There are 214 episodes and it gets better as it goes along The tv show continues the story of the film. In it, the original humans evolved in another galaxy and had a civil war. One side became religious fundamentalists who wanted to destroy all who opposed them. They were called the Ori. The others were known as the Ancients or the Alterans. They moved to the Milky way Galaxy but the Ori created a plague and began wiping them out. The Alterans found a way to Ascend to a higher plane as spiritual beings with godlike powers. They believed that they should not interfere with lower beings while the Ori began to be worshiped by lowers as gods. The Ori promise their adherents ascension, but are merely using them to draw energy from their devotion.
The Alterrans do not interefere because of the strong temptation to allow one's self to be worshipped, which is like a drug to them, but once in a while a few of them bend the rules a little bit.
The ancients developed the stargates before their ascension and they developed the city of Atlantis, which was in antarctica, but was also a space ship. They removed the city to the Pegasus Galaxy, and this is the basis of Stargate Atlantis tv show.
The show has ties to all of the ancient mythologies. One of the characters himself becomes ascended with the help of one of the ascended ones
In the show, they allow information about the top secret stargate program to be leaked in the form of a hollywood movie and tv show, because it provides cover for the real program. The producers hint at the concept that there is some truth to the fictional show.
Many of these concepts are similar to Gnostic myths where the Aeons, or the spiritual beings from higher levels, sometimes interact with humans to give them knowledge to assist their ascension. Some of them believe that the god of the old testament was really a lesser deity who merely tried to take credit for someone else's creation and use the role of supreme being to oppress mankind.
Some of the philosophical concepts of the show mirror my philosphy, which is that any being that desires to be worshipped, is thus not worthy of it. The show constantly asks the question "what is a god?"
There are different definitions of god and it is important to know which definition is implied when the term is used. To some, merely being Creator is enough to be God. To others, being all powerful makes one a god, or being all knowing or all loving. These are independant concepts and independant attributes that are not necessarily mutally exclusive. Some definitions insist upon all of the above, while others include just a few of them.
