Tin Man (118)

[dtheories]

I misread the instructions and listened to the GW simulcast with the dvd audio muted. So, spent a goodly portion of the ep listening to air or sudden bursts of laughter. I know it's the first commentary, so will have to hope for more "chat" in the next re-watch!

The idea of never being able to return home is difficult, and maybe let's some of us see through the eyes of a refugee. It was a very sad and complex ending, but Jack's facial expressions during his last conversation with Harlan rather gives away that plans are afoot!

The comedy was excellent! Daniel's expressions, especially in lock up when asking Teal'c how he felt without Jr., well, there were many fun moments to help balance the depth of despair.

[Starscape91]

This was a really great episode finding out that they were robots and actual copies of the original sg1 was a shocker and then came relief cause the robots have to stay their forever. Or until Sam builds portable batteries for them.

[Lieutenant Sparrow]

Comtraya!

Poor Harlan. I felt bad for the poor android. Not a bad ep. Did enough to keep me interested.

[Krisz]

One of my favourite episodes of the season.

Don't know how I'd feel being faced with finding out you are a copy of yourself and the 'real' you carries on with the life lived, the other condemned to searching for a new life and identity in a way for thousands of years!! The whole concept was interesting to explore. Robot Jack was trying to come to terms with it, but you knew he was suffering with the adjustment. As always the 'humanity' of synthetic android life is a great Sci Fi concept to explore and this episode was a good one for that.

The worst bit was that even if they could have gone back to Earth they would have been probably taken apart in the course of research. A chilling thought! Good thing Hammond was in charge and sent them back, if Maybourne was, off to Area 51 to be studied!

[Nindif]

Don't know how I'd feel being faced with finding out you are a copy of yourself and the 'real' you carries on with the life lived, the other condemned to searching for a new life and identity in a way for thousands of years!! The whole concept was interesting to explore. Robot Jack was trying to come to terms with it, but you knew he was suffering with the adjustment. As always the 'humanity' of synthetic android life is a great Sci Fi concept to explore and this episode was a good one for that.

There is a quote by the two Carters you may miss without subtitles as Jack walks out of the room in search of his copy. She says "We should evolve into different people based on our individual experiences" or something to that effect. It is a passing line which i think sums up the moral complexities of the episode. Over time, they will develop into unique people, it is just that they are starting from the same base.

I felt great sympathy for Harlan. He is simply alone and wanted some companionship and assistance. His situation and story are very heatfelt. Last surviving member of his entire race. All alone. World falling apart around him. Helpless. His plight is quite tragic.

Overall it is a very enjoyable episode. I would have liked an additional scene to explore the Teal'c/ Symbiote relationship. There was some nice comedic beats to break up the somber tone the story evolves into. It is heavily dialogue driven which is strange as most episodes thus far have followed a mystery/action/explanation structure, but it is well written and well paced. It is easily one of Season 1's best.

[Jae'a]

My LiveJournal post

[Matt G]

Another Sunday afternoon, by which point I was probably starting my A Levels...another ep of SG1.

1. Achilles heel of this ep? The title. "Tin Man". Mum and I used to watch the early seasons of SG1 together and it was pretty obvious to us what was going on before 'SG1' returned to Earth.

2. As Darren and David said, watching this 2nd time round is a bit bittersweet but there are/were one or two bits and pieces I forgot.

3. The biggest one of those was 'Teal'c' losing the plot, I remembered that he got trashed but over a decade after the only previous time I saw the ep, I didn't remember why.

4. I genuinely didn't expect Robo-SG1 to be copies first time round though though, just that they'd get somehow remade into flesh and blood so like most fans I presume I was seriously gutted about the Robo-teams eventual fate.

Interesting enough ep for what was at the time seemingly a standalone.

[NowIWillDestroyAbydos]

Let's see. A pretty good episode, which will setup the penultimate episode of Season 4.

I noticed that Hammond still has a tie on, which I find weird.

Tomorrow's episode is my favorite one of Season 1, and Martin Wood's first directed SG-1 episode.

[LeftHandedGuitarist]

This is an enjoyable enough episode. The story is great, but it's the execution which lets it down. I find Harlen a really annoying and unpleasant character to see on screen, and he suffers from that terrible affliction which many TV writers love in which they won't allow the character to just explain what's going on, even when asked with direct questions. It frustrates the hell out of me.

The big abandoned warehouse/factory style set (reused many times throughout the show) really looks bad here, and that's another thing that puts me off the episode a bit. It just doesn't look good.

The positive outweighs the negative here, though, because the episode's story is great and the twist that SG-1 are actually copies is not one you see coming; you fully expect them to be transferred back to their original bodies by the end of the episode. RDA does some great acting and especially in the scenes with his double. The ending of the episode actually leaves a somewhat bitter taste as it's a horrible thing that the robot copies have to go through. I could not imagine leaving my life behind and having another me continue with it, while I'm shut away from everyone and everything.

The biggest crime of this episode, though, was the fact that it was not followed up sooner. The sequel we do get is great, but still an unhappy ending for the robot team. They really should have been utilised a little more.

RATING: 7 out of 10

[hlndncr]

I believe the set for this episode is an old electrical plant that is used again in TBFtGoG and Watergate. I think it looks great here. They do some wonderful things with lighting to highlight the lines and textures and add color. It makes for some beautiful shots.

I love Harlan. He's sweet and tragic. Yes, he annoys the team, especially Jack, but for me that is part of his charm. Comtrya! (Best greeting ever!)

This episode has a fab twist at the end. I never believed that their real bodies were destroyed, but I didn't expect the robots were duplicates.

I like how you see each of the characters react to their new reality. Jack is angry for much of the episode, but then when he learns the truth he just looks devestated. As he said, he feels like someone stole his life; one he had just begun to believe was again worth living.

Daniel contemplates the essence of self. What makes him a unique being, whether organic or mechanical?

Sam is steeped in the logic of it. How can we be the same?

Poor Teal'c gets the short end. Having his consciousness combined with that of the Goa'uld. No wonder he went crazy.

I do think it has to be difficult for the robot team to be left behind to begin a new life. There are much more tragic ending than this one (Fragile Balance for example). They have each other, and they are family. And we later see that they still have their mission. So I do think they are ultimately happy.

[jelgate]

This episode has a great concept that losts its way. Turning SG1 into robot duplicates is a science fiction classic. However once SG1 returns from Earth with the knowledge they are now robots it drags on with no sense of direction. Its like they had a story that only lasts 30 minutes for a 42 minute episode. I will say this though. I love the sequel to this episode.

[DigiFluid]

I really like this one a lot. Which is odd because once upon a time I loathed it!

But over the years it's really grown on me. Harlan is a fantastic character, and "com-traya!" never fails to make me grin like an idiot now

I also really love the glum feel of Harlan's facility. It's dark, falling apart, industrial, and just all-around gloomy. It really compliments the tone of the story wonderfully.

One thing I've never really been able to work out though: what the heck is the facility/factory for? They're robots and have no need to eat or drink, so I'm not sure air is even an issue. And even if it were, the place looked gigantic! Even without circulating air, they could probably go for years and years between bothering to fix anything.

Or if it's not air circulation, what is it that keeps seeming like it'll explode if they don't fix it?

[Traveler Enroute1]

SG Rewatch episodes: 101 - 105, 106, 107, 109, 110, 111,112, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118

Tin Man

Another episode I always eagerly watch for.

Cool opening shot. The camera tilts down on strange structures until we see an active event horizon. And wait. When it disengages, we see that the team has already exited on the other side. Sort of like looking through the back side of a mirror. The music was nice and creaky, too. And when the whole team apparently gets struck down its uh-oh time.

Here's where the snazzy track suits come in. Always recall my own puzzlement at their change of clothing. I think I figured it was a prison outfit or lab clothes. Then we meet their host, Harlan, and the multi-use term 'Comtraya!' makes its appearance, too. Naturally Jack has his take on it ('Oh. Kumbaya.').

Everything looked fine till the team returned to the SGC. Yuck when Janet draws white fluid instead of blood from Jack's arm. Then it goes one step yuckier when Jack carves open his forearm to reveal mechanical workings instead of human tissue and blood. The big clue here was that he didn't seem to feel pain. But great shock scene, aided by the horrified reactions of Janet and the team.

Is this SG-1 or isn't it?

I got pulled into this one. It was conceivable to me that the team would actually have to remain on Harlan's forlorn planet. What would they do there? The writers would come up with some wild, imaginative rescue plot that, I don't know, maybe developed from an invading race more advanced. The team naturally prevails and uses this other technology to return to their bodies. Harlan gets to duplicate the losers and gain the companionship and workers he needs. Eh? Phfft. They'll never hire me to write an ep!

The more likely (and imaginative) scenario was that SG-1 still existed. This group that stormed back to earth was in fact a copy of the human team. Wow, talk about shock and awe. Poor Harlan let slip that though Teal'c was just vaporized before their eyes, he would be fine! Sam immediately leaps on this, as does Daniel, and Jack makes his presence even more threatening till Harlan has to reveal his secret.

Things get a lot more emotional at this time. The scene is masterfully played by the cast, as reality sinks in that they aren't the real SG-1. Hard to imagine what that did to them, how it shook them to their core. A copy, not the real deal as they thought. If they'd managed to remain on earth and the actual team returned, what a mess. But they had to face their greatest challenge now, to step back from a life they didn't really own but knew in all its intimate details.

Harlan seemed like a likable guy, but when I saw that the real SG-1 was lying on slabs AWAKE and immobile, probably wondering fruitlessly what was happening? Well, that wasn't very nice, it bordered on torture. I'm sure he never thought of it that way but I did. On the other hand Harlan was definitely in a sympathetic situation, alone deep beneath an unlivable planet with ancient infrastructure breaking down around him. Harlan was at the very least, a desperate survivor.

It was kind of fun to see the two Sams and two Daniels engaged in like-speak. But it's the conversation between the two Jacks that is most illuminating. Copy!Jack is clearly unhappy that he can't live what is essentially his life, too. But he's still Jack and accepts the only way this could go down was for the real team to return and his team remains with Harlan. The question always hovering about is whether the copy!SG-1 with all the same abilities, memories and feelings were entitled to that life, too. It wasn't their fault they came into existence as duplicates of others. Needless to say they all knew how earth's military and government would see it.

A storyline where this got some exploration was in Star Trek the Next Generation, where Star Fleet debated whether Data's rights as a sentient being were equal to humans ('The Measure of a Man') and if his creation had her father's rights ('The Offspring').

As they part at the gate, it's painfully evident that this solution is the best of a bad deal. The wistful expressions on copy!SG-1 made my eyes water. Even the Jacks and their parting banter can't lighten the mood much. They plan to bury the gate but we do wonder what will become of the fully duplicated SG-1 now that they can't be SG-1 anymore. A sequel waiting in the wings, I hoped then.

Additional stuff:

• Best screen effects for the doubles was with the Jacks. Sam's double was visually off-scale.
  
  
• People are not supposed to live forever. Copy!Jack said to Harlan.
  But if you try for just a few 100 years, perhaps you might change your mind! Harlan cheerfully replied.
  
  
• Noticed a lot of white (lab) coat people in the gateroom in this episode, way more than I noted before.
  
  
• Daniel had especially gorgeous eyes without his glasses.
  
  
• Some of Harlan's people left with portable power packs and never returned. Would they or their remains turn up somewhere beyond the gate?
  
  
• Cute moment when Harlan expresses a bit too much interest in 'the female.'
  

More lessons on how very wrong these gate trips can go, even without an enemy on the other side. The Pentagon wasn't going to be happy about this trip, either; they would love to study Harlan's duplicating tech. Wonder how the team debriefed this one. Touching, bittersweet gate trip that worked well for me. For the copy SG-1, apparently not so much.

Rated 4/5

[LeftHandedGuitarist]

Wow, so many people here actually like Harlan?! He literally makes me to want to smash the TV screen whenever he's on, and his delivery of "comtraya" is like nails scratching down a chalkboard to me! What am I missing?

[DigiFluid]

Taste?