Moebius (Stargate SG-1)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Stargate SG-1 episode
“Moebius (Parts 1 & 2)”
Episode no. Season 8
Episode 19 & 20
Guest star(s) Don S. Davis as Lieutenant General George Hammond
David Hewlett Dr. Rodney McKay
Colin Cunningham as Maj. Davis
Robert Wisden as Major Samuels
Georgia Craig as Sabrina
Alessandro Juliani as Katep
Peter Williams as Apophis
Jay Acovone as Maj. Charles Kawalsky
Sina Najafi as Egyptian boy
Writer(s) Joseph Mallozzi, Paul Mullie, Brad Wright and Robert C. Cooper
Director Peter DeLuise
Production no. 819 & 820
Original airdate March 18, 2005 & March 25, 2005
Episode chronology
← Previous Next →
"Threads" "Avalon (Parts 1 & 2)"

Episode chronology

"Moebius" (Parts 1 and 2) are the Season 8 finale episodes of the science fiction television series Stargate SG-1. They involve time travel and an alternate timeline. They were originally intended to be the show's series finale (like "Lost City" of the previous season and "Full Circle" before it), but became the eighth season finale after the series was once again renewed.

Contents

[edit] Plot

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details for Stargate SG-1 Season 8 follow.

[edit] Part 1

Carter introduces us to the designs of the Daedelus a new Earth-built battlecruiser larger than the Prometheus and capable of reaching the Pegasus Galaxy. News of Catherine Langford's death reaches Daniel Jackson at Stargate Command. After her funeral, Daniel receives a large number of documents and artifacts relating to the Stargate program from Langford's personal collection, and from one book learns the former location of a Zero Point Module in Ancient Egypt. Jackson and Carter persuade Jack O'Neill to use the time travel capabilities of the Puddle Jumper they found (in "It's Good to Be King") to travel back and take the ZPM, assuming that Ra never knew of its purpose. Once they arrive in 3000 B.C., they join in an offering to Ra, and witness his brutal murder of an Egyptian making the offering. Teal'c disguises himself as a Horus Jaffa and retrieves the ZPM from Ra's treasury. However, a sandstorm in the night reveals the cloaked jumper by drifting on top of it, and Ra's Jaffa discover it. Unwilling to upset the future by fighting the Jaffa to get their jumper back, SG-1 decides to live out the rest of their lives in the past and know that the rebellion will happen. An alternate timeline is created in which the Stargate itself was never discovered and what they did for the last eight years never happened.

In this timeline, the alternate versions of Daniel and Carter ("Alt-Daniel" and "Alt-Carter") have never joined the SGC, and Alt-O'Neill has long since retired. Alt-Teal'c is still the First Prime of Apophis.

Alt-Daniel is teaching English as a second language to adults. Alt-Carter spends her time double-checking other scientists' work. Both are contacted by the Air Force and brought to Cheyenne Mountain. However, Alt-O'Neill refuses.

At Cheyenne Mountain, George Hammond tells Alt-Carter and Alt-Daniel that in a dig in Giza, archaeologists found a video camera in a vacuum-sealed canopic jar. Recorded on it was the original SG-1, explaining who they are and what they were doing, as well as a number of things that were true from their timeline (recent political events, Presidents, personal details). Most importantly, they say, if things have changed, then something went wrong in the past and must be fixed. The plan is that in the future this videotape will be played and with any luck their alternative selves can save them.

An expedition team is sent to find the Giza Stargate, but find nothing. Instead, they discover that the original Daniel left a tablet where the gate should have beeen, inscribed with a dialect of Egyptian that only Alt-Daniel can read. It reveals that the original SG-1 instigated a successful rebellion against the Ra of 3000 BC. However, this caused him to leave Earth with the Stargate. However, they do find the Puddle Jumper, and alt-Daniel and alt-Carter figure out how to find the Antarctic Stargate. With everything in place, a team is readied to go through the Stargate to recruit Alt-Teal'c, under the instruction of the Daniel and Carter on the tape. Alt-Daniel and Alt-Carter are, however, not going to be on this team.

[edit] Part 2

The scientists working on the recovered Alt-Puddle Jumper cannot make it work because they don't have the Ancient Technology Activation gene. Alt-O'Neill is called in and he makes it work. He will also lead the team, in this ship, through the Stargate to find Alt-Teal'c. The team is called "GateShip 1" (GS-1, a take on SG-1, and an in-joke of McKay's name for a Jumper in Atlantis' pilot), and Alt-O'Neill agrees that Alt-Daniel and Alt-Carter are to join them.

On Chulak, SG-1 are caught by the Jaffa of Apophis, and imprisoned in the same cell and the same way seen in the pilot of the series, "Children of the Gods". There, Alt-Teal'c defects to their cause to help them escape, but Alt-Daniel is infected by a Goa'uld and is killed by Teal'c (much like Kawalsky was in the original timeline). They escape in the Puddle Jumper, but are chased and damaged by Death Gliders. Unaware of the jumper's cloaking capacity, they believe that only way they can survive is to time-travel. They travel back to 5,000 years, and then use the Stargate to pass from there to Ancient Egypt, where the original versions of SG-1 were stranded, and where Ra is still alive and ruling.

We discover that SG-1 in fact attempted a rebellion because O'Neill and Teal'c didn't want to stay, and that Carter, O'Neill and Teal'c were executed when it failed. Daniel survived, and meets with Alt-Carter, Alt-O'Neill and Alt-Teal'c. He has not yet made the tablet detailing their second successful rebellion attempt because it hasn't yet happened. This means that his current plans with the underground of the local populace are destined to succeed, however they lead to the Stargate being removed from Earth by Ra. Thus they must secure the Stargate when they instigate the rebellion. This should fix the timeline, allowing the events of the original timeline, beginning with the discovery of the Stargate in 1928, to happen like they were supposed to.

Ultimately they succeed, but not before Alt-Carter and Alt-O'Neill have a brief, passionate make-out session while under fire and uncertain if they will survive. Ra's Jaffa surrender, outnumbered by the staff- and zat-armed Egyptians. Again they leave the videotape for the SG-1 of the future to find, with the same instructions as before. However, they also leave the ZPM but destroy the time machine. The Alt-SG-1 and Daniel from the original SG-1 (of 3000 BC) live out the rest of their lives there.

Finally, the true SG-1 of the present day receive the videotape and the ZPM left for them a few weeks before they were to go back in time. As the timeline has been restored, they have no reason to go back in time, and they've gained a ZPM free of charge. The episode ends with SG-1 at O'Neill's cabin, fishing, in a scene identical to the end of "Threads"—except for one thing: there are now fish in Jack's pond.

Jack O'Neill: "Close enough".

[edit] Notes

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:
  • 'Moebius' refers to a Möbius strip, a special hoop that has 1 face and 1 edge and looks twisted and distorted-this seems to be a reference to time travel timelines.
  • The end of the episode is a reference to a Simpsons Halloween episode, Treehouse of Horror V, where Homer time travels and unintentionally makes numerous changes to history; upon returning to a timeline where his family have snake tongues but everything else is otherwise normal, he says "eh, close enough". This is one of several references to the Simpsons on Stargate SG-1, all centered around O'Neill. Another example from this episode is the name of Jack's boat, "Homer".
  • Alt-Jackson and Alt-Carter are reminiscent of Dr. Felger and his assistant, Chloe, from Season 7's "Avenger 2.0".
  • Since Moebius was supposed to be the Stargate SG-1 series finale, many actors reprised their roles from past episodes: Don S. Davis as George Hammond, Peter Williams as Apophis, Colin Cunningham as Paul Davis, and Jay Acovone as Charles Kawalsky.
  • Alessandro Juliani (Katep) previously played Eliam in the Season 4 episode "Scorched Earth".
  • This episode marks yet another 'not quite permanent' death of Daniel, as one of his alternate selves in this episode is killed by Alt-Teal'c (The other- original- one also presumably dies of old age in Egypt). To be fair, though, during the course of the episode, it's assumed that the whole team dies twice.
  • We get a glimpse of the specifications of the Daedalus at the beginning of this episode. We see it in action in "The Siege (Part 3)", the Atlantis second season premiere.
  • This is the last episode to feature Richard Dean Anderson (Colonel/Brigadier General Jonathan "Jack" O'Neill) as a main cast member.
  • This is the third episode to show O'Neill and Carter expressing their love outside of a dream or memory (the first being There But For the Grace of God, where alternate versions of them were engaged, the second being when O'Neill resigned from the Air Force at the end of a time loop so that he could kiss Carter in Window of Opportunity). All three, however, are either alternate timeline or alternate reality versions.
  • Alternate timeline differences:
    • Jack is a charter boat captain and has an emphatic Minnesota accent.
    • Daniel is still an Egyptologist, but times are hard and he's making a living teaching English as a second language.
    • Sam works in the Aerospace department where her genius is unrecognized, and apparently never joined the Air Force.
    • McKay doesn't have a citrus allergy.
    • Major Davis has a moustache.
    • Robert Kinsey is President of the United States while Henry Hayes is Secretary of the Interior.
    • General Hammond is only a Brigadier General.
    • Cheyenne Mountain doesn't house Stargate Command because they never found the Stargate in Giza. Rather, the USAF Advanced Research Institute, which can be briefly seen on the shoulder patch of one of the guard, is in charge of the program.
    • Apophis has a goatee.
  • Alternate timeline similarities:
    • Carter has the idea to make the "reproductive organs" line as she did in the pilot, though doesn't actually pull it off.
    • Jack left the Air Force and they want him back (whether his son accidentally shot himself with Jack's gun is not clear, as no reference is made to a son or a wife).
    • Samuels and two other Air Force officers still go to get Jack as they did in the pilot.
    • McKay still lusts after Carter. So does Jack.
    • The USAF Advanced Research Institute serves jello (and Carter still eats blue jello just like at the SGC).
    • Jack asks Daniel "You do have the address to get us back, right?" This refers to the film, where Daniel says he can get them back, but realizes he can't once he reaches Abydos.
    • As in "Children Of The Gods", one of the team members is implanted with a Goa'uld symbiote: Kawalsky in that episode, Daniel Jackson in this episode. In both cases, they are killed by Teal'c.
  • This is one of only two episodes of SG-1 (the other being the second-season episode "Secrets") where a Horus guard removes his cowl on-screen. The complex retracting effect that first appeared in the original Stargate film could not be done often during the run of the show due to cost, so it was regularly done offscreen with the audience only hearing the associated sound effect.(As Heru-ur did in "Thor's Chariot")

[edit] External links

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org../../../m/o/e/Moebius_%28Stargate_SG-1%29_595e.html"