The Road Not Taken (1013)

[hedwig]

I just watched this episode. She did ask about him when she was asking about everybody. He was retired and not part of SG1.

Good episode. Kind of a repeat of a few episodes we seen before but it was nice to see Sam's take on it.

I don't remember this happening. I guess I'll have to go watch and see for myself. A lot of people besides myself seem to have missed this since there's been much discussion as to why Jack wasn't even mentioned in this episode.

EDIT: I just browsed through the transcript for this episode, and in fact, there is not a single mention of Jack O'Neill.

[enibas5]

I am not too crazy about this episode from an entertainment point of view, mainly because personally I think we had already enough of parallel universes and alternate realities and such.
BUT, I really liked to know, if I got some political issues right and since this thread is just too much to read it all, I do not know, if this has been adressed before.

As a German viewer of the show, I could not help to see parallels in the alternate reality in regard to the Bush-Administration at that time. So, I perceived that certain ep. as a rather clear warning of how a society may develop, if a threat allows the political leaders to restrict civil rights and give up on freedom for the supposedly greater aim of total security. Actually I understood it even in a way, that a threat is held up by the government, just to be able to cut down on civil rights.

Sorry, if that has been discussed before, but I did not find any other similar comments while overviewing this thread. And looking back, I would really like to know if the writers commented on the political message of this ep.

[Anja]

Fortunately our Stargate played in our world, not in the other one.
Carter/Cam were great.
Nice when the rest of sg1 admitted having talked to an empty room!

[altair]

Sorry, some of you, that this isn't 'the greatest episode made', but The Road Not Taken was admirable and I liked seeing how this alternate universe turned out, and it's delightful to see Hammond back, and seeing Landry as president. Also, the 'system' could be seen as opposing democracy, but their motives were understandable, but Sam's resistance was inevitable. It recalled Antigone...Antigone vs Creon.

I also liked seeing McKay. One of the few times I liked him, and he and Sam almost approached screwball comedy. Here, Lee wasn't a clown, and did very well.
Also, Cam was admirable. His brief scene with Sam in the teaser and later were effective. I liked Sam's rounded character both in military and public.
Yes, good to see here Prometheus didn't get zapped. And the end, where the team had been talking to dead space was good. A warm, good episode.

[EvaWallE7744]

Decent episode, not my favorite but not my least favorite either. Having major Lorne is the episode was fun as he was not seen on sg1 often. My big question abut this episode is how are there Ori ships in the Milky Way? The Ancient/Alteran communication device had never been found and Daniel and Vala had not "visited" the Ori galaxy. For that matter how was the Ancient chair found in Antarctica? It was only located when sg1 was looking for Atlantis in the universe of the main-series. I'm fine with there being lots of differences as it shows stark contrasts for Colonel Carter to contend with it just didn't all completely add up.

[Xaeden]

The Ancient/Alteran communication device had never been found and Daniel and Vala had not "visited" the Ori galaxy

I think you may be confusing the communications device with Merlin's device. They were both found in the cave at Glastonbury, but the alternate universe didn't know what the latter did and just dumped it in storage. Carter had to tell them how it worked (not tell them how to find it). No mention was made made of the former as far as I'm aware, and when talking about getting Merlin's device out of storage, Lee confirmed that they had been to the cave, so there's a good chance they also activated the communications device when they looted it.

Quote where they talk about Merlin's device:

LANDRY
This one's ours?

LEE
Yes, sir. This one is ours. It was among the artifacts we found in the cave at Glastonbury, just like she said it was. And-and remarkably, it has been in storage ever since because we did not know what it was.

For that matter how was the Ancient chair found in Antarctica? It was only located when sg1 was looking for Atlantis in the universe of the main-series.

It's possible that they did go there seeking Atlantis, but the lack of international cooperation prevented them from figuring out how to dial the city (technically, Daniel figured it out, but he did so after an international team had been studying the outpost for a bit) or they opted not to try dialing the address because they lacked the resources to send an expedition without international funds. That could be why the writers had Hammond say they weren't big on international cooperation when Carter was explaining that the Atlantis expedition was an international effort.

The hiccup here is that it didn't seem as though Lorne had ever heard the name "Atlantis" before. I suppose it could be that he hadn't committed all of the terms from previous Sg-1 mission reports to memory yet and only knew of it as the Lost City or the outpost, but that seems like a stretch.