Stargate SG-1: Within the Serpent's Grasp

After last week's waste of time, the final episode (Within the Serpent's Grasp) is actually pretty cool. Aside from the fact that it's a cliffhanger. Don't you hate it when a season ends in the middle of what is essentially a double-length episode? I hate that. It's obviously not the same when you're watching it years later and can just keep going, but when it's first broadcast it means you come into the new season having to try to remember what the hell's going on.

Well, nothing's getting through that!

But we're not there yet, this is still season one, and we pick up right where we left off the last episode. The Stargate program's being shut down and the gate itself is going to be buried. Daniel is certain that Apophis is sending ships to invade in the very near future and it does seem like that's going to happen eventually even if it doesn't happen right away, so obviously our heroes have to find some way to keep everything going.

Hammond's tried everything he can think of though, including a direct appeal to his BFF, the president, to no avail. So SG-1 decide to try out the address Daniel got from the parallel universe (which Jack still doesn't believe is real), although Sam is a little hesitant. She seems more worried about getting in trouble with the authorities on Earth than getting stranded on a Goa'uld military base though.

Night-vision or just a red filter?

So they dial the address and go through, ending up in a storage room where they find cases of weapons - staff weapons and some cool high-tech guns called zat'nik'tels (Jack calls them "zat guns"), which are going to become really common in the show after this. One shot hurts, two shots kill, three shots disintegrate. They are ludicrously overpowered and it's never explained why SG teams don't use them all the time once they have a few to hand out, because they really should.

"Why don't they use zats?" is the new "why don't they quarantine?"

Then everything goes wibbly for a second and they decide they should be getting home. I guess they figured that they've proved the location is real so that's evidence they can take back to their superiors to convince them to keep the Stargate program going. But when Daniel tries to dial Earth, nothing happens. The gate doesn't work. Turns out they're on a spaceship and already on their way to invade Earth.

Then some Jaffa arrive and everyone hides. They get out a big ball that floats into the middle of the stargate for some reason. Teal'c explains that it's a communication device "like your television only much further advanced". I'm not convinced on that last point, because when we see it in action the picture quality is real bad.

I guess they're not using the gate for anything else right now.

With no way out, SG-1 sneak around the ship and find a sarcophagus - one of those ones that Goa'uld use to bring the dead back to life and stuff. Turns out it's got Skaara, that kid Jack and Daniel know from Abydos, inside. Or rather Klorel, the Goa'uld that's walking around in his body. It's played like it's meant to be a surprise, but his name's in the opening credits so that was never going to work. There's some more sneaking, Apophis uses the communication device to chat with Klorel.

Better than TV. Well, 1998 TV maybe.

Plan A is to have Skaara overpower Klorel and take command of the ship. That's a terrible plan, so plan B is to just blow it up. So Jack and Teal'c capture Klorel and try to get through to Skaara to save him while Sam and Daniel sneak around planting C4. And of course plan A immediately fails and Jack and Teal'c are captured.

As the ship arrives in the solar system, Sam and Daniel attempt to rescue Jack and Teal'c They succeed, but Jack is forced to kill Klorel/Skaara, and with the invasion about to begin and the Earth all-but-defenceless, the episode and the season ends. To be continued.

I'm not clear on what those hand-thingies actually do.

And it's a really dumb ending. If you watched this far you're not going to give up now, and if you were going to give up then this isn't going to change your mind. It's not like there's any possibility of them not saving the day. This was a light, action-adventure, sci-fi in 1998, it wasn't going to make a huge switch in season two to Earth being taken over and the protagonists as resistance fighters. No one thought that was a possibility. All this cliffhanger does is annoy.

The pyramid in the middle of the ship looks real dumb.

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