Death Knell

DVD, Stargate SG-1 S7 (Death Knell)

A little depressing, this episode spells the end, you might even say the 'death knell,' of the alliance between Earth, the Tok'ra and the Jaffa, and on the very day they finally created a weapon, the only weapon in the galaxy apparently, that can kill Anubis' Kull Warriors. Not the most ideal time to call a halt to cooperation, you'd think, but the Jaffa are fed up with the Tok'ra's devious ways, and don't want to be under human orders either. They want to do it for themselves. Which is fair enough, except that they're presumably not going to be on the mailing list for this super weapon, the only one in the galaxy to… you get the idea. Very little is really made of this landmark technological development, but then the episode itself rather shows it to be slightly redundant: all you have to do is fire a missile at a warrior and blast him to smithereens. Okay, it didn't work out perfectly (a bigger yield needed, perhaps?), but if kinetic energy is the answer why not send out your troops with rocket launchers and set up plastique all over the place which can be set to go off whenever a base perimeter is breached by the unstoppable enemy? I don't have an answer for that, and neither, it would seem, did the writers!

It's not that this isn't entirely uninteresting, and a story you're curious to see unfold, but the whole episode feels like anticipation with very little payoff. Carter gets rescued from being hunted by the single warrior who's after her, but who doubted that for a second, there being very little actual jeopardy - how can a story about someone being on the run in the forest be anything more than was portrayed here? Just check out 'First Blood' for that answer! The episode could have been all about Carter's desperate struggle for survival, having to outwit a superior force with stone knives and bearskins, but instead there's false jeopardy (we're supposed to think the warrior is approaching Carter as she reclines against a tree, only for it to be revealed it's an already-dead soldier, and Sam's fine), and a predictably foolish opponent who walks right into the Major's non-mobile weapons platform cobbled together from a downed UAV. The missile didn't do the job exactly, but it did slow the thing down, and as I say, a more destructive charge might have done the job. At least O'Neill got to be her hero and, along with Teal'c, save her from the creature (thanks to her own ingenuity in creating the weapon in the first place, of course). Not that she seemed particularly happy, but drinking out of rivers and getting shot at, not to mention an irritable Father, will do that to you.

The other side of the story is a welcome vehicle for General Hammond to spread his careful and considered diplomatic skills over troubled waters, even if it ultimately ends in failure. The representatives of the Tok'ra and Jaffa factions come across as pretty stupid and arrogant for putting their own irritations ahead of the simple logic of being stronger together, not helped that Jacob's now on the outside of the council as they don't trust him, considering him sympathetic to the humans, as a human host. It wasn't the best time for underhand deviousness to win the day: Anubis continues to smash through the System Lords, the latest to be knocked off his perch is 'Olokun,' who the Tok'ra had been spying on. They have good reason, but so do the Jaffa who claim the defeated Goa'uld should have been offered the chance to join their cause. So it ends with everyone unhappy with everyone else, and that would only make Anubis happy. The Alpha site and it's striking cooperation between the three allied races crumbles and the trust issues force everyone apart, which doesn't leave things in a good place. It doesn't begin in a particularly good place either, so for optimism it really isn't the most enjoyable watch! At least the action isn't badly played, with the warrior's blasts ripping through doors or taking down small trees, and the idea of the Stargate scything a hole in the ground when it opens a wormhole as it's lying face down, was a good one, but it did make me wonder what would happen to the 'gate: wouldn't the force push it up and make it roll away, or don't physics apply to these things?

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