S8 SPOILERS: COVENANT

Andrew Colson is a business tycoon in the charismatic, colourful, adventurous mold of Richard Branson. Colson lost his family while he was still a young man and turned both entrepreneur and philanthropist in a bid to compensate somehow for their loss. His global empire includes communications, biotechnology, aerospace and aviation, and he is himself a crack pilot.

Colson calls a press-conference and before the assembled reporters announces that the tragedy which befell the United States five months previously – the deaths of 2,000 US service men and women in a naval carrier group – was not as a result of a meteor strike which disrupted global communications.

Daniel Jackson is in his lab watching this press conference when he’s joined by Carter. Together, they hear Colson declare that none of his company’s satellites detected the alleged meteor shower and insist that some of the world’s governments are involved in a cover-up. The people are being lied to. Colson’s inescapable conclusion from this satellite evidence is that there is life beyond our world. There are aliens with technology far in advance of our own who’ve been intervening in Earth’s existence for some time. Colson gives an ultimatum: the governments of the nations aware of these facts have 24 hours to reveal the truth or he will do it for them.

Colson sounds like a Fox Mulder – a fanatic who believes the truth is out there. He is heedless of the very real economic consequences resulting from plunging his company into a firestorm of panic and controversy. He’s an old friend of Carter’s, who takes him on a personal tour through the Stargate in a bid to convince him to join in the alien cover-up for the good of mankind.

Carter and the SGC are not the only ones to intervene, however. Colson and his best friend and deputy Brian Vogler fall victim to a shadowy conspiracy which drives their empire into apparent bankruptcy and leaves Colson facing criminal charges for financial malfeasance. Meanwhile, Vogler has been personally threatened by an organisation he calls the Trust and he fears for his family.

Colson finds himself totally alone and isolated in his determination to reveal the truth and his belief that he must do this at any cost falters when the very real damage and consequences of his shock announcement spiral utterly beyond his control. Carter drives home to him the power held by the shadowy Trust, admitting that though the SGC have tried, they have not been able to bring the Trust down.

With Colson and Vogler rapidly running out of time and options, can Carter save them?

Andrew Colson is set to be a recurring character in Season 8.

18 thoughts on “S8 SPOILERS: COVENANT”

  1. Desperate billionaire Andrew Colson, victim of a shadowy NID conspiracy involving Carter, not to be confused with desperate billionaire Adrian Conrad, victim of a shadowy NID conspiracy involving Carter.

  2. Well said, Heyerchick! While I applaud the effort to address the events of Lost City, the idea of a new recurring character and a new conspiracy plotline leaves me cold with disinterest.

  3. Can Carter save them in time? Rogue group conspiracy? Ho..hum… They should call the show “Samgate: The X-Files Years”, at least there’d be some truth in advertising. Oh and Daniel gets to watch tv. Teal’c may be allowed to say “Indeed”. General O’Neill will be cosmically giddy.

  4. [THIS SECTION EDITED BY THE ADMIN FOR A CLEAR BREACH OF OUR RULES REGARDING RESPECT FOR OTHER BLOGGERS AND CONSTRUCTIVE COMMENTS ON THEIR OPINIONS. IF THIS POSTER HAS ANYTHING TO OFFER BESIDES INAPPROPRIATE SARCASM, THE SITE ADMIN WOULD BE HAPPY TO SEE IT HERE.]

    I think this episode sounds very good. The ONLY reason it seems likes there’s so much conspiracy stuff, is because all this information comes from script sides for Vogler.

    Disclaimer: I appologise to anyone who simply likes the character of Daniel. I feel he’s a great part of the show, and would like to see some more banter between him and Jack.

  5. Oh, right, so I’m not allowed to make personal attacks on people? OK, I see your point (No, I do, no sarcasm there… that’s coming up) But what about attacking labels? i.e. Danielites, Shippers, Slashers etc? But I suppose that would hurt the feelings of people who like Daniel or Ship or Slash. But, if I want, I can make fun of the show all I want, because, other people couldn’t possibly like the show. Other people couldn’t possibly hate to see people make inappropriate remarks about the characters they love, or the writers.

    Of course, making fun of the actors isn’t allowed, they’re real people. But they writers… no, the writers are that faceless group, “The Boys at Bridge”. We can mock them, and their skills, as much as we want!

    Now, I’ll reply to everyone’s posts, a nice contribution to the blog I hope.

    As I had said before:

    SG-1 is offworld when Daniel’s body gets taken over by an alien device, and he starts acting crazy and is put in his pajamas, not to be confused with SG-1 is offworld when Daniel’s body gets taken over by people, and he starts acting crazy and is put in his pajamas.

    Of course they have to go back to the events of Lost City, it wasn’t a very strong coverstory. But what’s wrong with a recurring character? He’ll probably be in maybe 2 other episodes, just because it’s the 8th season doesn’t mean we have to stick with the same characters all of the time. And it isn’t really a new storyline, it’s NID/Committee/”Trust” stuff, it’s always been around, and in a show set in the real world, it adds very much to the realism.

    Sorry, gonna have to get sarcastic here. OK, Samgate? So Sam plays a part in an episode, which seems to be more about Colson and Vogler, and you want to rename the show “Samgate”? Seems a little too drastic really… And yes, in one of the few pages available from this episode, Daniel does watch tv… if he didn’t watch, Sam might not contact Colson in time, so Daniel saved the day… Teal’c… well, I just won’t have any mocking of him and his cool hair 😛

    Now, “cosmically giddy” Jack? Let’s look this up…

    cosmically:
    -cos·mic adj. – Infinitely or inconceivably extended

    giddy:
    -gid·dy adj. – Frivolous and lighthearted; flighty.

    So Jack is extremly lighthearted? Well, what’s wrong with that? Or do you use giddy in the child-like hyper meaning? Because, I’ve never seen Jack run around like a 6 year old after a can of Coke. But why such a negative spin on the term? Jack’s always been like this (Well, since coming to terms with the death of his son), why is it NOW a bad thing…. because it’s a bandwagon thing?

  6. Gee three comments that don’t meet to your standards, and it’s off to the races, eh?
    Please tell me where the writers were insulted in the comments before yours, I’d love to see it. Please.

  7. The writers thing is implied in the first post, and it kinda spun off from my, now deleted, rant…

    And it’s not just three comments, it’s a large part of fandom with this exact same attitude, and I find it ridiculous that my post was edited for fear of offending people, but people can freely throw around terms like “Samgate”, which very much offend me.

  8. I’m sorry that term offends you, but a lot of people happen to feel that way about the latter half of Season 7.

    By all means, say that you enjoyed season 7, it is your right. Say what you liked about it right here. No one will attack you for your liking it. But try not to insult the opinions of others who don’t share your feelings.

    I happen to share the opinions of the others and I happen to feel quite strongly that there was too much emphasis on Sam, and that the writing staff are not as clever or original as they used to be. That’s my opinion.

    And we can certainly agree to disagree on that without being insulting or condescending, yes?

  9. “I’m sorry that term offends you, but a lot of people happen to feel that way about the latter half of Season 7. “

    Feel what way? They feel “Samgate”? The latter half of Season 7 had 3 Sam-centred episodes (One wasn’t even really, it was more about Jacob), while Evolution Part 2, Heroes Part 2 and Ressurection were all very Daniel-heavy. Teal’c got Orpheus and Birthright earlier in the season (And shone in Heroes Part 2 IMO). I don’t see how it’s “Samgate”, just because they put 3 Sam-centric episodes near each other, while other character-centric episodes were spread out. People who say that aren’t complaining about too much Sam, they’re complaining about Sam herself, and we’ve seen what that does to the actors…

    “No one will attack you for your liking it.”

    Oh, well I have to outright disagree there. Just watch this: “I like Jonas!”

    “that the writing staff are not as clever or original as they used to be”

    I’m going to have to ask you to back up that statement, with a list of who exactly the writing staff are, as I one read a comment along the lines of “Ugh, the damn writers are so bad, they should be replaced, they actually made Daniel stupid, by making him give Anna a candle!”… one of the less informed members of fandom… (I hold a deep hatred in my heart for the term “The Boys at Bridge”)

  10. Um… are you really going to parse words? I mean, do I really have to explain that people feel, experience, perceive, are affected by, suffer, consider, judge (please, take your pick) that Stargate has become Samgate based on the extraordinary emphasis on Sam as Sex Kitten and her lovelife which was a part of nearly every single episode in the second half of season 7? That is a fact. Down to even Resurrection when she was asked out on a date.

    You like Jonas? Fine. Enjoy! More power to you. 🙂

    Back up my opinion? Er…okay… I don’t think homages to Star Wars and Star Trek or the Core or any of the other modified movie plots are indicative of original thinking. Nor do I think turning Major Carter into a lovelorn sex kitten is very clever or original either. If someone finds a similarity between this S8 episode and Desperature Measures, what’s wrong with drawing a parallel? Doesn’t mean it’s right, and it doesn’t mean it’s wrong. It’s a matter of perception.

    Uh… what? I’m sorry, but did I miss a post here to that effect? Or are you confusing this blog entry with another forum?

    Again, please enlighten me as to where that was written in this thread on this blog. Or is this just a spillover rant from another forum?

  11. Well, the copy/paste options didn’t work very well.

    The 2nd to last paragraph was in response to the quote, “the writers are so bad…” etc.

    And the third has to do with the
    “Boys at Bridge” terminology.

  12. The reference to “cosmic giddiness” is nothing more nor less than a tip of the hat to RDA’s description of himself as an individual – he was the one to use the term “cosmic giddiness”. I don’t want to put words in that blogger’s mouth, but I believe they were being ironic.

    We’ve been told again and again that Jack is close to RDA in personality, that Jack IS RDA is personality, and even in the documentary in which RDA outed himself for cosmic giddiness, his partner and fellow exec Michael Greenburg and director Martin Wood were complaining about Jack’s alleged sense of humour for the cameras.

    It can hardly be taken for an insult if a fan runs with an analogy the actor originated.

  13. Admin, if you feel anything in my post went over the line and is causing a problem here, please feel free to delete it. I didn’t feel I was personally attacking anyone, just criticising the direction the show but if it stepped over the line at all, do what you need. 🙂

    You are not misinterpreting my use of “cosmic giddiness”, I was attempting, I guess poorly, to be ironic. 😀

    I would like to know what channel showed the Daniel-heavy Heroes Part 2, Evolution Part 2 and Resurrection? In the one’s I saw, Daniel was in a about a quarter of Evolution Part 2 and, I could be remembering this incorrectly, but I don’t believe he showed up until around 20 minutes into Heroes Part 2. In Resurrection, Sam had just about as much to do as Daniel did. Michael Shanks can be a powerful actor but let’s not mistake that for an episode actually being Daniel-heavy.

    There is much more detail that could be gone into regarding Sam’s role in Season 7 but it comes down to the alleged “team” episode of Revisions, wherein Sam alone had more lines than her three teammates did combined.

    It is rather odd to me that when Jack O’Neill was allegedly the “lead” character they managed to be much more equitable with how the storylines and screen time were shared, there was more teamwork, than has been the case since Sam became the focal point. Since then it has gone from the ensemble “SG-1” to “Sam and those other guys”.

    Covenant, with the promise of Coulson as a recurring character, seems to point to next seasonl being much the same. Sam will likely be the center SG-1er in all the Coulson eps because he’s been set up as a friend of hers. Coulson will also probably end up with as much if not more screentime than Daniel, Teal’c and Jack if we follow the example of previous seasons. About the proper timing too as it seems it will be approx. Ep 7 or 8, very similar to what happened in S7.

    Throw everyone else a bone with Daniel, Teal’c and Jack and “Team” focused episodes for the first 5 or 6 episodes, with Sam managing to play large roles in nearly all of them I have no doubt, and then in the remaining 12 Sam becomes the focal point, with one of the guys occassionally allowed to share.

  14. Come to think of it, I think Daniel first shows in real time in Heroes Part 2 about 15 minutes into it, when Robert Picardo’s character is questioning them. I don’t count “video tape time” of Bregman watching Sam and Daniel answer some questions on tape earlier in the show.

    In any case I am not looking forward to more conspiracy stories. If they at least took it an interesting route that might count for something but they are very unimaginative with it.

    I also don’t cherish the thought of some other character coming in and taking up time that could have been used to explore Daniel and Teal’cs characters and that could have been used to explore the team in now slightly changed format. I have no worries for Sam because they will be sure she loses no face time, after all Coulson is her friend.

  15. “I have no worries for Sam because they will be sure she loses no face time, after all Coulson is her friend.”

    As are, apparently, the writing and production staff. 😉

  16. Well, these spoilers do not leave me gagging to see the ep, but I’m trying to keep an open mind. I felt resurrection was a god ep, and that was a kind of conspiracy ep.
    As for Sam, I’m hoping that it’s just the spoilers that are skewed towards her, and that there will be lots of team interaction as they think of how to deal with Colson.
    Hope springs eternal with me, or am I just deluding myself??
    wallace

  17. NID stories dont interest me I must admit and Sam heavy stories dont interest me now as much as they used to do.
    Loved Solitudes and the one where she took Cassie down into the silo (?) but Season 7 Samheavy stories were not the best stories, Sam heavy or otherwise.
    Will watch and wait as usual . carole

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