Teyla's Choice (no, not THAT one)

[xandder]

the last 10 minutes of this episode is the best thing they have ever done with teyla. alot of people are saying that it seems out of character, but i dont it was, i think its just a natural progression for teyla to take that type of action against michael. As i was watching the fight between john and michael i was thinking 'teyla has to show up and kick his ass' if anyone else would have ended him it would of seemed wrong somehow. i just wished teyla woud of said something like 'goodbye michael' like she did in allies (i think its that episode, cant be sure)

this episode just reinforces the fact for me that its good that atlantis has ended, not because this episode was bad, because it wasn't, but because we can clearly see that rachel and teyla have serioulsy been under used when she could have had amazing storylines centred around the wraith and michael instead of just being in the background. even if the series had gone on i would doubt that teyla would again get this type of screen time, and i feel too much timem was again taken up by the shep/Mckay interaction, they should of left it down to teyla/ronon/michael, them three characters have so much baggage together that if they had more time together in this episode it would of made it a 10, instead of an 8, but thats just in my opinion.

[EvenstarSRV]

But when someone is hanging on a ledge like that, helpless? To forcefully kick their hands off? I just don't see it as something she'd normally do.

She did it in this instance, for good reason. But it was still a bit extreme, because she's Teyla.

The point of discussion I was trying to raise is not the fact that she did it at all, but that she did it in that situation. Teyla forcefully ended the life of an already defeated enemy when she (IMO) would usually have saved their life and captured them in instances like that.

I agree that Teyla would normally capture a defeated enemy, but IMO Michael is hardly a usual enemy for her. He's personally put her through hell, kidnapping her multiple times, kidnapping and killing many of her people, and trying to kidnap her son. And I do think that Michael threatened her son, since he was willing to set off the self-destruct if she didn't go with him. To me, that was him saying 'come with me, or I'll kill you, your son, and everyone on Atlantis'.

I think Teyla's actions were very much in character because I saw it as a display of a mother's protectiveness. I was talking with a friend a mine a few months ago who recently became a mother, and she told me that for the first time in her life she feels like she could actually kill someone if they threatened her child. And this is someone who flinches at the idea of even playfully throwing a punch at a friend. So for a warrior like Teyla who's no stranger to killing, I didn't think it was too much of a stretch for her to kill Michael in that way.

Yes, dangerous, yes, he's evil (and clearly nuts). But this is Teyla. This action for her was dark and extreme. For John, it would've been every day life. For Teyla, for Teyla, it was an interesting and powerful action, as demonstrated by John's reaction.

Some people seem to have missed that this is the issue I was trying to raise (not you, Pic), the fact that it was Teyla who did what she did in this very situation, not the fact that someone killed someone to protect their family.

If you stop to think about this, it was pretty dark and extreme, period. And I doubt Teyla's people make it a habit out of outright killing their opponents in situations like that.

Her people have a sense of "honor", after all.

I find those bolded points interesting, since if what you sees as a dark and extreme action is abnormal for Teyla and her people but completely normal for Sheppard, then by that logic Sheppard doesn't have a similar sense of honor as the Athosians concerning defeated opponents? He is an Air Force officer, after all.

[FallenAngelII]

It's not irrelevant at all. Ok, let's say Teyla would have reached down and saved Michael. John just would have went over and pushed him off the tower.

But the point of this thread is to discuss Teyla's actions, Teyla's mindset, Teyla herself.

Not what would have happened anyway. We're discussing what Teyla did, why she did it and how it was so different from what she normally would've done things.

That'd just be bad TV considering Teyla's actions in "The Queen" when she started fireing at the other hive just so she could kill Wraith, for the hell of it. After all Michael's put her through the past couple seasons, she had more then enough reason to want to kill him too.

Teyla ordered them into a battle situation where there was heavy casualties. She did not personally walk into a Wraith hive and started slaughtering Wraith as she saw fit.

I find those bolded points interesting, since if what you sees as a dark and extreme action is abnormal for Teyla and her people but completely normal for Sheppard, then by that logic Sheppard doesn't have a similar sense of honor as the Athosians concerning defeated opponents? He is an Air Force officer, after all.

The sense of honor in this case pertains to how Michael was already down for the count with no escape in sight.

No matter how heinous the criminal, according to Earth law (and the honor law I speak of) he's not to be killed in such a situation.

[LiLTiff17]

Actually, he didn't threaten her baby, not even once. He always reassured her the baby wouldn't be harmed (nor would she if she came with him). It was only by the end there that he abandoned them to their fate with the self-destruct.

He's still evil and stuff, but he didn't threaten the baby.

Self-destruct means he was planning to kill the baby (along with everyone else).

[jyh]

I agree w/ others that Teyla made a tough choice. As long as Michael was alive (in Atlantis prison or not), her son wasn't safe, Atlantis wasn't safe, and thousands if not millions of others in the Pegasus galaxy could become collateral damage from Michael's twisted plans. Not to mention the people he had already killed, and all the stuff he had done to Teyla heself. If he hadn't threatened her son, she might have felt differently, but I think that maternal "mother-lion-protecting-her-cubs" instinct took hold. I was waiting for her to say something along the line of "you will never threaten my son again" before she knocked him off, but that would have been a little cliche.

Long story short, Michael constituted a past, present, and future danger to the Pegasus Galaxy, and Teyla decided to finally put an end to the danger.

My only quibble was that I wish they had made a reference to actually finding Michael's body. I'd hate for him to become the Stargate version of MacGyver's Murdoch: he seemingly died about a dozen times, but since they couldn't find (or never bothered to find) his body, it seemed that Murdoch would survive to threaten them another day.

[EvenstarSRV]

The sense of honor in this case pertains to how Michael was already down for the count with no escape in sight.

No matter how heinous the criminal, according to Earth law (and the honor law I speak of) he's not to be killed in such a situation.

I agree, but what I found interesting in your post was that you thought that Sheppard killing an enemy who was down for the count would have been perfectly normal.

If Teyla's sense of honor should have kept her from killing Michael as she did, then wouldn't Sheppard's sense of honor also do the same? It seems that by that logic, it would have been just as dark and extreme for Sheppard to kill Michael as Teyla did, not 'everyday life' for him.

[Womble]

I'm amazing no one's created a thread for this yet. What do you think about Teyla's choice? No, not her choice between giving up Torren and not giving him up. If she'd given him up, I'd totally lost respect for her. Saving herself and her friends or just saving herself and him or just saving him at the cost of the entire galaxy (she knew what would happen from "The Last Man"). If she'd done it, I would've hated her forever, especially since she knows better (which she did).

No, the choice I'm talking about is the fact that at the end of the episode, she chose to forcibly end Michael's life. Now, I'm not saying what she did was wrong (although it probably was by legal standards; not extending a hand to help, not murder, kicking someone's hands off, murder (possibly)), I'm just saying that it was very dark and un-Teyla-y.

I'm glad they finally gave her stuff to do (even if she spent most of the episode just standing/sitting/lying still either unconscious or being terrified. She got to kick ass, she got character development and she got to commit an act of uncharacteristic darkness that I'm sure is going to haunt her for a while (at least I hope so).

I'm not saying she shouldn't have killed him. But that she chose to kill him herself instead of just waiting for him to fall down on his own (possible) or have John or someone else do it shows how much she hated him in that very instant.

And I'm not saying she shouldn't have killed him. But that she chose to kill him herself instead of just waiting for him to fall down on his own (possible) or have John or someone else do it shows how much she hated him in that very instant.

The point is not what we would've done. The point is that this is Teyla we're talking about. I liked that act of darkness coming from her. I just wanted to generate discussion over the fact that the writers chose to have Teyla be the one to end Michael's life, Teyla of all people, not John, not anyone else on Atlantis, but Teyla herself.

...Man, a bear in most relations – worm and savage otherwise, –
Man propounds negotiations, Man accepts the compromise.
Very rarely will he squarely push the logic of a fact
To its ultimate conclusion in unmitigated act.

Fear, or foolishness, impels him, ere he lay the wicked low,
To concede some form of trial even to his fiercest foe.
Mirth obscene diverts his anger – Doubt and Pity oft perplex
Him in dealing with an issue – to the scandal of The Sex!

But the Woman that God gave him, every fibre of her frame
Proves her launched for one sole issue, armed and engined for the same,
And to serve that single issue, lest the generations fail,
The female of the species must be deadlier than the male.

She who faces Death by torture for each life beneath her breast
May not deal in doubt or pity – must not swerve for fact or jest.
These be purely male diversions – not in these her honour dwells.
She the Other Law we live by, is that Law and nothing else.

...She is wedded to convictions – in default of grosser ties;
Her contentions are her children, Heaven help him who denies! –
He will meet no suave discussion, but the instant, white-hot, wild,
Wakened female of the species warring as for spouse and child.

...So it comes that Man, the coward, when he gathers to confer
With his fellow-braves in council, dare not leave a place for her
Where, at war with Life and Conscience, he uplifts his erring hands
To some God of Abstract Justice – which no woman understands...

(From Rudyard Kipling's "The Female of the Species").

[bcharley]

But the point of this thread is to discuss Teyla's actions, Teyla's mindset, Teyla herself.

Not what would have happened anyway. We're discussing what Teyla did, why she did it and how it was so different from what she normally would've done things.

But you need to discuss this character's actions/mindset in the context of the rest of the show. Teyla doesn't exist in a bubble. It wouldn't have made any sence for Teyla to save Michael's life considering several weeks ago she killed thousands of Wraith who hadn't done anything to her, considering what Michael's personally done to her and her people.

Then when you throw in the fact that John just would have killed him anyway, it really wouldn't make any sence.

Teyla ordered them into a battle situation where there was heavy casualties. She did not personally walk into a Wraith hive and started slaughtering Wraith as she saw fit.

If anything what Teyla did in "The Queen" was more dark then what she did to Michael. She killed thousands of Wraith just for the sake of killing Wraith, with a good chance that she was going to die in the process.

[Pandora's_Box]

Brilliantly put, Womble. Or should I say, Rudyard Kipling.

Killing Michael may have been "dark" and it may have been "cold", but I don't think it was anymore out of character for Teyla than her killing any other Wraith would be.

She grew up a warrior and a leader of her people - their protector in many senses. I don't think she would have hesitated to kill a Wraith then had she been given the opportunity, so I don't see the "controversy" here.

She's killed many Wraith since then in combat situations. This was a combat situation. Over more, she was protecting her son from a man responsible for so much terror in their lives.

It was fitting, Teyla's murder of Michael, and I'm glad she was the one to do it.

Her motivations were simple; protect her family, protect her son, protect her people and the people of the galaxy. Killing Michael accomplished that. End of story.

[ablevins425]

I'm amazing no one's created a thread for this yet. What do you think about Teyla's choice? No, not her choice between giving up Torren and not giving him up. If she'd given him up, I'd totally lost respect for her. Saving herself and her friends or just saving herself and him or just saving him at the cost of the entire galaxy (she knew what would happen from "The Last Man"). If she'd done it, I would've hated her forever, especially since she knows better (which she did).

No, the choice I'm talking about is the fact that at the end of the episode, she chose to forcibly end Michael's life. Now, I'm not saying what she did was wrong (although it probably was by legal standards; not extending a hand to help, not murder, kicking someone's hands off, murder (possibly)), I'm just saying that it was very dark and un-Teyla-y.

I'm glad they finally gave her stuff to do (even if she spent most of the episode just standing/sitting/lying still either unconscious or being terrified. She got to kick ass, she got character development and she got to commit an act of uncharacteristic darkness that I'm sure is going to haunt her for a while (at least I hope so).

I'm not saying she shouldn't have killed him. But that she chose to kill him herself instead of just waiting for him to fall down on his own (possible) or have John or someone else do it shows how much she hated him in that very instant.

And I'm not saying she shouldn't have killed him. But that she chose to kill him herself instead of just waiting for him to fall down on his own (possible) or have John or someone else do it shows how much she hated him in that very instant.

The point is not what we would've done. The point is that this is Teyla we're talking about. I liked that act of darkness coming from her. I just wanted to generate discussion over the fact that the writers chose to have Teyla be the one to end Michael's life, Teyla of all people, not John, not anyone else on Atlantis, but Teyla herself.

I think a lot of people forget how much the dynamic of the character changed when she became a mother. I think most mothers if in a situation where someone that was hell bent on abducting or harming there child would have done the same thing. So I don't believe that it is so out of character.

[Lythisrose]

Teyla was not raised with, nor necessarily bound by, Earth law or sense of "honor."
When has she ever shown that she is?
In Missing she killed the Bola Kai warrior without hesitation.
She understood Ronon's killing of his ex-commander, and even said that she understood it, but not to tell the Earthers, as they would not.
Her actions in the Queen, against the Wraith Hive again show that she will kill without hesitation, those she feels are her enemy. And Michael has clearly shown that he is. In the alternate timeline he gutted her like a fish to take her child. And as others have said, she's a mother bear.
I think to try to judge her actions or motivations by our standards leads to a real cultural misunderstanding. We need to know what is "honor" in the Athosian or Pegasus traditions. Not what it means in ours.

[fumblesmcstupid]

What Lythisrose said!

MW vs Pg morals are very different!

The 10 commandments are an Earth and Christian based concept!

Religion is a subject that I don't think you can discuss here at GW.

So all I am saying is Thou shalt not kill! Probably don't mean much to the PG people!

[WarGrowlmon18]

I'm amazing no one's created a thread for this yet. What do you think about Teyla's choice? No, not her choice between giving up Torren and not giving him up. If she'd given him up, I'd totally lost respect for her. Saving herself and her friends or just saving herself and him or just saving him at the cost of the entire galaxy (she knew what would happen from "The Last Man"). If she'd done it, I would've hated her forever, especially since she knows better (which she did).

No, the choice I'm talking about is the fact that at the end of the episode, she chose to forcibly end Michael's life. Now, I'm not saying what she did was wrong (although it probably was by legal standards; not extending a hand to help, not murder, kicking someone's hands off, murder (possibly)), I'm just saying that it was very dark and un-Teyla-y.

I'm glad they finally gave her stuff to do (even if she spent most of the episode just standing/sitting/lying still either unconscious or being terrified. She got to kick ass, she got character development and she got to commit an act of uncharacteristic darkness that I'm sure is going to haunt her for a while (at least I hope so).

I'm not saying she shouldn't have killed him. But that she chose to kill him herself instead of just waiting for him to fall down on his own (possible) or have John or someone else do it shows how much she hated him in that very instant.

And I'm not saying she shouldn't have killed him. But that she chose to kill him herself instead of just waiting for him to fall down on his own (possible) or have John or someone else do it shows how much she hated him in that very instant.

The point is not what we would've done. The point is that this is Teyla we're talking about. I liked that act of darkness coming from her. I just wanted to generate discussion over the fact that the writers chose to have Teyla be the one to end Michael's life, Teyla of all people, not John, not anyone else on Atlantis, but Teyla herself.

He was too dangerous to be kept alive, she knew that and there's a reason I think she did that: her baby. He would have kept coming after him so she did it to protect him. As for John, I think he just let her make the choice of what to do as he just sat there and watched her as she killed Michael. I consider what she did justice and self-defense as she did knock him initaly off the tower in a fight. Also it may have been symbolic as the one person Michael seemed to care about was the one to finish him off.

[WarGrowlmon18]

Makes perfect sense in my opinion. Michael threatened her friends, herself, and her son multiple times. Like some say, "Never threaten a mother's baby because she will kick your ass."

So much anger and pain was building up in Teyla because of how Michael sinisterly treated her son and herself. It seems perfectly logical for her to end his life. She wanted to make sure that he would really be dead and best way of knowing that is doing it yourself. She did that allowing her to have closure and a clean conscious. Clean conscious as in she won't have to fear that he will threaten her child ever again.

I would have hated to have Shepard kill an enemy again. It was worth due to have Teyla kill one of her worst enemies (to herself and her son), show more of her dark side, and even develop her character further. As shown, we know Teyla isn't an angel and is a human who does have a dark side and will use it if her life or her son's is in danger.

The writers were right in having her kill of Michael. No one else could measure up to the dramatic effect she had when she did so.

True. The only one who may have deserved to do it more was the clone of Beckett for all Michael put him through.

[WarGrowlmon18]

Actually, he didn't threaten her baby, not even once. He always reassured her the baby wouldn't be harmed (nor would she if she came with him). It was only by the end there that he abandoned them to their fate with the self-destruct.

He's still evil and stuff, but he didn't threaten the baby.

Only because he needed him. Otherwise he would have had aboslutly no problem with it. He murdered a young woman to get Beckett to help him and threatened to keep doing it. He's insane and a mass murderer.