Stargate SG-1/Recap/S5/E12 Wormhole X-Treme!

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.
< Stargate SG-1‎ | Recap‎ | S5


This episode is a continuation of the Season 4 episode "Point of No Return". A spaceship that had been hidden in the outer solar system activates and begins approaching Earth, and its energy signature is matched to that of Martin Lloyd's escape pod suggesting that this is its mother ship. The military tracks down Lloyd (played by Willie Garson) and discovers that he has become the creative consultant for a television series whose concept he sold to a Hollywood studio, Wormhole X-Treme!. The parallels between Wormhole X-Treme! and the real SGC are clear. The Air Force had decided that while being a breach of secrecy, the show could prevent any future leaks of information about the Stargate program from being taken seriously.

Jack O'Neill is given the position of the Air Force technical advisor to the show in order to covertly confront Lloyd about both the secrets he has leaked and the approaching spacecraft. He discovers that Lloyd has resumed using memory suppressants and does not consciously remember his previous encounter with them or his own extraterrestrial origin. O'Neill initially suspects Lloyd's associates of drugging him again, but in fact Lloyd started taking them on his own so that he could feel more comfortable with living on Earth.

Lloyd's associates are indeed nearby, however, as well as another secret government group called the NID that wishes to seize the ship's technology for themselves. Lloyd has in his possession the remote control device necessary for boarding the empty ship when it arrives, thinking it merely another of the many functionless science fiction props used on the show, and both parties want to recover it. His associates kidnap O'Neill and Lloyd, injecting Lloyd with a memory-restoring drug. Before they interrogate him, however, O'Neill and Lloyd escape.

O'Neill and Lloyd recover the remote control just as the spacecraft arrives, with the NID and Lloyd's associates in close pursuit. O'Neill gives the remote to Lloyd's associates allowing them to flee Earth, both because he sympathizes with their plight and to deny the ship's technology to the NID. Lloyd decides that he is comfortable with his new life and remains on Earth to continue consulting for Wormhole X-Treme!.

At the end of the episode there is a "Making of Wormhole X-Treme!" featurette with interviews of several of the actors from the fictional show. Wormhole X-Treme! is mentioned again in the season 8 episode "Citizen Joe", which reveals that the fictional show ran for one episode before being cancelled, though Mitchell later claims it ran for three episodes. Martin Lloyd returns in the milestone episode "200" in season 10, trying to write a TV film based on the fictional show. The latter episode stated that Wormhole X-Treme! ran for ten seasons prior to cancellation.

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