"That's right, Dorothy. It was all a dream."
This may, perhaps, have been a bit of a breather, an episode to slow down a bit after the eventful and no doubt expensive pilot... indeed, this is almost a bottle episode as, unlike the pilot, it takes place wholly on the existing sets, with no location filming at all. And the premise- Major Kawalski is infected by a Go'auld that seeks to destroy the team from within, and the ensuing ethical dilemma of how to deal with him- is an intrinsically good one.
Yet the execution (SPOILERS) is even better. There's lots of tension. Colonel Kennedy is used as an antagonist so that none of the regulars have to show disloyalty to their friend. The operation seemingly going well offers hope, of course, for the team's missing friends. But the final twist- the Go'auld remained in Kawalski's brain even after the op- is a deeply effective shock, as is the very early death of what seemed set to be a series regular, reminding me of Jesse from Buffy.
Again, the use of Colonel Kennedy also allows the episode to deal with the question of how teal.c is to be treated, going from prisoner and potential lab rat to trusted team member. I notice also that he's an ever-convenient source of exposition, but he's also beginning to learn more about his ancestral homeworld.
A bottle episode, then, but one that has some massive twists and is vitally important for setting up our initial staus quo. I'm still very much enjoying this.
Teal'c also as exposition.
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