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The events of ‘Heroes Part 1’ and ‘Part 2’ shocked Stargate fandom but as Kayleigh Dray argues, the tragic death of Dr. Janet Fraiser has only become more affecting in the years since it was broadcast.
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The events of ‘Heroes Part 1’ and ‘Part 2’ shocked Stargate fandom but as Kayleigh Dray argues, the tragic death of Dr. Janet Fraiser has only become more affecting in the years since it was broadcast.
Content Warning: This Audio Article deals with the death of a character, please be advised.
Content Warning: This Audio Article deals with the death of a character, please be advised.
Read by Rebecca Davis and written by Kayleigh Dray. Theme song by Lofi Geek.
Excerpts from Martin Wood’s Stargate SG-1 Explorer Unit fan club interview: https://www.gateworld.net/sg1/s7/heroes-part-2/
Robert C. Cooper’s GateWorld interview: https://www.gateworld.net/news/2021/01/how-heroes-came-to-be-stargate-most-memorable-episodes/
The original article on The Companion: https://www.thecompanion.app/2022/05/10/firefly/
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What is Audio Articles – Longreads from The Companion?
The Companion's Audio Articles are recorded and produced versions of some of our deep dives, untold stories and interviews that we don't think you'll find anywhere else.
content and spoiler warning.
Before we begin, this article
deals with the death of a
character. Please be advised
as you're listening to the
Companions audio articles, a new
series that features our best
stories on the companion. I'm
Rebecca Davis. Today I'll be
reading a piece about one of
arguably the most iconic and
important episodes of SG-1.
Heroes has always been one of my
favourite moments in Stargate
history, and also one of the
most devastating in reading
through this piece I realised
that there are very real and
relevant modern reasons why
losing someone like Janet
Frazier would still hurt to this
day, and why that two part
episode remains so iconic. Janet
stet stings now more than ever,
by Kaylee, Dray, and
Stargate SG-1 is on the surface
of beautifully fun and zany romp
of a sci fi series. We have a
bevvy of suitably wild costumes
usually based on those worn in
ancient Egypt. The villains are
campy and fond of heavy eye
makeup. There is to a bevvy of
new oxygen rich worlds for our
plucky heroes to explore,
usually with suspiciously North
American esque landscapes true,
but sometimes strewn all over
with fairy lights and strange
flora and fauna for that oh so
alien effect. And on the subject
of those aforementioned plucky
heroes, we have a core team of
warm and quick witted men and
women, fine woman, all of whom
are seemingly equipped with as
many jokes as they are bullets,
or in the case of Tilke as many
eyebrow raises as he has mattock
blasts. That's only on the
surface. However, because his
diehard fans of Stargate SG-1
will already know all too well.
The show's true story runs far
deeper than that. The gate
system allows for a new planet
and a new thought provoking
theme to be explored each
episode. Over the years we
retreated to thoughtful hot
takes on everything from
politics and flawed prison
systems, to pandemics ever
relevant in our post COVID world
and the classic good versus evil
divide. Our heroes may have been
plucky, and they may have been
able to find the humour in these
situations, but they weren't
perfect by any means. Colonel
Jack O'Neill still grieving the
death of his young son had a
noticeably short temper at
times. Major Samantha Carter was
sometimes too stringent in her
scientific applications, failing
to see the more human answer to
a problem in her dogged pursuit
of logic. Dr. Daniel Jackson's
unshakable belief and others
morality often led him to
overestimate their capacity for
doing the right thing. And
Tilke? Well, while Tilke was the
very definition of a gentle
giant, his unshakable hatred of
the go old often prompted him to
snake bait and put himself in
danger many times over. War
doesn't discriminate.
Essentially, the Quartet that
made up SG-1 were believably
fallible, although they always
followed a strict moral code and
strive to do the right thing
wherever and whenever they
could. And this fallibility, of
course, came hand in hand with
something not unlike simmering
darkness. Because this show was
let's face it every bit as dark
as it was fun. How could it not
be hidden underneath Cheyenne
Mountain? The Stargate programme
was a top secret military outlet
under the control of the US
government. This meant for
starters, that there was
opportunity for corruption and
thinking about secrets season
two, episode nine in particular,
in which a journalist named
Armand Selleck somehow learned
about the Stargate programme and
relentlessly pursued Colonel
O'Neill in his bid to confirm
the leak and get the ultimate
scoop. The journalist story
never ran Of course, he was run
down by a speeding car in
Washington DC. In his dying
moments, he cursed O'Neill for
having him killed and while him
and reassured a shaken jack that
nothing sinister had taken
place. It was an accident. Yes,
sir. The show forever implied
that Selig's death was no
accident. It meant to that the
continued usage of the Stargate
didn't just allow Earth to forge
new offworld friendships. It
also introduced our planet to
new enemies. And this combined
with the show's penchant for
deep themes and fallible
characters, so our core heroes
constantly thrown into danger at
every turn. So much so actually,
that we often worried that one
day one or all of them would
fail to return through the
wormhole that they will be taken
prisoner or injured or worse.
First of all, killed in battle.
But war as the news constantly
reminds us at the moment reaches
far further than the frontlines,
that one doesn't have to engage
in battle to find themselves
caught up in it. And this is
underlined in Stargate SG-1's
unforgettable two parter heroes,
in which one of the show's most
beloved characters is killed
during an offworld mission. It
was the sort of death that took
everyone by surprise. We knew
that someone was due to be
killed off shore, and we knew
that it would be somewhat
important. We had seen Colonel
O'Neill take a staff less to the
torso after all, and we had seen
an unidentified yet clearly
lifeless body on a gurney back
at the base. We too had seen a
tearful major Carter struggling
to comprehend the tragedy, and
we knew all about her unspoken
feelings for O'Neil. Plus, there
were rumours that Richard Dean
Anderson was planning to leave
the show. It made sense to us
then, that the soldier we'd all
fallen in love with during the
previous seven seasons had been
killed in the line of duty.
Instead, footage accidentally
recorded by Dr. Jackson revealed
the truth. The ever dependable
Dr. Janet Frazier had also gone
through the gate that day
medical gear in hand, and she
had been fighting to save the
life of a wounded soldier. When
a shot from a Jaffar shuttle hit
her squarely rendering the new
protective vest designed by the
SGC useless to save her. Dr.
Fraser our Janet had died on the
spot. Thinking the unthinkable
it was the ultimate bait and
switch by writers because Dr.
Fraiser wasn't someone we
expected to be in the line of
fire. We never associated her
with the horrifying chaos of
battle. Instead, she had served
as the metaphorical embodiment
of safety and healing for the
best part of a decade. Whenever
our heroes had awoken under her
care in the past, we knew all
will be well because her
reassuring presence had long
signified that everything would
be okay. And the idea that she
wouldn't be there anymore to
welcome SG-1 back through the
gate. It was honestly
inconceivable. As Robert C
Cooper, the episodes writer told
GateWorld, anytime we talked
about killing a character, it
was obviously a big deal in the
room. And in that case, we
didn't do it lightly. He added
to me, it was like you have to
occasionally lose someone in
order for there to be any real
jeopardy in order to feel like
there are actual stakes in the
show. If we just lost a red
shirt, I don't think it would
have been the same. One of
SG-1's regular directors Martin
would echoed this sentiment in
an interview with the Stargate
SG-1 Explorer's Unit official
fanclub saying, you know, what
is the difference in heroes from
everything else we've done?
Robert Cooper sat down and came
up with a story that was a
dramatic story inside what we
normally do. Inside the show
that we normally do is an oasis
of drama in heroes. And it
doesn't feel like anything that
we've done before. When you're
going to take a major character
and take them out of the show.
You have to do it that way.
Because it's the only way you
can actually deal with that he
finished. The end result was in
this writer's opinion, two of
the best hours of television
ever aired. Emotional, impactful
and provocative. It left many of
us in tears, including Dr.
Fraiser actor Teryl Rothery. The
script killed me she said of her
character's final episode during
an interview with gateworld I
just wept. It was so sad, and I
still haven't watched it.
Fighting for life. Of course, it
seemed strange that the episode
should have such an enormous
effect on us all. The character
we lost wasn't one of the core
force him after all, her death
occurred off screen. Although
unusually, we were still allowed
to witness it via grainy footage
filmed by Dr. Jackson. She
didn't get a big goodbye or
dramatic deathbed scene. She was
there one moment doing what she
did best. And then she was gone.
Know the success of heroes was
never hinged upon his big death
scene. Instead, it was down to
writers taking the time to shine
the spotlight on the life that
Dr. Fraser To lift and the
endless good she put into the
world. Janet Fraser was an
extraordinary person. Major
Carter said during an emotional
eulogy for the late doctor. She
was kind and funny, and
talented. Above all, she was
courageous. Try as I might, I
could not find the words to
honour her to do justice to her
life. Thankfully, I got some
help. She continued.
While words alone may not be
enough, there are some names
that might do. We often talk
about those that give their
lives in the service of their
country.
While Janet Fraser did just
that, it's not what her life was
about. The following are the
names of the men and women who
did not die in service. But who
are in fact alive today. Because
of Janet. Major Samantha Carter,
Dr. Daniel Jackson, Colonel Jack
O'Neill,
Teal'c, Sergeant Connie Smith,
Major Ian Hughes, Senior Airman
Simon Wells. This list of names
served as a fitting testimony to
her character's role in the
show. Each of those lives saved
felt like a tiny glimmer of hope
in a very dark place. Despite
this, though, Dr. Frazier's
death hurt us on a far deeper
level than we realised at the
time, because it reminded us
that nobody, nobody is untouched
by war. All these years later,
the sentiment remains all too
sadly true. Indeed, the
distressing photos currently
being circulated by news outlets
and on social media have
provoked an intense state of
anxiety and sense of existential
threat in many of us, and
prompted many of us to switch
off from what's happening. And
that's largely because these
images feature ordinary people,
people like us, and Janet caught
up in unimaginably horrifying
situations. War must be while we
defend our lives against a
destroyer who would devour all,
but I do not love the bright
sword for its sharpness, nor the
arrow for its swiftness nor the
warrior for His glory, said JRR
Tolkien. I love only that which
they defend. We cannot switch
off from the news. Not really.
And we shouldn't. It's important
to stay engaged with world
events. And it's important to
remember that each casualty
isn't just another number or
meaningless statistic. It's
someone like Janet, someone with
a rich backstory and people who
care about them. Someone whose
absence will be felt by those
who loved them. Someone who's
quiet impact has been felt by
the people around them for
years, even if they might not
have realised that at the time.
That's why Dr. Frazier's death
was so significant. It took the
incomprehensible toll of war and
boiled it down to just one
person. And in doing so, it
helped us to feel that yawning
ache of loss more keenly than we
would have with just another
report from general Hammond on
the countless lives lost. But
while Dr. Frazier's death
hammered home the awful impact
of battle, it also highlighted
the need to protect human life.
As Fred Rogers famously said,
when I was a boy and I would see
scary things in the news, my
mother would say to me, look for
the helpers, you will always
find people who are helping.
Janet was a helper. She fought
to preserve life, not to end it.
Her role in battle was to
protect others, patch up wounds,
and uphold basic human decency.
We too, should do our best to be
the helpers we see in the world.
Because if there's one thing we
learned from Janet, it is that
our desire to do right by other
people is far more powerful than
the desire to inflict fear and
oppression. Goodness will
prevail while evil will not. And
let's be honest, when we all
like to be remembered as a
Doctor Janet Frazier, someone
who put nothing but goodness
into the world I know I would.
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