"Spirits" ( 2 x 13 )

So. We just got out of this fantastic story arc involving the Tok’ra, Carter’s dad, and all sorts of more awesomeness, and the next episode is titled… “Spirits”. I’m thinking ghosts? Ghosts of someone’s past? I guess I’ll just see.

We open up at the Hangout, and SG-1 is looking at some samples of a very strong mineral called Trinium. It’s from a planet that SG-11 had traveled to, but they haven’t been heard from in a while. Just then, the ‘Gate whirls to life and an arrow shoots out and impales O’Neill through the shoulder.

(He’s probably thinking, Not again! I guess Teal’c paid his dues and now it’s my turn again.)

O’Neill gets put in the infirmary, but he’ll be fine. Jackson reports that the arrow is Native American, and if that’s true, they’ve come a long way from those on this planet.

Hm… Let’s see. SGC is mining. It’s a planet probably inhabited by a Native American-like population. Why do I see this turning out badly?

Anyhow, Carter will be leading Jackson and Teal’c out to the planet, where their primary goal will be to make sure SG-11 is okay.

Carter and Jackson find SG-11’s tent, but it’s empty, and there’s no indication where they went. Teal’c senses something, but it vanishes. Later they find a totem pole, which indicates that this was once a Goa’uld planet before it was liberated by a spirit called Xe-ls. Teal’c once again springs in to action and spots a wolf. Then, though, they’re each struck by arrows and knocked out.

They wake up in a spacious room (I should mention here that Teal’c has his jacket off and is wearing a tank top… hee) and are more or less prisoners. They meet a man called Tonane, and he’s indeed part of a Native American-looking population. He tells them that SG-11 is “with the spirits”, but he offers to take the three to them.

He leads them into the forest, where they encounter the raven showed earlier and the wolf Teal’c spotted. The raven is Xe-ls and the wolf is T’akaya, according to Tonane. However, the animals eventually lead them to a different section, where SG-11 emerges. They appear disoriented, and they can’t remember what happened.

Back with the Council of Tonane’s people, Carter tries to convince them to let SGC mine the Trinium there, and of course they have an issue with the use of dynamite. So Tonane decides to go back to Earth with her so she can show him their other methods of mining.

Tonane is introduced to the rest of the major crew (Hammond and O’Neill primarily) and even after he’s showed the other methods, he still doesn’t approve. Jackson takes him away for a tour, and Hammond reveals that when the Salish (the native population) travel away from the mountain where the mining occurs, they are to do their mining then.

(I see you smirking in the background, Maybourne!!)

It’s repeating history, and SG-1 doesn’t seem happy about it. Neither does the SG-11 Captain…

…and suddenly he claps his arms together and Hammond vanishes!

And he goes back to SG-11 and it turns out they’re all actually spirits!

Okay, I think that the spirits are actually able to possess people. Which is crazy. Also they have freaky powers that can make people vanish in a flash. WEIRD.

So basically these spirits start going around and start making everyone disappear. The base goes into a state of chaos. SG-1, and Jackson with Tonane are okay. O’Neill zaps “Doctor Warner” who confessed he’s one of the spirits. After that, we see a very alien-looking creature.

Oh, so they’re shapeshifters!

T’akaya’s here too, and Jackson spots her from his hiding place. He takes Tonane to the infirmary, where the rest of SG-1 and not-Warner are. (By the way, it was Xe-ls.) Tonane insists that his spirits wouldn’t harm them unless they were threatening the Salish… which apparently this mining is. Huh. Kind of had it coming, didn’t they?

Jackson tries to talk to T’akaya, but more spirits come and they… make Teal’c disappear! No! Teal’c! (Sadness!) They come to the infirmary and make Carter disappear too! Turns out they just want to heal Xe-ls from the zat gun, and they do, so he’s fine now.

The spirits certainly aren’t happy and still want to destroy the base. O’Neill suggests they merely bury their own Stargate, and it seems to swing well with them. However, they’re also peeved that they’ve been revealed in their true forms to the Salish – or at least just Tonane. They’d saved the Salish and taken on spirit forms in order to allow them to evolve naturally. They do agree, on the other hand, that Jack has a point: the Salish people won’t necessarily turn against them.

In the end, the spirits return the SGC crews to existence and the sprits, as well as Tonane, exit without further incident. Another win for O’Neill and SG-1.

Final thoughts… Okay, I’ll confess, I got bored with this episode pretty quickly. The first time I got all the way through it, no stops, no nothing. It was late but I wanted to see if anything important came after the epicness that was “The Tok’ra”. The second time I stopped about halfway through… got distracted with Facebook… browsed through the Teal’c “Thunk” thread on Gateworld Forums… giggled through all the pictures… talked about football with a friend…

Point is, I didn’t find the writing or really anything about this episode all that captivating. I mean, even with something like “Bane” at least you had this really interesting character interaction even if the story itself was kind of dumb. The plot here is actually pretty okay. It’s a very familiar problem to anyone who knows American history and they make it a bit more interesting by adding in the whole aspect of aliens who are able to take revenge/retribution on behalf of their people. For some reason, though, I just never really felt a “flow” of sorts. It was just like, “Oh, wow, shapeshifters!” and then some stuff happened and the episode was over. It's such a widely used idea in sci-fi it's practically cliche now. Furthermore, Tonane seemed rather superfluous. I felt like his place in this storyline was never really established. Kind of a shame. He’s cute if not a little annoying.

In conclusion, it’s kind of a shame, but this episode is pretty far down on my list. A bit of a disappointment considering how strong “The Tok’ra” was. I guess there’s more, and this is just one!

PREDICTION/REFLECTION THINGY

(…Yup.)

O’Neill: So.

Jackson: Um.

Carter: Yup. Saved the day again.

Teal’c: Who would care to join me in a Star Wars marathon?

(Three hands shoot up and then they all run off.)