“Sounds like a good idea for a TV show”
- Release Date: 8th September 2000
- Season 4
- Episode 11
- Director: William Gereghty
- Writers: Joseph Mallozzi & Paul Mullie
General Hammond calls an emergency meeting. They received a call from a man that left a message listing a bunch of conspiracy theories, such as Roswell and lizard people, then says none of them are as big as the large circular object found in Egypt and is currently under Cheyenne Mountain, and that it’s called a Stargate. He says he wants to speak to Jack O’Neill in a restaurant, and for him to be alone.
Of course, they bug the restaurant, with Teal’c going undercover as a cook (I’d love to know how that was decided and what they had to teach him) and Daniel and Sam in a surveillance van. His name is Martin Lloyd and he claims that he’s from outer space, although his memories are fuzzy. Jack denies any knowledge of travelling to other planets and pokes fun at his conspiracy theories by mentioning the moon landing (although Martin thinks that the hoax stories were created by the government to hide something else). He said he got the information online, but Jack has to stall him as the others have discovered his address.
They search his house (while Jack and Martin look for his space ship, with no luck) and it is full of alien-based memorabilia. The main thing of interest are a vast amount of drugs. The audience sees that a mysterious group of people (one of them a cylon) are spying on Martin and, as a result, SG-1. After a lab analysis, they discover that there are unknown chemicals in his medicine. Something fishing is going on.
Jack and Teal’c are staying in a motel (with Teal’c massively enjoying a vibrating bed) when Martin knocks on the door – he found them because he had a map for the motel chain. Jack claims that Teal’c is called Murray and takes away Martin’s medicine (although doesn’t explain why). Martin gives him a note of symbols that he keeps having visions of – it’s a stargate address. Daniel and Carter visit his psychiatrist but only get Martin’s work address – which turns out to be a trap. Quite why those two are doing this kind of work is baffling – especially a civilian archaeologist.
When they fail to report back, Jack retraces their steps, finding the pharmacist office completely empty – it was all fake. When he gets back, Martin faints, but quickly comes to, saying that he now knows where his ship is buried. He takes them there while the group of people that were spying on Martin interrogate Daniel and Carter (with no success). The ship is found and a team is called in to investigate it. Martin thinks it’s too small before he remembers that it was an escape pod from a bigger ship, and that he wasn’t alone when he arrived. Opening the hatch will alert them, so Jack gets the investigation team to head off. Martin also remembers that their homeworld was attacked (Jack and Teal’c realise it was the Gou’ald) and they were all deserters. Martin wanted to go back to try and save his people, which is when they drugged him.
Using Martin as bait, they open the hatch then follow them to the warehouse, finding Daniel, Carter and Martin. His fellow aliens are nowhere to be seen. Looking at a device Martin pilfered from them, he realises there’s a countdown, so they all run and jump – but the warehouse doesn’t explode, instead the escape pod did (luckily with nobody nearby). Everyone is rescued, but their captors are nowhere to be seen.
They take Martin through the stargate to the address he provided earlier, but finds that his world has been wiped out and that only ruins remain. If he didn’t desert the cause, he would be dead. He heads back to Earth – a sad ending to a silly (in a good way) episode. Martin is very likeable and I know he comes back in some great episodes.
