Aiden Ford - Conceptual History

Conceptual History

After the end of season 1, the series producers, and the actor himself, felt that Ford had not worked as intended and was highly underused as a result. Unwilling to write him out, the writers came up with an idea to make the character more important, but that downgraded him to a recurring character. Producer Joseph Mallozzi said in 2009 that "We can assume went down with the ship" in "The Hive". Rainbow Sun Francks was disappointed about the evolution of his character, saying Ford did not evolve a backstory which the other characters did. Although Francks called the situation "tough", he reacted positively towards the development of character during the second season.

After announcing that Ronon Dex would become a main character in the Atlantis series, they followed up with another announcement saying that they had reduced Ford to a recurring character in the series. Many fans were disappointed with this new development because many felt he didn't have time to "prove" himself in the new series and that the character was never fully developed compared to the other characters in the show. Many campaigns to save the character were created after the announcement, the most notable being the F.O.R.D. campaign. Francks said that the change was not a "blow", since he and Brad Wright had already discussed the change. He was also more positive in the change of story arc for the character, saying he was a "big part" of the second season compared to season one where they hadn't had enough episodes to broaden the character. When asked about reducing Francks' role in Atlantis, Wright replied "The change in status means that Francks will not appear in every episode, and will not be listed in the show's opening credits."