Fallout

DVD, Stargate SG-1 S7 (Fallout)

Initial impressions were positive that Jonas Quinn had returned (already), to the series, but negative that it was a heavily political story supported by reams of technical jargon and scientific theorising. Don't get me wrong, this can be a wonderful way to deepen and explore an alien culture, but apart from the main races (Goa'uld, Tok'Ra, etc), few, even among the recurring species are really developed in a way that I would like. They don't tend to have enough depth. The Kelownans are a special case as they're the race that caused the death of Daniel Jackson and the addition to the team of Jonas, so they at least have an interesting history with the SGC. I also like the technobabble and the pseudo-science it usually encompasses, as it makes me feel more intelligent! But I can also find myself zoning out, and I would concur (though more for reasons of entertainment), with Daniel's statement at the end when he asks if Jonas misses the 'gate and all it entails, and when the answer is in the affirmative, says that facing peril is preferable to the diplomatic side of things! The Kelownans and their reluctant allies of the other two factions on the renamed Langara, are no easier to get along with, or fun to watch, than before, their squabbling and outrages draining. At least in this case they have a natural, or should I say unnatural, disaster to focus their minds, or nothing would ever get done, and it's amazing that any kind of cooperation had been possible in the first place!

As usual, Jonas is the one to bring a voice of reason, though he doesn't have much to do directly with the politicians this time as he's too busy with top secret giant excavators and girlfriends. Once again we have an episode written by an actor for his character and he gets a girl and plays a crucial role in the future of his world. I'm not saying actors are vain, but… In truth I'm glad he did come up with the idea, and of course he's going to develop something that will get him some work by bringing him back to the series, even if it was only for the one episode (I'd be happy if he had returned as a regular, but I'm not sure the budget would have stretched to that many in the main cast), and he's more likely to have thought about the life of the character he played, so it was only logical it would be Jonas-centric. At first I wondered if he'd taken on a new career as part of a Kelownan boy band, but the new look is soon explained when you meet his mirror female image in the form of assistant Kianna. They certainly share the same hairstyle, and that's not all, since Jonas finds her 'interesting.' I'm glad someone did, because she started out as a really boring character that had nothing going for her, but as soon as she begin to strip away her false personality (visually echoed in her wardrobe - first her tightly drawn jacket becomes loose, then is cast off completely), she suddenly became a lot more interesting.

It's a tribute to the writing that it could take us from such a dull, minor ancillary character that doesn't even really figure strongly in Jonas' life (or he might have said something more than 'interesting'), to someone that you despise for having lied to him about her true identity, right through to a surprising turn of self-sacrifice where you end up hoping she survives! That's quite a turnaround, it's all done without resorting to romanticism. Well, not much, anyway. She became such an intriguing character that I wanted her to stay as a Goa'uld and remain by Jonas' side as she clearly wanted to be. In the end it becomes a bit too much of a happy ending, when the symbiont is killed (Kianna was actually a spy for Baal, looking into conquering Langara), having battled to return to the safety of the giant Kelownan excavating drill machine, having reached the sweet spot to leave a bomb, having set off said bomb, and having thus saved the planet from destruction from the chain reaction of naqadah turning into naquadria, which would have eventually blown up most of the globe. There was a hint of something more than the usual sci-fi nonsense when Kianna (or the Goa'uld using her as a host), points out the unspoken decision that Carter would sacrifice herself to save an alien planet, and it only became more involving as we see Kianna choose to take the risk to take the bomb the last section when the giant Kelownan excavator drill machine packs up.

What motivated her is the most fascinating question in the episode. Was it, as she suggested, that she wanted the mineral wealth and power of naquadria for her own empire, was she still secretly working for her master, or did she, as seems most clear in her dealings with Jonas, and in the way he responded, feel a debt of closeness to him? She could have been a fantastic character to see again, but sadly she reverted back into the fairly ordinary Kianna by the end, the damage to the host body reversed by the symbiont, but at the cost of its own life. A self-sacrificial Goa'uld is a deep concept for this series and I so wish it could have been further explored. In a way, she became more interesting than Jonas himself, but the story worked rather nicely to get to this moment. If we'd been a season or so back, Teal'c might have been the obvious choice to brave the heat and fumes and complete the mission (though he'd have scratched himself even more on the crystalline tunnel sides, as Kianna was messed up pretty bad and she was quite thin), so developments in character do make a difference to how a story runs, which is good to see.

The fact that the apparently natural disaster was actually caused (or at least exacerbated), by the Kelownans naquadria bomb test, which led to Daniel's death, is no less chilling for the fact that you can see it coming when they start mentioning the two year time span. The Kelownans giant excavating drill machine may have been a bit of a deus ex machina, or a McGuffin, something they just happened to spend half their research budget on because they were going to need to explore the nether regions was unimportant in the dramatic size and introduction, even though it's still somewhat amusing the way Jonas and Kianna shuffle their feet a bit - should we let them in on this big piece of tech we've been building, that would be ideal for saving our world? Guess so… More impressive than the drill itself (and the interior which clearly had at least elements of the Prometheus, if not a full redress of the bridge), was that there are practically no exterior CG shots of it. Apart from the initial reveal, and the triumphant escape, we never see it burrowing in the ground, but it never matters because the tension and impression of heat and closeness aboard sells the reality of it without the need for anything else.

O'Neill and Daniel's attempts at diplomacy are far less involving than the big drill extravaganza, and the big drill extravaganza is far less interesting than the deft swerving of expectations and our own impressions of a character, something that demonstrates that it doesn't matter if you have the best special effects in the world, the biggest sets and vastest casts: it is character that is most important. I'd love to see Jonas (and Kianna), again (even though all the good stuff was basically just a dream to her), and I'd be interested in seeing how the Langaran politics plays out, and whether the factions can continue to work together in the light of the Kelownans almost being responsible for the destruction of the planet. But with this series, the problem can be that there are just too many easily accessible locations to visit (even if they do all look like a forest), so they don't tend to spend enough time in one place to effectively build up another race. But at least in this case I was impressed enough.

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