sholio | 03x07 - Common Ground

I'm seriously thinking about signing up for

yuletide this year. Still not sure if I'm quite clear on the rules or who can write for it and who can't. But in the past, it's been a delightful source of fics in rare fandoms that I enjoy, and I'd really like to participate. I'm awfully tempted to request one of my own original works, too, just to see if anybody might actually WRITE it. (I have, to date, received two fanfics of my original series, which just turns me into a quivering puddle of happy authorial jello.)

In other news, Common Ground reactions!

Another episode that rated quite high on the squee-o-meter. I think this season is just completely spoiling me! This one didn't quite turn me into the puddle of goo that "Progeny" and "Sateda" did, but it still had enough wonderful moments to make me a happy, happy fangirl.

I did see the ending coming a mile away, along with the blatant "Enemy Mine" elements of the plot. Still fun to see, though. Words cannot describe how much love I have for Sheppard's insistence that his friends will come for him. (And, continuing last season's trend, he only ever expresses that sentiment when no one is around to hear it.) And his snarkiness in the face of death, and never-say-die attitude .... And OMG, Rodney! Rodney, Rodney! SQUEE! "What have you done to him?" -- and his "seriously pissed off" body language in the conference room with Leydon just afterwards -- and trying to give a Sheppard-esque pep talk (and doing a very good job!), then still being his usual utterly incompetent self with weapons ... and FLYING THE PUDDLEJUMPER (competently!) -- between "Sateda" and now this episode, I think it's pretty much established that Rodney's become a darn good pilot -- and "He looks even younger than he was before!" to Sheppard ... and the little squeak at the end ... Oh yes, my Rodney fangirliness is back in full swing, all right!

And I believe we finally had an episode in which nobody double-crossed anybody! How unusual for them, LOL. (Unless you count Leydon double-crossing Kolya, but that happened last season.) And, you know, I *really* like Leydon. Liked him in Coup D'Etat, like him even more now. He really is a much better leader of the Genii than either Cowen or Kolya would be.

My one big question at the end, though, is: What about the Wraith enzyme? Don't they inject it when they feed? Did the Wraith "gift of life" fix that aspect of it, or does he have to deal with enzyme withdrawal now?

Oh, and a random side note -- I liked that it was night on the planet where they gated with the Wraith, but day where they came from. Almost invariably this show seems to sync up the day-night cycles of the different planets where they go, and really, what is up with that? Shouldn't they be about equally likely to encounter night as day on the planets where they go? Or did the Ancients actually take that into account when they placed the gates and make sure they were all in approximately the same "time zone" on their respective worlds?

Yet another side note, and while I hate to derail the overal positive of the rest of this post, I just have to ask ... WHAT is up with the Carson hate in the fandom? The first time I ran across a Carson-bashing comment in somebody's LJ, I just thought, oh, whatever, everybody has their least favorite character and it's not like, say, Weir or Teyla don't get bashed a lot too. But it's gone from being kind of a minority opinion to something I see everywhere. It seemed like every other episode reaction for "Common Ground" degenerates into Carson-bashing at some point -- and it's not like "I disagree with his actions in this episode" or "I wish they'd take his character in a different direction" ... it's character hate of the "kill him off already" variety, which I just don't get. Especially not for Beckett. WHY?

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I already talked about this a little bit in a comment I just wrote for the post before this one. But, basically, I see Carson's growing bravado as part of the character's evolution, especially considering the events of the end of the last season and the beginning of this one. It seems to me that Carson is turning into a darker, harder-edged character than he used to be -- and, see, it makes *sense* to me that he would be. It struck me in particular in this episode, when they're all watching the Wraith feed on Sheppard and Carson has this ... really dark, *cold* look on his face. That was when it struck me how much he really has been changed by what he's seen, and done, in the Pegasus Galaxy. Admittedly, there's something about Carson now that scares me a little bit, something dark that the Pegasus Galaxy has brought out. But, you know, different people react to extreme stress in different ways. In Carson, it seems to have made him more cynical and harder. It's a little sad, but not unrealistic.

If they role back the clock and have Carson start jumping at his shadow again, that would REALLY annoy me, because it would mean that it isn't part of his character's development but just inconsistent writing. But at this point, it seems like Carson is, by necessity, turning into more of a fighter and developing the ability to handle himself offworld. Just as Rodney's gone from a guy who can't fly in a straight line to someone who can handle a puddlejumper in a combat situation (and I really hope they don't roll the clock back on that, too ... but so far, it seems like they're pretty good about keeping the character development consistent and on track).

Rodney's still jumping at shadows (and mice!) but then ... that's Rodney. He's changed a lot in other ways, but will probably always be useless with a gun. And yet ... think about how terrified he was in combat situations in the early Season 1 episodes, compared to how he's been handling himself in the field lately. The characters have all grown an awful lot.

I guess what bothers me is that the change was so quick--Rodney evolved over the course of two seasons, and is still very much like he was in the pilot; he'll never be a warrior, poor thing--although he was doing a pretty good job at pre-mission pep talk :)

I have the feeling that Carson went awfully fast from doctor-who-doesn't-want-to-handle-guns, to accompagnying marines off world. Of course, he had to take harder decisions than most of the other characters, and sacrifice more of his principles--John and Elizabeth took the decisions too, but he's the one who had to implement them.

I just wish we had been given more time to see the transition--but maybe we were, and I just didn't see it, since I watched all of season 2 in about three days. :-/

I guess it'll be interesting to see how things go from here--all the characters get creepy sometimes--John when he killed that Wraith, Ronon most times, and yes, Carson these days... But I do agree that the bashing is a little extreme.

Now, I'll agree with you there -- the evolution of the character happened awfully quick. I think a lot of it was the events of the most recent episodes -- from about Michael to Misbegotten, a LOT of stuff happened that forced Carson to confront the darker side of himself. It didn't seem particularly jarring to me, but it did happen fast and it wasn't really addressed in the show in any overt kind of way; it just happens in the background and we catch glimpses. And I *am* still waiting to see if he "reverts" in later episodes, which would mean that they're not paying as much attention to the character as I'd thought they were.

03x07 - Common Ground

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