Okay, I’m gonna guess… alternate future/reality. Or time travel. Which is ironic, since I’m now living in the year 2011, but this was made in like 2001… Okay, I’ll stop and just watch.
The episode starts off with a kind of strangely-dressed Carter sitting across the table from a man in a business suit. (Nope, we are definitely not in Colorado.) Apparently they’re married, since he called her “honey”. Apparently she’s also trying to get pregnant, but it just hasn’t happened yet.
WHOA TRANSPORTER TECHNOLOGY.
And a public Stargate?
And some people named the Aschen?
Who apparently did what the Tollans never did and shared technology?
Well, before we can learn more, Carter’s hubby is gone, and we’ve gained a lot more questions.
(By the way, Sam/Jack shippers, I see you writhing in the background. It’s okay. I’m sure this isn’t even real or something.)
The president comes on a screen above the public Stargate (I think we’re in D.C.), and Janet Fraiser, Carter, Jackson, and Teal’c (who has no serpent guard emblem on his forehead… say what?) are watching. No Jack, though. Hm… The president more or less outlines what’s happened: SG-1 made contact with a race called the Aschen ten years ago (so, like, present-day in the show) and they’ve given us all kinds of cool stuff. Gets better: They helped us defeat the Goa’uld.
The three present (er, former) members of SG-1 are awarded for helping to forge this alliance, and then they toast “to General Hammond”. He died six years ago. (Aw! Sad!) According to Teal’c, it doesn’t sounds like Jack’s all too fond of this alliance, so that’s why he’s not here. We also learn that Carter’s husband, Joe Faxon, is an ambassador.
Well, you know those ambassadors. First Sarek got Amanda Grayson, and now this guy’s got Carter.
They all part, planning to meet for dinner that evening. Carter and Fraiser chat, and the doctor expresses her feelings that her job is becoming obsolete, given all the advanced medical technology of the Aschen. However, she does convince Carter to let her check her out the old-fashioned way.
At her office, Fraiser has… bad news.
Carter literally can’t have children. Her ovaries are damaged beyond repair. Carter can’t believe that the Aschen doctors lied to her, and they plan on figuring out just what’s going on.
Carter, similarly, has some occasional issues with her co-worker, an Aschen named Mollem. She convinces him to let her into the main computer interface, and after he leaves, Fraiser joins her.
The news is bad:
According to the stats, the birth rate has dropped 91% in the last two years.
That’s… bad. That’s really, really bad.
Yeah, I don’t think these Aschen are as benign as we think.
And it’s all connected back to this anti-aging vaccine.
That night at dinner, the ladies reveal what they have discovered. The guys can hardly believe what they’re hearing; that the Aschen would basically commit an act of genocide against humanity… without so much as firing a shot.
And then it gets interesting.
The night before General Hammond’s untimely heart attack, he had called Fraiser and told her he needed to talk to her about something really important. Teal’c surmises that perhaps he was murdered.
The problem is, though, they have nowhere to turn. The Aschen control most everything, and even their other allies, such as the Tok’ra, are almost all gone. According to Teal’c, who I think is some kind of liaison between Earth and Chulak, says that very few Jaffa would be willing to fight back against the impossibly powerful Aschen.
In a particularly despondent moment, the team reflects:
Carter: “We don’t even control the Stargate. God, what have we done? This morning we were celebrating…”
Jackson: “Now I wish we could all take it back.”
Waitress: “Will there be anything else?”
Jackson: (Despondently) “Apparently not.”
Then Carter gets a “1969” idea! Fraiser at first objects, but Carter fairly points out that if they don’t send a note of warning to themselves, the whole human race will die.
Later, Carter goes to Jack’s cabin at the lake with no fish. (Well, this is awkward.) He’s looking kind of scraggly, and he’s a little annoyed that she’s just now realizing that he was right all along, and refuses to help her with her plan. He’s very bitter about it and turns her away.
“Let me tell you something, Carter. You want to erase your mistakes? That’s your business. My conscience is clear. I warned everybody. I threw up the red flag and everybody, including you, shut me down.”
Teal’c goes back to Chulak, as he does not wish to further arouse suspicions, and Jackson and Carter travel to Colorado to grab an old GDO from the Cheyenne Mountain “museum” as it were. It’s actually very funny – the two are in sunglasses (a la “1969” actually) and dutifully following an overly-bubbly tour guide. (“And we’re walking!”)
AND JACK SHOWS UP! Yay!
They meet him in the old control room, where he’s procured a couple zats and… a replica GDO. Well, darn. They are, unfortunately, caught by our dearly beloved Sergeant Walter Harriman. However, they convince him to let them go.
Carter talks to Joe and tells him what the Aschen have done.
Gets worse.
Joe knew that they were going to be instilling this “birth control” of sorts – but not to this extent.
Carter is obviously very upset with him now. However, recognizing that he was wrong, he agrees to get a GDO for her from the President’s desk.
The next day, they all meet in the Aschen lab but Joe doesn’t want Carter taking part in this. He won’t give them the GDO without that promise, so O’Neill reluctantly agrees.
Personally, I’m a little surprised that a headstrong woman like Carter let her husband exclude her from this mission, but I do suppose marriage is about compromise…
About an hour later, everyone has written a note, in case someone fails to put it through the ‘Gate. Jack takes the GDO and they all meet in the Stargate terminal… which is of course very well-guarded. Mellom approaches him and asks him why he’s there, and he says:
“Ah, well, you know my friend Teal’c. I missed him at the celebration. He’s coming into town. I bought him a hat.”
Does he really need the hat now?
Teal’c and another Jaffa come through the ‘Gate…
…and all hell breaks loose.
Teal’c first shoots one of the guards with his staff weapon. Jackson zats someone, then O’Neill zats Mellom, and Teal’c starts to dial out, but THEN HE’S GETTING SHOT OH MY GOD SOMEBODY HELP HIM!!
Teal’c manages to dial out all the way, but he’s taken one too many shots and collapses. Jack gets down there, and then he collapses halfway up the ramp to the ‘Gate. Now it’s Jackson’s turn, and he doesn’t succeed either.
GO, SAM, GO!!
She dashes up the ramp, and tosses the note through the Stargate… just before dying.
Well. Everyone died. This is depressing.
Back in the year 2000, the ‘Gate whirls open… and out comes a crumpled piece of paper. O’Neill picks it up, and reads simply: “Under no circumstances go to P4C-970.” The Aschen homeworld.
Hammond, alive and well, orders the planet removed from the dialing list (but is it locked out?), and SG-1 merely wonders why this was sent to them.
Final thoughts…
Lesson #1 of sci-fi: Nobody is ever “just fine”.
Lesson #2: DON’T TOUCH THAT THING IN FRONT OF YOU.
Lesson #3: Everyone always has ulterior motives.
Lesson #3.5: If it seems too good to be true, it probably is, unless it’s the Vulcans, ‘cause they’re logical and stuff. (First Contact was great.)
This is pretty much like a worst-case-scenario alliance, and oh gosh did I LOVE how they made this episode. Just like really brilliant writing. It was literally a systematic extermination of the population (“EXTERMINATE!” Oh wait, wrong show), except that it was more like mass suicide. Ironically, the treatment which prevented one from being able to have children doubled the lifespan.
This is a case of the authority figures of an establishment being too eager and too desperate for help. Frankly, I thought we were doing just fine, but the allure of an alliance with a most powerful species probably seemed like a really good idea at the time. Let’s face it, half of SG-1’s successes were either by chance or by pure dumb luck. But from what it sounds like, when the Aschen moved in, Earth’s other allies kind of pushed us aside. I know they mentioned the Tok’ra, but what about the Tollans and, to a lesser extent, the Asgard? I just find it a little strange that, with the help of the Aschen, Earth would be making leaps and bounds and no one else really got after us for it.
All in all, execution-wise, I thought “2010” turned out very well. It was interesting to see the possibilities for all these characters and the lengths they went to to prevent this from occurring. And our guys? Peacefully oblivious about what could’ve been.
REFLECTION/PREDICTION THINGY:
(No room on the page for this! Sad!)
O’Neill: You know, it doesn’t have to be exactly three pages. It can be four.
Marie: YOU BE QUIET. I don’t like to have all that blank space! Get over it!
Interesting idea, but sometimes they seem to take things a bit far in these alternate reality episodes ... I don't think Jack would get quite so bitter, or that the others would settle for losing relationship with the Asgard, the Tollan, etc.
ReplyDeleteIt's also interesting to think about what a truly benevolent race might be like -- if the Aschen didn't want to exterminate us, would we still want to give them control of everything? Would the benifits of health / long life, no more wars, etc. be worth the loss of freedom of choice?
Reminds me of "I, Robot" (spoilers for that movie follow) ... where the computer decided that the "0th law" should be that it would not allow humanity to come to harm, and so decided to control people for their own good.
Even though he wants only good things for us, God never does that -- just the opposite; he sets us free to make our own choices (even if they're self destructive), and wants a relationship based on trust and freely given, reciprocated love. He isn't a "benevolent dictator", he is a father who wants his children to know and trust him. That's what love does ... it doesn't control, it makes free.