Redial the Gate: Abyss

[fignewton]

Why, yes, I've seen this one before! Raise your hand if you're surprised...

::looks at empty landscape::

Sadly, because this isn't a new one for me, I did not make the time to rewatch. I hope to do so before the end of the week, though. In particular, I always more or less skimmed over the SGC bits and concentrated on the Jack and Daniel bits. I want to watch again now with pro-Jonas goggles!

I will still probably skip over the Jack-getting-tortured bits. Yes, I did the same thing for Serpent's Venom and Talion. Urgh.

In the meantime, here's a question for discussion:

The monk told Bra'tac back in Maternal Instinct that he couldn't Ascend until he dumped his symbiote, with the inference that it was evil and thus blocking his Ascension. Of course, that was back in the day when Ascension was percieved as a "higher" plane of existence that one needed to be worthy to achieve, rather than just a question of brain activity. (Sorry to insult Stargate like this, but it's rather the way Lucas retconned the Force into midichlorians, with the obvious supposition that there was a thriving black market in Jedi blood transfusions.) Then we discover that Oma actually Ascended Laundry Pile Anubis once upon a time.

So: is there something about the Goa'uld/Tok'ra that makes them biologically incapable of Ascension? Is this Oma not wanting to risk another Anubis again, or just pique at being tricked once by a Goa'uld?

rydra_wong's powerful Walked Right Out of the Machinery touches upon this a bit, actually, but from a different angle. But do you think a Tok'ra or a reformed (or even non-reformed!) could Ascend, with or without the Oma booster?

...

That's where you're WRONG!

Oh, yeah. Must sit down and watch this one again. :)

Comments

[princessofgeeks]

Well, how did Anubis ascend, then? Did he convince Oma he was not a Goauld at all? Seems unlikely. Did he convince Oma she was talking to the host, and that the symbiote would be left behind, as Rydra theorized in her EXTREMELY EXCELLENT story?

I can't reconcile canon on this. Am looking forward to the answers you get here..

[fignewton]

I was speculating above - and probably not very clearly - that perhaps Oma instigated the no-symbiote rule because she was so badly burned by Anubis.

Not sure Ascended have Goa'uld sensors. Some of their tech does seem to exclude Goa'uld usage, but most doesn't. (Stargates and rings, anyone? And while we're at it, why this obsession with big circles?

I'm looking forward to some answers, too! There might be more (eventually) over at LJ as well.

(Love your thinky Sam icon, btw)

[crevanfox]

why this obsession with big circles?

well there are a matriarichal society, so...long live the yonic symbolism

[fignewton]

The Ancients were a matriarchal society? Since when?

I know very little (okay, nothing) about what we learn of the Ancients from SGA, but there's certainly nothing to suggest it from SG-1. Yes, we meet powerful women like Oma and Morgan. But the diner in Threads had plenty of men there. The glimpse we get of the Ancients in the prologue to Ark of Truth was a mix of men and women. I do know there was someone named Janus in SGA. And there's Merlin, too...

Can you give me some canon proof that the Ancients/Alterans were matriarchal?

[crevanfox]

Blaa! Ignore me, I had just woken up when I posted that-I confused Ancients with Tokra.

Sorry about the mix up.