Stargate SG-1 1018 Family Ties

[fignewton]

Oh, Abyssis. You have my extreme sympathy that you put all that effort into catching up with… this.

Well. Two bright spots.

First of all, Sam and Vala going shopping together is delightful. If I’m not mistaken, this is our first true glimpse of them as casual friends, instead of teammates with a decent working relationship. And while my mind usually doesn’t work like this, I had the distinct impression that Mitchell’s “gallantry” in allowing “ladies first” was more for the chance to watch them in their nice new civvies for a little while longer. :)

Second, Landry’s ex-wife Kim is a truly beautiful woman.

…Okay, two and a half. We got a lot of SG-1-in-civvies scenes, which I always enjoy.

Er. That’s it, really.

I found this episode to be seriously awful. Awful enough, in fact, to rival Avenger 2.0 for the not-so-coveted spot as Worst Episode Ever. I can’t believe they wasted an entire episode on this absolutely awful dreck.

I don’t  care enough to go through it bit by bit, so I’ll just highlight all the really wincing points:

They decided to spend an episode on highlighting Vala’s past. Okay, fair enough, I suppose, even if it’s not the wisest decision only three eps from the end of the series. Still, there’s so much intriguing fodder for a truly powerful ep – Qetesh, for example, and a closer look at her post-host years, or even a confrontation with the planet where she was taken as host.

So what do we get instead? Her smarmy father – not even a mention of stepmother Adria. Not a single reference to her lost years as a host. Her box of keepsakes were something Qetesh took along with her, perhaps?

There was no confirmation that dear Dad’s intel was accurate, except for the presence of people on the planet and a heavy concentration of naquadah. And they took his word for it blindly and shot those people and ships without even trying to communicate. For all the SGC might know, those were innocent people that dear Dad just happened to frame for convenience, and his entire story was cooked up in order to get those people killed. Putting this together with the way they killed the guys at the beginning of Bounty, and I’m beginning to wonder just what has happened to the SGC.

It took Teal’c eight years to be allowed off-base, and thanks to the Trust, he was back to living at the SGC in less than a month. He’s still there now, as Mitchell’s suggestion about finding him an apartment last season confirms for us. Vala, as is clearly indicated in this very ep, is also still living on-base. So they give dear Dad permission to waltz off-base to live with the Tau’ri? Why did “sanctuary” automatically mean allowing him to live on Earth? I know he asked for it, but why grant it? The Land of Light, Cimmeria, Edora – or, if you prefer, any planet that wasn’t on the Abydos cartouche, and thus is unknown to the general population. Or toss him through the wormhole to the Pegasus galaxy, and have Weir shift him to one of the planets there. He wouldn’t have been able to complain that he wasn’t safe. …But of course, they needed him on Earth to finish a dangling plot line from ONE EPISODE AGO that no one even knew was dangling. How lovely.

By the way, this makes two eps in a row when the SGC ignores the opinions/concerns of an alien that has supposedly been accepted as part of the team. At least Teal’c had Daniel vociferously defending his views. Vala has nobody. Maybe Jonas should count his blessings that the SGC is content to leave him languishing under the rule of the Ori.

Yawn. Again we need to drag in the Dr. Lam/Landry familial connection? Aside from the concept of father and daughter, there is no similarity whatsoever between Lam/Landry and Vala/dear Dad. Landry’s patronizing attitude is so off-base that it hurts, even without the fatherly attitude towards Vala that made me definitely cringe.

An absolute alien fits seamlessly into Tau’ri culture, just like that? No matter how long his career as a scam artist, there’s no way he could pick up all the tricks and twists of scam artistry on Earth so quickly – never mind the bingo games.

Apparently, the writers wanted to trash any suggestion of Vala/Daniel. While that’s a sentiment that pleases me, I have never seen Daniel so patronizing in ten seasons, despite his tendencies towards arrogance. And where is this attitude coming from? Daniel knows all about not-so-happy families and people who aren’t very good at parentage (yeah, I’m looking at you, Nick, even if you might have been right to make that decision).

How did Teal’c become The Girl of SG-1? He’s been whumped more this season than every other SG-1 member combined, and that includes Daniel being abducted and Priorized. Why did they have to come up with a plan that involves Teal’c being deliberately zatted?

A ship full of weapons-grade naquadah. This means a big boost to the budget, right? And everyone a lot happier with the SGC and the new ability to build more ships and so on, right? …Of course not.

Sam drinking on-base, huh? First Mitchell last season, now this. Shame on you, writers.

You don’t mock Teal’c, writers. You just don’t. And I didn’t see Teal’c sliding down in that chair – I saw Chistopher Judge.

Oh, yes – and broad meta hints about how meeeean the PTB are to end Stargate in the middle of a really awful episode? It doesn’t work very well.

Sigh. 0.5 out of ten, I think. Please, please let next week’s ep be better!

Comments

[sg-fignewton.livejournal.com]

Oh, you are dangerous, you know that? Hee!!

"But who'd want to worship frozen broccoli?" the young man joked. Then he got a thoughtful look in his eye.

Can't you just see Nyan bursting into Daniel's office with the horrible news that the Ori have secretly planted worship me nanocytes into the local vegetable patches?

Seriously, though (can we be serious about this?) I understand exactly what you mean: the storyline of S9-10 isn't enough to truly interest me, or charm me, to want to write about it. aurora_novarum suggested I try writing Vala in order to start liking her, but I can't even think about it. And I think they went the easy/lazy route by picking Arthurian legend, despite the timeline contradictions and the lack of melding with what we know about the Ancients, instead of going with the Roman/roads motif.

The idea that I am totally resisting (or maybe saving for retirement), is the urge to completely rewrite S9 and 10. With more emphasis on the post-Goa'uld galaxy, the Ori as creepier but less overwhelmingly powerful enemies, the Stargate going public on Earth... because it's really silly that they it hasn't been blown yet

I don't care if you don't write this now, or if your Nyan snippet gets thrown away. But I do hope you write this someday, because while I don't care for Mitchell much and Vala makes me crazy as she's presented to us now, I would dearly love to see some kind of sense made out of these last two seasons of SG-1.

[redbyrd-sgfic.livejournal.com]

Can't you just see Nyan bursting into Daniel's office with the horrible news that the Ori have secretly planted worship me nanocytes into the local vegetable patches?

You're channeling the parody *g*. Actually, it's a rather clever insight to some iconography that's been baffling the archeology team. But Daniel totally understood how he got there from frozen broccoli. (It'll probably turn up somewhere eventually- I never throw these bits out!)

And I think they went the easy/lazy route
by picking Arthurian legend

Oh, god, yes. This was the 'gee, we don't have to explain anything because *everyone*'s seen "The Sword in the Stone". Pardon me while I go thump the heavy bag a few times.... okay, better now.