On Destroyers of Worlds and Gamekeepers

[fignewton]

I missed Prisoners in redial_the_gate last week, and abyssinia4077 will be posting on The Gamekeeper later today. So here's both of them at once.


Prisoners

As myystic pointed out in her recap, Prisoners offers that wonderful cliche - SG-1 in prison, other than being captured by Goa'uld. Besides that, though, it offers us Jack backstory - he was once in prison (and Daniel didn't know about it, which implies that it's something he really doesn't want to talk about). It gives us Teal'c in fierce defense of Daniel, and some great Sam excited-by-tech moments. It gives us another example of one of my favorite Daniel quirks: when his brain is exhausted and/or oxygen-starved, he actually does his best out-of-the-box thinking. But most of all, it offers us Linnea, who is one of the most fascinating antagonists SG-1 ever faced.

I love how creepy Linnea is, on so many levels. Despite her usage of simple terminology, it's clear that she understands technology marvelously - she has that little hand thingy with which she (I think) turned Vishnoor's own attack against him, and later stunned Sam and the medtech. She had no trouble understanding how a computer system works, and manages to hack her way through the SGC's systems with little effort. Then there's her cool self-assessment, as she practically tells Sam that she shouldn't be trusted. Sam interprets her words in the best way possible, but then Sam saw Linnea as a protector, a source of scientific knowledge, and a woman who had fought off male aggressors; it's unfair to expect Sam, in those circumtances, to be more skeptical. Oddly, it's Daniel who suggests the greatest caution - doubly ironic, since he's usually the one to offer the greatest optimism, and he certainly champions Linnea/Kera later on! You do wonder why Linnea healed the blind man. Of course, she had no way of knowing that he could reveal her true identity, but what prompted her to heal him in the first place? The desire to further impress the people who were going to get her out of Hadante? A compulsion to practice her arts, whenever she gets the chance? How much of Linnea's version was truth, compared to what the man told Hammond later? How much of her genocide was intentional, and how much was accidental, and how much was simply the cool calculation of a scientist perfecting her techniques?

(Speaking from the Sam and Daniel friendship aspect,  I adore Sam petting Daniel's hair on the steps of the Stargate.)

Some questions:

From the discussion in front of the Stargate ("Cimmeria is out") it seems as if not every Stargate can go everywhere in the Stargate network. Are there more symbols than fit on a regular Gate, thus causing some Stargates to be inaccessible from others?

Why didn't Daniel point out that while glasses might seem like a weakness in a prison on Earth, there's no way to tell how an alien culture might interpret them? Who knows - maybe some of the natives saw Daniel's glasses as a status symbol, or a mark of power.


The Gamekeeper

Interestingly, the Keeper is never actually called the "Gamekeeper" at all.

More Jack backstory and more Daniel backstory (because he wasn't a tragic enough figure yet, apparently.) More marvelous cementing of the Sam-Daniel and Jack-Teal'c friendships. Tragedy and pathos and agonizing emotionally wonderfully acted and... how stupid is the Keeper, really? (And how old? If he created the "Enviornment," what's been keeping him alive for a millenium?) Why did he deliberately choose the worst possible moments in Jack's and Daniel's lives? Especially as we see how he stacks the deck against them, by changing the rules so that they can't win. If he wanted to tempt them into staying, why didn't he choose happy moments in their lives? We should have seen Daniel back on Abydos, and Jack with Charlie...and speaking of which, does anyone really believe that this botched mission in '82 was Jack's "worst memory," the one he most wanted a chance to relive and fix? How about Charlie? Or even Daniel nearly dying, just a few weeks before this? I have no problem with the Keeper's choice of Daniel's parents' deaths over, say, Sha're's abduction or his failed lecture. OTOH, for someone obviously looking for maximum angst, imagine an endlessly looped replay of the moment when Apophis and Teal'c stepped through the Abydos Stargate. Daniel possibly shooting and killing Teal'c, right then and there? With Teal'c playing himself? Talk about possibilities.

But here we have the Keeper, hoping to keep his new software, as Daniel puts it, endlessly available. Yet he chooses depressing events that the victims would obviously seek to escape, and he fails to keep up even the specter of reality. Even when he tries for greater subtlety, when the team thinks they're back in the SGC, he overplays his hand as Hammond and makes it blindingly obvious what's happening. It doesn't even occur to him to make sure the residents are invisible to SG-1 - their black-robed, brooding presence is more than a little bit of a giveaway. Was this simply because the man never had any need for subtlety before? He had cunning, but no guile?

So many questions... How much were Melburn (sorry, yes, that's the way it's spelled in the credits) and Claire in character? We know that the usage of "Danny" was in character, from Daniel's reaction; but was Claire really so kindly dismissive, and Melburn really so brusque? Would he really order "Jake" to haul his eight-year-old son away? Or was this the Keeper's manipulations? It seems to fit with the same mind that stupidly had Hammond suggest, in a public briefing, that Jack could spend time with Charlie; and it's all in a piece with the mind that had Kawalsky tell Daniel, "Doctor Jackson, I always made you laugh." And when would this be, Kawalsky? When you were busy throwing his suitcase down a sand dune? When you were cursing him out for getting you stranded on Abydos? When he was watching you suffer from being Goa'ulded, and thinking about Sha're undergoing the same torment? Or maybe you're referring to Daniel's hysterical laughter when you claimed, on the way back from Abydos in the movie, that you always knew he'd get you back to Earth.

I want to see an AU with a Keeper with just a little bit more brainpower. One where he learns his lesson and goes for subtle, and the team thinks they're out... but they're not.

Two little observations:

I'm really glad that Sam got this first hint that her mind isn't quite what it once was, before she suffers Jolinar Flashbacks (tm) in next week's Need.

Daniel sneezing into his hand and then shaking it vigorously is just... ew. Daniel, sweetie, you know we love you - but next time, use tissues, okay?

Comments

[sg-fignewton.livejournal.com]

Oh, I love that video game analogy! And I like the suggestion that the Keeper chose scenarios where Daniel and Jack had to struggle. OTOH, what fun is a video game where it's impossible to win? The Keeper deliberately manipulated reactions so that Daniel and Jack would lose, every time. I can't imagine that would be fun for anybody - not the "characters" OR the "players." The Keeper, though, seemed to be having a great time. He was a bit twisted, apparently. :)

[randomfreshink.livejournal.com]

Oh, I love that video game analogy! And I like the suggestion that the Keeper chose scenarios where Daniel and Jack had to struggle. OTOH, what fun is a video game where it's impossible to win?

Ah, but if you keep to the video game anaolgy--the toughest thing with a game is to tune the learning curve (I speak as someone who has had to do this).

Too steep a curve, and yes, folks quite. But, too shallow a curve and folks quite there, too. (There was actually a study done once that I read about regarding challenging kids and it's the same thing--make it too easy and kids get bored and quit. Make it too hard and they quit.)

So, my take is that the Keeper's been doing this a long time--meaning he's used to folks with steep learning curves. So he throws in the 'new software' and sets it on max learning curve because that's what his residents need.

It's miscalcuation on his part because he's thinking about his resident's needs, not about the new software refusing to operate (hmmmm... SG-1 as Windows....hmmmmm).

This is also why he wouldn't pick a 'nice' story--as in nice stories are dull, dull, dull. He wants instant drama and impact and POW for his residents--he really isn't caring about the software he's yanked into this.

Notice, too, he doesn't have prior experience with deaing with fresh input--so he's got nothing to help him calibrate it right. So it's not so much dumb as lacking experience that gets him.

[sg-fignewton.livejournal.com]

Yes, the analogy does keep working nicely, doesn't it? And what you say makes a lot of sense - by now, the residents would be experts and demand proper intensity with lots of WHAMs (as my old fandom called those wrenching, heartbreaking, agonizing moments). Still, the Keeper ought to have recognized, on his second try, that he'd better try to tone things down... but he didn't.

[randomfreshink.livejournal.com]

That is where you kind of wonder if the Keeper is a person, or a machine. On the one hand, if he's just programming himself, maybe he's not set up to adapt. On the other hand, people can get terribly set in their ways.

But the second try sort of does tone thing down in thet it starts off with him trying to simulate the SGC and encourage Jack and Daniel to go back and 'pick' experiences.

Either way he doens't seem to have much patience for someone who has been around -- maybe he can sense or see the resident's interest level and gets a little pressured when they start losing interest in a scenario?

[sg-fignewton.livejournal.com]

A very good question, yes. As I asked in the post - he claims to have created the enviornment. Is he actually 1,000 years old? A consciousness downloaded into an android body, like Harlan? Deluded, even?

Does he have to really please the residents or just keep them occupied? They do believe there's nowhere to go - how much does he really have to keep them happy, when they're literally a captive audience?

[randomfreshink.livejournal.com]

Maybe he's 'programmed' to do this? Or he wants them occupied so they don't get bored and go looking for the exit (it is easy to find if you poke around), so maybe it's like keeping the cat amused with a toy so it doesn't go poking into the fish tank for the fun of it?