SGA 4x15: Outcast

[sholio]

Still not feeling like doing long reviews, so itty bitty comments instead!


BATES!!!!! I was totally unspoilered for that ... and thrilled to death to see him, and find out what he's been doing over the last couple of years.

I liked the episode a lot. Sheppard's early life ... REVEALED! *g* I was a little bit spoilered for this, to the extent that I knew he had an older brother and that his dad was (probably) dead -- but I really loved those bits, and I ended up liking his brother a lot more than I was expecting to at first. The plot was pretty good this time -- Terminator, not exactly a new idea, but I didn't expect the twist with the female scientist and I loved how they solved the problem, in the end, using actual science! Score! (I'm really fond of clever uses of the technology they have. The whole thing with the knife-beacon and beaming an enemy into re-entry -- that was smart!)

I did really love that we got a little scene at the beginning with Rodney making a stab at being comforting and wanting to go along for moral support; I think I would've been very disappointed if the episode hadn't had anything along those lines. Having said that, I do like the way that they've been mixing up the characters this season into different combinations -- last week, we had a ton of Rodney/John interaction, so it was nice to get Ronon/John this week, for balance.

And I do love, love, love how we're getting a deeper understanding this year of who John is. Last season basically did that for Rodney, and this season is doing it for John. One thing I find really interesting, after this episode, is how much of his isolation pre-Atlantis is apparently self-imposed. What I mean is, it's not that he didn't have people who liked him and cared about him -- it's that he pushed them away. It wasn't just John, of course; it takes two to have a fight -- but I really liked that aspect of this episode, that we saw it was at least as much him walking away from them, as them walking away from him. It makes him much more human, and less of a woobie victim than he's often written in fic that deals with his past.

Yep, liked the episode very much. Want tags now. :D

Comments

[friendshipper.livejournal.com]

Well, it mostly makes sense. The one area that I still have a little trouble with is that he was unwilling to bend far enough to at least send a message, or acknowledge their existence, in "Letters From Pegasus". It's just a little odd, is all, because from what we saw of his brother in "Outcast", he seems like a decent enough guy -- certainly not the sort to inspire the level of animosity towards his family that John must have felt to have basically had them be "dead to him" for years. Especially since he's so devoted to his Atlantis "family"; it's just an interesting contrast.

But I don't mean this to sound like I'm criticizing him, because honestly, it's John's flaws that draw me to him -- and to know that he's capable of being stiff-necked and irrational and carrying grudges is actually a point in his favor, in my book. I feel like we've really gotten to know the character a lot better this season, his strengths and his weaknesses, and I really love that.

And it also says a lot about how much he's changed through the course of the series that he's willing to seek reconciliation with his family in season 4, where he wasn't willing to do the same in season 1.

[aelfgyfu_mead]

Yeah, from "Rising" and "Letters from Pegasus" I fully had the impression that John had no relations, or no relations from whom he wasn't totally estranged. In the first season, he seemed to be pretending his family didn't exist.

Now it looks like it was a misunderstanding, at least partly on his side: he tells Dave that he was doing what he thought his father wanted, and Dave says that their father never wanted that but always regretted the break!

I liked the character parts much better than the Replicator story (which had holes you could fly a Replicator ship through). My review is the first half of this entry.

I loved the one scene with Rodney, and I was so happy to see Bill Lee again! All I knew about this episode was that
1. Sheppard's dad died
2. It looked like a John and Ronon ep
3. Replicators might be involved.
Yes, I much prefer to get as few spoilers as possible.

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

Since I haven't seen the episode, I can't really say too much. I have been thinking about Letters From Pegasus and John's decision not to send a video-letter, though. I don't know if Outcast mentioned any kind of a fall-out moment - a final fight - but I got to wondering if, perhaps, there "had" been a final fight - one so bad as to result in something along the lines of John's father wanting nothing more to do with him (or not wanting to speak with him ever again, or something along those lines, something that ended in a complete lack of contact between them) and John being too happy to comply.

Okay, rambling here. My brain is refusing to work. What I'm trying to say is that, maybe, deep down inside, John didn't send a message because he thought his father wouldn't want to hear from him. It's kind of the impression I got the first time I saw Letters from Pegasus: his decision being a combination of stubborn pride as well as uncertainty. Either "Dad made it clear he wants nothing to do with me" or "Dad probably doesn't want to hear from me, anyways." The brother too, if, perhaps, he took the father's side, which in turn gave John the impression that his brother didn't want anything to do with him, either.

Just my theories on the matter. It could just be John being my favorite tainting things, but it just doesn't "feel" right that the only reason John didn't send a message was because he was pissed. I personally detected a little insecurity when he declined sending a message. But, yes, this was a two-party deal. Neither one even tried to start some kind of reconcilliation. John took it all as not being wanted, left it at that, and now has to live with the regret of never having even tried to patch things up, let alone drop his dad or brother a line. Like you said, it makes him more human, more complicated, and I like that as well.