The Stargate Franchise - A First Timer's Watchthrough

[DonIago]

I found the episode effective as essentially a one-room play myself, though I've also read some criticism of it for not being an especially accurate portrayal of torture (which is to say, far, far worse than what we see here). It does seem as though they're using a 'light touch' in this episode and have upped their game a bit by the next episode, but I kind of understand the critique as well.

There may be some valid concern that if television makes it look like torture isn't 'all that bad', then in the mind of the public it may become a more acceptable practice.

Picard gets worse in "Chain of Command".

 

[Jayson1]

Nightwalker & Abyss

It's a light night for Stargate viewing, but I got three in today, including these two. Nightwalker was a very different episode of the show, but I still really enjoyed it. This one had Sam, Teal'c, and Jonas investigating a small town after a Doctor from the research lab that Adrian Conrad (Desperate Measures) worked at. Turns out the townspeople were Goa'ulds, but they were cloned symbiotes so the symbiote only had power to control the host at night. This would have been a solid X-Files episode, but it still had that Stargate feel that made it fun. I also liked Jonas eating as much as he could and the revelation at the end with Sam taking the antidote and then her discussion with Jonas about hitting him just to keep the act going.

Abyss was a fantastic episode. It seems like a lot of the shows in various franchises have that psychological torture episode. Farscape had The Hidden Memory (John in the Aurora Chair), Star Trek had Chain of Command and Die is Cast, amongst others, Babylon 5 had that amazing episode where Sharidan was being psychologically tortured (I forgot the name, but it was in season 4) and this one had Jack O'Neill being psychologically tortured by System Lord Ba'al. Every single scene with Jack was fantastic, from the camera angle on the cell, to Daniel even appearing, to the revelation that Jack was protecting Kanan's secret about the Slave Woman. I'm not sure if it's a top episode of the series for me yet, but it's pretty close up there. It is telling me one thing about this season though. Stargate is not missing a step with Shanks' departure. Granted, he was back in this episode, but I can't really say I miss him that much. The way they've written this season so far is really well done. I hope it keeps going but in the first 6 episodes, I'm pleasantly surprised. The only episode I haven't liked so far was Frozen, but there were redeeming qualities in that one, at least with Jack's decision.

Even though he was already established I believe this is the ep that put Ba'al on the map. Expect much more from him in the future.

Jason

 

[Farscape One]

I found the episode effective as essentially a one-room play myself, though I've also read some criticism of it for not being an especially accurate portrayal of torture (which is to say, far, far worse than what we see here). It does seem as though they're using a 'light touch' in this episode and have upped their game a bit by the next episode, but I kind of understand the critique as well.

There may be some valid concern that if television makes it look like torture isn't 'all that bad', then in the mind of the public it may become a more acceptable practice.

Picard gets worse in "Chain of Command".

I think the torture of Sheridan was meant to be in stages. Remember, he was beaten before the guy comes in to interrogate him.

He got physically exhausted, made to throw up, forced to not be able to sleep with that infernal recording repeating, then the more mind games happen.

THEN... they start using the psychoactive drugs the next episode.

I'm sorry, but they did put Sheridan through the wringer.

(Picard did get it a bit worse, I do agree. But it's apples and oranges... Cardassians ARE shown to be more ruthless than humans. Plus, different franchises.)

 

[Jayson1]

You would think most torture would be less physical torturous and more about mental manipulation. They say that torture is not a effective means of gaining information but I am guessing that isn't the case with brainwashing.

Jason

 

[Romulan_spy]

I found the episode effective as essentially a one-room play myself, though I've also read some criticism of it for not being an especially accurate portrayal of torture (which is to say, far, far worse than what we see here). It does seem as though they're using a 'light touch' in this episode and have upped their game a bit by the next episode, but I kind of understand the critique as well.

There may be some valid concern that if television makes it look like torture isn't 'all that bad', then in the mind of the public it may become a more acceptable practice.

Picard gets worse in "Chain of Command".

I would agree that the severity of Jack's torture by Baal is implied but not really shown. We see Baal throw daggers and drip acid on Jack which would certainly have been very painful. And we know Jack dies and is revived over and over again in the sarcophagus. That would be a very traumatic experience. But the episode does not really show us the full effect of the torture. So it does sanitize it a bit.

 

[Jayson1]

Of course their is also only so much you can show when it comes to torture and violence on a family friendly show. If you notice Stargate was also very reluctant to show humans killing other humans. Their was often something alien involved in any murder whether it was G'ould or Jaffa or humans who got a G'ould in it. I think it happened sometimes but not often and even then I can't think of any earth human killing a earth human example.


Jason

 

[tomalak301]

I would agree that the severity of Jack's torture by Baal is implied but not really shown. We see Baal throw daggers and drip acid on Jack which would certainly have been very painful. And we know Jack dies and is revived over and over again in the sarcophagus. That would be a very traumatic experience. But the episode does not really show us the full effect of the torture. So it does sanitize it a bit.

I think if the show was made today, it would probably be a lot more graphic than it was on the Sci Fi Channel. Just look at Picard and what happened to Icheb, which I thought was crossing the line a little. I appreciated the restraint, and thought what they showed was just as, if not more effective. It did what Intersections did, to an extent. It showed how Torture can wear you down mentally and psychologically.

 

[DonIago]

I would agree that the severity of Jack's torture by Baal is implied but not really shown. We see Baal throw daggers and drip acid on Jack which would certainly have been very painful. And we know Jack dies and is revived over and over again in the sarcophagus. That would be a very traumatic experience. But the episode does not really show us the full effect of the torture. So it does sanitize it a bit.

Sorry, I was referring to the torture of Sheridan.

I think I found the torture of Jack arguably more effective even if less graphic. We see him becoming more exhausted through the course of the episode (I don't recall Sheridan quite going through that, but I don't tend to rewatch that episode ), we know that he's actually being killed every time, we know that the sarcophagus has a corrupting influence, so being exposed to that repeatedly just can't be good, and we even see Daniel's mounting desperation to do whatever he can to save Jack.

Maybe the episode should have been extended over a longer timeframe and we should have seen Jack starting to experience personality changes due to the sarcophagus? Hrm.

Again though, in B5's defense, I think Sheridan was just getting a 'light touch' in the episode and they amped things up between that episode and the next.

 

[Romulan_spy]

I think if the show was made today, it would probably be a lot more graphic than it was on the Sci Fi Channel. Just look at Picard and what happened to Icheb, which I thought was crossing the line a little. I appreciated the restraint, and thought what they showed was just as, if not more effective. It did what Intersections did, to an extent. It showed how Torture can wear you don't mentally is psychologically.

Agreed. Abyss was effective. We see Baal throw daggers and drip acid into Jack. By the way, having gravity work horizontally was also neat. Plus, we see Jack becoming exhausted and begging Daniel to help. So the audience definitely gets the idea of what Jack is going through without having to be super graphic and hardcore about it.

 

[tomalak301]

Even though he was already established I believe this is the ep that put Ba'al on the map. Expect much more from him in the future.

Jason

Ba'al was in the two part episode in Season 5. I'm actually glad the series is doing more with the various System Lords of the Goa'uld regime. It seemed like they didn't do enough (Other than develop Apophis and kill off a few of them) in the early seasons.

By the way I loved Jack's quote about his name.

Ball? That's it? Like Bocce?

 

[Farscape One]

I can understand why they didn't show a lot of different System Lords in the early years.

As the SGC started out, they would only likely encounter a few. But as their victories grew and they became bigger pieces on the chess board of the galaxy, they would eventually encounter more of them.

 

[tomalak301]

I can understand why they didn't show a lot of different System Lords in the early years.

As the SGC started out, they would only likely encounter a few. But as their victories grew and they became bigger pieces on the chess board of the galaxy, they would eventually encounter more of them.

I can understand not doing it for the first three seasons (You need to develop the main cast, and expand the universe) but I think we could have started delving into more of the System Lords in Season 4. It's a difference of one season though, so I'm not sure if it matters much.

 

[Jayson1]

Ba'al was in the two part episode in Season 5. I'm actually glad the series is doing more with the various System Lords of the Goa'uld regime. It seemed like they didn't do enough (Other than develop Apophis and kill off a few of them) in the early seasons.

By the way I loved Jack's quote about his name.

Ball? That's it? Like Bocce?

More puns are coming in that department.

Jason

 

[Romulan_spy]

More puns are coming in that department.

Jason

Yeah, O'Neill has definitely more fun with Ba'al.

 

[bigdaddy]

I can understand not doing it for the first three seasons (You need to develop the main cast, and expand the universe) but I think we could have started delving into more of the System Lords in Season 4. It's a difference of one season though, so I'm not sure if it matters much.

The main complaint of mine is what changes in just one season, or episode. Unnatural Selection is one of them, so is the episode before it. It's alway been ridiculous to me. I'll leave it at that for now.

 

[JD]

Wow, I didn't realize they introduced Ba'al this early, I thought he didn't come in until a lot later.

 

[DonIago]

^Well, they introduced him way back in "Summit", though you could be forgiven for not having remembered that by the time you got to "Abyss".

 

[fireproof78]

I might be misremembering my timelines (a definite possibility) but I swear we had more System Lords explored even before Ba'al. There was Hathor, Her'ur, Apophis (obviously), Cronus, Sokar, Neritie (sp?) and Yu. I mean, obviously we get more development, but I didn't think it was lacking in the early part.

 

[tomalak301]

I might be misremembering my timelines (a definite possibility) but I swear we had more System Lords explored even before Ba'al. There was Hathor, Her'ur, Apophis (obviously), Cronus, Sokar, Neritie (sp?) and Yu. I mean, obviously we get more development, but I didn't think it was lacking in the early part.

We did see them in the early seasons but they didn't get nearly as much development as when they actually started to make them a focus in Season 5, onwards.

 

[Romulan_spy]

I might be misremembering my timelines (a definite possibility) but I swear we had more System Lords explored even before Ba'al. There was Hathor, Her'ur, Apophis (obviously), Cronus, Sokar, Neritie (sp?) and Yu. I mean, obviously we get more development, but I didn't think it was lacking in the early part.

Yes, we saw them but they were mostly there just to be an obstacle for SG1. They'd threaten SG1 or capture SG1 and then SG1 would defeat them. In Fair Game, we got a little bit more about them but I think Summit gave us the best development of the Goauld.