AP2 DRAFT 8; CHAPTERS 1-18: COMPLETE!
The end is getting closer. The chapter re-reads are getting faster. The most interesting error was this part where I had to fix a character speaking when they weren’t even supposed to be present in the chapter. 😅
Kim still hasn’t read any of these latest drafts, but at least her cancer is reacting well to treatment. She will live to be tormented by more of my early drafts yet!
Stargate SG-1 Season 7:
E1; Fallen – Daniel broke the rules of ascension, and now returns to the mortal world. I notice that he is also back to being part of the main cast during the opening sequence, and Jonas Quinn is a guest star now. Jonas is still in this episode, but he is captured by Anubis, and about to suffer the horrible spiked-ball brain probe as the episode ends.
Gotta be kidding me. Does Jonas really only last for one season!? What was the point of this? Did Michael Shanks (Daniel) really just need a vacation or something!? 🤨
E2; Homecoming – Jonas survives the brain probe, but he pulls a ‘Poochie’ in this one. “I have to go now, my planet needs me.” Anubis, through the brain probe, learns of Jonas’ home planet and the Naquadria riches there. He’s chased away, but Jonas stays behind. Then Daniel slips back into the team like nothing happened. Although he did lose his memory for a little bit. 🤣
E3; Fragile Balance – A young boy shows up at Cheyanne Mountain Complex—and he says his name is Jack O’Neill!?
It seemed like the standard ‘Let’s make a character young’ plot, but I was quite happy to see that this was NOT the case. Turns out an Asgardian has been kidnapping humans and replacing them with imperfect clones. This alien ‘trickster’ then returns the original human and takes back the clone after he’s done some experiments.
This gives the team the perfect opportunity for an ambush. They slip a zat gun on the ‘young Jack’ and when he’s beamed up for the swap, he blasts the Asgardian captor. Next the kid releases the REAL Jack that’s been asleep on this ship the whole time. Then they call Thor for some answers.
Thor shows up and reveals that this Asgardian is NOT affiliated with the others, and that he is an outcast called Loki. Yes, LOKI has finally appeared. And he’s not a prankster; he’s just an idiot. Like he seriously can not tell the difference between a young and old human, which is why a young Jack clone was sent to take his place.
This episode ends like an episode of Saved by the Bell: Jack drives his clone to some high school and tells him to blend in and live life as a normal teenager. The clone agrees, PUTS ON SUNGLASSES, and moseys over to some hot babes while some upbeat lyrics sing about life and love and whatever. 😫
E4; Orpheus – Teal’c gets hurt in this episode and then whines a lot. Because without his parasite he has to recover like a normal human and do physical therapy. I can’t really recall what happens in this one. And I’m pretty sure I never learned who Orpheus is.
E5; Revisions – The team finds a planet where the surface is inhospitable. However, there is ONE inhabited village that uses a force dome to keep their people alive. Everyone is also hooked up to a networking system that controls their memories.
The big reveal is that everyone’s minds are being ‘revised’ constantly. The reason? Because the dome is losing power, and the AI in charge of the network has to reduce the population every time the dome shrinks in area. So it sends people out to die, while erasing those people from the villagers’ memories. Only the SG team, with no networking hardware, can hope to bring the truth to light. A+
E6; Lifeboat – “You want back on the show, Shanks!? Well here ya go; get ready to play twenty different characters in one episode!”
Yes, Daniel gets dozens of minds uploaded into his brain: an arrogant sovereign, a panicked woman, a little kid, and even a British person. And Shanks pulls it all off, as each personality shifts in control of his body in turn. A++
E7; Enemy Mine – Uh, no, this was the title of a movie in the 90’s. Or was it 80’s? Whatever. Daniel is back as himself, and just seems to take over the whole show this time.
The rest of the cast barely appears, but Daniel DOES need the help of his ol’ Unas buddy to broker a peace deal between humans and Unas. The humans need Naquadah, but the planet’s mine is also an ancient Unas burial ground. Ugh, is this title a pun? I just realized it means the enemy is occupying a mine, not the that enemy is someone’s enemy in particular. Or maybe it’s both. But I think this episode should be called The Art of the Deal, because Daniel and his pal make a deal so good that the Unas agree to mine Naquadah from their own mine for free! All the humans had to do was honor Unas culture and bow down to the ground.
E8; Space Race – Oh, did I say Daniel’s deal was good? Because now Sam is going to make her own deal. You see, in order to get access to an alien race’s ion engines, all she has to do is WIN AN INTERGALACTIC SPACESHIP RACE!?
Yes, complete with weird aliens; outrageous sports casters; asteroid belts; players sabotaging other players’ ships; the rival that seems evil but isn’t; and losing the race in order to DO THE RIGHT THING.
Did Voyager do this? I think they did. I gotta watch Voyager again.
E9; Avenger 2.0 – One of the ‘losers’ from The Other Guys episode is back, and he wants to make a super virus that shuts down key Goa’uld stargates. He gets permission to try the virus, but it works so well that it shuts down EVERY stargate in the universe. Whoops!
Luckily for the loser, his virus had really been found by Baal and modified. The loser is then able to reverse the effect by going to the planet by starship and hacking the original stargate that they had targeted with the virus. Nice job, buddy.
How come we aren’t seeing Baal more often? He doesn’t appear in this episode, but he’s being talked about constantly. Bring him back! 😤
E10; Birthright – I noticed that Christopher Judge wrote this episode. I guess he was jealous that Daniel and Sam and B-teamers were getting all the action, so he wrote an episode where HIS character gets it on with T’pol from Enterprise.
There’s also a story about Moloch and saving little baby girls that he wants killed.
E11; Evolution Part 1 – Anubis is done messing around. He’s used his Ancient technology to create a super-powered soldier that is impervious to all weapons and just blows away dozens of guys like he’s Rambo. And no weapons or force fields can even touch him.
Look at that: walking through the smoke and devastation like he’s on Dragon Ball Z.
This SOMEhow leads to Daniel going to South America to find the Fountain of Youth. Seriously, I can’t remember how they got to that point. It’s weird. On one hand, you have these invincible Goa’uld death machines and the race to figure out what they are. On the other, you have Daniel getting kidnapped by normal cartel dudes in Columbia or something. It’s so bizarre. 🤨
E12; Evolution Part 2 – The SG-1 teams finds out that Anubis has created hundreds of these invincible soldiers and are forced to retreat from his stronghold. Daniel is also recued from the normal humans that have been turned into undead zombies by some Ancient artifact. Why couldn’t these episodes have been split up into their own stories? Again, this is so strange.
E13; Grace – Ah, I see that I didn’t know what weird TRULY was yet. Sam is riding along with the Prometheus on its way back to Earth when the ship is attacked by unknown aliens. Sam falls and hits her head as the Prometheus heads into a nebula to escape.
When she wakes, she is alone on the ship and everyone else on the crew has vanished. For the entire episode she hallucinates as she tries to figure out what happened and how to escape. And although her hallucinated friends get her through the crisis of her situation, a little girl named Grace helps Sam get through the crisis… of her heart. B-.
E14; Fallout – Jonas Quinn returns! He could not save his planet, and it is about to explode. The only way to stop the explosion is to dig deep into the planet and set off a nuclear blast in just the right spot. But the real fallout involves Quinn’s girlfriend, who turns out to be a Goa’uld spy.
This is discovered AFTER everyone starts digging down through the planet inside some giant drill pod. However, Quinn is able to convince the Goa’uld to help them finish the mission, and the parasite is later removed. His girlfriend, who was never in control of her body the entire time Quinn knew her, seems to like him anyway.
I guess that’s a nice consolation prize for being kicked off the show. 🙄
E15; Chimera – Speaking of girlfriends, Sam starts dating some cop. It seems her talk with Grace was productive after all. Daniel’s old girlfriend also returns, still possessed by Osiris. She visits him in his sleep, and searches his brain for info on where the lost city is.
There’s a confrontation with Osiris at the end, and the cop shows up while stalking Sam. I guess he’s part of the gang now! 😑
But where was the chimera!? Is it with Orpheus?
E16; Death Knell – Sam is almost done with a weapon that can kill Anubis’ super scarab warriors. Too bad one warrior dude shows up at the planet she’s on and everything explodes for some reason. I thought she might be dead for good, but it turns out she’s on the run alone from the warrior the entire episode.
She escapes and uses the weapon to kill the scarab warrior. I think. But the ‘death knell’ from the title refers to the ending of the Human/Tok’ra/Jaffa alliance. I guess Vanessa Angel really isn’t coming back. 😭
E17; Heroes: Part 1 – Some weird guy gets permission from the president to film and interview the SG-1 team. That’s it. This is probably one of the most boring episodes of the season. I did like the Goa’uld probe that shows up on a mission, though. It gets crushed by a collapsing wall set off by some other SG team. Wow! I almost forgot that there WERE other teams. The big cliffhanger is that there’s a mission that SG-1 must go on, in order to rescue this other team. I really didn’t get why this was a two-parter, or why ‘going on a mission’ would be presented as a tense cliffhanger.
E18; Heroes: Part 2 – Now I get it. During this mission someone is killed. The audience doesn’t see it, and doesn’t know who it is. (We are led to believe it’s Jack, as he doesn’t appear. Also, Sam is hysteric after returning from the mission.)
The weird reporter from part one wants the footage of the team member’s death. Daniel took the footage, and is convinced that this video could show heroism to the world on the future day that the Stargate Program is revealed.
We finally see the footage, and we see Daniel and Dr. Frasier attempting to save a wounded soldier. Frasier gets blasted by a staff weapon with no buildup or warning, and that’s it—she’s dead. (The journalist character flinches, which is a nice detail.)
The journalist gives the footage back to Daniel, but Daniel won’t accept it. He wants the video to be made into a memorial for Frasier, which it is. The episode ends with the team watching the memorial video.
Farewell, Frasier! No one else can say ‘I’m out of my depth, here.” or “I need to call in a specialist.” quite like you did.
E19; Resurrection – I flipped out when I saw this as the title for the next episode. “No way,” I thought. “They’re bringing Frasier back already!? After a two-part tear-jerker that ended with a video memorial!?”
But no. This episode is about some assassin girl that, uh, I can’t really remember. I just know that the bad guy was a terrible actor. He smoked a cigarette in a jailcell and pontificated like he’s Hannibal Lector or something. Really bizarre.
E20; Inauguration – We FINALLY see the president of the United States, and he just got elected. It’s his first day on the job, and his chief of staff has an important update: the United States has been exploring other planets using an alien device called a stargate. The president thinks it’s a gag, but then he realizes that government officials never joke around or spread rumors.
Now we get to see the president filled in on recent SG-1 episodes, so of course this turns into a friggin’ clip show. 😭
E21; Lost City: Part 1 – The new U.S. president replaces Hammond with a lady named Dr. Weir. He also suspends all stargate activity. Go woke, go broke, as they say. 😅
This all happens right after Jack downloaded Ancient knowledge into his head again in an attempt to find the lost city they’ve been searching for all season. It would be funny if they didn’t find it. I mean, the title would still be correct.
But the knowledge takes a whole weekend to emerge, so Jack heads on home for a while. That’s when all the main cast members come visit Jack for beers, including Hammond. You see, Jack is going to die from this, and Anubis is bringing his fleet of ships to Earth. This could be the end for real this time. (We did just see Frasier die, so I know deaths are on the table. And I have no idea how long Richard Dean Anderson stays on the show. I actually thought he’d be gone by season five.)
E22; Lost City: Part 2 – The Ancient knowledge has emerged from Jack’s mind, and the entire team flies off to find the lost city on a far-off planet. Anubis has also reached Earth, but he’s reluctant to attack, just in case any Ancient weapons have been readied. But readied they are not, and the new president stalls for time.
SG-1 finds an observatory on a distant world. The Ancients have recorded the location of the lost city, or as Jack states: TERRA ATLANTIS. Yes, after seven seasons Atlantis is finally mentioned. And it’s on ‘Terra,’ or Earth. So now everyone needs to race BACK to Earth to find the city and the weapons which can hopefully save everyone.
What follows is probably the most action-packed and exciting bunch of sequences I’ve ever seen on the show. It was like a movie. And, now that I look at the IMDB page, I see that this storyline WAS going to be a sequel to the first film. If random ‘trivia’ bits on the page are to be trusted.
But it was quite a battle, with Anubis’ entire fleet destroyed by the awakening of Atlantis. Even Hammond got to charge to the rescue in the Prometheus.
My friend Kim told me that the Atlantis spin-off started during SG-1 season eight, so I downloaded a list that told me how to watch the two series as they originally aired. Seems strange, since the outpost found in season seven isn’t even the true Atlantis site. I was expecting the city to be found before the Atlantis show itself started. 🤔
Supernatural season 12, episode 12 – Stuck in the Middle (With You)
No idea what the title means, but this is a good one. I really regret waiting a full month in between episodes now. 😣
But this episode is a bit different than others. The story is told out of order, like that movie Memento. These fragmented story segments also have their own titles, like the sitcom Fraiser. And finally, trumpets and other brass instruments feature heavily in the music, just like in Star Wars. You wouldn’t think that all these facets would mix together into something great, but it seems the Supernatural crew has discovered something unique! 🤣
The story itself is simple: a demon-hunt goes terribly wrong. The demon in question turns out to be a PRINCE of Hell, and he is far more powerful than the average mook. He is also a rare weapon collector, and during the brawl he materializes Micheal’s Lance from thin air and skewers Castiel.
It’s good stuff, and in the end they have to use the demon’s own lance to kill him. Breaking the weapon also saves Castiel from the slow-acting poison, as Crowley figures out.
Also: the bros’ mom has been working for the British Men of Letters, and she STEALS one of the demon’s weapons during the chaos. At first I thought we weren’t going to see what the weapons was. Y’know, like the briefcase in Pulp Fiction. But the show pulls a fast one and shows us. Yes, forged on the night of Halley’s comet, the COLT is back. 😮
E13; Family Feud – And now we get a normal ghost episode. We do NOT get the usual ‘burning of the wrong bones’ fake-out at least. Because you see, the solution is to send Crowley’s son back in time. And the bros just do that somehow. 🙄
We do get some movement on the ‘Lucifer’s child’ plot, though. It seems the Hell Prince had a sister, Dagon, and she’s interested in protecting the future mother of evil. Or maybe not evil, as Dagon believes that labels are SO ten seasons ago.
Well, that’s it for now! Maybe I can get this draft done next month. See you next time!