Parting is such sweet sorrow *snicker*

[trinityofone]

YAY CALDWELL! I am so very very glad to have him back. Although would it have killed them to explain how he got all Goa’ulded in the first place? One line of exposition, guys: “It really sucked when those NID peeps beat me over the head with wiffle bats and dragged me into an alley,” or, “I should never have gone into the bathroom at Popeye’s.”* But whatevers: he owned this episode. *is proud of own decision to put him in We Have Lingered* *resumes sekritly shipping him with Elizabeth* *when not shipping Elizabeth with Zelenka* *or Ronon* *or Lorne*

Other than that...meh? And I feel an almost instant need to disclaim that: I’m not negative about everything! Really! SGA is my favorite favoritest show! But that’s why I want it to be as good as it can be, and when it’s weird and nonsensical, I want to talk about it. Endlessly.

Still with me? Okay. I think the biggest problem with this episode was that I’m sure the writers were thinking, “Yay! We can do our cursory Elizabeth episode!” (And seriously: why do the cursory Elizabeth episodes always involve old people? What’s up with that? And what’s planned for S3: Elizabeth visits an Ancient retirement home?) Only--this wasn’t an Elizabeth episode. It was an Elizabeth’s body episode--a Torri episode, sure--but Elizabeth herself was out of the picture for most of it. The only character development for Elizabeth we got was: 1) still feels guilty about the events of ‘Critical Mass’ (duh); 2) will most likely feel guilty about shooting Ronon (duh); 3) is willing to flirt vaguely with Caldwell (after showing such a fab, take-charge attitude, who can blame her?). That’s nothing. We get more interesting teases about John. Or maybe we don’t, but at least with Shep I have a feeling--I am positively convinced, whether by writing hints or just Joe Flanigan’s pretty, moody eyes--that there is loads going on beneath the surface. With Elizabeth, the only hints I’m getting are repeated assurances that she’s boring.

SHE SHOULDN’T BE. She doesn’t have to be. This is so frustrating, and sometimes I just feel like writing loads and loads of Elizabeth gen because, sheesh. Give us something to work with, guys! No wonder I’m a slasher now.

Speaking of shippy stuff, the John/Teyla really kicked the John/Elizabeth’s ass in this, didn’t it? I mean, the latter had a kiss--a full-fledged kiss!--but neither of the bodies was occupied by its actual...occupant, and it was a sneaky hate kiss at that. Caldwell’s line at the end and J & E’s reactions could I guess be twisted in a shippy light, but to me the reaction seemed much closer to everyone at the end of ‘Duet,’ where John is Carson, Elizabeth is Rodney, and Caldwell is John, jealous jealous jealous. ;-) And then for John/Teyla there is one line, and it blows everything else out of the water. If my tastes ran that way, I would have been doing cartwheels at that point.

Also, did anyone else notice that after not!John’s “He cares for you more than you know,” there’s a completely pointless cut to Rodney working away at his computer? He shudders, shakes himself. Then back to Teyla.

These editors, man. Do they know something I don’t? *g*

I also have to admit that I completely misread not!Elizabeth’s line to Caldwell--“Oh, please: even Weir thinks you’re hopeless”--as “Oh, please: even Weir thinks you’re hopelessly in love with her.” No, seriously: I thought he was being called on his blatantly obvious crush. I still like my reading better. *pouts*

As for the other folks...hm. Well, Teyla was pretty cool in this ep, although again, we didn’t really learn anything new: her reactions in the “To shoot or not to shoot?” scene were pretty much exactly what I would have expected. Ronon...well, that was a little more interesting. It was pretty stupid of him to trust Sheppard, but it also seemed in character: Dex loves his leader, doesn’t he? Now, though, the show has to follow through with it, show Ronon as less trusting in the future, as less willing to follow blindly. He could use a lesson or two from Skinner Caldwell: Trust no one, Mr. Dex!

John, like Elizabeth, wasn’t actually there for most of the episode. When he was, I liked his reluctance to play host--although he can be scary persuasive a lot of the time, I can definitely see him as occasionally unable to launch a better argument than “don’t wanna.” And to go back to the “he cares for you more than you know” comment: hell yes, he does. He cares for everyone in Atlantis, more than he’ll ever tell them, more than he’ll ever show them outside of risking his life for theirs. It terrifies him how much he cares for them. *sniff* Oh, John. *snuggles him*

As for my boyfriend Rodney...this just wasn’t a very interesting episode for him? Not that I mind watching him bitch and complain, then make woobie eyes, then save his boyfriend John at the last minute, but in case it isn’t clear by now, I am a WHORE for character development. And there wasn’t much here. The one interesting thing was the contrast between how Rodney reacted under Caldwell’s leadership and how he usually reacts under Elizabeth and John’s. I don’t think Rodney has anything against Caldwell, or was even that concerned about the recent Goa’uld thing, but he clearly doesn’t respect him (yet) the way he does Elizabeth and John. Rodney doles out respect in small, precious doses, and it says a lot about the people on the receiving end if they’ve earned it. Probably the only reason I’m able to take Elizabeth seriously as a leader is because Rodney does. So it was interesting to see the inverse of that.

And yeah, I liked the Jeopardy! conversation, mostly because of everything kalpurna says here, but also because I’m now picturing Rodney mocking Alex Trebek. Okay, Rodney and Darrell Hammond’s Sean Connery mocking Alex Trebek. Sometimes it’s fun inside my head.

In conclusion, I think I said it best at the beginning: Caldwell owns. YAY CALDWELL. The end.


*True story:

trinityofone and family are in Washington, D.C., near the Ford Theater.

trinityofone: *spots Popeye’s Chicken* I need to use the bathroom.
Trinity’s Mom: Not in there! You’ll prick yourself on a needle and get AIDS!

Not her finest parenting moment. ;-) But a funny one!

Comments

[kalpurna.livejournal.com]

You know, I've read a lot of interpretations of that moment, and all of them seem to be different. It's kind of a hard one to pin down.

The way I saw Rodney during this whole first part was as someone who's in denial about his huge ridiculous crush. He was a little too gung ho about the whole thing, I think; to me, it read as "Well, obviously I don't have a problem with this. And it definitely doesn't bother me to see Sheppard kissing someone else. At all. NOT AT ALL." Normally he would have been all "Doesn't anyone else see that this is an unbelievably stupid plan?!" and not tossing off lines like "Have fun!" when Sheppard's about to be possessed by an alien.

And his reaction to the kiss, on rewatching, had two parts – at first, he looks kind of whumped, and then he starts to give a little smile and "huh" type noise right before they cut away. Maybe he's pleasantly surprised by the total lack of sexual chemistry? Maybe he is hiding his ANGSTY PAIN? Maybe he's trying to avoid another embarrassing Chaya-style jealous temper tantrum?

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

I definitely see the denial angle. This:

Maybe he's pleasantly surprised by the total lack of sexual chemistry?

is also an excellent theory. *eg* "Oh, well. Nothing to worry about there. *cute smile*"

And aww, I liked Rodney's Chaya-induced tantrum. He was full of righteous, righteous fury! ;-)

[coreopsis.livejournal.com]

Maybe he's pleasantly surprised by the total lack of sexual chemistry?

is also an excellent theory. *eg* "Oh, well. Nothing to worry about there. *cute smile*"
And suddenly I like that scene a whole lot more. *g*