Ryan Robbins, the actor behind Genii Ladon Radim, is incredibly grateful to Martin Wood. The Stargate: Atlantis director is single-handedly responsible for saving Ladon's life. Were it not for Wood, the Genii scientist would never have survived to engineer Cowen's demise, and become leader of his people. It was a close call though.

"When I first got the role, the character wasn't supposed to survive past two episodes," Robbins explains. "We were about to shoot the scene where Ladon gets killed and Martin goes, ‘You know what? I like you, I don't think I'm gonna kill you. Let's kill that guy!' — and he pointed to a background artist. Then he said to me, ‘We'll get you back on the show.' Martin Wood decided to keep me around!"

Thanks to his last minute stay of execution, Radim went on quite a journey during the series, but not necessarily the one intended. Robbins stepped in one day after Robert Davi was unable to shoot an episode, which allowed him and the writers to take a closer look at the character.

"When I came back as the Genii leader, we had a discussion because the character was quite sinister, and it just didn't seem right that Ladon would suddenly be so sinister. That wasn't how it was when we first met him — he's a scientist. So, we talked about how to create that sort of storyline, and we decided that it wasn't that he was good or bad — he was just determined to do whatever it took for the good of his people."

Character Actor

With the series over, and the highly anticipated movie on the way, if Stargate: Atlantis once again came calling, could Robbins be tempted to don the Genii uniform once more?

"That is something I would definitely be interested in! We'll see if that's the sort of nemesis they want for the movie, or if they want to create a whole new nemesis. Maybe they'll need to team up with Ladon to thwart evil — whatever evil lies out there! It's bittersweet that Stargate: Atlantis has come to an end, but, Stargate SG-1 has proven that the movies can be just as popular. They had a lot of fun and a little more freedom to shoot them. There aren't so many rules, I guess. People were swearing in Stargate: Continuum! They get cheeky when they start making movies!"

With the TV landscape as conservative as ever, is typecasting a concern?

"It's definitely a concern, but being a character actor, I've played so many different types of roles within sci-fi. It's not like I'm out there as the leading man, and then going to another show where I have to be the leading man, and basically, the audience really just wants you to be you. I get to play characters that aren't me. Ladon Radim and Henry Foss (his character on Sanctuary) are opposites, really. But, what is sci-fi now? The genre has almost surpassed itself. We need to come up with a new name for it because it's a completely different genre. The latest Hollywood blockbusters are all based on comic-books — that's considered part of the sci-fi genre. Sanctuary, to me, is a graphic novel on television, but we still call it sci-fi. Really, the genre has gone well beyond that. I don't know what to name it, but I'm working on it. When I figure it out, I'll let you know and we'll start a petition!"