidates, that's about 63 billion possible combinations."]
The show is consistent with the mechanics of address-dialing. The process involves associating a unique symbol of the inner ring to each of at least the first seven of the chevrons on the outer circumference. The main "address" is invariably dialed first, and the last symbol being the "point of origin" " representing the gate being used, which acts as the final trigger for the completion of the address sequence.["Chevron 7, locked"; multiple episodes including the original film.] As each symbol is dialed, the chevron is said to "engage" and usually responds by lighting up or moving. When the final symbol of an address is dialed, that chevron is said to "lock" and the wormhole opens (this terminology is arbitrary and often interchangeable, but preferred by the recurring character Walter Harriman).[ If the address is incorrect or does not correspond to an existing or otherwise functional Stargate, the last chevron will not lock, and all of the chevrons will disengage.]
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Addresses
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The symbols used to comprise addresses are actually images of constellations. By identifying six constellations in space, a single point can be extrapolated that corresponds to the destination desired.•
Nine-symbol addresses have never been dialed, but their purpose is thought to be like the eighth chevron. If such were the case, then it might take exponentially more energy to dial gate a ninth. The extra chevrons are so rarely used that Stargates are often seen with those two chevrons embedded within the stone platform that holds the gate upright (see the image at the top of this article). This has often led to the misconception that a Stargate only has seven chevrons.
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Dial-Home Device
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There are a handful of methods used in the shows to dial a Stargate, and the most common is with the use of a Dial-Home Device. Almost always referred to as the "DHD" for short, it is depicted as a pedestal-shaped device with a round inclined control panel on top, consisting of two concentric circles of "keys", and a translucent red (Milky Way) or blue (Pegasus) hemisphere in the center; the keys represent the symbols on the rim of the Stargate. By pressing these keys a traveller builds an address. The central hemisphere serves as an "Enter" key to activate the Stargate once a destination has been dialed. In the Milky Way, the Dial-Home-Device contains 38 of the 39 symbols on the Stargate, meaning there is always a missing glyph on each DHD. This missing glyph however is not the point of origin for the planet. It has been confirmed that the missing glyph on numerous DHDs differs based on how each stargate is positioned on different planets. The glyph that is hidden under the pedestal of the stargate, unseen along with the two chevrons, cannot be dialed by the DHD. This states that only certain addresses can be reached in certain positions in the galaxy as a safety mechanism. In one episode of the SG-1 show, the team, because they did not have a DHD on the Stargate on Earth, overrode the mechanism, passing through the center of the star almost detroying that system. The mechanism in this case, was only activated temporarily because the star's orbit would have intersected the Stargate for a short period of time. The only way to intervene and reach all destinations in the Milky Way is to manually dial the gate, or use an alternative dialer, such as the one at the SGC.[Andy Mikita, Stargate SG-1 Co-Producer]
The show makes it clear that every Stargate originally had its own DHD, located directly in front of the gate and facing it.
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The Wormhole
Once an address is dialed, the gate is said to have created a "stable wormhole" between itself and the gate dialed. The creation process is depicted with great consistency, and hence has become one of the defining motifs of Stargate, at times being central in both the and title sequences. It involves the generation of the "puddle of water" portal which lasts roughly 2 seconds, and is completed by the ejection of an unstable energy vortex called the "kawoosh", resembling a surge of water or quicksilver. The "kawoosh" is portrayed as a symbol of the Stargate's power, invariably causing characters to be awed,[ | Screenplay (for example)] reflecting or imbuing the awe of the audience, and any matter contacted by the "kawoosh" effect is destroyed, save for the inevitable smoking shoes.[ | Screenplay]
It is explained that the power for the wormhole is drawn solely from the point of origin (the dialing Stargate's power source).[ | Transcript] One of the most basic and repeated axioms of Wormhole Physics, the (fictionalised) field of study pioneered by the character Samantha Carter, is that unless an extraordinary amount of energy is being generated at either end, a wormhole can only be maintained for 38 minutes at a time.
The actual portal of a Stargate appears inside the inner ring when an address is correctly dialed. This has the appearance of a vertical puddle of water which represents the "event horizon" in the show. In non-fictional parlance, an event horizon is the surface of a black hole or wormhole through which one could pass into. The wavering undulations characteristic of water are supposed to represent the "fluctuations in the event horizon".[ | Screenplay] Additionally, the outgoing gate is invariably entered from the same side as the gate's "kawoosh"; the show has not demonstrated what happens if a traveller enters from the wrong side.
Passage through a Stargate is usually accompanied by a visual effect of shooting through a tunnel in space, though it is just meant to be a visual aid. The representation of the transit is sometimes almost instantaneous, and other times it appears to last up to 20 seconds. This is thought to be just a represention of how it might look. Since they are disintegrated, it would be impossible to truly see the inside of a wormhole or travel through it, and the reason of the disintegration is so that the person is not destroyed by the gravity of the wormhole. The actual time the process lasts is on avarage .03 seconds. The former interpretation is often suggested by the show, as novice travellers often emerge from the gate trembling as if they've been on a "roller coaster ride".[ | Screenplay (at roughly 27mins)] This has since been explained as problems with the man-made interface on the Earth gate, and has mostly been fixed over the years of Stargate operations.
The visual effect resembles a spinning wispy tube, and was in Season 9 (and the first season of Atlantis) revamped to resemble a misty tunnel lit by shooting rings of light. The film depicted the first moment Daniel Jackson entered the pool, walking through and remaining in apparently physical form as if the pool was in fact simply a covering for the black of the wormhole beyond.
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Complexities of function
Both Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis introduce complicated facets of Stargates to contrive more interesting plotlines. Some of these have been developed into integral parts of how Stargates function.
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Matter transmission
When an object passes through the event horizon (the "puddle"), it is not immediately transferred to the destination Stargate, but rather the portion that has passed through is dematerialised and held in a "hyperspatial buffer".[ and its atoms will rematerialise from the buffer as it is extracted. The gate does not begin transmitting an object until it has entirely passed through the event horizon. This ensures that only complete objects are transferred. Objects in the buffer remain in a state of suspension. This has been used to "store" people in medical need,][ but is a dangerous maneuver as when a Stargate is shut down everything still in the buffer "ceases to exist".][ | Screenplay] The unstable vortex ("kawoosh") wipes the buffer clean to receive new information every time the gate activates.[ | Screenplay]
Several facets of the Stargate are necessary for it to function as a useful personnel transporter. Matter emerging from a Stargate retains any kinetic energy it had while entering, so a person running into one Stargate will hit the ground running upon emerging from another. (Weapon projectiles also maintain their trajectory upon transit- a bullet fired through a Stargate is just as dangerous as it would be otherwise) Also, the transmitting Stargate does not allow the air molecules of the local atmosphere to pass through; doing so could be disastrous should a receiving gate be located in a vacuum. The show explains that the Stargate differentiates between objects attempting to pass through the event horizon and things that would naturally exert pressure, such as water, air, lava, etc.[ | Screenplay]
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Gate obstruction
A wormhole is prevented from forming if a significant obstruction is present inside the Stargate's ring. Consequently, it is fairly common for Stargates to be semi- or permanently sealed by burying them, invalidating that Stargate address.
Another means of controlling travel through a Stargate is by placing a barrier a minuscule distance (less than three μm, in the case of the Earth's Iris) from the event horizon,[ which allows the wormhole to form but prevents the reconstitution of matter upon arrival through the gate. In other words, a connection can be made but any matter trying to exit the gate will not regain its original structure, and hence will be annihilated. The Iris on the Earth Stargate and the Shield on the Atlantis Stargate perform this function, and have been seen to be used as an effective defensive precaution, whilst still allowing radio communication through the open wormhole.]
Iris-type barriers also suppress the kawoosh, but it is unknown why physical barriers are not destroyed by the "kawoosh", as it seems to disintigrate all physical matter it contacts. Such barriers, however, are not the only way to achieve this. Several aliens, including the Asgard and the Nox have demonstrated the ability to open a wormhole without the "kawoosh" (Both races were allies of the Ancients, and may posses better knowledge of the Stargate than other races).
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Power source
Power is always required to establish an outgoing wormhole, and is usually supplied by the DHD, but any Stargate can receive a wormhole whether it has a power supply or not; the dialing gate is the one that supplies power to both. In a few cases, Stargates have been dialed "manually" when more sophisticated means were not available. This was accomplished by providing sufficient raw power to the gate and then rotating the symbol ring by hand to lock each chevron.• The Stargate that establishes an outgoing wormhole determines how long the wormhole is held open, and can generally close the wormhole at will.
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Secondary gates
Some planets are known to possess "secondary" or "backup" Stargates.[ If a Stargate experiences a power surge while an outgoing wormhole is open, the other end of the wormhole has been observed to "jump" to the next closest gate in the network, most likely as a response to destabilisation of the wormhole and to prevent it from failing while in use. (The effect can also be used as a defensive measure, as seen in the episode "Prototype"). In the case of a planet with two gates, the closest is the inactive secondary gate. This scenario occurred in the SG-1 first season, and resulted in a second gate being discovered on Earth, located beneath the ice of Antarctica.]
The Antarctic gate was later revealed to have originally been the primary stargate on Earth, built by the Ancients. It could in fact be the first stargate ever built.[ | Screenplay] The stargate originally used in the SGC, found in Giza, was brought to Earth, by Ra, from another planet. Since Stargate addresses corespond to planetary locations and not individual gates, the new gate inherited the same address as the one in Antarctica. Because the Antarctic gate had been abandoned millennia earlier by the Ancients and no longer had a connected DHD, Ra's gate became the primary.
In the episode "Nemesis", SG1 transports the stargate from Stargate Command onto a crashing spaceship in order to escape. The gate is replaced at the SGC by the Antarctic gate. The original gate survives the crash, however, and the Russian military takes possession of it to conduct their own off-world travel. Because they were also in possession of a DHD (not found in the original Giza dig but recovered from Germany after WWII), which they activated and deactivated at pre-defined times, they were able to selectively become the primary gate. Using a strict schedule for returning teams, they were able to avoid detection by the US Air Force for some time.
In "{{{2|SG1}}}|}})|Redemption", the second stargate was destroyed, and now only one Stargate remains on Earth.
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Durability
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The Stargates themselves are extremely resistant to damage or destruction: in one case, a Stargate survived a direct hit from a meteor,[ | Screenplay] A Stargate has also been seen to continue functioning whilst entering a sun,[ | Screenplay] though it was protected by a portable forcefield for a portion of its journey. In the SG-1 fourth season episode "Chain Reaction", the SGC sent a naquadah-enhanced nuclear bomb to a planet whose surface had trace amounts of naquadah in its topsoil; the explosion destroyed the entire planet, yet the gate still remained open and intact.
In the ninth season of Stargate SG-1 the United States develops a naqahdriah-enhanced "Gatebuster" nuclear bomb that is theoretically capable of destroying a Stargate (the "Mark IX"). However, when it was first used it failed to destroy the intended Stargate. This could have been because of several mitigating reasons.
However, there have been incidents when a Stargate was destroyed. The character Anubis used a piece of Ancient technology to destroy the SGC's Antarctic gate, and used a weapon of his own creation to destroy the gate on Abydos.[ | Screenplay]
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Exceptions
Under normal circumstances, a wormhole can only be maintained for slightly more than 38 minutes.[ However, on a few occasions, this limit has been surpassed. The first breach of this general rule occurred to Earth's gate connected to a planet in the proximity of a black hole.][ | Screenplay] The second incident occurred when energy-rich liquid beings maintained the power for a gate while a Russian vehicle had its transmitter stuck.[ Finally the third exception happened when Anubis used a weapon made by the Ancients (or with their technology) to slowly feed energy to a Stargate. The gate remained active and eventually exploded.]
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Other uses
In several episodes of the series, the Stargate Network was used for a purpose other than interplanetary travel. In the plots in which these extra functions feature, they are almost always discovered by a fluke, and were not intended in the design of the Stargates. Two such occurrences regard the Stargate's interaction with time, such as "1969", in which the SG-1 team accidentally travels backward in time to the year 1969, as a result of the matter transmission stream passing through a solar flare. The character Samantha Carter intentionally uses this phenomenon in the episode "2010", where she uses advanced technology to predict a flare and send a message back in time. Time is also a factor in the episode "Window of Opportunity", when a scientist uses a failed time machine built by the Ancients to isolate a region defined by 14 Stargates from the rest of the space-time continuum, causing a time loop.
In several episodes, the Stargate, and the cobbled-together dialing program utilized by the SGC, are nearly the cause of disaster. In the episode "Red Sky", the bypassing of a system error caused the Stargate to introduce atoms of plutonium into the center of a star, causing the star to become unstable. In the episode "Ripple Effect", the passage of a Stargate matter stream through a black hole caused the creation of a passageway into alternate realities.
Later in Stargate SG-1 a feature of the Stargate Network, whereby one Stargate can be caused to dial multiple other gates simultaneously, is revealed. This allows a blast wave such as that of the Dakara Superweapon to extend almost indefinitely throughout the galaxy, as seen in "Reckoning". (It is unclear whether the ability to dial multiple destinations simultaneously is an original function of the Stargate, or if the Dakara gate was specially modified to be able to achieve this. If it is a function all gates share, the exact purpose is unknown, as is what the effect would be upon matter entering the event horizon of a gate with multiple connections.)
In the episode , a stargate was used as a weapon capable of destroying an entire solar system. The gate was dialed into a planet in close proximity to a black hole. The gate (protected by a force field) was then sent into a star. The resulting loss of mass caused the sun to go supernova, destroying the solar system and Apophis's fleet, which was orbiting the star at that time.
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Surrounding plot
The ''Stargate'' film begins in 1928, when the titular alien device is first discovered and unearthed at Giza. It quickly skips to the "present day" (1996), in which an unsuccessful archaeologist Daniel Jackson is giving a lecture about his outlandish theories that the Egyptian pyramids were not built by the pharaohs. After he is laughed away, an aged Catherine Langford meets with him, and recruits his egyptological talent, taking him to a top-secret military base at Creek Mountain, where he is instructed to decipher the unique Egyptian hieroglyphs present on a set of cover-stones. He realises that the indecipherable glyphs are in fact not words but images of constellations, such that by identifying 6 of them a position in space can be extrapolated. He is then shown the Stargate itself, uses his new understanding to identify the 7th symbol (the point of origin allowing a route to be extrapolated), and the gate is opened for the first time.
Because thousands of combinations had been previously tried and had failed, it was believed at the time that only two Stargates existed, connecting Earth and the planet Abydos, which was visited in the film. At the beginning of the Stargate SG-1 series, however, a large set of additional valid coordinates were discovered engraved in ruins on Abydos. Because the coordinates pick out stars, and because time leads to stellar drift, other addresses were impossible to dial until Samantha Carter reworked the dialing system on Earth to account for this movement. After this, a massive network of possible connections suddenly became available.
The alien race encountered in the original movie is later developed in SG-1 as the Goa'uld, the dominant evil power in the Milky Way. The leaders of this race, the System Lords, pose as gods and use the Stargates to transport slaves between worlds. This has resulted in a large number of planets throughout the galaxy sporting human life, often in civilizations more primitive than Earth. The majority of these civilizations, descended from former Goa'uld slaves, treat the Stargate as a religious relic, often as a source of long-forgotten fear and evil.
For a long time it was thought that the Goa'uld were the builders of the Stargate Network, but it was later discovered that they had merely made use of the relics left behind by a different and extinct race, the Ancients. The Ancients placed Stargates on thousands of worlds across the galaxy, but the gate network was open to use by all, and continues to be a convenient form of travel for many races. Some races, such as the Goa'uld, grew their ways of life around the gates, which became integral to the functioning of their culture. In turn, most races have their own names for the Stargates. The Ancients called them Astria Porta (a Latin-esque word for "Star Door"). The Goa'uld and Jaffa, call them the Chaapa'ai. The English word "Stargate" is a direct calque of Chaapa'ai, and Chaapa'ai is itself a calque of Astria Porta. Many of the humans in our Galaxy refer to them as "Rings of the Gods" and similar variations, and in the Pegasus galaxy, villagers know them as Rings of the Ancestors and variations thereof. They are also commonly referred to as "the ring", "the annulus", or simply "the gate".
For most of the ongoing run of Stargate SG-1, Earth has been under constant threat from the Goa'uld, and is no match for their superior technology. In the face of this threat, the US Air Force established a top-secret base, the SGC (Stargate Command), as a frontline defence. Multiple teams are formed and sent on missions through the Stargate, their primary objective being exploration, and through it the discovery of intelligence, technology and allies to help the fight against the Goa'uld. The primary team is called SG-1, and the series follows their adventures.
At the climax of SG-1's 6th season, Daniel Jackson discovers that the Earth myth of Atlantis is in fact founded upon the Lost City of the Ancients, and Season 7 is spent trying to locate it. At the beginning of the show Stargate Atlantis, which coincides with the beginning of SG-1's 8th season, the city is found in the Pegasus Galaxy, and 8 chevrons are dialed to send an expedition there on what could be a one-way trip. It is there that they discover a new network of Stargates, and are plagued by the nemesis of the Ancients, the Wraith.
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Milky Way
A Milky Way Stargate has thirty-nine inscribed symbols on the inner ring. When dialing, this inner ring rotates until the dialed symbol is aligned with the seventh chevron, at which point the ring pauses, the seventh chevron moves down and up, and the appropriate chevron in the sequence engages. In the Stargate SG-1 series, an engaged chevron glows red. In the original Stargate film, all of the chevrons use this motion, and none of them glow red.
With 39 symbols, the Stargate Network in the Milky Way has:
38×37×36×35×34×33 = 1,987,690,320 possible addresses.
8-symbol addresses will yield:
38×37×36×35×34×33×32 = 63,606,090,240 possible addresses.
If a 9-symbol address operates like 8-symbol addresses it will yield:
38×37×36×35×34×33×32×31 = 1,971,788,797,440 possible addresses.
However, not all points in space represented by these addresses have stargates, in fact, there are sufficiently few valid coordinate sets that randomly dialing the Stargate is largely futile.
If the person dialling does not know the point-of-origin symbol, there are many more possible combinations.
The Stargate network in the Milky Way has:
39×38×37×36×35×34×33 = 77,519,922,480 possible combinations.
8-symbol addresses will yield:
39×38×37×36×35×34×33×32 = 2,480,637,519,360 possible combinations.
9-symbol addresses will yield:
39×38×37×36×35×34×33×32×31 = 768,997,631,000,160 possible combinations.
Because the gate on Earth was found without a DHD,[ the Stargate team on Earth developed the technology to interface with the gate in order to power it and dial it by the use of computers.]
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Symbols at Giza
Depicted in the original film, the Stargate found at Giza, Egypt was the first discovered by humans of Earth, in 1928. In SG-1 the same gate is used by the SGC for the first 3 seasons to explore other planets.• It was discovered in the season seven finale, Lost City, that the glyphs have sylable pronunciations that allow a gate address to be spoken aloud as a destination name. This is how the planet Proclarush Taonas was named. The gate symbols are as follows:
†This symbol is unique to the Stargate recovered from Giza. In the movie, Dr. Jackson interpreted it as representing the Sun over the peak of a pyramid. Other Stargates are described as having their own unique origin symbols as well.
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Pegasus galaxy
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In the spinoff series Stargate Atlantis, an expedition dials the 8-symbol address
from Stargate Command to travel to the Ancients' Lost City of Atlantis, located in the Pegasus Galaxy. They find that the Ancients seeded planets throughout the Pegasus galaxy with Stargates too, but used gates of a slightly different design. As these gates were built at a later date than the original Milky Way network, they may be of more advanced design, however at this point the differences appear mostly cosmetic.
The alternative Stargate design in the Pegasus galaxy is one of many things the producers of the shows employed to differentiate the sister shows SG-1 and Atlantis. Pegasus Stargates are designed with teal chevron lights instead of red ones, and the address symbols are groups of small blue lights (rather than embossed figures) that light up sequentially instead of rotating. In SG-1 it is stated that the rotating section of the gate unlocks when sufficient power to dial has been fed to the gate, allowing manual dialing in case the DHD is damaged or not present, as on Earth. In "Phantoms", an off world DHD is destroyed, and Dr. McKay states that there is no way to manually dial the gate. Presumably this is because the Pegasus gates lack the free-rotating central ring. Unlike the Milky Way gates, Pegasus gates are depicted with 36 symbols, but 7 symbols are still required to dial an interplanetary address — which totals 1,168,675,200 possible addresses (fewer than those in the Milky Way but adhering to the same constraints).
In a departure from the definitive "anywhere to anywhere" ethos of SG-1, the only Stargate in the Pegasus galaxy capable of reaching Stargates in the Milky Way is the one located at Atlantis.
Some Pegasus Stargates are orbital: they lead to open space, something never seen in the Milky Way. This is again a departure from the "personal travel" rather than "starship travel" ethos of SG-1, as these gates are used solely for space-faring vessels and never for humans. It is possible that the Ancients created these gates for localised travel to worlds where ground-based gate travel would be hazardous, either due to climate or atmospheric difficulties or due to native creatures. Orbital gates are depicted without a DHD, being powered by three power nodes spaced equally along the outer ring (see image). In the show, Puddle Jumper vessels have built-in DHDs to explain how a craft would return through an orbital gate.
In "Irresistible",
One facet of the gate was, however, directly ported from SG-1 to Atlantis, and that was the idea of an "Iris" that allows wormholes to form but stops anything trying to emerge.[ The Atlantis Stargate has a "Shield" to this effect. As with SG-1, only the protagonists' gate has this capability, being the singular real defense they have against major attacks (thus allowing the shows to continue despite having insuperable enemies).]
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Symbols at Atlantis
The symbols depicted on the Atlantis gate again correspond to constellations, although in this case the constellations are fictional. The Atlantis glyphs do have names as was seen during a shot of McKay's laptop in the episode Sateda but most of their names are currently unknown.
†As with SG-1, this origin symbol is unique to the Stargate at Atlantis, and other Stargates have their own unique origin symbols as well.
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Ori "Supergates"
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In the ninth season of Stargate SG-1, the Ori were introduced as a new main enemy for the show. They come from an entirely new galaxy, and are described as being masters of technology and Wormhole Physics equal to the original gate-builders. While it is not known what the Stargates in the Ori galaxy look like, their presence is implied by the fact that the Ori were able to send Priors (religious messengers) to the Milky Way through a Stargate. The only clue as to their design is that the transport rings used in their galaxy are white and pearly, suggesting by analogy that their Stargates are of this design as well.
On two occasions in the plot of Season 9,[ they attempted to create a massive Stargate 300 to 400 metres in diameter, which was made of individual modules which were passed through a standard Stargate, presumably from the Ori galaxy. The modules formed the ring of what the character Samantha Carter called a "Supergate". These gates lack an inner track and are instead dialed by preprogrammed data crystals inserted into a panel on the side. Carter hypothesized that by tapping the power in a black hole, a Supergate connection could be permanent.][ This was later confirmed in the episode The Pegasus Project. A standard gate was dialled from the Pegasus Galaxy to another placed in proximity to the Supergate. The Pegasus gate was then placed near a black hole, and then had a series of nuclear devices detonated at its event horizon. This resulted in the wormhole jumping to the supergate, thus preventing any future use of it by the Ori. The Goa'uld word for the supergate is Chappa'ko (Cha-Pa-Ko).]
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Orlins homemade stargate
On the Stargate SG-1 episode "Ascension," the outcast Ancient Orlin built a miniature Stargate in Samantha Carter's basement. Its components included 100 pounds of pure raw titanium, 200 feet of fiber optic cable, seven 100,000 watt, industrial strength capacitors and a toaster. This gate was hooked up to the main power supply of the house and only connected once, to Velona, before it burnt out. It has been mentioned once since, in the ninth season episode "The Fourth Horseman."
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McKay-Carter Intergalactic Gate Bridge
During the third season of Stargate Atlantis, a project to place a chain of Stargates in the void between the Milky Way and Pegasus galaxies was initiated, to allow rapid transit between Atlantis and the SGC without the need of a ZPM to power the Stargate. At the time, only the Atlantis gate had a ZPM available, meaning that the return trip from Earth required a three-week journey in a hyperspace-capable ''Daedalus''-class battlecruiser. When Atlantis' ZPM was depleted,• the project took on an added urgency and was made operational shortly afterward.
The McKay-Carter Intergalactic Gate Bridge (named as such by its co-creator Rodney McKay, recognizing Samantha Carter for the original idea) consists of seventeen Stargates from the Pegasus network and another seventeen from the Milky Way network. A macro program written by McKay and uploaded to the gates' operating systems before dialing causes them to store incoming matter in their buffers, forwarding travellers from one gate to the next along the bridge, rather than emerging from the gate that is initially dialed.
However, because gates from separate networks cannot be chained together by the macro, the travelers will need to exit at the Midway Space Station, halfway between galaxies, which serves as a transfer point between gate networks. Travelers from Atlantis would then use a Milky Way gate to travel on to Earth; similarly, travelers from Earth would use a Pegasus gate to travel to Atlantis. Even with this, the travel time between galaxies is just slightly over thirty minutes, making it far more efficient than travelling by hyperdrive.
When the first test of the gate bridge was conducted, only the framework of the station had been completed, so a Puddle Jumper was used. The test was a complete success, and the bridge was declared operational. It was later revealed that, since the last gate in the bridge must dial the exit gate, normally either Atlantis or Earth, the macro can be rewritten to dial a different exit gate in the destination galaxy.•
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Making of the props
Two full Stargate props were originally built for the SG-1 pilot , the second of which was reconstructed from the prop used in the film. They are made of steel and fiberglass, and are 22 feet in diameter. The second prop is less detailed, and is used for exterior scenes; in the pilot it was used solely on the planet Chulak. The primary one, however, is quite sophisticated. It is fully automated, and capable of rotating and emitting light. This is achieved by the use of a specially-designed 22-foot circular gear, which turns the inner ring on a precise pinion drive wheel, using an eight horsepower electric motor. The top seven chevrons emit laser pulses which are read by a sensor fed into a computer responsible for the gate's movement, which is consequently able to start and stop the rotation very quickly. This main prop is kept almost immovably at the permanent set of the SGC, at Bridge Studios, Vancouver.• Rather than being a jet of water, it is actually the image of high-pressure air being blasted into a tank of water. The effect was achieved by mounting a jet airplane engine two feet above a water tank, and using its 180 mph windstream to create the sufficient water displacement. In post production, the surrounding water was removed with computer editing, and the image of the air-jet pasted into the center of the opening Stargate. This technique was only used for earlier episodes, and the effect was replicated digitally soon after to allow more flexibility in shots.
To cut down on costs, the opening of a Stargate is often just implied rather than shown, by a costless sound-effect followed by distinct lighting effects characteristic of light shining through water (as the event horizon is depicted). The DVD commentary for Stargate SG-1 explains that these effects are produced by reflecting light off a large sheet of aluminium.
The Stargate itself is nearly always filmed against a blue or green backdrop, not only making it easier to paste the kawoosh imagery onto the scene, but also facilitating the superimposition of the "event horizon ripple effect", which is entirely computer-generated. On occasion, the Stargate itself is also completely swapped out for a computer generated model, usually in cases where it is being moved, or is depicted in space. Series producer Robert C. Cooper explained that it often costs a lot to erect a Stargate on location, and so in some cases offworld gates are also entirely a visual effect.•
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Other uses of the concept
The basic concept of a Stargate did not originate with the movie Stargate. Arthur C. Clarke first coined the term "Star Gate" in his novel 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) as a fictional device allowing rapid travel between distant locations. Clarke’s "Star Gate" does not resemble the one described in this article; nevertheless, Stargate SG-1 paid homage to Clarke in the two episodes "2001" and "2010," which correspond to the first two books in his Space Odyssey series: 2001: A Space Odyssey and 2010: Odyssey Two.
Stargates were also seen on television well before the movie Stargate. They can be seen in the series Buck Rogers in the 25th Century (1979-1981), where travel between stars was also accomplished by a Stargate network. Each Stargate carries a designation such as "Stargate 4." These Stargates however were only shown as a diamond-shaped quartet of stars that shimmered when a vessel was making transit.
Writers of both novels and comics have also used the name prior to the Stargate movie. Stephen Robinett's book "Stargate" (1976) revolves around the corporate side of building extra-dimensional and/or transportational Stargates. In the novel, the Stargate is given the name "Jenson Gate," after the fictional company which builds it. The Shi'ar, an extraterrestrial race introduced by Marvel Comics in 1976, also utilize a network of Stargates. The Shi'ar utilize both planet-based Stargates and enormous space-based versions (equivalent to the Ori supergate), though both are usually depicted without any physical structure to contain the wormhole.
Since the introduction of the Stargate on the big screen other authors have referenced the Stargate device. Authors Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince also write of "The Stargate Conspiracy: The Truth About Extraterrestrial Life and the Mysteries of Ancient Egypt." The book details an alternative theory which ingrains the term Stargate with Egypt's past: either the pyramid itself is a gateway to the stars (because of the shafts pointing to a star) or the building of Heaven on Earth based on geographical location of the great and outlying pyramids (see: Orion).
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Common envisioning
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There is a widespread conception within science fiction culture of what a "portal" should look like, with a large proportion of such devices bearing resemblances to a Stargate. The "ripple effect" is the most common part of this conception. One of the earliest examples is the Guardian of Forever, an artefact of the Star Trek universe. The device could open spacetime portals to any point in history on any world in the universe, and was ring-shaped with a watery "event horizon." It was first seen in the Star Trek: The Original Series episode "The City on the Edge of Forever" (1967) and later in the Star Trek: The Animated Series episode "Yesteryear" (1974). Again in Star Trek, portals (with angular frames) and ripple effects are seen in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "To The Death."
Other examples include the "warp gates" in Jak 3 which are rings containing a rippling blue substance used for transportation; a portal in ReBoot, created by the characters Megabyte and Dot displays a rippling "event horizon"; and the "Waygates" in Warcraft III which bear a shimmering portal. Also, in the fictional StarCraft universe, Warp Gates exist, which are similar in both style and function. Protoss warriors created Warp Gates to travel great distances instantaneously, rather than using the slower process of space travel. The knowledge involved in their creation was lost, but on some planets like in Stargate, these gates still remain.
In Star Trek: Voyager and the game Star Trek: Armada II, the Borg have a device known as a Transwarp Conduit. The aperture of the conduit resembles the event horizon of a Stargate crossed with the wormhole effect created by the Stargate.
Doom 3: Resurrection of Evil features a Hell Portal device that looks like a demonic version of the movie Stargate, with satanic markings replacing the constellation symbols. The event horizon resembles water, but in the form of a vortex.
The series Prehistoric Park features a "time portal" which main character Nigel Marven uses to travel back in time to save now-extinct ancient animals. The portal, which also seems to function as a geographic portal, consists of two small generators which generate between them a translucent, rippling event horizon, much like a Stargate.
In the video game Metroid Prime 2: Echoes the protagonist Samus Aran travels between the dark and light dimensions or versions of the games' setting through "Dimensional portals." These are semi hoop shaped structures in both demensions though the actual portal surface differs depending on which side of the portal you happen to be on. Also, while the portal will transport you to an analogous location in the destination dimension, there is rarely an analogous portal at the destination point.
The opening cutscene of the video game Soul Reaver 2 features a time portal similar to a Stargate in several respects, including a similar "Kawoosh" effect.
The Time Portal in Timesplitters 2 which makes the centerpiece of the level select screen bears a major resemblance to a Stargate.
In the single player campaign of the video game The Settlers II progression to the next level becomes possible when the player's territory is extended to include the "Gateway", a stone arch structure containing a rippling water effect.
In the Expanded Universe of Star Wars, two hula hoop-sized devices, capable of instantainiously transporting matter from one to the other are depiced in the "Star Wars Guide of Technology and Devices" as being part of a magician's act.
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Common functions
The concept of "gates" that can span huge distances are used abundantly in science-fiction to cast protagonists into new territory. The 1998 film Lost in Space featured a space-bound hypergate system. The premise of the film is that the Robinson family will pilot a spaceship to Alpha Centauri, in order to complete construction of another hypergate there, which will allow instantanous travel between Earth and Alpha Centauri.
Stargate-like devices are abundant in video games as they can be used to neatly split a game into levels. The video games Primal and Turok the Dinosaur Hunter feature gateways that allow instantaneous travel between locations to this effect, and in Metroid Prime 2: Echoes, a number of ring-shaped dimensional portals allow the main characters to travel between a "Light" and "Dark" version of a planet. More commonly, however, any game set in space will feature something like a Stargate purely to allow the game to function. In the game EVE Online, a large object called a Stargate lets you travel between solar systems, and in Homeworld 2, "Hyperspace Gates" serve as the centerpiece of one of the game's final missions; these are massive rings that create wormholes capable of transporting matter great distances.
In the cartoon series The Transformers, the Decepticons built the Space Bridge, which serves a similar purpose. A large round ring built on Earth(lying flat) would create a subspace tunnel to a destination tower on Cybertron. One key difference in function was that matter was not broken apart for transport.
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Differences between Stargates
There are many differences between the film's Stargate and the Stargate in SG-1.
The chevrons in the Stargate film do not glow as they do in the series.
The top chevron on the film's Stargate is different aesthetically than the rest of its chevrons. In SG-1, all the chevrons on a stargate are visually identical.
In the film, to "lock" in a Stargate symbol, each chevron "pops" or "clamps" the symbol in question to dial it. In SG-1, only the top chevron "pops" when dialing an address, while the other chevrons merely light up and do not clamp.
In the film, the symbols on the gate are engraved into the surface of the Stargate. In the television series, the symbols protrude from its surface.
In the movie, each stargate has a unique set of 39 symbols, but in the series, each gate has the same 38 symbols (Earth's symbols based on Earth's constellations), minus a single point of origin symbol that is unique to that individual gate.
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See also
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