The Dicer is Coming!

[Nate the Great]

Or not. Altvers seem to be yesterdays news. Oh well.

[PointyHairedJedi]

I suspect we all are letting stuff slide when it comes to the site? Five-Minute 24, fer instance...

[Nate the Great]

I'm not going to point fingers; it's just not a smart thing to do.

I really should go back to the OOT dicer, shouldn't I?

[Nate the Great]

With the recent rediscovery of the Stargate fivers, I've decided to revive the dicer concept, running through my fivers in order. While I'll be copying over everything here, I recommend running through each fiver in its original format first, then coming back here for the commentary.

Entry One: "The Enemy Within"

HAMMOND: These are the first two planets you're going to go to.
O'NEILL: Flip you for it.
DAVIS: Incoming traveller! Closing the iris.
(Thump thump thump)
HAMMOND: Let's hope the Goa'uld give up soon.
KAWALSKY: I've got a headache. I'll go to the infirmary.

Haha, "Davis". Poor old Walter Harriman went through his share of placeholder names before becoming a true secondary character, didn't he? Anyway, this is a terrible scene. "Flip you for it" is the only real joke, I could've done better.

HAMMOND: Colonel Kennedy is coming to interrogate Teal'c.
O'NEILL: Doesn't that sound fun?

Sound like fun, Jack. And couldn't I have made a JFK or KFC joke?

O'NEILL: Teal'c, I'm sorry to say that some of my superiors are coming to experiment on you.
TEAL'C: I need to earn their trust.
O'NEILL: Yep.

What a snorefest. Where's the joke?

DOCTOR: How long have you been having these headaches?
KAWALSKY: Ever since I got back from Chulak.
DOCTOR: Look at that lump on your neck!
KAWALSKY: What lump? (Kills Doctor. Eyes glow.) Oh, that lump.

If I was writing this today, I'd probably attempt to spin off that old Looney Tunes joke regarding lumps of sugar and lumps on the head.

DANIEL: We need to find this device near the Stargate if we want to come back. Hey, what's Kawalsky doing there?
KAWALSKY: What am I doing here?
O'NEILL: You must have blacked out. Back to the infirmary with you.

Coma, here I come!

KENNEDY: Hi Teal'c. What do you know about how Goa'uld ships or Stargates work?
TEAL'C: Nothing.
KENNEDY: Well that was helpful.
TEAL'C: Indeed.
KENNEDY: Where did they get their slaves?
TEAL'C: From the First World, the Tau'ri.
DANIEL: Teal'c, humans evolved here.
TEAL'C: You are the Tau'ri? Wow.
O'NEILL: Indeed.

It's always nice when people other than Teal'c use "indeed", but this scene was too long.

CARTER: You need to get some sleep.
DANIEL: I know that. I just need to show the viewers I haven't forgotten about Sha're.
CARTER: OK.

This scene could've been extended, I could've even thrown in a repeat of the lump joke from earlier.

WARNER: There's a Goa'uld in Kawalsky's brain.
O'NEILL: Bummer.
KAWALSKY GOA'ULD: Time to kidnap Carter in a futile escape attempt.
CARTER: Why me?
KAWALSKY GOA'ULD: You're the closest.

I feel that I could've come up with something better than "bummer", possibly involving "buzzkill" or "wet blanket." I also think I could've made the punchline more foreboding, involving a prediction of Jolinar or something.

CARTER: You'll never escape.
KAWALSKY GOA'ULD: Shut up. (Throws her against wall)
O'NEILL: What's going on?
KAWALSKY: Help me get her to the infirmary!

On second thought, if I was rewriting this today I'd skip the whole "kidnap Carter" thing to make room for other jokes and plot points.

HAMMOND: Can you remove the Goa'uld?
WARNER: Maybe.
KAWALSKY: You need to cut it out of me!
O'NEILL: Later.

Toss this whole scene, merge the plot points with a later one.

KENNEDY: Teal'c, we need to make sure that it's not your Goa'uld in Kawalsky.
TEAL'C: OK. (He pulls it out)
O'NEILL: Yuck!

Again, there's a better O'Neill punchline somewhere...

KAWALSKY GOA'ULD: Send me through the Stargate.
HAMMOND: Not until we take you out of Kawalsky.
KAWALSKY GOA'ULD: You will all die!

Where's the joke?

KENNEDY: Maybe we should leave the Goa'uld inside Kawalsky if they'll both die if we remove it.
HAMMOND: Let me think about it. No.

That should be two different sentences. Furthermore, I should've had a joke where Hammond lords over Kennedy.

KAWALSKY: If this doesn't work kill me.
O'NEILL: OK.

Unneeded scene, skip it, skip it!

WARNER: The procedure worked!
O'NEILL: How much time do we have left in the episode?
WARNER: About twenty minutes.
O'NEILL: Then I'm sure it didn't.

Finally, a fiver-worthy scene!

KENNEDY: I'm going to turn Teal'c into a guinea pig!

Why is this here?

KAWALSKY GOA'ULD: Serve me, Jaffa!
TEAL'C: No.
KAWALSKY GOA'ULD: Then die!
TEAL'C: Sorry, I'm a main character. I can't die.
KAWALSKY GOA'ULD: Drat.
TEAL'C: Indeed.

You gotta love main character invulnerability.

KAWALSKY GOA'ULD: I'll go to Chulak!
TEAL'C: I think not.
O'NEILL: Let me stick your head in the wormhole. Turn it off!
DANIEL: Ouch.
TEAL'C: Indeed.

A little tweaking is needed, but this one isn't so bad.

HAMMOND: Thinks to a quick call to the President, Teal'c isn't going to be sent away after all.
O'NEILL: Goody.
HAMMOND: Time to go on your first mission and forget Kawalsky ever existed.
O'NEILL: OK.

Again, O'Neill saying "goody" is weird. "Cool" would be way better.

[Nate the Great]

Entry Two, "Solitudes"

(Daniel and Teal'c fall out of Stargate)
HAMMOND: Where are Jack and Sam?
TEAL'C: They must have taken wrong turn somewhere.

No mention of Albuquerque? I would've referenced Weird Al AND Bugs Bunny given this opportunity.

TEAL'C: We were under fire. They were right behind us.
TECHNICIAN: You broke the Stargate. It'll take a few days to fix it.
HAMMOND: Bummer.

There should've been a voided warranty joke in here somewhere. Given a little more time I think I could've come up with something more Hammond-esque than "bummer" as well.

O'NEILL: Where are we?
CARTER: In some kind of ice cavern. I can't find Daniel or Teal'c. Oh,
and you broke your leg.
O'NEILL: Bummer.
CARTER: Here's the DHD. It's frozen in a block of ice!
O'NEILL: Double bummer.

The last line should've been "And me without my Fire Arrows." Who cares if it's a relatively obscure Zelda joke, it would've made me smile.

HAMMOND: We'll see if they're on that planet you were on.
TECHNICIAN: The probe was blown up as soon as it got there!
HAMMOND: Bummer.
TEAL'C: Indeed.

Seriously, Past Nate, knock it off with all the bummers!

DANIEL: Due to technobabble, they must be on one of these planets.
HAMMOND: Start searching.

CARTER: I've uncovered the DHD. I'm trying it now.

DANIEL: Why did the room start shaking?

There's a milkshake joke in here somewhere.

CARTER: It's not working!
O'NEILL: Take the supplies and climb out.
CARTER: I won't leave you!
O'NEILL: That's an order.
CARTER: OK.

Zzzzzz.....

HAMMOND: We've searched all of the planets. Time to give up.
DANIEL: Wait a minute! There must be a second Stargate! That's what was
making the ground shake! They're here on Earth!
HAMMOND: Why didn't you figure this out earlier?
DANIEL: We had to fill an hour.
TECHNICIAN: The earthquake came from Antarctica.
HAMMOND: OK, lets go rescue them just before they freeze to death.

The ever classic "we had to fill an hour"/Idiot Plot joke.

CARTER: It's an ice planet! We're doomed!
HAMMOND: No you're not!
CARTER: Where did you come from?
HAMMOND: Who knows? We only had five minutes left.

A few too many "five minute" jokes in this one.

[Nate the Great]

Entry Three: "The Serpent's Lair"

CARTER: We've set all of our explosives to blow up this ship.
O'NEILL: Great. Prepare to detonate.
TEAL'C: Uh-oh. Apophis' ship is coming.
O'NEILL: I knew it couldn't be this easy.
TEAL'C: Indeed.
GRENADE: Boom.

"Uh-oh"? That doesn't sound like Teal'c. "Set all of our explosives?" Just "We're ready to blow up this ship" would have been adequate.

O'NEILL: Ouch. I'm blind!
TEAL'C: That's just a side effect of the grenade, included for the sake of these cute blind moments.
O'NEILL: That's fun. Not!
CARTER: Now I can see!
O'NEILL: What happened to the blind moments?
DANIEL: We only have five minutes.
O'NEILL: Right.

I should've either skipped the blind stuff or expanded it to have jokes throughout the rest of the fiver (including several Daredevil punchlines, of course).

BRA'TAC: Time to ressurect Klorel to stall for time!

SAMUELS: Hi.
HAMMOND: Not you again.
SAMUELS: Look at my nifty new naquadah warheads! I'm going to blow up the Goa'uld ships!
HAMMOND: Yea, right.

Should've turned Samuels into more of a pyromaniac. And for some reason I forgot the "h" in "yeah."

APOPHIS: Excecute the humans!
BRA'TAC: OK.

There's another typo. Ugh.

BRA'TAC: Hi.
O'NEILL: Hi.
BRA'TAC: I was going to make Apophis and Korel kill each other, but you had to interfere, didn't you?
O'NEILL: Nice to see you, too.

Should've explained Korel a bit.

HAMMOND: Why are the ships just hanging there?

BRA'TAC: Here are your weapons. We need to stall until your spacecraft destroy this ship.
DANIEL: Well, all we have is shuttles but due to budgetary constraints we can't afford a space battle scene.
BRA'TAC: Drat.
TEAL'C: Indeed.

Ha ha. Should've tracked down when SG-1 actually did start doing space battles so I could say "we won't be able to do that for X years."

HAMMOND: You are the best and the brightest people that we can find. In case the planeet goes foom, you're going to start a new society at Alpha site.

"Planeet"? I must've forgotten to use my spellchecker before sending it to Nan. There should've been an Adam and Eve joke from one of the Alpha Site colonists.

O'NEILL: So even with a few gliders we couldn't destroy Apophis' ship?
TEAL'C: Indeed.
CARTER: Well, the explosives will blow up this ship.
O'NEILL: So we need to get to the other one.

There has to be a funnier way to cover this.

SAMUELS: There go my missiles! How exciting!

APOPHIS: Missiles? Don't make me laugh! Shields!

HAMMOND: The missiles didn't work.
SAMUELS: Drat.

Skip the Apophis line, combine the two Samuels scenes, and add a joke.

BRA'TAC: Do you have any more explosive?
CARTER: Nope.
BRA'TAC: Drat.
TEAL'C: Indeed.

Should've thrown in a MacGyver joke, "not unless you have a stick of chewing gum and some duct tape" or something.

SAMUELS: I'm scared.
HAMMOND: Cry me a river. Go and sulk in the corner.

DANIEL: I'm shot. Leave me behind.
O'NEILL: I won't.
DANIEL: I'm a main character. I can't die.
O'NEILL: Right, I keep forgetting.
TEAL'C: Indeed.

I do use the main character invulnerability joke a lot, don't I?

BRA'TAC: I directed the two ships toward each other. If we disable the shields on Apophis' ship it will be destroyed along with this one.
O'NEILL: Thanks to our last two grenades the shields are gone.
BRA'TAC: That was way too easy.
TEAL'C: Indeed.

HAMMOND: I've launched the shuttle. Hopefully the budget will let us see it this time.

DANIEL: Hi. I used the Stargate on the ship with a second to go on the detonation.
HAMMOND: Lucky you.
DANIEL: Not luck, my contract.

I've said it before, the main character invulnerability joke is always funny.

O'NEILL: Good thing we were on these gliders when the ships blew up.
CARTER: Oh-oh, we were damaged in the explosion. I guess we're going to die after all.
O'NEILL: I think not. There's a shuttle right there.
CARTER: Wow! I thought I'd never see one of those!
TEAL'C: Indeed.

How could a space shuttle dock with a death glider?

BRA'TAC: Hi, Hammond. I've got to go.
O'NEILL: Great. Please don't show up again until next season.

I don't know why I said this. I like Bra'tac, and he'll appear seven episodes from now anyway.

[Nate the Great]

Entry Four: "Need"

O'NEILL: Look at the Jaffa carrying naquadah through the Stargate.
CARTER: We can see them.
O'NEILL: Well the reader didn't.
CARTER: Oh.
TEAL'C: Indeed.

This must've been early on before I learned to dial back on this sort of fourth wall-breaking expositional gag.

DANIEL: She's going to jump!
CARTER: Who?
DANIEL: That woman there on the edge of the cliff.
CARTER: So now we can see them? Stop confusing me.
O'NEILL: Calm down.
DANIEL: My turn to be the hero, right?
O'NEILL: Let me check the schedule. Okay.... hmmm... yep, your episode.
DANIEL: Good. I'll go rescue her.

I do like the schedule gag.

SHYLA: Huh?
JAFFA: Get away from her!
O'NEILL: Sure.

"Huh?" doesn't seem to fit. That should've been more descriptive.

SHYLA: This is my dad, Pyrus the God Slayer.
O'NEILL: What a great name. Do you put that on your income tax returns? Occupation: God Slayer.
PYRUS: Silence! Off the naquadah mine with you!
O'NEILL: Bummer.
TEAL'C: Indeed.

I do like the occupation gag, whether for tax returns or business cards.

JAFFA: Dig!
O'NEILL: You know I would, but I'll think I'll futilely try to excape now.
JAFFA: OK.
JAFFA 2: Yeah right.
O'NEILL: I told you it was futile.

Seriously Nate, spellchecker. Should've tried to fit a Borg joke in here.

PYRUS: It stinks that even though I use a sarcophagus I'll still die soon.
SHYLA: Yep, bummer.

I need to dial back on the bummers.

SHYLA: Hi. What's your name?
DANIEL: Daniel Jackson.
SHYLA: Great. Use this sarcophagus to heal your wounds.
DANIEL: Are you sure?
SHYLA: We need to advance the plot. Get in.
DANIEL: OK.

Should've changed the punchline to something like "Are you sure this won't make me crazy?" "I've used it tons of times and I'm the picture of mental health, right?" "That's debatable, but you're hot so okay."

DANIEL: Let my friends go.
SHYLA: I would, but I need to keep them as hostages so I can seduce you.
DANIEL: OK.
SHYLA: By the way, you're my destiny.
DANIEL: Works for me.

I wonder why I didn't make a Captain Kirk joke anywhere in this fiver. For that matter "you're my destiny" just invites a Back to the Future joke, right?

DANIEL: Hi guys. I'd let you go, but I need more time to be seduced by the princess.
O'NEILL: Hey!
TEAL'C: Indeed.

O'Neill should've said "I thought that was my job!"

PYRUS: I killed the Goa'uld 700 years ago.
DANIEL: Kudos to your plastic surgeon.
PYRUS: We keep sending naquadah through the Stargate so they won't reconquer us.
DANIEL: Boy, a plan like that is sure to blow up in your face someday.
PYRUS: Leave now!
DANIEL: Boy, is he touchy.

"Kudos" is a word I use as often as I can, which isn't very often.

SHYLA: We'll convince him to release your friends.
DANIEL: Sounds like plan to me. Wait a sec, aren't you keeping them around so you can seduce me?
SHYLA: That was the general plan.
DANIEL: Well, it worked. You can let my friends go, I'll stay here with you.
SHYLA: Time for another nap in the sarcophagus.
DANIEL: Sure.

That was a weak punchline, should've thrown in a milk and cookies joke, or maybe a teddy bear joke.

DANIEL (over radio): Hi General Hammond. Having a great time. Don't send any troops here or anything.
HAMMOND: I wonder what that was about?

This is okay, I guess.

DANIEL: I'm going to marry Shyla. Oh, and I'm addicted to the sarcophagus too.
O'NEILL: Why does that not sound good?
CARTER: Jolinar told me that the sarcophagus will steal your soul.
O'NEILL: Jolinar again? That plot device is getting old.
CARTER: If I didn't use it the nitpickers would be asking why I don't.
O'NEILL: Drat.
TEAL'C: Indeed.

For all of the continuity Stargate SG-1 keeps track of, there are also things that they forgot to follow up on. But as Alton Brown would say, that's another thread.

DANIEL: I'm going home with my friends now, but I'll be back.
SHYLA: I know you'll be back.

Sorry, but no Terminator joke. I haven't watched any of those movies.

DANIEL: Ack!
FRAISER: He's going through sarcophagus withdrawl.
O'NEILL: Serves him right for leaving us to rot in a mine while he had a fling.
FRAISER: But he's dying!
O'NEILL: Serves him right--
FRAISER: Be quiet!

Should've had "my contract says that I get to make out with the alien princesses" in there somewhere.

FRAISER: He's not dying after all.
O'NEILL: Yipee.

DANIEL: I'm alright now. Why don't we go back to that planet now?
O'NEILL: Are you sure?
CARTER: We need the naquadah.
O'NEILL: Oh, fine.

SHYLA: You're back!
DANIEL: Yes, but I'm not staying.
SHYLA: Bummer.
DANIEL: You need to destroy the sarcophagus now.
SHYLA: OK.

Zzzzzz......