Stargate SG-1--"Chimera"

It looks like the writers want to test the patience of the Jack/Sam shippers with “Chimera,” an episode with the odd combination of a romantic story as the subplot for the continuation of the season long story arc of searching for the Lost City of the Ancients and ending the Sarah Gardner/Osiris storyline so Anna-Louise Plowman can go back to the United Kingdom for an episode of Doctor Who. Or something like that. “Chimera” is a strange bird, to say the least.

The main plor involves Sarah Gardner/Osiris sneaking into Daniel’s home at night and using a device to invade his dreams to force him to translate a tablet that will reveal the location of the Lost City. One cannot read in a dream, but whatever. Daniel’s dreams are vividly reliving his early days at the University of Chicago when he kinda/sorta romanced Sarah in his own nerdy way. Sarah Gardner/Osiris is forcing the translation of the tablet into the past as Daniel dreams it was.

The subplot is a sometimes sweet, sometimes disturbing romance between Sam and a Denver cop named Pete. It is sweet because there is a teenagers in love vibe to it. It takes a while for Sam to even let pete into her home after they have dated a while. It is only after the two crash a fiftieth wedding anniversary party because Sam longs for the Singing in the Rain days of romance that she spends the night with him. It is disturbing because Sam freely admits she is keeping pete at a distance because all her past loves have been killed. This is true--Jonas Hanson, Martouf, and Narim have all bit the dust over the last seven years. But if Sam the Black Widow is not bad enough, Pete takes it upon himself to have an FBI buddy run a background check on her. He then follows her to a stakeout at Daniel’s house where the two stories collide. Is it really true romance to sic the FBI on your new girlfriend, then stalk her? Sam has had stalkers before. Pete adds to the notion there might just be something wrong with Sam that such guys are drawn to her.

The two stories do collide when the SG-1 team corners Sarah Gardner/Osiris. They capture her after a short battle with the presumably unintentional humor of Jack popping her in the behind with a tranquilizer dart. As is always the case, the person drugged never passes out until they pull the dart out and look at it a moment. Pete is, of course, right there with them, though uninvited. He is wounded in the fight, which surely makes everyone in the audience assume he is about to join the choir invisible along with all of sam’s other fellows. But he survives. He is taken to SGC for medical treatment. Sam reveals everything about the stargate program to him. It is another point that makes one suspect he is going to be killed off. The last civilian to learn about the stargate was Chris Owens’ character. He got run over by a car to silence him. While we are on the subject of harsh endings, we will never hear from Sarah Gardner again even though she and daniel are supposedly in love.

Pete is played by David DeLuise. David makes the fourth DeLuise to show up on Stargate SG-1. Dom, Peter, and Michael are the other three.

What to make of “Chimera?’ It is a stargate love story. As such, it is a couple notches above the sex equals love philosophy of Star Trek. I suppose that means Stargate SG-1’s audience is not a bunch of horny fourteen year olds. Yet the romance does not fire on all cylinders. Announcing to a nee fellow you will not let him in your house because all your other boyfriends have been killed under odd circumstances is not a good way to begin a relationship. You really also cannot think he is The One because he did an FBI background check and then followed you all night. I am skeptical discussing alien parasites attempting to destroy the Earth somehow patches all that up.

Keep in mind the sam/Pete romance is the subplot. Nevertheless, it completely overshadows the main story about daniel looking for the Lost City. I suppose that makes sense, considering he makes no progress. All the story succeeds in doing is getting rid of Osiris. The good points of "chimera’ are worth watching. I am not a Jack/sam shipper, so my lone peeper never bled at watching Pete and Sam do their very, very strange thing. "Chimera” is worth watching on the grounds it is so peculiar.

Rating: *** (out of 5)