Jack O'Neill
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| Stargate character | |
|---|---|
 Jack O'Neill portrayed by Kurt Russell (left) in Stargate and Richard Dean Anderson (right) in Stargate SG-1 |
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| Jonathan "Jack" O'Neill | |
| Race | Human |
| ATA | Natural carrier |
| Gender | Male |
| Rank | Colonel/Brigadier General/Major General |
| Birthplace | Chicago, Illinois, US, Earth |
| Relatives | Sara O'Neill (ex-wife) Tyler/Charlie O'Neill (son, deceased) Jack O'Neill (clone) |
| Portrayer | Richard Dean Anderson Kurt Russell (film) |
| First episode | "Stargate" |
Jonathan "Jack" O'Neill (born October 20, 1952)[1] is a fictional character in the science fiction feature film Stargate and the subsequent television series Stargate SG-1 played by actors Kurt Russell in the film (name spelled as O'Neil) and Richard Dean Anderson in the series. O'Neill appears occasionally in the television series Stargate Atlantis.
In the film, he is a United States Air Force Colonel, who leads a reconnaissance team through the Stargate. In the television series he leads the primary team, SG-1, on further missions through the Stargate before being promoted to Brigadier General and assuming command of Stargate Command for about a year. The character was promoted to Major General and ceased appearing in the show on a regular basis.
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[edit] Events of the film
In the film he is married to Sara O'Neill and had a son. However, after a tragic accident where their son shot himself with O'Neill's personal gun, a Beretta 92FS, he suffers a period of depression and retires from the Air Force becoming anti-social.
When the Stargate is deciphered by Daniel Jackson, the project commander, Major General West, takes advantage of O'Neill's mental state and recalls him to active duty to lead the off world reconnaissance mission. O'Neill's standing orders for the mission are to go through with a team and detonate a nuclear warhead near the Stargate if there was any sign of danger, something he was very willing to do in his depressed state.
On Abydos, O'Neill and his team find the indigenous population to be simple desert-dwellers and makes friends with a boy named Skaara, the son of the ambassador, Kasuf, to the planet's ruler, Ra. During a fight against Ra's forces on Abydos, O'Neill fights hand-to-hand against Ra's First Prime to regain control of the warhead which had fallen into Goa'uld hands. Unable to stop the timer on the device and as Ra tries to escape the planet, O'Neill and Daniel Jackson transport the bomb to Ra's ship, destroying it in orbit.
O'Neill and the rest of the team returns to Earth without Jackson who remained on Abydos, having inadvertently married a local woman, Sha'uri. O'Neill is left with a renewed sense of life.
[edit] Events of Stargate SG-1 (Seasons 1–8)
In the first episode of the television series, "Children of the Gods", O'Neill is recalled by the new project commander, General Hammond following an incursion by the Goa'uld Apophis. After returning to Abydos and bringing Daniel Jackson back, O'Neill reveals that Sara left him sometime between the end of the film and the beginning of the series. O'Neill admits he had not destroyed the Abydos gate, after a plan was revealed to send a more powerful warhead to Abydos "just to make sure". After visiting Abydos and discovering the true nature of the Stargate network, O'Neill is once again reactivated and is made the team leader of SG-1.
In the first season episode, "Cold Lazarus", the viewer is given a little more of O'Neill's backstory. When O'Neill is duplicated by a crystalline energy life-form the viewer is reintroduced to Sara O'Neill, Jack's ex-wife. Flashbacks show how O'Neill's son, Charlie (name differs in the film), was killed. O'Neill blames himself for Charlie's death, however the crystalline life form helps him gain a certain amount of closure at the end of the episode.
In the second season episode, "The Fifth Race", O'Neill has the Repository of the Ancients "downloaded" to his brain. He slowly loses the ability to speak, write, or even comprehend English. While under the influence of the Repository, he enters hundreds of new gate addresses into the dialing computer not found on the Abydos cartouche, formulates a new system for calculating interstellar distances based on gate addresses (which compensates for stellar drift), and translates Ancient text for Daniel Jackson. He finally builds a device that produces enough additional power to allow the Stargate to dial Othala, a planet in the Ida Galaxy and home to a colony of Asgard which requires an eight-chevron address. The Asgard remove the knowledge from O'Neill's mind before it produced permanent harm and return him to normal. Seeing great potential in both O'Neill and the human race, the benevolent Asgard send him back to Earth. With this incident, O'Neill becomes the first known human to personally meet the Asgard. He also is the first modern human to demonstrate the stargate's ability to dial extremely distant addresses using an eighth chevron. O'Neill is one of the first humans to re-evolve to a level allowing him to use the Ancient knowledge. The theme of evolution and its connection with ascension and advanced mental abilities appears repeatedly in future SG-1 episodes, and in the spin-off, Atlantis.
In the Season 7 finale, "Lost City", O'Neill is again forced to download the Ancients' knowledge into his mind to seek information that will protect Earth from attack by the Goa'uld Anubis. He expects it to kill him, as the Asgard were expected to be unavailable to help in time. He was willing to sacrifice himself for Earth. The Ancient knowledge leads them to the Ancient outpost in Antarctica and a power source for it and allows O'Neill to put himself in stasis to preserve his life after the attack is thwarted. His ability to operate the Ancient chair technology means that O'Neill possesses the ATA gene, seemingly in an unusually powerful form. This is later confirmed in the episode "It's Good to Be King".
In the Season 8 premiere, "New Order", SG-1 attempts to contact the Asgard, only to find the humanoid Replicators had escaped and were again threatening the Asgard. Thor returns with SG-1 to Earth and removes the knowledge from O'Neill's brain after he is consulted and designs a weapon effective against replicators by instantly severing communication between their blocks.
In recognition of his service and unique diplomatic position O'Neill is promoted to Brigadier General and given in command of the SGC ("New Order," "Lockdown") after Elizabeth Weir, the civilian leader is tasked with the expedition to Atlantis and Hammond is promoted. He tries to adjust to life on the other side of the 'Gate room glass, envying his former teammates' journeys. The SG-1 episode "It's Good to Be King" is the only time he went off-world on screen while commander of the SGC because SG-1 discovers a Puddle Jumper only operable by someone with the ATA Gene.
[edit] Other Appearances
O'Neill fades into the background during Season 9, where he appears in two episodes as Major General Jack O'Neill, and is no longer a main character. His replacement is Major General Hank Landry played by Beau Bridges who takes command of the SGC early in Season 9.
O'Neill appears in the 200th episode, during Season 10, and makes an appearance in the Atlantis Season 3 episode, "The Real World", both aired on the same night (His appearance in The Real World was as a hallucination of Doctor Elizabeth Weir's due to her being infected by Asuran nanites trying to convince her the entire Stargate program was a figment of her imagination).
At the end of the 3rd mid-season finale of Atlantis, he is in Atlantis with Richard Woolsey during an Asuran assault, as the two of them attempt to negotiate for the Atlantis expedition's return to the city. He is eventually rescued by members of the former Atlantis expedition.
In the episode "The Shroud", O'Neill is reunited with his old SG-1 teammates again, helping to save Daniel Jackson (Who has recently been turned into a Prior of the Ori) from the IOA, who believe that he has become too dangerous to be allowed back onto Earth. This is his final appearance in the show.
[edit] Character developments
O'Neill has focused his free time on the more important things in life, such as fishing at his cabin in Minnesota, watching The Simpsons, doing crossword puzzles, playing chess, collecting stamps and drinking Guinness (and also cooking with it, implicitly as the only ingredient ("Citizen Joe")). It has been mentioned, occasionally, that he likes Mary Steenburgen ("Urgo" and "Heroes (Part 1)").
O'Neill is somewhat of a wit throughout the series. Enemies and allies alike are subjected to frequent quips and facetious remarks. He often derides Carter and Jackson's esoteric interests, though it is frequently hinted that he finds intellectuals intimidating. He is irreverent towards authorities, including his own superiors, and especially revels in mocking the System Lords, whom he views as overly theatrical (as well as over dressed). He also commonly corrects improper grammar, most often saying, "It's whom!", usually doing this when the correctee has SG-1 at a disadvantage, as in "The Other Guys". As a last resort, and sometimes as a first, he will resort to sarcasm.
Throughout the series, O'Neill's relationship with Samantha Carter has been subjected to a great deal of interest and speculation. On two separate occasions, either O'Neill or a member of his team come into contact with (different) alternate realities in which O'Neill and Carter were either engaged or married. In the fourth season episode "Divide and Conquer", both O'Neill and Carter had to officially admit that their feelings for one another were more than professional. There are several events and incidents spread throughout the series that imply that the feelings they have for one another remain a subtle constant in their lives, despite various outside influences, such as Carter's temporary fiancé Pete Shanahan, and O'Neill's brief relationship with Kerry Johnson, an officer of the CIA, as well as their relationships with offworlders, particularly (in Carter's case), Narim and Martouf.
Unlike Anderson's other famous on-screen persona, Angus MacGyver, O'Neill has no aversion to firearms, apart from the fact that his son, Charlie, accidentally shot himself with O'Neill's pistol and died (O'Neill never forgave himself). He is a career special operations operative, owns at least two personal firearms, and becomes extremely agitated whenever it is suggested he and his team go anywhere unarmed, including places known to be safe for SG-1 and where firearms may be a liability. Another trait that sets Anderson's two characters apart is that MacGyver was an all-around scientific genius; O'Neill, while far from stupid, is very focused on the practical and prefers to skip over almost any scientific explanation (in which Carter & Daniel often indulge). He's been known, only half-jokingly, to refer to "magnets" as the explanation behind any technology he does not understand. The primary exception to this is in the field of astronomy, as O'Neill is himself an amateur astronomer. Despite these differences, O'Neill and MacGyver do share some similarities, both play hockey, but also in their past: both characters served in the United States Special Forces.
[edit] Differences between film and TV series
In the film, Jack's son is named Tyler (the name is seen on an award in his room in an early scene) as opposed to Charlie (as in the SG-1 series) or Jack Jr. (as in the non-SG-1 books.) Also, the Colonel's name in the film is O'Neil (with one L), a fact which was referred to light-heartedly in the TV series ("Secrets") and ("The Other Guys").
While the two O'Neills do have radically different personalities, it is easy to reconcile the two versions of the character, as Kurt Russell's O'Neil is depressed and suicidal over the loss of his son, while Anderson's O'Neill has, over the course of the year between the film and the first season, since come to terms with his loss and has reverted to his 'true' personality. There are even one or two moments in the film where O'Neil seems to display certain mannerisms common to the series' O'Neill, such as his comments to Ra's guards before killing them; "How you doin'?" and "Give my regards to King Tut, asshole!". Likewise, the series' O'Neill occasionally reverts to his original personality, usually when faced with reminders of difficult events in his past.
[edit] Ribbons and Medals
O'Neill's ribbons and badges are an additional difference between the film and series, although the series has been relatively consistent over the seasons. As of Season 10, Jack wears the following ribbons and badges on his dress uniform:
- Defense Distinguished Service Medal
- Air Force Distinguished Service Medal
- Defense Superior Service Medal
- Airman's Medal
- Defense Meritorious Service Medal
- Meritorious Service Medal, 3 Oak leaf clusters
- Air Medal, 2 Oak leaf clusters
- Aerial Achievement Medal
- Joint Service Commendation Medal
- Air Force Commendation Medal, 2 Oak leaf clusters
- Air Force Achievement Medal, 2 Oak leaf clusters
- Outstanding Unit Award, 3 Oak leaf clusters and Valor device
- Organizational Excellence Award
- Combat Readiness Medal, Oak leaf clusters
- National Defense Service Medal, Bronze star device
- Vietnam Service Medal
- Southwest Asia Service Medal, Bronze star device
- Air Force Overseas Long Tour Ribbon
- Air Force Longevity Service Award, 3 Oak leaf clusters
- Republic of Vietnam Campaign Medal
- Kuwait Liberation Medal (Saudi Arabia)
Ribbons are worn with the most prestigious Department of Defense award at the wearer's upper right and then in descending order to the left and down with authorized foreign awards at the end. Multiple awards are indicated by the use of oak leaf clusters or stars.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
| Regular Characters on Stargate SG-1 | Edit |
| Current: Cameron Mitchell | Samantha Carter | Daniel Jackson | Teal'c | Hank Landry | Vala Mal Doran
Former: Jack O'Neill | Jonas Quinn | George Hammond | |
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