Paradise Lost

DVD, Stargate SG-1 S6 (Paradise Lost)

Or 'Jack and Harry Go Fishin''. Just last episode I was wishing Mayborn could come back, and old Harry doesn't disappoint; turning up out of the blue to steal from O'Neill's barbecue; lying to the hilt, as ever; even shooting ("zatting!"), Carter and Jack, both. All for the fabled paradise promised by an old scroll and key. Sometimes old keys can unlock fabulous treasure (and that's how Harry gets the SGC interested, pretending it's something to do with a weapons cache Simmons had been after), other times the information is so old as to be obsolete. And with the title giving away this little paradise's fate (er, it's lost), it doesn't take long for Mayborn's retirement plan to become another entry in O'Neill's anti-bucket list, should he have one - as I wrote in the previous review, he's already played host to a symbiont and been photographed shaking hands with Senator Kinsey. All that remained was for him to spend the rest of his natural life with a whining Mayborn to complete the hat trick of nightmares!

I like Mayborn. I know you're not supposed to, he's a traitor and a liar and can never be trusted, but he has a certain dogged charm in that he always wants Jack to see him as an equal; a friend. A friend who will stab you in the back (or shoot you in the front, in this case), but otherwise loyal. Funnily enough, this time he didn't want O'Neill around, his whole plan was to escape Earth to this fabled land of secret perfection. And more funnily enough this led to an understanding between him and Jack that he'd always wanted. I will say that the pacing is a bit uneven, spending too much time on Jack or Harry standing around in the village, or walking around the undergrowth (or facing an unconvincing CGI warthog), when we could have done with more of Carter and her attempts to deal with the guilt of getting O'Neill stranded. One of the most important scenes is when she's sniffling in the women's locker room and Teal'c comes in to provide support, ending up with a little friendly cuddle, a personal thing you wouldn't normally see with any of the characters usually, since they're tough military people. In this case it rang true, made possible with the simple line that Carter speaks about how they just lost Daniel, and now… Even at her fiercest with the scientists assigned to decode the gateway, she doesn't really come across as a hard-as-nails, bootstraps kind of person, she has too much intelligence and care for that. But it was fascinating to see her go through guilt, even though, when you look at it rationally, it wasn't her fault at all…

If Mayborn had succeeded in getting through the doorway before O'Neill did, Jack wouldn't have been stranded with him, and despite all the survivalist sense he's shown in the series, Harry would probably have ended up dead, gone mad from the plant he ate. I was banking on it being the water since he admits he drank straight from the lake, something you'd think an experienced agent like him would have been more cautious about, but it turned out to be a simple answer, just like the clue to their whereabouts which Carter realises - it's the moon. It was disguised so well in the beautiful visuals that make up for all the Earth, base, or featureless alien planet episodes we've had lately, from the shot of that gigantic moon in the sky to the strongly contrasting vistas when Harry and Jack go from an ancient temple ground (apparently made by the Furlings, the most mysterious, and possibly most ridiculous-sounding members of the Stargate races, and one which I doubt we'll ever see), to a field of green grass mixed with yellow flowers, to the backdrop of a forested mountain. It's stunning and makes you want to go there!

The care that went into finding a location for the village is also on screen, a gorgeous lake in the background - it does look like one of those locations they'd used before, but on a TV budget I wasn't going to complain. This bright, sunny paradise is even made foreboding when they portray Jack's descent into paranoia after ingesting the plant, nicely adjusting the colour palette and contrast in one continuous shot circling round him, almost like putting on the ring in 'The Lord of The Rings,' if not as dramatic as that, as well as some 'dying man' point of view shots with O'Neill hovering over his vision in a whited-out sky. The little straw huts were kind of basic, and too much time was spent in the village (perhaps to justify the cost), but you could say it was to help sell the time they're supposed to have spent there which was weeks, running into months. I would have liked to see more of Jack and Harry working together for their survival, like Robinson Crusoe on his desert island (though their methods differed as much as their personalities if you take the styles of fishing as example: Jack uses a stick and line, Mayborn chucks in a grenade!), and the ending would have been improved if we'd been privy to Carter seeing O'Neill again, but perhaps they wouldn't have been able to show much in that regard because of military protocol and Jack not being one for joyous reunions.

I do think that sometimes more of an ending scene is required on this series where they can cut away too early. It leaves it up to the imagination, but I would have liked to know where Mayborn got to go, or see that SG-1 reunion. It was a nice way to close out the Mayborn storyline, with O'Neill fulfilling his destiny and shooting Harry ("twice!"), then admitting he'd thought of a way for Mayborn not to have to go back: let the Tok'ra take him to another planet. Though the man is still not to be trusted, and has enough secrets about Earth he could find himself a target of more than rogue NID or official government agents, if Goa'uld or other aliens went after him. Actually that could have potential as a story… I never think we've seen the last of Harry, but I don't remember if he turned up again, and I know the series took a turn away from the past in the last seasons, plus Richard Dean Anderson stepping back would make the character unnecessary since it's O'Neill's grudging respect for Mayborn's ability to stay ahead, mixed with a strong dislike of the man and his methods, and a personal problem with him that always made the pair's interactions so fun. If it was his last appearance it was a fitting story to go out on.

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