'Miller's Crossing' (409) General Discussion

[Jackie]

Yeah, its been awhile, but wasn't Barrett under Ba'al's control last we saw him? Wasn't he carted off to jail or something like that?

Plus, didn't sis live in Canada? Why was Barrett there with our "heroes"? They wouldn't have had jurisdiction in a Canadian kidnapping because no one knew whether or not this was related to Rodney's emails.

Ah yes, emails. Yes, let's send top secret emails to sissy's home laptop which is left open on the kitchen sink for hubby to see and for baby niece to possibly play games on.

Does the NID even have a jurisdiction? I was under the impression that were pretty much a rogue outfit anyways. Barret just made no sense to me. maybe woosley would have been a better choice.

I don't remember what became of Barrett but I seem to recall he was brainwashed or something.

[Traveler Enroute1]

I think it was a hard decision for Sheppard. He did not want to see his friend's sister die. Remember it was Wallace who infected her with the nanites. So if she died it would of been murder on his part.

Sheppard I think gave him a way out. To make him do the right thing. Still Sheppard probably felt guilty for how it went down.

I definitely agree that Sheppard didn't do this lightly. He knows what it's like to be fed on, after all. When Rodney came to speak with him after, I noted the little moment of awkwardness as if he didn't want to be thanked for his action. I think it's going to come back and bite him somehow; it was one of those profoundly helpful acts that a good person will have to pay for, unfortunately. (As in "no good deed goes unpunished," esp in Stargate Atlantis-land.)

Just sayin', a good ep with great performances all around. Well, poor Malcom hits the deck again!

[Briangate78]

Well, that was depressing. Shep sank to a new level for me. I no longer consider him a "hero" in the series. Sorry but he crossed the moral line with "offering up the options" bull crap. (Of course I shouldn't be surprised the writers did that--they had Thor blow himself up.)

I watched MASH right before this ep--I guess moral stories died out when MASH went of the air or when RDA left the SG-1 series.

Wallace was not very convincing as a desperate father--I've seen many people die of cancer and I just found him hard to believe. I also know of people who have lost "everything"--kids, house, job and they are still alive. Sorry, don't believe that whole--"he lost it all" bull crap. It was nothing more than Shep taking advantage of a grieving and desperate man.

Shep must have replaced by a replicator--just way occ.

No real moral to the story--at all.

Wallace would of been convicted of Murder if he let Mckay's sister die. Sheppard could not let Rodney sacrifice himself. Sheppard basically gave Wallace a way to redeem himself and set things right. Both his Wife and Daughter were dead, well his Daughter was brain dead. He would be going to jail the rest of his life. I see it as Sheppard giving him a way out. Sheppard felt upset about what he did. The last scene with him in his quarters says it all. Sheppard is not a bad person or lacks compassion. He did the right thing.

[Ace]

Why not just put Jeannie in the Antarctica cryo pod thing? That would essentially give them all the time in the world to figure out the situation... in any case it would have meant that they didn't need to bring the Wraith to Earth or feed him for that matter. Not that I mind that he was feed...

I just couldn't figure out why they didn't put her in the pod... they had the Daedalus it wouldn't have taken more than a second to do. Just beam her directly in as they were going to do with Jackson.

Overall it wasn't a bad episode... These types of episodes are never my favorites but I knew that going in and still liked it. Heck... I like all Stargate episodes escape Bane & Emancipation.

I did miss the trailer for next week as my roommate decided to walk in just at that moment... luckily I recorded it on my DVDR so I'll have to rewatch that part.

All in all I'd give it a 7 out of 10

Ace

[Briangate78]

I definitely agree that Sheppard didn't do this lightly. He knows what it's like to be fed on, after all. When Rodney came to speak with him after, I noted the little moment of awkwardness as if he didn't want to be thanked for his action. I think it's going to come back and bite him somehow; it was one of those profoundly helpful acts that a good person will have to pay for, unfortunately. (As in "no good deed goes unpunished," esp in Stargate Atlantis-land.)

Just sayin', a good ep with great performances all around. Well, poor Malcom hits the deck again!

That scene was so powerful between Mckay and Sheppard. I cannot understand people thinking Sheppard would not have done what he did. This just shows how much Darker the show has gotten. I like it, and was ready for eps like this.

[Anlaria Onyx]

Uh, I think someone needs to get over SG-1.
This was SUCH a bad episode and mostly because it was based on Earth! This is Atlantis! I didn't think this show could get any worse, but it did!!!

That's a little unfair. They are an Earth based mission. Because they work on Atlantis their now not allowed to go to Earth? I like to see and Earth based episode every now and then. It is after all were it all began.

[Wilson3Girl]

I think Wallace offering himself up would have been a convenient cop-out. by Sheppard 'presenting' the situation, it shows the tough choice he made (and I'm sure someone above him as Wallace's demise is gonna require a government cover-up for sure). Ethically, yes, the situation was dreadful, and that's the 'dark' we've been promised for season 4. If nothing else, it opens up the boards for some interesting discussion.

I agree. We've seen John have to make tough calls before. He wasn't happy about doing it. The little lighthearted scene with Rodney and Shep at the end wasn't about Shep celebrating that Wallace died, its just what Shep and McKay do---they joke around, even during crappy times---they're not going to sit around and talk about their feelings and re-hash the agonizing events of the day. John did say, "I don't want to talk about it." He's indicated that he was not thrilled with what he had to do, but he did it because he had to and now he wants to get past it and move on. If he sat around sulking about every tough decision he had to make, he wouldn't have time for anything else......like defending Atlantis against the Wraith and the Replicators.....


Wilson3Girl

[jelgate]

She was right. The SGC is not a part of SGA, and SG1 characters really don't fit with SGA folks. Its just another murky way for TPTB to continue to merge two shows into one, ruining both of them in the process.

Are we a little parnoid. Sheppard,Carter, and McKay have connections back on Earth. I loved seeing Ronon trying to assimilate Earth culture. Reminds me of early SG-1 when Teal'c was learning about Earth. I'm trying to see how SGA is getting runined
*thinks for a minute*
Nope don't see it

[Teslan]

You're probably right about Mallozzi joking, because now that you mention it I think I do recall that being mentioned, though I don't remember which episode, and I don't want to go through all the transcripts.

But looking back at the episode "Poisioning the Well", and how the Shepard character was almost eager to use the Wraith known as 'Steve' as a lab rat it does not surprise me. But Weir was there to caution him that time, and its funny that while I wasn't really a fan of her either when she was on the show, I am starting to think it was a bad idea of getting rid of her, without at least putting someone else on the show to ask the tough questions.

Tough choices are good. I like them being presented in the media, particularly in scifi where they usually like to add a twist. But I also like it when there are consequences. The reason i have always liked this show is because they have always had to deal with concrete consequences. I liked SG-1 (up until the later seasons) at least as much as Atlantis, but I felt they always had that kind of "wrap it up in an hour", feeling. It was kind of lacking when it came to getting the characters dirty, which was fine for its more 'Star Trek' like atmosphere.

But ever since the first episode of Atlantis, it has been about people questioning what they are doing. They woke up the Wraith not too long after they arrived, causing massive panic for the galaxy's native inhabitants. But it was a mistake. Same thing for the Replicators. Rodney going over it in his head two weeks ago, made it clear that their mistakes do haunt them. Same with Michael. And I felt this mistake was just kind of passed over, which is somewhat unfortunate.

[technoextreme]

Wallace would of been convicted of Murder if he let Mckay's sister die. Sheppard could not let Rodney sacrifice himself. Sheppard basically gave Wallace a way to redeem himself and set things right. Both his Wife and Daughter were dead, well his Daughter was brain dead.

Actually his daughter was dead at that point.

You're probably right about Mallozzi joking, because now that you mention it I think I do recall that being mentioned, though I don't remember which episode, and I don't want to go through all the transcripts.

Yes. The planet where the prisoners were being fed to the wraith to save the population at large. The wraith can eat food. It doesn't do anything but they can eat food.

[FoolishPleasure]

Hubby knew about Atlantis.It happens plenty of times with the United States. Those incidents don't involve secret alien technology capable of transporting people across galaxies (As far as I know).

US authorities go to Canada to investigate kidnappings all the time? At the beginning, no one had any idea this crime involved SGC/US military secrets.

As for Barrett - we last saw him in "Insiders" (season 10) and others were right:

Deciding Baal's plan worked only because of Barrett, they question the agent, thinking (and soon confirming) he has been brainwashed. He is taken into custody.

Hmmm. Seems our writers forgot about that one.

[ColCaldwell]

US authorities go to Canada to investigate kidnappings all the time? At the beginning, no one had any idea this crime involved SGC/US military secrets.

As for Barrett - we last saw him in "Insiders" (season 10) and others were right:

Deciding Baal's plan worked only because of Barrett, they question the agent, thinking (and soon confirming) he has been brainwashed. He is taken into custody.

Hmmm. Seems our writers forgot about that one. ;)

I cannot remember the episode, but he was back after he went through some sort of reconditioning in a season 10 episode.

[smushybird]

I just find it so hard to believe, that a man who wanted to save his daughter would risk the life of somebody else with the belief that these two strangers could make his daughter well again.

Something even harder to swallow was seeing Shepard talk the guy into sacrifcing himself to the wraith so it could continue it's work to save Jeannie, I suppose it was the easy way out for the writers to get the wraith a home cooked meal...

I found the first totally believable. In fact, I think I could probably do it, myself.

The part with Sheppard talking him into sacrificing himself was less believable, although I could imagine that with both his wife and daughter gone, he felt he had nothing left to live for and truly did not want to be responsible for Jeannie's death. He was portrayed sympathetically enough that I could almost imagine that.

Wallace was not very convincing as a desperate father--I've seen many people die of cancer and I just found him hard to believe. I also know of people who have lost "everything"--kids, house, job and they are still alive. Sorry, don't believe that whole--"he lost it all" bull crap. It was nothing more than Shep taking advantage of a grieving and desperate man.

For some people, losing your child feels like losing everything. Just because you're still alive doesn't mean you feel life is worth living.
I do agree with the people who don't like what Shep did. I think they should have written it so Wallace offered, instead, as an act of redemption.

I loved hearing Rodney use John's first name again. The scenes between them were wonderful. DH and JF are such exceptionally good actors. DH's sister is excellent too.

eta:
I disagree with technoextreme. He didn't murder his daughter. Many parents make decisions to try very novel and untested therapies to save their children from cancer. Some of the drugs in clinical trials are very risky with nasty side effects. Occasionally, they prove fatal. You can't blame the parent for that. You can't call it murder when the parent's desperate desire is to save the child.

[technoextreme]

US authorities go to Canada to investigate kidnappings all the time? At the beginning, no one had any idea this crime involved SGC/US military secrets.

Sure they do. If the crime is high profile enough. Having someone who knows of the Stargate Program being kidnapped is certainly high profile. I don't know enough about how it works but I know it isn't in the realm plot hole.

The part with Sheppard talking him into sacrificing himself was less believable, although I could imagine that with both his wife and daughter gone, he felt he had nothing left to live for and truly did not want to be responsible for Jeannie's death. He was portrayed sympathetically enough that I could almost imagine that.

The fact is that he technically murdered his daughter. He would have been killed anyway though we don't have any clue where this happened. As sympathetic as he was what he did was pretty dam evil.

[jelgate]

As for Barrett - we last saw him in "Insiders" (season 10) and others were right:

Deciding Baal's plan worked only because of Barrett, they question the agent, thinking (and soon confirming) he has been brainwashed. He is taken into custody.

Hmmm. Seems our writers forgot about that one.

No they didn't. Check this transcript from Uninvited,

VALA
How's it going?
CARTER
Nothing yet.
VALA
Any word from Area 51?
CARTER
Yeah. Agent Barrett called in about an hour ago. Said his team has detained everyone who had security clearance to the lab where the devices were being held