Stargateis a strange yet compelling franchise. It started in 1994 with the original Stargate movie, where Roland Emmerich and Dean Devlin crafted a story of an interdimensional portal and the revelation that the gods humanity worshiped were actually aliens. Stargate would grow into a cult classic and launch a fleet of spin-offs beginning with Stargate SG-1. A potential Stargate reboot recently hit a creative roadblock, as Prime Video opted to go in a different direction than what showrunner and longtime Stargate writer Martin Gero planned for. While this decision upset fans, it’s not the first time a spinoff in this franchise has hit a wall.
Most Stargate fans forget that the franchise’s first spin-off show wasn’t Stargate Atlantisor Stargate Universe, but the animated series Stargate Infinity. Infinity follows Stargate Command’s Gus Bonner (Dale Wilson), who’s framed for a crime he didn’t commit. When the alien race known as the Tlak’kahn comes to Earth looking for a mysterious chrysalis that was unearthed in Egypt, Bonner utilizes a Stargate and takes the chrysalis off-world alongside a small group of soldiers.On paper, Stargate Infinity should have worked. Animation meant that it could deliver stories with a bigger scope than Stargate SG-1 while also expanding the universe in a unique way. But sadly, the show only lasted for a single season and was eventually relegated to a footnote in Stargate history.
‘Stargate Infinity’ Was Plagued by Production Problems
Stacey Bonner, Seattle Montoya, and Gus Bonner in ‘Stargate Infinity’Image via MGM Television
To bring Stargate Infinity to life, MGM Television tapped the creative team of Eric Lewald and Michael Maliani. Lewald was no stranger to shepherding an animated franchise, as he previously served as a producer on X-Men: The Animated Series and currently does the same for X-Men ’97. Other X-Men alums, including director Will Meugniot and writer Mark Edward Edens, would board Infinity, but didn’t enjoy the same success they had in bringing the Children of the Atom to television screens. The reason for this lies with DIC Entertainment, who handled the animation.
DIC is infamously known for its controversial English dub of Sailor Moon, but it also gained a reputation for having animated series that looked and felt cheap. Anyone who’s watched Stargate or Stargate SG-1 will tell you that part of the franchise’s appeal is the idea of traveling to other worlds, which should be a landscape that’s ripe with potential. Instead, most of Stargate Infinity feels like a cheap computer game you’d find in the clearance bin, with flat designs and the protagonists sporting bulky power suits that feel more at home with the Power Rangers than a Stargate show. Eric Lewald would later confirm that Stargate Infinity‘s writers were writing scripts that couldn’t match a fraction of the actual budget DiC was putting in.
“While we wrote with an Imax screen image of action in our heads, what DIC paid to produce was something iPad-sized. The writing budget was fine — it was the production/animation budget that was a problem. We writers, in crafting the stories, were imagining ‘Stargate’-like spectacle, or at least like animated series we’d done like ‘X-Men.’ But Mike [Maliani] and the overseas animators were given maybe 30 percent of the time and money to do it. If we’d known beforehand, we might have written simpler, smaller stories.
Collider Exclusive · Sci-Fi Survival Quiz Which Sci-Fi World Would You Survive? The Matrix · Mad Max · Blade Runner · Dune · Star Wars
Five universes. Five completely different ways the future went wrong — or sideways, or up in flames. Only one of them is the world your instincts were built for. Eight questions will figure out which dystopia, galaxy, or desert wasteland you’d actually make it out of alive.
💊The Matrix
🔥Mad Max
🌧️Blade Runner
🏜️Dune
🚀Star Wars
01
You sense something is deeply wrong with the world around you. What do you do? The first instinct is often the truest one.
02
In a world of scarcity, what resource do you guard most fiercely? What we protect reveals what we believe survival actually requires.
03
What kind of threat keeps you up at night? Fear is useful data — if you’re honest about what you’re actually afraid of.
04
How do you deal with authority you don’t trust? Every dystopia has a power structure. Your approach to it determines everything.
05
Which environment could you actually endure long-term? Survival isn’t just tactical — it’s physical, psychological, and very much about where you are.
06
Who do you want in your corner when things fall apart? The company you keep is the clearest signal of who you actually are.
07
Where do you draw the line — if you draw one at all? Every survivor eventually faces a moment that tests what they’re actually made of.
08
What would actually make survival worth it? Staying alive is one thing. Having a reason to is another.
Your Fate Has Been Calculated You’d Survive In…
Your answers point to the world your instincts were built for. This is the universe your temperament, your survival instincts, and your particular brand of stubbornness were made for.
The Resistance, Zion
The Matrix
You took the red pill a long time ago — probably before anyone offered it to you. You’re a systems thinker who can’t help but notice the seams in things.
You’re drawn to understanding how the system works before figuring out how to break it.
You’d find the Resistance, or it would find you — your instinct for spotting constructed realities is the machines’ worst nightmare.
You function best when you have access to information and the freedom to act on it.
The Matrix built an airtight prison. You’d be the one probing the walls for the door.
The Wasteland
Mad Max
The wasteland doesn’t reward the clever or the well-connected — it rewards those who are hard to kill and harder to break. That’s you.
You don’t need comfort, community, or a cause larger than the next horizon.
You need a vehicle, a clear threat, and enough fuel to outrun it — and you’re good at all three.
You are unsentimental enough to survive that world, and decent enough — just barely — to be something more than another raider.
In the wasteland, that distinction is everything.
Los Angeles, 2049
Blade Runner
You’d survive here because you know how to exist in moral grey areas without losing yourself completely.
You read people accurately, keep your circle small, and ask the questions others prefer not to answer.
In a city where humanity is a legal designation rather than a feeling, you hold onto something that keeps you functional.
You’re not a hero. But you’re not lost, either.
In Blade Runner’s world, that distinction is everything.
Arrakis
Dune
Arrakis is the most hostile environment in the known universe — and you are precisely the kind of person it rewards.
Patience, discipline, and political awareness are your core strengths — and on Arrakis, they’re survival tools.
You understand that the long game matters more than any single victory.
Others come to Dune and are consumed by it. You’d learn its logic and earn its respect.
In time, you wouldn’t just survive Arrakis — you’d begin to reshape it.
A Galaxy Far, Far Away
Star Wars
The galaxy far, far away is vast, loud, and in a constant state of violent political upheaval — and you wouldn’t have it any other way.
You find meaning in being part of something larger than yourself — a cause, a crew, a rebellion.
You’d gravitate toward the Rebellion, or the fringes, or whatever pocket of the galaxy still believes the Empire’s grip can be broken.
You fight — not because you have to, but because standing aside isn’t something you’re capable of.
In Star Wars, that willingness is what makes all the difference.
Future ‘Stargate’ Spinoffs Would Avoid The Pitfalls of ‘Stargate Infinity’
Another reason why Stargate Infinity isn’t as fondly remembered as the other Stargate spinoffs is that it took place in the far future, meaning that it had little connection to the characters and concepts that made Stargate SG-1 so beloved. Stargate SG-1 co-creator Brad Wright even went on record to say that he doesn’t consider Infinity canon. Future Stargate shows like Atlantis and Universe would spin out of events that took place in SG-1, to the point where SG-1‘s characters would often guest star or even become part of the narrative. This connection made the world of Stargate feel rich and layered, and it’s an approach that Infinity could have used.
The combination of lackluster animation, a lack of connection to the core Stargate series, and competition from popular anime like Yu-Gi-Oh!eventually led to Stargate Infinity‘s demise. It’s a stark reminder to anyone looking to expand a franchise: whether said spinoff is live action or animated, you can’t lose sight of what makes said franchise so special.
Release Date
2002 – 2003-00-00
Network
FOX
Directors
Martin Wood, Mario Philip Azzopardi, Will Meugniot, Peter DeLuise, David Warry-Smith, David Winning
Writers
Richard Mueller, Michael Edens, Mark Edward Edens, Katherine Lawrence, Christy Marx, Jan Strnad, Julia Jane Lewald, Len Uhley, Steven Melching, Bob Forward, Francis Moss, Craig Miller
