Stargate SG-1, Season 5, Episode 6

"Rite of Passage"

images used above are courtesy of Gateworld and MGM

Overall Rating:  Good

Commentary by:
Peter DeLuise -- Director
James Tichenor -- Visual Effects Producer

The commentary is very informative, and interesting.  Lots of behind the scene information.  The commentary stays on point with what is on screen.

Review:
Cassandra, the charming child from “Singularity” is now a petulant teenager.  Dr. Frasier adopted her about four years ago.  At home, after giving Dr. Frasier some attitude, Cassandra heads to the front porch, and her awaiting honey-bunny.  She and her boyfriend smooch.  The porch light shatters and Cassandra falls unconscious.  Frasier takes her to the SGC infirmary.   Along with severe flu-like symptoms, Cassandra is also producing a fluctuating electro-magnetic field, which increases in strength over time.

The Goa’uld Nirrti (“Fair Game”) wiped out everyone in the girl’s village, and implanted a bomb inside Cassandra that would have destroyed Earth’s stargate, and much of the western United States.  Considering her past actions, Nirrti is considered a likely source of the retrovirus causing Cassandra’s current illness.  Without a cure, she will die.

Video of the girl’s people taken by SG folks documents other children exhibiting the same symptoms as Cassandra now experiences.  The children would go into a nearby forest while they were ill, and return to the village a few days later, suddenly healthy.  Cassandra wants to go to the forest, located on her home world.  Instead, SG-1 goes to the planet, and into the forest.  There, they discover a secret laboratory, apparently belonging to Nirrti.  Dr. Frasier and the team try to determine the cause of Cassandra’s illness before she dies.

Colleen Rennison portrays Cassandra.  Ms. Rennison portrayed the plucky ‘tween in “Bane.”  The part in this episode calls for a sullen teen, and Ms. Rennison delivers.  Another actor, Katie Stuart, was Cassandra in “Singularity.”  Everyone’s performances were nice.

Failures:
Years have passed since Cassandra’s last appearance on Stargate SG-1.  The character is different now, and rightly so.  However, not being a party to the changes in Cassandra as she grew up makes it difficult for me to embrace the new, snippy, antagonistic, cranky, smart-mouth version of her present in most of this episode.