Amazon spent the week telling the industry it welcomes any conversation around IP. Daniel Jackson has a follow-up question.
On August 29, Michael Shanks quote-tweeted Deadline‘s Edinburgh TV Festival story — the one headlined around Amazon execs saying they “welcome any conversation around IP” when asked about Doctor Who — and answered it in four words: “Really?? Do they? #SaveStargate”
The post is piling up likes and reposts as the “Save Stargate with Martin Gero” petition closes in on 120,000 signatures, and it landed the same weekend Shanks put on the record what Stargate fans have long wanted to hear about the series Amazon killed.
UPDATE: The petition has since passed 120,000 signatures, with Shanks surprising Stargate cosplayers at Dragon Con as the campaign worked the convention floor in Atlanta.
Open For Business — Just Not For Stargate
At the festival, Prime Video’s senior UK scripted commissioner Oliver Jones was asked whether the streamer could become the new home of Doctor Who and answered that he loves the show and would welcome those IP conversations, while he and Amazon MGM Studios international originals chief Nicole Clemens laid out plans to significantly increase Amazon’s spending on UK content.
Netflix gave the festival the same non-answer, and neither streamer committed to anything.
Sit with the timing, though. Three months ago, Amazon MGM scrapped its own legacy sci-fi series roughly 20 weeks into preproduction — writers room finished, London soundstage booked, sets under construction, casting underway — reportedly over concerns it wouldn’t appeal beyond the existing fanbase, a claim Shanks disputed at the time.
This week, the same company told the industry it’s boosting its UK spend and is open for business on somebody else’s franchise.
Shanks needed four words and a hashtag to make the point.
Adding to the pile-up: Stargate‘s own co-creator Dean Devlin, an executive producer on Gero’s canceled series, is now openly chasing the Doctor Who job once the BBC opens bidding.
Shanks Confirms His Return Would Have Happened
The other half of the weekend played out on stage in Birmingham.
Appearing alongside his wife and SG-1 co-star Lexa Doig at Starfury’s Ascension 2 convention, which runs August 28-30 at the Hilton Birmingham Metropole with a guest list headlined by Richard Dean Anderson, Shanks confirmed he was set to reprise Dr. Daniel Jackson in Gero’s series, according to fans in attendance who posted accounts and photos from the hall.
Attendees also relayed that Shanks and Gero remain very sad about the cancellation, and that the new show would have respected the fans.
Petition Closes In On 120,000
The “Save Stargate with Martin Gero” Change.org petition sits at 118,922 verified signatures as of August 29 and is still adding dozens per day, up from the 100,000 milestone that Robert Patrick helped celebrate in late June.
The campaign’s receipts keep stacking: a banner plane over Amazon MGM’s Culver City lot, a Times Square billboard, a London Eye rally, and public backing from Patrick, Shanks, and Joe Flanigan, who told fans “people do change their mind”.
Organizers have a signature drive running at Ascension 2 this weekend, with a campaign table set for Dragon Con in Atlanta on September 3-7, where Shanks is scheduled to appear next.
Amazon MGM Studios, which has not publicly addressed the campaign since the June cancellation, says it welcomes any conversation around IP.
It owns one with 118,922 people waiting to have it.
