A Matter of Time (216)

[SF_and_Coffee]

I haven't read them yet, but they're on my list. I hope you do read my fanfic, as well as the related fanfic I link to in my foreword, and I hope you enjoy them all. I always welcome comments, by the way.

[Ripley2012]

This is the best episode, simply because black holes are amazing! Although in the show, it was quiet sensationalized in regards to the true nature of a black hole....still even in its exaggeration was correct in the effects. Not to mention a great way to build on Sam's character more. I watched Atlantis series first, and this episode really struck me as a building block for Rodney McKay's character in Atlantis all in one episode which made me chuckle when they met later in the series.

Black holes are so abundant in the universe and it would have been nice if they revisited this science a little more in the series but that's OK because time travel produced by sun flares? totally cool! Anyway, best episode ever....!

[Lieutenant Sparrow]

Strange, the eps on my DVD are in a different order to the ones on here. A matter of time and the fifth race are swapped around. Oh well.

Not much of an ep. The black hole stuff is cool but it doesn't hold my interest very well. Felt sorry for Cromwell. Felt him and Jack would have mended things if he hadn't been sucked in.

[SF_and_Coffee]

Strange, the eps on my DVD are in a different order to the ones on here. A matter of time and the fifth race are swapped around. Oh well.

Not much of an ep. The black hole stuff is cool but it doesn't hold my interest very well. Felt sorry for Cromwell. Felt him and Jack would have mended things if he hadn't been sucked in.

I love this ep (obviously, if you look at my current sig and avatar) and the character development opportunity it set up. And I, too, always felt sorry for Cromwell and thought he deserved better. I kind of got the impression that he and Jack actually did make a start at mending things while they were gearing up to go in and set the bomb, although we don't actually see this scene on-screen. I wrote a "missing scene" detailing this, along with an entire story in which Cromwell turns out to have still been in-transit when the wormhole skips to P2A-870, where he exits the Stargate, alive and only slightly injured. Things get interesting from there...

[SF_and_Coffee]

I don't often write episode reviews, but for this one, I'm going to. And I'll warn you, it won't be short, because there are just too many layers going on here.

The first time I watched this ep, the early scene on P3W-451 confused me. I'd been working two jobs, so I often wasn't home to catch the show when it aired. I had a VCR and recorded the episodes on VHS tapes when that happened, so I could watch them later. When I started the tape to watch "A Matter of Time", I was intrigued by the opening scene set in outer space itself. Then came the scene of the team on the planet's surface, and for a moment I wondered if there were suddenly something wrong with my player! Everyone was moving in slow motion, their speech low and drawn-out, but by the time I reached for the remote, things had returned to normal, and I realized what was going on. Oh my God, they've sent a team to a world that's too close to a black hole!

Sam's little session with Jack, where she explains wormhole travel in terms of apples and worms, made me chuckle. Now, I know Jack's a lot brighter than he lets on (else there's no way in hell he'd have made full-bird colonel in the USAF -- you have to be both intelligent and highly educated to get that far) and at times I wonder why he plays dumb, but when he does the "humor me, I'm dense" routine, the befuddled look on his face is definitely comical. RDA always nailed that.

And suddenly, we have someone dialing in when there's no one expected. Now we get to the plot. All right, what's going on, and how's SG-1 going to save the day this time?

It turns out they really can't, at least not for poor Henry Boyd and his team. SG-10 are doomed, sadly. Had we seen and gotten to know any of the characters on that team prior to this ep, that would have had even more impact on viewers, but the tragedy of their loss is reflected in Jack, whom we learn was the man who'd recommended Boyd for command of this team, and it was their first mission. Oh yeah, Jack's going to take an emotional hit for this, I recall thinking, and it won't be pretty at all. I could see him already beginning to fray at the edges. (Technical nitpick: with the time differential and the redshift factor, control signals sent to tilt the MALP's camera upward should have taken forever to be received and processed, yet in fact the MALP responded normally to the command. Oh well, it's television and fiction. Physics can screw up a great story, if you let it. SG-1's writers weren't about to let that happen.)

On the other hand, the befuddled act has evaporated, revealing the intelligence of a man who quickly identifies the problem to Hammond as a black hole, even before Sam says a word about it. We are reminded that Jack is in fact an amateur astronomer; he understands this stuff perfectly well.

Meanwhile, Sam's as excited as a kid whose Christmas presents came early. Here's a chance to study a black hole up close, via the Stargate and the MALP -- essentially cheating physics. Of course, watching the black hole also means watching SG-10 in their nearly-eternal final moments... Jack nixes the idea by reminding his 2IC of this, rather strongly. Suitably chagrined, she backs down and Hammond orders the gate connection to P3W-451 terminated. SG-10, we hardly knew ye.

Uh-oh. It won't shut down. Now we've got an even bigger problem. Meanwhile, outside the mountain, it appears the brass are getting worried. What looks like a strike team is arriving. (It always sounds to me like they also used Marshall Teague for the voice-over of whatever anonymous person was shouting "Go! Go! Move! Move!" just before we see his character show up. Getting more bang for their guest-star buck, perhaps?) The team's commander appears to be all business, and I love his manner as he queries the young airman on guard outside. Teague is so often cast as as a real arsehole character -- he plays them brilliantly, though he has far more range than that as an actor -- and at first I wondered if this would be a similar role.

Back in the bowels of the mountain, Hammond's red phone isn't working. Not good, and no wonder the brass upstairs are concerned. Sam and Siler are trying to get the Stargate to disconnect, and not having any success. The gate is still open to P3W-451, the event horizon is behaving oddly, and Lieutenant Simmons announces that the SGC has lost communication with the upper levels of Cheyenne Mountain. (Okay, the line explaining that part was poorly-written, but after parsing it in my head I realized what Simmons was trying to say.) Off goes the general to use NORAD's phone, leaving Jack in charge. He suggests simply pulling the plug, and takes Siler with him to try it. I love seeing Siler in action, and he's getting some this time... but he gets hurt in the process. Jack's concern is palpable -- okay, caring for those under his command is a hallmark of a good commander and of Jack's character, but on re-watch I have also noticed it's another of the many subtle ways Jack gets mentally beaten up on from time to time as well, and especially in this ep. He's lost a friend and a team, people are getting hurt, and there's a crisis that even Carter's brain hasn't resolved yet. So not a good day! And it's about to get worse.

Siler's hurt. Teal'c is hurt. The wormhole is still connected, the Stargate won't shut down, and the gravity of the situation becomes apparent when Teal'c notices smoke from an electrical fire being drawn visibly into the gate. Sam experiments with her dogtags -- the gradient is weird, because you'd think she'd feel the pull in her whole body rather than just the tags suddenly reacting when in close proximity to the event horizon, considering the way the smoke was drawn in from across the room. Well, again, let's not let physics mess up the story too much, nor destroy a great visual. Sam orders the iris closed, lest something else be drawn in.

Upstairs, Hammond runs into Major Davis and a contingent sent by the Joint Chiefs, and is quickly whisked off to a jet bound for Washington, to consult with the President. Meanwhile, back in the SGC, Janet's on her way to the gate room to attend to a medical emergency when she encounters the strike team we saw arriving earlier. We see Teague in his full "I'm in charge here" glory, armed to the teeth and ordering Janet up against the wall. Thing is, you really don't want to mess with Janet, because tiny as she is and unarmed as well, she will cut you with a word and her tone of voice when she thinks you're out of line -- and clearly, she thinks Colonel Frank Cromwell, United States Air Force Special Operations, has overstepped his bounds. She lets him know this in no uncertain terms.

He frog-marches her off through the base anyway, and I'm already waiting for the moment when they run into Jack. I expect he won't be happy when he sees Janet in this predicament. However, Cromwell has also delivered information to the viewer: we now know it's been over five hours in outside time since the SGC dropped out of contact.

Davis elaborates on this in conversation with Hammond, and now we know the big picture as the Pentagon sees it. The writers did a great job in delivering information to the viewer in this segment, assuring that we knew the whole situation even if various characters only had bits of it yet. There's a sense of urgency all the way around, and I'm still wondering how things will resolve. I'm also curious about Cromwell, and how he fits into things. It's obvious from the opening credits that he's going to be a major factor in something, since the actor portraying him is a known quantity and given guest star billing, but what does a Special Ops colonel from outside the program have to do with anything?

Sam has another explanatory session with Jack while Teal'c is being treated for burns. The black hole's gravity is somehow coming through the wormhole and affecting the SGC. Jack tells her to come up with a solution. Ah, scientific and technological magic made to order! It must be nice to have Sam Carter on your team.

In the corridor, Jack finds Janet in Cromwell's clutches. One look at Cromwell's face at their first encounter, and I knew this wasn't the normal garden-variety arsehole character I'd expected at first. There's something in his eyes when he sees Jack, and the moment I saw it I remember thinking that these two had a history of some sort. Jack confirmed it, although without details, a second later. Both actors played this out brilliantly. In the Control Room, adding Sam to the interaction made it even better. Jack's animosity toward Cromwell was thick enough to cut with a knife, but there was also a familiarity that told me they knew each other well. Had they always disliked each other? But something was off, because the dislike seemed to come solely from Jack. Cromwell's attitude was completely different, and I found myself wondering about their story. Meanwhile, Sam is clearly puzzled by her CO's reaction to the newcomer, who seems reasonable enough to her. I loved watching Cromwell's expression on first being introduced to Sam; I think he was thrown off-balance just a little, and even more so a moment or two later when he came face-to-face with the fact that she was the SGC's resident scientific genius. Given that he came in knowing what the Stargate was, he must have been briefed, and I wonder whether he'd been told anything about the story behind it and Sam's role?

Hammond returns in the middle of the exchange, and we learn he's been gone for eighteen hours. The Pentagon wants to use the base's self-destruct to shut down the Stargate and sever the wormhole connection. Sam doesn't think this will work, but she gets overruled. Problem is, Sam knows more about the Stargate than nearly anyone, and right away I'm thinking, this can't be good. I get the impression Hammond may share my sentiment, but he has his orders and he's going to go with them for now. If Sam comes up with a better idea, he'll be all ears, I'm sure.

So, the base will be evacuated, but two officers are needed to remain behind and set the self-destruct, then try to outrun it. Of course Jack is going to volunteer. Cromwell does, too... and it becomes clear that he is the last person Jack wants to be stuck with. Hammond ignores this, and orders the evacuation. Jack looks like he's chewing on broken glass, but there's something in Cromwell's expression that says he's just gotten an opportunity he was looking for. Is he trying to impress Jack somehow? Clearly, we haven't yet gotten to the bottom of whatever their backstory is.


(To Be Continued in next post.)

[SF_and_Coffee]

Hammond, Sam and the others get topside and learn that the time dilation is increasing. Down in the Control Room, Cromwell's demeanor has altered slightly. The gruff attitude is gone as he notices Boyd's image on the viewscreen still displaying telemetry from the doomed MALP, and asks Jack softly, "Who's this?"

Jack's answer tells us more about his view of Boyd, and a hint of his view of Carter as well. It also reveals that this was SG-10's first mission as a team, and from his tone it's clear that Jack enormously regrets the result. Cromwell observes that Boyd looks "scared to death" and this is obviously the wrong button to push, because Jack snaps at him. Okay, I can understand this, but I still want to know: what's the story with these two? It's clear that they know each other reasonably well, and that Cromwell holds no animosity toward Jack, but Jack appears to have a real problem with Cromwell. What gives?

In the command post set up outside the mountain, Sam is burning the midnight oil, trying desperately to understand and resolve the problem in a way that will give better results than she expects from what the Pentagon's people came up with. Teal'c offers his support, and she bounces ideas off him. Her mounting frustration is apparent, and I felt much the same way. Amanda Tapping always did make it easy for me to slide right into whatever Sam was thinking or feeling, and this ep is no exception. I love the dynamic between Sam and Teal'c, especially here.

Back downstairs, Jack is all business now. He and Cromwell prepare to set up the self-destruct. Cromwell makes a cryptic remark: "Maybe now you know how it feels." WTF is he talking about? Jack isn't having any; he merely asks, "You done?" For the moment, Cromwell abandons whatever line of questioning he'd begun, but it's clear from his face that he isn't finished yet, and again I wonder what is going on between them. Jack advises Cromwell to "run like hell" after they start the self-destruct sequence. There's an edge in his voice as he says it, matched by the edge in Cromwell's as he acknowledges the instruction. Okay, the clues are flying thick and fast but I still don't know what their problem is.

Sam reports to Hammond, and the news isn't good. But in the course of the conversation, she suddenly hits upon the solution to the problem. The same mechanism that accidentally sent her and Jack to Antarctica some time ago can be utilized to sever the wormhole's connection to P3W-451 and force it to skip to another Stargate. All they need is the right kind of bomb... and to reach Jack and Cromwell in time to prevent the self-destruct.

In the Control Room, there's one minute remaining. "Maybe the last one," says Cromwell, and then the story comes out. "We used to be friends, Jack." A-ha, I thought so. Jack acknowledges this, too, but makes it clear that he doesn't consider Cromwell his friend anymore. And we learn why: a mission some years earlier turned into a complete Charlie Foxtrot, with enemy intel screwing up whatever Jack and Cromwell and the rest of their team had been doing. Jack was shot, Cromwell mistakenly thought he was dead, and left what he thought was Jack's corpse behind as he struggled to get the rest of their team to safety. The result was that Jack was captured by Iraqis and spent four months in prison. (My guess is that this happened sometime during the Persian Gulf War of '90-'91.) And it's clear that Jack has never forgiven Cromwell for this... and that Cromwell has not forgiven himself, either. But he wants to make amends, or at least make some sort of peace with Jack. Absolution, if he can get it, whether from Jack or from himself. It's probably why he volunteered to stay behind and risk his own life alongside Jack in setting the self-destruct. And now we also know a bit more of the genesis of the "leave no one behind" ethic that runs so strongly within Jack O'Neill. He's experienced first-hand what happens when someone gets left.

It's an emotional punch to the gut. But Jack is still unwilling to forgive. "What happened to 'no one gets left behind?'" he asks Cromwell.

Cromwell points to Boyd, still visible on the viewscreen, and delivers the harsh truth: "Well, what about him?" Jack denies the similarity in the two situations, but Cromwell maintains -- correctly, IMO -- that "It's the same damn thing."

Like I said, a punch to the gut. It shows in Jack's face, for the split-second we get to see his reaction at all. Then everything goes to hell again as the Control Room's window glass shatters from gravitational stress and both men dive to the floor in a trained reaction to avoid whatever might be happening. The glass is outgoing rather than incoming, but their twin response points up even more their training and what must be a shared past of similar situations.

Sam arrives, with Siler in tow, and her new idea for solving the gate problem. We go to commercial, and when we come back, something seems to have thawed slightly between Jack and Cromwell. The tension has gone out of Cromwell's face and body language, and we get to see him smile and even chuckle a couple of times over things Jack or Sam say. Jack still doesn't crack a smile, but then again, he delivers so much that's deadpan anyway, I think Cromwell is just interpreting Jack's attitude in that light now. And he's probably right. Obviously, it would take a while for Jack to come all the way back from the place he was in with regard to their friendship, but Cromwell's facial expressions, body language and verbal interactions with him in this scene indicate that he sees things as having turned the corner. Presumably, he knows Jack well enough to understand how he operates. I posit a "missing scene" that runs something like this:

Spoiler:

Alone in the locker room, the two men had busied themselves with buckles, laces and zippers, at first speaking only those words necessary to adjusting the g-suits. It was not an activity quickly or easily performed on oneself, and they fit them to each other. The task was reminiscent of countless other occasions spent double-checking each other's equipment before missions, and they fell naturally into the flow as though the intervening years had never happened. Finally, Jack broke the near-silence.

"We actually do have aliens here, you know. Well, one, anyway."

Cromwell's response was to tug harder on the lacing he was adjusting on Jack's right leg. He looked up, ready out of old habit for whatever joke was coming, and saw that Jack was serious.

He grinned anyway. "See now, I knew you were holding out on me, Jack."

"Yeah, well, you know how it is." A shrug. "You're probably going to get to meet him in a bit, so I wanted to warn you to not freak out or anything."

"That ugly, huh?"

"Oh yeah. Big scary dude named Teal'c. No hair. Looks like he should play left tackle for the Bears. Weird tattoo-thingy in the middle of his forehead. Don't mention it though; I think he's a little sensitive about it. Oh, and he's Jaffa, which means he's got a snake living in his gut."

Cromwell waited for the familiar O'Neill smirk; caught its ghost for just an instant. It was enough. "Sounds like a fun guy to have at parties. Friend of yours?"

"Actually, yeah. He's on my team. Him, our resident genius Captain Carter, and this geeky civilian Ph.D. named Jackson who speaks a metric buttload of languages and figured out how to get that gate out there to connect in the first place. We're a regular traveling circus."

"You always did know how to pick 'em."

The ghost gained more substance this time, before vanishing under the equally-familiar deadpan delivery that was O'Neill's trademark. "Nothing but the best for Jack O'Neill. You know that."

Cromwell grinned again.

Their exchange regarding gravity while descending on ropes over the gate seems to bear this out, because it sure feels like humorous banter, complete with deadpan Jack being deadpan while Cromwell laughs. And then, in the process of finally solving the problem with the Stargate, Cromwell makes the ultimate sacrifice. With both men slipping down their ropes after another gravity wave takes out the rest of the Control Room's window glass, Cromwell attends to Jack's safety, not realizing that it's his own which is compromised. The iris fails while the two men argue, with Cromwell telling Jack to climb (ostensibly far enough that he'll be able to reach safety between the bomb's arming and its detonation), while Jack tells Cromwell to just arm the bomb. Cromwell begins to do so, but his rope, damaged by glass, parts and he's left hanging onto Jack's harness. Both men know, it seems, that one man climbing can't get them both out under this kind of gee-force, and Cromwell lets go, though Jack makes an instinctive grab for him as he falls. The look on his face when he fails mixes anger and anguish, and he pulls the pin on the bomb, savagely hurling it into the wormhole after his lost friend. Only the efforts of Teal'c, Siler and Sam manage to draw him to safety just before the full force of the detonation would have taken him out, too.

Jack awakens in the infirmary, and we seek Daniel for the first time, having apparently returned from an archaeological dig offworld. (In reality, Shanks was absent during filming due to the birth of the child he had with Vaitiare Bandera, who played Sha're.) No more mention is made of Cromwell, which I felt was odd on both Jack's and Hammond's part, but my guess is that things had to be wrapped up swiftly to fit into the run-time allotted to the episode.

I give this episode major points on character development, a few minor demerits on physics, and a big thumbs-up for drama. It's also notable for using almost no off-world settings beyond the few brief moments with SG-10.

My overall rating: 8 out of 10.

[dtheories]

Jack and Sam, with help from a few friends, saving the world again.

Awesome ep. This is actually only my second viewing, surprisingly, but when watching closely, there's just so much going on it's hard to not be pulled in.

Starting with the anxious opening moments for Boyd's team as they're slowed in their rush to the gate. (And thanks for the earlier reminder about the Code and Cost of Honor books. Those were exceptional.)

There's so much personal loss for Jack and plenty of humor, especially involving Siler - ok, being electrocuted is not so funny, but his shared look with Sam when the cords "dropped" toward the open 'gate lightened a tense moment.

Lt. Simmons returns and Major Davis makes his first appearance. The effects of the gravity waves and warping space on the control room, and seeing that cyclone out the back of the 'gate were awesome! Daniel at the end asking what he missed was priceless!

I'll be watching this again, for sure.

[LeftHandedGuitarist]

Hmm... no. I don't like this episode at all, one of my least favourite of the season.

I don't mind sciency episodes, in fact many of them are amongst my favourites, but this one is just plain boring. The big enemy here which they have to deal with is TIME, and the problem is it is very difficult to make that feel like any real kind of threat. We get a few shots of people talking/moving slowly and are told that bad things are going to happen. Eventually we see the devastating events unfold: MY GOD, THE PHONES DON'T WORK.

Yeah, obviously there's much more at stake but its not explored properly, and too much of the time is spent tied up in character building that unfortuantely falls a bit flat. Daniel isn't present, Teal'c gets to stand around and use his muscles, Carter can't think of a good solution and Jack is moody. The sequence at the end where Jack and Cromwell go to plant the bomb makes me feel like time has slowed down too, it seems to go on for ages, and the whole way through there is zero sense of threat.

- There are some things I liked. Of all the characters, General Hammond gets the best development here and following him is quite good fun. The effects for Jack and Cromwell moving at a different angle to the control room is pretty cool, and the couple of moments when the glass shatters looks great. The prison time Jack alluded to in 'Prisoners' gets some explanation which satisfied that little part of me wanting to know.

- Carter using the donut to explain made me smile.

- The Cromwell guy is just an arse, I can't say why but immediately upon his introduction there's no way to like him. An obscene arrogance surrounds him and everything he does. Badly, badly written and the actor seemed to settle on playing it as a stereotype. He didn't really deserve to get pulled into the black hole planet, still.

- Really bad special effects for the opening shot of the sun, planets and black hole. Probably the worst effect seen in the show so far, with a cheap Photoshop-style lens flare and even the star field looks rubbish.

- On the flip-side, the swirly Stargate effect was very nice, and as I said above the whole gravity distortion effect at the end was very well done.

- Where did the SGC get the trinium to make the new iris? I thought they couldn't mine the planet from 'Spirits'.

- First appearance for Major Davis!

RATING: 4 out of 10

[SF_and_Coffee]

- The Cromwell guy is just an arse, I can't say why but immediately upon his introduction there's no way to like him. An obscene arrogance surrounds him and everything he does. Badly, badly written and the actor seemed to settle on playing it as a stereotype. He didn't really deserve to get pulled into the black hole planet, still.

Wow, goes to show that two people can see someone very differently. I didn't read him as an arse at all after his initial scenes. Definitely not after the scene in which his history with Jack is revealed, and after seeing his and Jack's interactions while setting the bomb. And I thought Teague did a good job playing him as a well-rounded character rather than a stereotype. It would have been easy for him to play Cromwell as a stereotype, since that's the kind of character Teague is so often cast as, but this time he did something deeper, even though he only got a very short time to really bring out the other aspects.

There's a really great, very well-written fanfic trilogy of short stories by an author named Flora that fleshes out Cromwell's character and his prior friendship with Jack, and also goes far in explaining why he acts the way he does when we first see him here. I suspected things of this character that are very much like what this writer did with his history, and my own story about him is a direct result.

[LeftHandedGuitarist]

It is very interesting how people can see the same thing and come away with a completely different impression. Obviously from your sig pictures this episode really clicked with you, whereas for me it is a big collection of negatives put together in really messy way. You mentioned that you feel the episode has a lot of depth, whereas it feels completely superficial to me!

I don't think either of us are wrong and I can certainly respect your views on it, even if I don't understand them!

[Krisz]

I switch off with the sciencey stuff along with Jack most of the time, but I like this episode for bringing across the sense of helplessness one could feel being faced with such an awesomely unfathomable powerful force in the universe, a black hole.

The moment that SG-10 knew they had no hope and the way it was fixed on their faces is one of the powerful moments in SG-1 for me. I never forget that, that horror of realising that it was certain death and they couldn't get back even though they were actually doing it. *shudder*

The effects of the black hole on the gate were great, loved the swirling event horizon. Jack and Cromwell 'absailing' horizontally across the gateroom is one of the memorable scenes for me in Stargate.

It is the early days of exploration at the SGC and this is an example of how they have to learn the hard way about things that could happen when using the Stargate without any clue about what they are really doing, and the inventive ways they get out of trouble. I love early SG-1 for that alone and made for great episodes like this.

[Seaboe Muffinchucker]

I wonder if Hammond's "There and back again" line was a deliberate reference to Tolkien.

ETA: more detail.

This is one of my favorite episodes, despite its flaws. Like Solitudes, even though I know there are things they get wrong, they don't ruin the episode for me.

There are, however, a few things I notice every time. Like the fact (mentioned in my previous posts) that no one ever mentions that at least some of Jack's injuries have to stem from slamming into the wall. Let's review: he's hanging in a harness over the Stargate. Teal'c and a winch have hold of the rope. We know, from the scene where Cromwell falls into the gate, that even if Jack lets go of the rope, he will not fall out of the harness. The minute gravity returns to normal "over the Stargate" is going to become "in front of the Stargate" and Jack, quite likely unconscious (from the concussion wave of the explosion) and upside down (because he will have let go of the rope), will fall sideways and into the wall. Yet his only injuries at the end seem to stem from the broken glass. [Note that the fanfiction Medical Considerations that deals with this episode does acknowledge the wall]

Let's also take a look at that glass. Given that they already know of the potential for people to fall through it (viz. The Broca Divide), and the fact that this is a government facility (though OSHA doesn't apply, the odds are very good that the Air Force has its own safety regulations), that window is probably now safety glass. Safety glass is designed to crumble into bits when it breaks. So how is it that a single bit of this glass, under no real pressure, manages to cut through a climbing rope so quickly that Cromwell falls? For those who would argue that the glass is under the pressure of gravity, this is true--but, from the picture they showed us, the gravity is not pressing it against the rope, it's pressing it against the climbing grip. Also, climbing ropes are designed to resist friction (otherwise they'd break everywhere they have to hang over rock).

And about that bomb. Why don't they lower the bomb faster than Jack and Cromwell climb down, so that it is in position and waiting for them when it's time to set it? So that they don't have to climb UP to set it? And what about that "certain distance and exact angle" that the bomb needs? Jack certainly doesn't seem to be that particular about how far away it is, and given how the bomb in swinging on the rope, the angle bit is pure fiction.

EATA: I yell "and Colonel Cromwell" at the TV when Hammond says "Thanks to you and Captain Carter."

I still love the episode, though.

Seaboe

[SF_and_Coffee]

Well, as for climbing up to the bomb, remember that originally they were lowering it right along with themselves, and only wound up beneath it after the gravity wave that shattered the remaining windows and somehow caused them to descend faster than the bomb. Perhaps something they themselves did with their gear, as a reflex? And then another wave pulled Jack even closer, which prompted Cromwell to descend farther himself in order to try to help Jack. In my take on this (and fellow fanfic author Flora's as well), Cromwell's whole purpose in volunteering for this mission was because he wanted an opportunity to try to put right the mistake he'd made in Iraq several years earlier that had resulted in Jack's capture and the dissolution of their friendship. He wanted to make sure that if there was trouble in Cheyenne Mountain and Jack was in harm's way, that Jack would get out of it okay. Basically, he wanted another chance to save Jack, and so he went down to try to get Jack to climb up far enough to get out of the bomb's range, even if he himself didn't make it out.

That's my take, anyway.

On the glass, what it looked like to me wasn't that gravity caused it to cut the rope, but rather the pressure of a part of the climbing equipment itself pressed the sharp edge of the glass against the rope, and the rope would of course already have been near its safe rated capacity for anything, due to not having been designed to operate under as many gees as the guys were surely pulling by then. I'd guess that each of them was probably putting something like at least twice their normal weight's worth of strain in the ropes. I'm not sure what the rating is for ropes like that, but if each man was functionally somewhere around 350 to 400 lbs rather than their normal ~175 or so (just absolutely guessing at their weights here, but given height and build I'm probably somewhere in the ballpark), that has to be a factor.

[fems]

As for the glass being safety glass, I'm not so sure about that considering they often lower the blast'door' when a team comes in under fire and thereby the control and briefing room are protected.

[Seaboe Muffinchucker]

As for the glass being safety glass, I'm not so sure about that considering they often lower the blast'door' when a team comes in under fire and thereby the control and briefing room are protected.

Actually, you can tell it is safety glass because all the pieces are so small.

Seaboe