"Stargate" Closed: Sci Fi Opts Not to Renew Long-Running Series

After ten seasons (and two different cable networks), drama Stargate SG-1 will be taking its final leap at the end of the current run.

According to an announcement made yesterday, cabler Sci Fi has opted not to renew the series, which recently aired its 200th episode and is scheduled to return in March with the second half of this season. However, the decision to wrap production on the longest-running sci fi series in TV history was, in the words of exec vp of original programming Mark Stern, "not a ratings-driven decision. We're actually going out on a high note." In fact, Sci Fi has given the series' producers enough leeway to wrap up the series at the end of the season.

Stargate SG-1 spin off Stargate: Atlantis will continue, however, as the cabler has renewed that series for a fourth season. And it's possible that some familiar faces from SG-1 might migrate over to its sister show, at least according to Sci Fi.

While I never watched Stargate SG-1 or its companion series, I know that both have an extremely loyal fanbase that must be saddened by the cancellation. However, an inside source tells me that another sci-fi series--one of my favorites--has been picked up for another season. Expect an announcement later today or tomorrow... But in the meantime I am simply jumping with joy. More on that to come...

What's On Tonight

8 pm: JCPenney Jam: The Concert for America's Kids (CBS); Fear Factor (NBC); Gilmore Girls (WB); According to Jim/According to Jim (ABC); House (FOX); Major League Baseball (UPN)

9 pm: Big Brother: All-Stars (CBS); Gilmore Girls (WB); According to Jim/According to Jim (ABC); Vanished (FOX)

10 pm: Rock Star: Supernova (CBS); Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (NBC); Primetime (ABC)

What I'll Be Watching

9 pm: Eureka on Sci-Fi.

The whimsical new sci-fi drama that's more Northern Exposure than Stargate. On tonight's episode ("Dr. Nobel"), the gang enlists the help of an aging scientist to prevent a catastrophe. It better not be the same catastrophe from The 4400, because that's seeming more and more likely...

11 pm: Love Soup on BBC America. (10 pm ET)

The whimsical British romantic drama, starring Black Books' Tamsin Greig and Lois & Clark's Michael Landes and written by Jonathan Creek creator David Renwick, returns with another new installment tonight. In tonight's episode ("They Do No Move"), Alice attempts to find a new apartment but instead reaches an epiphany, while Gil is set up with an actress.

Have a Burning Question for Team Darlton, Matthew Fox, Evangeline Lilly, or Michael Emerson?

Lost fans: you don't have to make your way to the island via Ajira Airways in order to ask a question of the creative team or the series' stars. Televisionary is taking questions from fans to put to Lost 's executive producers/showrunners Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse and stars Matthew Fox ("Jack Shephard"), Evangeline Lilly ("Kate Austen"), and Michael Emerson ("Benjamin Linus") for a series of on-camera interviews taking place this weekend. If you have a specific question for any of the above producers or actors from Lost , please leave it in the comments section below . I'll be accepting questions until midnight PT tonight and, while I can't promise I'll be able to ask any specific inquiry due to the brevity of these on-camera interviews, I am looking for some insightful and thought-provoking questions to add to the mix. So who knows: your burning question might get asked after all.

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What's Done is Done: The Eternal Struggle Between Good and Evil on the Season Finale of "Lost"

Every story begins with thread. It's up to the storyteller to determine just how much they need to parcel out, what pattern they're making, and when to cut it short and tie it off. With last night's penultimate season finale of Lost ("The Incident, Parts One and Two"), written by Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse, we began to see the pattern that Lindelof and Cuse have been designing towards the last five seasons of this serpentine series. And it was only fitting that the two-hour finale, which pushes us on the road to the final season of Lost , should begin with thread, a loom, and a tapestry. Would Jack follow through on his plan to detonate the island and therefore reset their lives aboard Oceanic Flight 815 ? Why did Locke want to kill Jacob? What caused The Incident? What was in the box and just what lies in the shadow of the statue? We got the answers to these in a two-hour season finale that didn't quite pack the same emotional wallop of previous season

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In Defense of Downton Abbey (Or, Don't Believe Everything You Read)

The proof of the pudding, as they say, is in the eating. Which means, if I can get on my soapbox for a minute, that in order to judge something, one ought to experience it first hand. One can't know how the pudding has turned out until one actually tastes it. I was asked last week--while I was on vacation with my wife--for an interview by a journalist from The Daily Mail, who got in touch to talk to me about PBS' upcoming launch of ITV's period drama Downton Abbey , which stars Hugh Bonneville, Dame Maggie Smith, Dan Stevens, Elizabeth McGovern, and a host of others. (It launches on Sunday evening as part of PBS' Masterpiece Classic ; my advance review of the first season can be read here , while my interview with Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes and stars Dan Stevens and Hugh Bonneville can be read here .) Normally, I would have refused, just based on the fact that I was traveling and wasn't working, but I love Downton Abbey and am so enchanted with the proj

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