Ra, the last Asgard?

[DrAltaica]

At the end of the movie we see Ra's true form( https://youtu.be/RWIS7olVbGE?t=125 ) and it's said that he is the last of his kind. Could Ra be the last Asgard born?

[Xaeden]

In the movie, the writers intended for Ra to be from a dying race that looked similar to the Roswell grays and for him to inhabit the body of human through a form of spiritual possession. What you see at the end of the film is Ra's spirit, which reflected the look of his original form (seen in the flesh during a flashback).

The creators of the TV show changed a bunch of things when crafting their continuity; Ra is no longer from a dying race, his kind are called the Goa'uld, they're a snake like parasite that physically burrows into a host's body, and the Roswell grays are the basis for a separate alien species.

Since the TV show uses the movie's plot as the basis for much of its backstory, fans like to see the two as part of the same continuity, so they'll come up with theories to try to explain away inconsistencies. One of those is that Ra took an Asgard as a host before coming to Earth and taking control of a human. I think some Stargate tie-in material may also promote this idea, but it's non-canonical. However, seeing a reflection of the Goa'uld's previous host when they're dying is not a thing that has ever happened in the TV continuity.

[Peterking72]

Well, Anubis did a kind of spiritual possession, where he possessed various human hosts with his near ascended "soul/spirit/essence". This was after SG-1 destroyed his fleet and the vessel that contained his ascended essence. By the way it would be interesting to learn what ancient knowledge that vessel originated from or whether the Ancients have ever used such thing. Because I doubt that he created one from scratch even with the knowledge of the Ancients.
So I think you could entertain a notion that Ra in Goa'uld parasite form burrowed inside an Asgard body,
then ascended and posessed a human in his ascended form.

Although that would mean that he is still out there in his ascended form unless the ascended Ancients took care of him in some way.
It also poses another problem. We saw that when Anubis possessed a human in his ascended form it caused the body to phisically deteriorate. I don't know whether a sarcophage could fix that and to what extent, but we could surmise that since Anubis wasn't able to fix it, that it might be useless that way.
However we also know that the ascended Ancients tried to "de-ascend" Anubis and he remained stuck halfway. We also know that the Ori was able to possess humans, like they did with the Doci. Of course it was rather brief and seemed to have a bit of exhausting aftereffect on the host.
So maybe Anubis' essence was causing deterioration because of his half ascended state and a fully ascended being would not cause deterioration when possessing others.

Of course retconning only goes that far and it will always leave inconsistencies, even after extensive rubberbanding.
The most definitive solution would have been to create an entirely new origin story, which the entire series could have based on instead of the film. I was kind of hoping that Stargate Origins would turn out to be it, but we all know it didn't. In fact it barely touched on anything I have hoped for.

Anyhow I hope my rambling here helped a bit.

[Xaeden]

Yeah, trying to reconcile the two gets convoluted. I think it's just easier to accept that they're different continuities. The way I see it, events similar to the movie happened in Sg-1's continuity, but we shouldn't assume any specifics outside of what we're given in dialogue or (potentially) flashbacks.

For example, we know that they used a nuclear weapon to kill Ra because Jack said that's what happened in "Children of the Gods." We do not, however, know that the team ever encountered that Yak like animal or that it even exists on Sg-1's Abydos because we only know of its existence through the lens of the movie. If Sg-1's writers wanted to, they could have said that the only animals living on Abydos were brought from Earth and then proceeded to introduce camels and whatnot. Just as they've rewritten several other plot points from the movie.

Bryan Singer did something similar with "Superman Returns." Despite what some thought, his movie was not a direct sequel to "Superman II." Instead, he decided to set his film in a world where something akin to events of the previous two movies had happened. Superman still fought Zod and won, but that happened, as I recall, six years prior to modern day, not in the 1980s, and things like the memory wiping kiss seemed to have not occurred at all. It's a perfectly legitimate storytelling technique and has a lot of benefit in that it allows you to link your story to something audiences already have a strong connection to without having to start fresh or redo familiar events before being able to tell an original story.

People do get confused by it, but I think that's less a problem with the technique and more to do with it not be explained properly.

[Platschu]

It would have been nice to see a Stargate Origins : Ra story which could have covered the Goa'uld and Asgard questions.

His host was named as Famrir and here you can read a little more uncanon information:
https://stargate.fandom.com/wiki/Famrir

[Elite Anubis Guard]

Credit to the old RPG where it's due, it sure did fill in a lot of blanks with its world building.

[Platschu]

That is the best part that they have named the races and the planets for the first 3 seasons, while,the episodes were extended with a fanfiction type mini stories. And after that the RPG players and GMs can spin stories for roleplay gaming.

[Peterking72]

Unfortunately I was never able to experience the RPG as by the time I heard about it it already went offline. RIP.
I wish there would be an indie studio that could remake it in Unreal Engine 4 or 5. I would buy it for sure.
Just need a good story or an alternate universe where things went differently enough that it would not be the same story as SG-1 was.
More Goa'ulds and more alien races,different SG-1, etc.

[Platschu]

The RPGs were books. One rule book, one book for season 1 and season 2 and one book for the Goa'uld race. Season 3 was never published, but some articles were placed in different forums.

The Stargate : Worlds was the MMORPG which was cancelled before it was finished. You can find many informations, concept arts online. It would have told a story near the end of SG-1 season 8, how the Goa'uld have tried to raise again, what has happened with Ra, the Furlings and the Asgard. The Asgard would have been even a playable race. There were many plans to show different Jaffa Guards as well.

[Peterking72]

It was playable, not finished, but playable. It was graphically around the level of Unreal Tournament 2004 if I remember. So it would have looked a bit dated by the time it was supposed to came out, but I still play games that are using graphics that is 16 years old. I'd definitely have played it, no question about it.

I'm not familiar with tabletop RPG's as I have never played with one and they lack the visual stimulus (that I'm maybe a bit too attracted to) I like in PC and other video games. I don't know. I just love to see the action play out, rather than to just imagine it.
I don't thik my imagination suffers from it though, because I read books and stuff, so it's more or less balances things out and as you can see I pretty much can imagine anything SG-wise too.

As for the real original question. Now that the Asgards are extinct, the Vanir on the run I think no one knows who will be the last Asgard. There could be Asgards elsewhere too, that we don't know of. So this question will remain unanswered, but ultimately, only viewing the film, he might have been the last of his kind. We will never know.

[Platschu]

Well.. Are we sure that the Asgard has gone? They could have dialed a 9 chevron address (like Valhalla) which has caused the explosion at the meeting side... They could have ascended... They can come back as holograms. They can come back from time travel or maybe they have gone to rescue themselves. They can come back from other realities. Anything can happen.

Here is my thread about Jaffa Guards :
https://forum.gateworld.net/threads/...targate-Worlds