Write or Wrong? Writing Stargate SG-1

"Stargate is a tough show to write for," continues Glassner. "One of the reasons for this is that we want to give something to all of our leads to do in every episode and occasionally that's a challenge if the plot centres on just one of them."

Jonathan Glassner, Executive  Producer, Stargate SG-1 Seasons One - Three.

Divide and Conquer

I must admit that I utterly detested this episode. From the costume in which the poor actor playing Anise/Freya was expected to parade herself, to the 'revelations' of the 'feelings' between Carter and O'Neill, to the death of Martouf, it seemed to lurch from one disastrous directorial or script-writing decision to another. The death of Martouf seemed to be done for no reason except to provide the cheapest of all 'cheap thrill's, and possibly to pacify those people who disliked the character for reasons entirely unconnected with his character, the character development of Carter, or the good of the show in general. It certainly did not appear to be done to give us any new insights into Carter, as none were forthcoming. Or to bring to the fore any new memories of Jolinar, as Jolinar has barely been mentioned since. (Unlike Martouf himself, of course, who, despite his great popularity with many fans, has not been mentioned at all.)

As to the Carter-O'Neill 'feelings', I felt these 'revelations' made a mockery of previous episodes such as "Solitudes" in which we saw Carter win O'Neill's respect for her determination and courage as an Air Force officer.  They also rendered two of the four main characters unsympathetic and unprofessional to a large section of a previously friendly audience, leaving many of us with only Jackson and Teal'c with whom we could now sympathize.

The Carter-O'Neill relationship in earlier episodes was fresh and unusual, showing us a man and a woman whose relationship was evolving realistically, as relationships do evolve in situations where any romance is and always has been out of the question. The credibility given to the show by its USAF advisors also seemed to offer the viewer protection from any clichéd and stereotypical 'romance' developing, as did the repeated assurances from the writers and actors involved, that the only Carter-O'Neill liaisons we would be subjected to would take place in AUs. This was one of the reasons why so many viewers welcomed the addition of Carter to the pre-existing Jackson-O'Neill relationship, as so rarely does one find a well-written and truly three-dimensional female character in television who is not defined by her romantic relationship with a male character.

The only way I can view this episode as anything other than a terrible mistake is if it was supposed to be part of a story arc that was intended to show us how devastating can be the effects of such unprofessional misconduct upon a previously functioning unit. If that was its purpose then I would have to concede that it was effective, for the team dynamic was almost destroyed in Season 4, with Jackson agreeing to go off with other teams so frequently and O'Neill allowing him to do so; their friendship being severely undermined; Carter and Jackson's relationship also moving from the previously close and affectionate one to being distant; not to mention Teal'c becoming as isolated from the rest of his teammates as Jackson.

So, all that one would expect from such a relationship ever being allowed to develop did occur and served as a perfect example of why the regulations exist. However if it turns out that we were not supposed to either notice the damage done by the Carter-O'Neill relationship, or to blame it for the wreckage that was left in its wake, because that was not the writers' 'intentions', then I will feel my first instincts were right, and this episode really did spell the beginning of the end for this show.

Personally, I can only continue to watch this show because I believe the characters to have 'moved on'. If it turns out that Carter and O'Neill continued to harbor unprofessional feelings for one another after they were forced to confront them, and fully intend to have some kind of romantic liaison after they retire but in the meantime are going to deceive Hammond so they can be 'together' while on duty, then I cannot ever again have any respect for them, or, frankly, for the show. (Unless we are supposed to believe that a new definition of being an 'Air Force professional' is to wantonly endanger the lives of your teammates so you can continue with a distasteful flirtation without it damaging your chances of promotion.)

I do also feel that if the writers wanted to make a show about two people who work together and fall 'in love' they should have set it somewhere other than a military unit under the aegis of the United States Air Force. And if they did not want to make a show which explored the intense and complicated relationship between Jack O'Neill and Daniel Jackson, then they should have made a pitch for an original series instead of using characters created by someone else.

I think by introducing this 'romance' they severely underestimated how many people came to the series from the movie, and also how many of us have seen far too many TV shows sacrificed on the altar of so called 'UST'.   (Particularly as the fans who care for such things have proven themselves the most fickle about moving on to pastures new in the past when they get their 'fix' of romance.)

The relationship between O'Neill and Jackson should always have been the cornerstone of this show. The other characters are important, three-dimensional, and much-loved by the audience, but there is a hierarchy in this show into which Carter's character fits. As a strong woman on the team, she is loved by all; as O'Neill's 'love interest' she is immediately loved only by those who want to see the Carter-O'Neill romance, and becomes much less sympathetic to those of us who do not, and who thought better of her than to be so unprofessional. (Not to mention stereotypical.)

Anything that undermines or adversely affects the O'Neill-Jackson relationship is always going to be deeply unpopular with a sizeable proportion of this show's fans because of where the show came from and its origins in a movie in which that relationship was shown to be one of great intensity and complexity.   Something the show has always built on intelligently and subtly in the past but seemed to completely abandon in S4 so that it could promote the Carter-O'Neill relationship sprung upon us all in this travesty of an episode instead.

In the past I have always felt that the people making the show (actors, producers, writers etc) were very aware of where this show had its roots, and showed enormous care in trying to give a sense of continuity with these characters' origins; that much effort was invested in developing them intelligently and sympathetically so that those of us who came to the series from the movie could feel that everyone involved in the show cared as passionately about these people, and what became of them, as we did. In this season, for the first time, I felt there was a barely veiled hostility towards the characters, and their origins, from some of the creative people involved in making the show.

Things established all the way back in the movie: Jackson and O'Neill talking in unison; O'Neill's protectiveness of Jackson; Jackson's instinctive trust of O'Neill; were all deliberately downplayed or actually erased from the show for much of the season; only making a reappearance in "The First Ones", "Absolute Power", "The Light", "Double Jeopardy" and (thank goodness) in the excellent season-ender "Exodus" in any significant way. And I do feel that the root of many of the problems of this season, the character distortion, the damage to the team dynamic, the filming of scripts still at the 'draft' stage, not to mention major departures from previous 'canon', all had their roots in "Divide and Conquer".

Ultimately, this episode ended up feeling as if it was all about an unseemly scramble for ratings to me, and nothing at all to do with quality television, character integrity, or indeed Stargate SG-1.

I am just grateful to the writers and actors who managed to dim the memory of this disastrous episode for us with such fine performances and intelligent scripting decisions in later episodes. I hope Season 5 will prove "Divide and Conquer" to have been the aberration it appeared on a first viewing, and episodes such as "The First Ones", "Tangent", "The Curse", "Serpent's Venom", "Absolute Power", "Double Jeopardy", "Exodus" etc to be far more typical of the kind of quality writing and directing that we can expect in the future.

Harriet

(c) Harriet, 2002.  All rights recognised.  No copyright infringement intended.
 

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