In the TV Zone Special #42 Stargate SG-1 Special II interview RDA said:

"There was an episode in our third season [A Hundred Days] in which we gave every indication that O'Neill had fathered a child. Earlier this year, I asked Brad Wright [series co-creator and executive producer] if he'd ever consider doing a story in which O'Neill goes back to that planet and discovers he's got a child. If we did, I'd like it to be a daughter, only because he's already had a son. I'd love to see a relationship like that unfold in front of the cameras. I know this type of storyline might not necessarily belong in a Sci-Fi oriented show, but I'm sure we could come up with an adventure to justify it. One of the many positive things that has been said about Stargate is that it's based around the characters, all of whom are unique and constantly interact with each other. So to touch upon a new relationship such as the one I'm suggesting isn't out of the question.  We'll have to wait and see though."

I do think the storyline they introduced in A Hundred Days was one that merits a follow up of some kind as it contained some pretty important events: Jack forming a relationship with Laira, acceding to her request to try to give her another child and possibly having done so. This isn't really the kind of plotline they should just leave dangling, on the other hand, I thought the episode was pretty corny. Laira was underwritten, and the situation was a TV series cliché given a Stargate spin. There wasn't really anything very original about any of it except for Teal'c's rescue of Jack.  

So, do they just keep moving swiftly away from it or do they go back and try to 'redeem' it by making it more interesting? The Jack-Laira relationship as it was presented to us wasn't really very exciting. The character suffered from what a lot of guest star roles do - particularly female ones - and didn't really have any distinguishing characteristics. At the end of the forty-three minutes there wasn't really a lot we could say about the character of Laira that was distinct to her. Nor was the chemistry between Laira and Jack very visible on the screen although it was clearly meant to be in the script.

On the other hand this is someone who did give Jack shelter for three months, they were clearly supposed to have formed a strong emotional attachment. She was the only person he could really talk to the whole time he was there. She did try to help him adjust to his new surroundings. If Jack had been stuck there forever - which was what they were both assuming - Laira making him throw out his SGC clothes etc was a good move to help him get used to the idea that this was his life now. And they did have sex.

Unfortunately we weren't shown enough scenes of the two of them bonding to remove the impression she was being a little selfish and manipulative. Her character wasn't really made sympathetic enough to us so the over-riding impression I took away from the episode was one of Jack's isolation; how bereft and lonely he seemed when cut off from the people he knew and the past he remembered, and which these people were never going to understand, rather than a strong sense of how important his relationship with Laira was. That was probably the forty-three minute barrier problem again.

The writers have never before managed to show us how any member of SG-1 can sustain a relationship with someone who is off-world. Daniel was never reunited with his wife. Sam's relationship with Narim was impossible when she believed him to be on the Nox world, but wasn't resurrected after she made contact with him on Tollana, presumably because of her feelings for Martouf.  (The reason she gives Narim in Pretense anyway.) And her relationship with Martouf was abruptly terminated in 'Divide and Conquer'.  Teal'c's relationship with Drey'ac broke down, although we don't know if it was because of the difficulty of maintaining a relationship with someone who was living on a different world, or if their relationship was already too badly damaged by his abandonment of her and Ryac in the first place, and by her having married someone else in his absence. But presumably the combination of the three was too much for the relationship to take. 

So, from that point of view Jack's relationship with Laira might have presented an interesting challenge. But it now seems a bit late in the day to expect us to believe that he's been popping back there on his free weekends when we haven't heard a mention of her in 30+ episodes. Also, if they wanted to show us a relationship between Jack and a woman with whom he has a convincing emotional connection/ nteresting past history, it would surely make more sense to bring back his wife (presumably ex-wife now?) into the picture. They did have terrific chemistry in Cold Lazarus and it's been very well established that these were two people who really did love each other and were only driven apart by a terrible tragedy that would probably be enough to kill most marriages. If the writers want to give Jack a happy ending with another person, Sara seems like a better choice than Laira on all kinds of levels.

As to the suggestion that it might be a nice idea to give Jack another child and show the development of that relationship, I do feel a bit 'put out' on behalf of the other characters. Jack has had an awful lot of episodes that deal with his relationship/ affinity with children. In the movie he wasn't really anything except a guy who was suicidal because of the loss of his child and who through bonding with a son-substitute (Skaara) and making friends with Daniel gets back his will to live again. Daniel had a score of interesting characteristics in the movie as he was a much more well-defined character so with him they had more to play around with. 

By comparison, to show continuity with the movie in connection with Jack, the series writers had a lot less to work with. They could reiterate how Daniel can get through to him when no one else can/them talking in unison/Jack's need to protect Daniel/ Daniel's need to protect Jack, but they're all as much to do with Daniel as with Jack. For things that are specific to Jack and don't involve Daniel, they really only had his bond with Skaara, his relationship with Sara, and, most importantly, the fact that his son accidentally shot himself with Jack's gun. (Well RDA could have tried to make his hair stick up but frankly I'm very glad he didn't.) So, very reasonably, the series has always given a lot of weight to that aspect of Jack's past.

As a consequence we've had Charlie mentioned in COTG in an excellent scene where we learn about how much Jack still misses him and how he can't forgive himself for his death; Cold Lazarus gave us flashbacks to the moment when Charlie killed himself and spent a lot of time dealing with how deeply affected Jack still was by the loss of him. The culmination of S1 for Jack really was him having to choose between Skaara and Daniel, pretty much a choice at the time between one son substitute and another. 

Then we've had all the other 'child substitute' episodes such as 'Show and Tell' and 'Learning Curve', and another (excellent) flashback to Charlie giving us more insights into their relationship in 'The Devil You Know', and another reference to Jack's loss in 'Window of Opportunity'. The fact that Jack feels a strong sense of connection to children and still misses his son is something that I think this show has actually covered really well. There are lots of aspects of Jack's personality that haven't been explored but this doesn't feel like one of them to me.

The show has also been canny about giving all the other characters children or child substitutes of their own. In 'Singularity', Sam first meets and bonds with Cassandra. Cassandra is totally focused on Sam in that episode and it's very well established that Sam absolutely loves this child. We get more confirmation that the relationship between Sam and Cassandra is very important to both of them in 'In the Line of Duty'. We also learn that it is difficult for Sam to visit as much as she would like, and how she's now in almost the 'parent with visitation rights' situation in regards to Cassandra who it is confirmed is now living with Janet. There's another mention of this relationship in '1969'. And Janet asks Sam to come to the lake with her and Cassie in 'Urgo'. 

So, as with Jack's continuing sense of loss where Charlie is concerned, it is stablished that Sam is still in contact with Cassandra and is still just as connected to her. I do think it would have been nice if we'd seen a bit more of Sam and Cassandra interacting over the years or found out a bit more about how she and Janet managed things between them when Janet was having to work late and Sam was on a mission or whatever, but given that it's an action-adventure show, the writers have tried to make sure there were mentions of Cassie from time to time. 
 
Then we get Teal'c, the only member of SG-1 to actually have a living child with whom he has a biological connection. We met Ryac in 'Bloodlines', had some very interesting insights into his and Teal'c's relationship in Family, and then, apart from a mention in 'Nemesis' that Teal'c was off visiting him, we haven't heard anything about him since. (Unless I'm missing something?) 

This seems pretty odd to me. In Seth, Teal'c asks if Earth parents love their children unconditionally and makes it clear he sees nothing complicated about loving one's child. But Ryac never gets a direct mention and we haven't seen him for more than two years. In fact it seems to me that Jack has had a lot more screen time dealing with his relationship with his dead son, than Teal'c has had dealing with his live one.

We also have Daniel and Shifu. Daniel delivered Sha're's baby in 'Secrets' and seemed to form an instant connection with him in 'Maternal Instinct'. It clearly really upset him to have to give up the baby to Oma Desala, and he was unusually dense for most of the episode because he was so unwilling to see that his only way to protect the child was to let someone else take care of him. In 'Absolute Power' we had more evidence that Daniel is very close to Shifu and would love to see a lot more of him.

So, all of the main characters have a child with whom they have a connection, and we've had quite a few episodes that deal either wholly or in part with that. 'Cold Lazarus'; 'Bloodlines'; 'Singularity'; 'Family'; 'Show & Tell'; 'Learning Curve'; 'Maternal Instinct', and now 'Rite of Passage', are totally focused on the relationship between one member of SG-1 and a child with whom they have formed a connection, and there are lot of other episodes where it is mentioned in passing or we get flashbacks.

So to me this just doesn't feel like a theme in the show that is in need of another child. It feels more like we already have more children with whom the main characters are connected than there is time to give their relationships the screen time they deserve. The writers have already had to accelerate Shifu's ageing process because there is only so much you can do with a baby in terms of dramatic interest. 

What aspects of the relationship between a member of SG-1 and a child are now left unexplored? I don't really see much of a gap the writers haven't already covered which another child for Jack could fill. And if they found it, one can't help feeling it would only be taking up the screentime that should really be filled with Teal'c's relationship with Ryac; Sam's relationship with Cassandra, or Daniel's relationship with Shifu.

With SG-1 their children seem to be part of the sacrifice they have made.  None of them get to see their children (biological or adopted) as much as they would like, and Jack has to live with an absence all the time. Is there really a gap to fit in yet another child and yet another SG-1 member's relationship with a child? I have to say I can't see one, especially as the writers would have to come up with something totally original about Jack's relationship with this baby to make it different from Teal'c's relationship with Ryac, Daniel's relationship with Shifu, Sam's relationship with Cassandra, or Jack's relationship with Charlie as we have seen it in flashbacks.

So, personally, I can't say this is a storyline that interests me very much, but who knows, perhaps the writers will find a way to make it fresh and interesting? I just hope that if they do it, they don't do it at the expense of the previously established relationships of other SG-1 members with their children.

Lori

(c) 2001 Lori.  All rights recognised.  No copyright infringement intended.