Hmmm, as I was reading your comments about how you can show multiple moral equations I kept wondering if you had watched Star Trek, specially DS9 so I was glad when I got to that part. I think they did it really well. Another great one for that was Babylon 5. Heroes tries, but... Well, they're just not very good at it. I do think there are other, non sci-fi shows that play with it from time to time as well, but I can't really think of any offhand.
That said, I disagree with you about this last ep of SGA.
By that point in the show it's no longer germane... it ended when Michael told her he already had Torren's DNA and if she came to him he would turn off the self destruct and leave the city with him snip She's felt his emotions, when he asks her to go with him, and she has the evidence of his word that he'll harm neither of them
In the ep itself as the countdaown reached 2 minutes she radioed him that she was willing to go with him so long as he turned off the countdown and allowed Atlantis to survive. His response was that she disappointed him and he rejected her offer, leaving her to die because he was unwilling to not destroy Atlantis. So, when she killed him at the end, I don't have any problem with her doing that because at that point any empathy, any reason she might have to think she could influence him away from his madness was moot. He was bent on revenge and she would not be able to stop him. Additionally, he's been good at escaping in the past and he now had Torren's DNA - she was taking no chances with the fate of the galaxy.
Personally - and this is entirely my opinion - I've never been sure her empathy was toward him as a person, but more she disapproved of what SGA did to him and the idea in general and as such viewed him as a victim. That changed as he made choices - his own choices to kidnap her people and experiment on them, kidnap Teyla for her unborn child, kill millions by releasing the Hoffan drug - those were very much choices he made that he didn't have and wasn't forced into. So, I don't see why she should be expected to empathetic to him at this point.
Look, I agree with the general idea that Michael was a victim of the SGA and their running amok in Pegasus without ever thinking of the consequences. I would have loved last week's ep to be less about saving money with flashbacks and having nothing really change because ultimately it was a power game and instead have it actually be a Hague-like situation where "our Heroes" finally understood what they had done as they played Ancient in Pegasus. I would have loved to it if the writers had an ep with an outside OC who would view SGA's actions through a non-heroic spotlight and felt that the first Michael ep did just that to devastating effect. There is a lot of room in SGA for playing with the question of right/wrong actions as it comes to SGA's decisions that influence so many with such little control over the decision process. And occassionally they've done it, so I know they could if they wanted to and the fact they don't makes me sad. Michael's storyline, though, once he came back as a villain that first time, was set in stone because he made bad choices that hurt people. It's not morally ambiguous, but then it couldn't easily be and have him be a true villain, however sympathetic his past may have made him.
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Date: 2008-11-08 09:16 pm (UTC)Hmmm, as I was reading your comments about how you can show multiple moral equations I kept wondering if you had watched Star Trek, specially DS9 so I was glad when I got to that part. I think they did it really well. Another great one for that was Babylon 5. Heroes tries, but... Well, they're just not very good at it. I do think there are other, non sci-fi shows that play with it from time to time as well, but I can't really think of any offhand.
That said, I disagree with you about this last ep of SGA.
By that point in the show it's no longer germane... it ended when Michael told her he already had Torren's DNA and if she came to him he would turn off the self destruct and leave the city with him
snip
She's felt his emotions, when he asks her to go with him, and she has the evidence of his word that he'll harm neither of them
In the ep itself as the countdaown reached 2 minutes she radioed him that she was willing to go with him so long as he turned off the countdown and allowed Atlantis to survive. His response was that she disappointed him and he rejected her offer, leaving her to die because he was unwilling to not destroy Atlantis. So, when she killed him at the end, I don't have any problem with her doing that because at that point any empathy, any reason she might have to think she could influence him away from his madness was moot. He was bent on revenge and she would not be able to stop him. Additionally, he's been good at escaping in the past and he now had Torren's DNA - she was taking no chances with the fate of the galaxy.
Personally - and this is entirely my opinion - I've never been sure her empathy was toward him as a person, but more she disapproved of what SGA did to him and the idea in general and as such viewed him as a victim. That changed as he made choices - his own choices to kidnap her people and experiment on them, kidnap Teyla for her unborn child, kill millions by releasing the Hoffan drug - those were very much choices he made that he didn't have and wasn't forced into. So, I don't see why she should be expected to empathetic to him at this point.
Look, I agree with the general idea that Michael was a victim of the SGA and their running amok in Pegasus without ever thinking of the consequences. I would have loved last week's ep to be less about saving money with flashbacks and having nothing really change because ultimately it was a power game and instead have it actually be a Hague-like situation where "our Heroes" finally understood what they had done as they played Ancient in Pegasus. I would have loved to it if the writers had an ep with an outside OC who would view SGA's actions through a non-heroic spotlight and felt that the first Michael ep did just that to devastating effect. There is a lot of room in SGA for playing with the question of right/wrong actions as it comes to SGA's decisions that influence so many with such little control over the decision process. And occassionally they've done it, so I know they could if they wanted to and the fact they don't makes me sad. Michael's storyline, though, once he came back as a villain that first time, was set in stone because he made bad choices that hurt people. It's not morally ambiguous, but then it couldn't easily be and have him be a true villain, however sympathetic his past may have made him.