Wraith Defenders Club

[Wraith Cake]

Spikey, did you see Hellboy II? I think Wraith Tinkerbells would look a lot like the Tooth Faeries from that movie.

@Giwark: Welcome! We love fresh blood, uh, new members here!

Hahahahah lol!!

WK

[GoSpikey]

Spikey, did you see Hellboy II? I think Wraith Tinkerbells would look a lot like the Tooth Faeries from that movie.

@Giwark: Welcome! We love fresh blood, uh, new members here!

Nope, haven't seen it yet. I'd only watch it to see that prince, because hellboy itself seems kinda... dumb to me?

Replied to you and IHS. Schweetums......Nice massage thanks

MCH

I'd better check that out tomorrow... I'm still busy reading the forum of Infection, lol.

[MyFavoriteWraith]

Ya, I was wondering when we were going to see this. Todd looked so sad when he was sitting the hospital bed. I did think it was corny at the end when he says to Shepard

Spoiler:

"I'll remember this..." As if Shepard was his best buddy again.

WK

I know! I was like, "Todd are you a masochist? Where's your self-respect, dude!?" It must be love. But then I decided, for my own respect of Todd, to put more of a warning tinge to that last line. Not necessarily that he'll remember the favor, but rather all that transpired and how it transpired. Gives it a little more "mwahahahaha" tinge to it. *shrugs* I know, I may be totally deluded, but I'm ok with that! It helps me sleep at night.

The way todd reacted,

Spoiler:

maybe the wraith didn’t evolve from the Irctus (sp) bug, but were influenced by it. It seems that he was not around at the time and the wraith may have been a weaker species back then. Im sure this is information that would have been passed down. I mean we know so little about them, maybe they are great story tellers!!

THUNKING Ahead

Spoiler:

so while watching infection, the part where tood is talking about the "bug"... OMG his hand!!!! I dont know why he has to be so darn HAWT!!!! Even when he is sick and not speaking with the lyrical voice that he normally does, there was just sompn about that hand gustier and the way he said "bug." after i got over the initial "thunking" i thought, i bet das loved that! O, and when they wake him up, he just stands there, all shadowy and then says “Shepherd” THUNK. Actually every time he was shown was awesome! Grumpy todd, laughing Todd, sick todd to smiling todd, CH knows how to play it !!

You mean the way he stroked his neck lightly with his fingers? Guh! Yeaaah! I've rewound that part and replayed it a couple times myself. Followed by a *thunk* each time.
As far as knowledge being passed down, the Wraith with their (supposed) telepathy amongst each other, I always thought it would be kind of like a "collective conscience" to borrow a psych term. So as a young Wraith you're, uh, marinating in a pod for awhile with all this fluid interchange, I'm assuming there's also an info interchange as well. This is just an assumption I've always had and, again, I may be wrong, but at this point - *throws hands up*!

*whew* That wore me out. Back to another nap. *yawn*

mfw

[MCH]

Go Spiky

Sheppard never flew a Hive, he only flies Darts. It's a 'he can fly with anything' thing.

Oh OK I'm sure your right. But I wonder if he could fly a hive if he still has some of Becket's retrovirus in his blood? After the episode?

This is abit OT but I think this lets get MCH time of the year had another little incident at 1am Saturday morning that did not involve the wraithy lady in the foggy night. Th temp outside was -1 below very cold.

Spoiler:

Went to bed and was woken by my door buzzer. Went to my window over looking the communal front door.
Was some what surprised to find 7 men in white underpants and ladies tights legging (I'm NOT making this up) opened the window and asked why they where ringing my door bell they said they had been out and where returning to get changed!!!!!!!
Oh yes and the one who'd not been drinking had snapped the key off and it was stuck in the lock. We finally got it sorted out.
It was -1 below freezing they had hardly any clothes on. But the worse of it was Ladies some of those body's definitely should NOT HAVE been undressed like that. Cold or not more clothes where needed. Needed a cup ofter to recover......Not a pretty sight.

Todd would have been much more acceptable at my front door.

Oh yes things happen in 3 to me, so sooner or later the 3rd will happen......

MCH

[leksa]

Thank you. YES! Exactly! We have discussed the issue of wraith being more iratus/more human here at length, however it is refreshing to have the argument laid in a clear linear corollary: wraith culture is different merely because their brains are shaped differently.
I would love to explore this, the only problem I see is that (unfortunately), the wraith have appeared completely human--because the writers have not revealed any of their culture to us, therefore we can only analyse them with our human filters.

Well, let us explore. At least it will be some nice exercise in the logical thinking and after all we might end up creating some great species which might be used in the literature.

And to start. those differences would not be just because of the brain, but because of their complete bodies, they social structure, hive structure.
And when i talk about that, it is strange that species which is "hive" organized have an individuals which will "betray" that hive. I mean, we are very cooperative species and we are not "hive" species. Hive species should be even more cooperative. The hive would be like close family.

Also, the hostage syndrom--YES!! Fascinating, this is why I thought the "what" statement was more intriguing than the "where" statement in Common Ground, because this "what" leads into further discussions on Todd's mental state. For instance, why the heck did he lie to Shepard about how to get to the Stargate, when he didn't know what the heck it was? If it was as he says "I did not intend to deceive you Shepard", then why the heck did he run around with him for an hour with a gaping wound? Did he not want to appear weak? Was he just willing to be lead? Did he now think of Shepard as his "new" merciful master? Did he now identify so much with humans, that he was clingy to Shepard, because John still had leadership chutzpah? There are so many more interesting scenarios revealed about Todd's character that leads me to believe it was intentional--not to mention the fact that this is film. This a subtle but significant line screw-up. The directors could always have re-shot that particular segment had they not wanted to include it.

You know what I think the problem with that notion is? You assume that writers are too smart to go into such a details. Unfortunately, their treatment of others parts of the stories showed contrary.

However, Stockholm syndrome might even explain how come that Todd was not raging at the end of the last episode. Hell, Sheppard killed off his complete hive on purpose and he ended up thanking him for letting him go!!!
So either Todd suffers from the Wraith equivalent of the Stockholm syndrome or he is so vise that he sees Sheppard as we would see some teenager, someone young and inexperienced but with the potential.

Thank you for this too. I was just mentioning to Liquid Sky this same thing. Sci Fi fans tend to be a narrow group and a dedicated group. They also tend to like information, typically scientific and dynamic in nature (theories that are constantly being revamped). Thus, sci fi writers really need to bear this in mind when writing toward its fan base--we will scrutinize a particular line of reasoning a little more closely than the average alpha wave watcher.
This is also one of my major *issues* regarding the wraith's "innocence" or lack of culpability: how does any species this evolved, this intelligent, and this dominant NATURALLY develop such a specialized diet?--this points to their own tinkering with their own DNA, or perhaps they are Ancients (or a weapon of the ancients). Ergo--they have had some hand in the ethical decision making process on whether or not to continue to feed--on humans. If they have the technology to be as powerful as they are (which they do), then by refusing to develop a technology that will allow them to diversify their food base, they are therefore intentionally continuing to inflict wide spread suffering on human populations. Their stubborn insistence on slaughtering their peers (their sentient peers) is one of the reasons the wraith are considered "evil" in the show. They are considered evil by the Lantians because the power to change really is in their hands--pun intended. Do you know what I mean?

Yes, I see your point. The problem with seeing the Wraith as the whole evil species is that where you have intelligence you must have curiosity and diversity in opinions. Even if they did on purpose limited themselves to one food source (extremely stupid move, because it creates high dependency on the food source in question) there has to be some part of their species which refused to do so, simply because they were smart enough to see limitation and curious enough to decide to go and explore the universe using more portable and efficient source of the food.
That's why I agree with someone's statement (I can remember who said that first) that the Wraith are turned into caricature arch-villain.

Also, because my expertise is in language and linguistics not so much with science, though I do live with a science head, I find it very incredulous that the wraith language, which is a derivative of Ancient, could have been automatically learned. In other words, language like a plant is organic--it changes with the people who speak it. Thus the wraith would have needed to learn it from the Ancients over a long period of time, then it would change "naturally" over time as the ancient population became wraith and the language would become "wraith" too. However, the iratus insect is so intensely aggressive, as we've seen, and quickly evolves into a humanoid/insectoid (so we've also seen--I guess???) once it feeds on people, therefore, there would be no period of time in which "learning" the ancient language could take place. The iratus "people" whatever they are, would have bitten the heads off of the Ancients before anyone of them had a chance to say "Can ye please pass the salt?" in the Ancient tongue.

I agree with you. The slang is nice example of how the language changes. And yeah, why should the Wraith accept the language of their enemies??
For the bug and fast evolution, just to remind you, Michael said that female bug has provided him with the eggs with the enough human DNA FOR HIM TO MANIPULATE, not enough for independent development of completely different organism. And I have problem even with this human DNA in the egg. It is not logical. The bug is predator, and every species has urge to leave successful offspring behind. So why would a successful predator allow that preys DNA mixes with its own and potentially weaken the offspring? Every predator sees the prey as something weaker than it. I mean, it is not controlled process so bug might end up with offspring which, because of the prey DNA has diminished ability to feed the same way as it's parent. Only way to avoid that is to control process, and that means experimentation by someone intelligent.

One of the most significant methods anthropologists turn to in order to understand the development of an ancient culture is to study its language. This is the reason Elizabeth Weir--who held a Doctorate in Linguistic Anthropology--was heading up the mission to the lost city of Atlantis. What we know about ancient culture is learned from studying the language, the arrangement and artifacts in burial mounts and now DNA testing. Therefore, it is not reasonable to assume the wraith started out as bugs, no matter how dynamic and unusual those bugs are.
I find this aspect rather difficult to overcome in my "willing" suspension of disbelief.

Thanks for responding to my blab.



WK

You're welcome. It is interesting to hear another argument against the "Wraith evolution".

[MCH]

Not that I want to draw the ire of the Wraith Defenders Club down upon myself, but lets say for the sake of argument what exactly was Sheppard supposed to do to save the rest of the Wraith crew?

As if the WDC would have a go at you......

Hum well infinite possibilities are out..... so I guess the actions that he and the rest of the Atlantis crew took was the only possibily..... and they stopped the infection from spreading any further.

Welcome to the WDC Thread Giwark and Gavatarman. Nice to met you.

MCH

[leksa]

I agree. This statement of the wraith "using all of the human" when asked about the coats is quite silly. First, now that there is a civil war humans are considered a precious food resource. Why skin what you intend to eat? After all the wraith do not eat the way we do. Also, when Mallozzi first stated this, a number of us discussed this at length. Second, another argument put forth regarding Joe's statement is that the wraith drain the life force of humans so completely the skin is almost liquefied--therefore not useful to make a leather jacket out of. And third, my explanation referred to the possibility that the wraith actually did this as standard practice--the implication being when they as a people were in "better times" (meaning, before the civil war and when humans were plentiful), they had "extra" humans lying around, so why not skin 'em? Thus, if we assume that the wraith do this as par for the course of their culture, well let us consider all the possible ramifications and implications of this thought process. One corollary is that they skin children (hey why not--they cry too much and the leather is soft), Next, if they are sadistic enough to skin children, then they are sadistic enough to do it to them while they are alive. (Not a pretty picture of wraith culture).
So, we have two options: believe we cannot judge every wraith by the standards of his culture (because that would be an ill culture indeed), or we acknowledge that Mallozzi is full of .... (sunshine!!).


WK

You're right in all your assumptions. But only way I see the Wraith skinning the humans is choosing those on which they cannot feed, like Ronnan. Then the clash with the feeding is avoided.
About being sadistic. Sure. They would not even saw that as sadism. I remember once seeing a human male (country boy) who decided to kill a sheep and roast the whole animal for some holidays. In some European cultures this is still done. Usually people try to make the killing as painless as possible to the animal, however this man did not do so. Instead, prior to the painful kill he was "playing" with his dog (German shepherd) by dragging the sheep close to the dog and than taking the animal away just before dog had chance to bite something more than wool. The sheep was alive and terrified, and after this "play" he cut the animal throat letting it bleed to death. However, he did not saw that as sadism, but fun. He could not even comprehend that the sheep could actually feel something. (After that I could not eat the lamb for decade, even now I have second thoughts when I'm faced with it.)
So notion that the Wraith would skin children alive, is quite possible if they would not consider that waste of the good food.

[leksa]

Spoiler:

Hmm. I think that their evolution into full Wraith had not yet been perfected. It is similar to how people used to use leeches to cure themselves. Both are dangerous, but potentially helpful. I wish Sheppard had not cut him.

Iratus

Spoiler:

Or they did some more genetic manipulation on themselves to perfect themselves.
Sorry I'm still against this "evolution of the Wraith" theory.

[leksa]

A dart is also a troop transporter, we've seen them beam down squads of soldiers. In this way they are better than jumpers which have to land to let their troops out, a dart can do just a fly by and deposit soldiers.

I stand corrected. I forgot about that. Who flies the Darts in the first place? Drones or higher males?
Maybe the answer is there?
I mean if the Drones fly them then they would be considered to be less important.
And there is another thing. The ships the Wraith has at the beginning of the SGA are the not military ones, but the ships made to support their way of life, culling especially. Perhaps the Darts were developed after the war with Lentians as "harvester ships".

[leksa]

Not that I want to draw the ire of the Wraith Defenders Club down upon myself, but lets say for the sake of argument what exactly was Sheppard supposed to do to save the rest of the Wraith crew?

Accept Todd proposal to go with the Hive to another planet. At least, then the death of the crew would not look like sneaky jackass behavior. And the writers could find possibility for the team to use the jumper to leave the Hive and "save themselves".

[leksa]

So, if Beckett explains the wraith evolved from the iratus bug feeding on humans, and considering he has no reason to lie, I believe him. I do even if it would make no sense in the real world, because it's not the real world, it's a fictional world where the only true laws of physics/biology/etc. are the ones the writers want to use. On the other hand, any off-screen comment is, IMO, non-canon, even if Joe Mallozzi or any other writer is the one who says it. So until it's clearly stated as such on show,

You know what my major complain about that is?
Ignoring certain aspects of the science which cannot be justified with the "need for dramatic special effects" turns the decent SF show into the Fantasy show.
If you wish to have SF show then at least show a bit of the respect to the science part of it!

[Wraith Cake]

You know what my major complain about that is?
Ignoring certain aspects of the science which cannot be justified with the "need for dramatic special effects" turns the decent SF show into the Fantasy show.
If you wish to have SF show then at least show a bit of the respect to the science part of it!

Well then, this of course makes sense.


WK

[leksa]

Well then, this of course makes sense.


WK

I should stop making sense now, should I?

[StarOcean]

But I found Keller's comment about Shep very interesting:

Spoiler:

"He saves people, too. He just uses a different set of tools."

She has a very interesting perspective on things. I liked her a lot in this episode, probably because the writers did a better job with her dialogue. And I like seeing her interact with Todd!

I thought that line was ridiculous.

Spoiler:

Sure Sheppard is saving people. Usually by TAKING lives. Those tools are used for killing. It's not the same thing as being a doctor. I really thought that Keller and Todd scene was absurd, it didn't make sense at all. First, because she has a romanticized view of Sheppard's character, which I think is inaccurate. Secondly, her compassion speech had little relevance to a species that can't afford compassion to other species. There's only so much they can feel pity or sympathy for. Compassion practically equates with starvation. I also feel that she's conflating compassion and understanding together. You can be understanding of a plight, and still lacking compassion. Or misplace and force your compassion in the force of decision making. (Hello, Michae/Allies/No Man's Land/! Keller's really channeling Beckett.)

And she can't make a call on compassion among Wraiths themselves, seeing as how little is known. And Todd should be aware of compassion because he obviously cares about his crew. And while Sheppard may feel some sympathy for Todd's plight, what's between them is about honor, debts, guilt, and knowing one another. Compassion is the least of it. Someone brought up Stockholm's Syndrome and I agree with it.

I hope Todd doesn't fall for Keller's pro-Sheppard talk. That's not the way to understanding Sheppard. It's misinforming Todd and I wonder if that's the reason why he was so "appreciative" of Sheppard letting him go. Not to mention that Todd isn't aware that Sheppard killed his crew. Really, I think at this point Todd is quite vulnerable to Sheppard emotionally. Sheppard can really manipulate Todd if he wants to.

Really like the Todd and Sheppard scenes. I'm not sure if I want them to ever be friends though because I'm starting to think that it would be unhealthy for Todd. Yes, Todd is a member of an enemy race, but he is an ally who will work with them as a means to benefit both of them. And Todd has tech at his disposable. But the thing is, Sheppard really holds a lot of emotional power over Todd. And he actually used it this episode. Todd's at a disadvantage and Keller's Sheppard speech doesn't help.

[Wraith Cake]

Well, let us explore. At least it will be some nice exercise in the logical thinking and after all we might end up creating some great species which might be used in the literature.

Hey that's a great idea. This is what I would like. I've been trying to write a book now for a while and would rather not teach but write full-time. This may not happen. However, in the mean time I peck away at my novel thinking about more "viable" story lines involving species not like but not unlike the wraith. Story lines with a credible evolutionary history. [As you've said, make it science fiction, not fantasy.]

And to start. those differences would not be just because of the brain, but because of their complete bodies, they social structure, hive structure.
And when i talk about that, it is strange that species which is "hive" organized have an individuals which will "betray" that hive.

Do you mean Todd,

Spoiler:

who seems to be a self made man/wraith--a maverick? You're right, this behaviour would be highly unusual in a hive based culture, as individuality cannot exist--there is no time. However, you are probably quite aware of the r/K species selection theory: only in highly intelligent (arguably sentient) species would one have this type of independent thinking--this scope and magnitude of independent thought. Only a species that takes a looooong time to mature, and is large and reproduces slowly would we see this type of individuality (Wraith existence = K selection theory) . Ergo, my problem with the wraith still remaining "buggy" in nature and biology. Whatever their beginnings (again the blue footed boobie argument), their morphology indicates they're certainly hominid now.

You know what I think the problem with that notion is? You assume that writers are too smart to go into such a details. Unfortunately, their treatment of others parts of the stories showed contrary.

Spoiler:

Again, this speaks to how a story is read. As I've alluded to before, my background is in linguistics and my undergraduate degree was in semiotics and literary theory (the philosophy of the theories of language)--sounds very convoluted I know--well...it is. Anyhow, the larger issue is can these inconsistencies be explained within the larger framework of the story (is there a theory of how we can analyse the story)? Once again, it depends on the "reading" a viewer takes of the narrative as a whole.

The next question, and probably the more important question is, does this "reading" provide a credible explanation for the inconsistencies? I myself would tend to think "no" --You can come up with all sorts of explanations about who did what, who said what to who, and who knows where who, where and what's on "second"--do you know what I mean? The issue is, does the reading hold it's own? Does it have weight, in the common sense realm?

However, Stockholm syndrome might even explain how come that Todd was not raging at the end of the last episode. Hell, Sheppard killed off his complete hive on purpose and he ended up thanking him for letting him go!!!
So either Todd suffers from the Wraith equivalent of the Stockholm syndrome or he is so vise that he sees Sheppard as we would see some teenager, someone young and inexperienced but with the potential.

Spoiler:

Now this really is interesting stuff--Thank you, I find these types of insights really thought provoking.
For everyone reading:
The Patty Hearst Syndrome (an heiress to a media magnet was kidnapped by an organisation of some type. She eventually robbed a bank because she took on their propaganda). Ug, ug!! This totally pulls at my heart strings.
For everyone reading
I'm not trying to be patronizing, but for those of you who do not know what Stockholm Syndrome is, it involves identifying with your attackers to such an extent that you adopt their M.O. You start to believe their propaganda (out of absolute abject fear for your own safty)--the novel 1984 is essentially about this--identifying with the abuser to such an extent one loses who he/she is.

Thank you for bringing this insight up leksa. I absolutely relish this sort of discussion.

Yes, I see your point. The problem with seeing the Wraith as the whole evil species is that where you have intelligence you must have curiosity and diversity in opinions. Even if they did on purpose limited themselves to one food source (extremely stupid move, because it creates high dependency on the food source in question) there has to be some part of their species which refused to do so, simply because they were smart enough to see limitation and curious enough to decide to go and explore the universe using more portable and efficient source of the food.

Spoiler:

Right, of course--they could not ever be a hive species with this level of sophistication--not a true hive species in any event. This idea of diversifying their food supply as a back story, does not appear to have been well thought out. The only purpose this serves is the "Ooooo hoolie goolie -- they eat people, aren't they scary!!?", part. Someone mentioned on a previous thread at some point that perhaps the wraith feed on humans because they need to as part of their evolutionary process--the more feeding on humans occurs the more the wraith become human. Then again, this points to their original hominid origin that has develop a deficiency, thereby needing to recapture whatever "this" is to continue to survive. In essence, they are eating what we eat, but cannot digest it the way we do. They need the food energy we have processed, then again this argument falls apart too. Oh well. Again, sloppy writing.

I agree with you. The slang is nice example of how the language changes. And yeah, why should the Wraith accept the language of their enemies??

Exactly, unless they WERE never enemies to begin with, but rather ancients themselves.

For the bug and fast evolution, just to remind you, Michael said that female bug has provided him with the eggs with the enough human DNA FOR HIM TO MANIPULATE, not enough for independent development of completely different organism. And I have problem even with this human DNA in the egg. It is not logical. The bug is predator, and every species has urge to leave successful offspring behind. So why would a successful predator allow that preys DNA mixes with its own and potentially weaken the offspring? Every predator sees the prey as something weaker than it. I mean, it is not controlled process so bug might end up with offspring which, because of the prey DNA has diminished ability to feed the same way as it's parent. Only way to avoid that is to control process, and that means experimentation by someone intelligent.

Spoiler:

Okay, I'm not completely clear on what you mean here. Do you mean Michael extracted the ova of female wraith, and that ova had strands of human DNA within them? (Or do you mean the iratus insect? This then begs the question, why would the iratus insect have human DNA?)
Also, these strands (when he did extract them) were not enough for him to manipulate into [another human] organism? Did he say this, I must have been sleeping. Which episode, I can think of a few. However, when did he talk about extracting the ova of wraith queens, or the iratus insect?

Oh wait a minute--you're talking about HOW the wraith would have involved from the iratus insect: the insect after feeding on a human being would have needed to harvest or keep back human DNA and incorporate it into her gametes--thus continuing to produce off spring that would evolve into a humanoid/insectoid.

Right, exactly. Of course. This is what I have been saying since I started posting here, this evolutionary process does not make sense unless this species of insect is unlike anything we've ever seen here on Earth and it behaves in absolutely incredible ways.

The only way it would happen based on our current knowledge of interspeciation would be if there were some type of artificial tampering. i.e. the Ancients were doing their dirty experiments again.

However, wraith evolution may be possible, as life on other planets (were it comparable in intelligence) may look completely unlike human beings because of the different evolutionary pressures. But unless there is some type of catastrophic change in the laws that govern the universe this would be highly, highly HIGHLY unlikely.

Thank you so much for engaging me. I love this sort of stuff--along with the drooling over the wraith bit.

I wish the writers would read our babble, it would be nice.



WK