Seven Moments Of Teyla Emmagan Awesomeness
In the spirit of halfamoon's Celebration of Female Characters (and as my late choc_fic 100 Days Of Colour entry), I present to you:
Rising
We'll start with Teyla going back for Aiden Ford after their escape from the Wraith hiveship. He's shooting blindly at unseen foes, confused by the 'phantoms' that the Wraith project as they cull.
Teyla appears out of nowhere, disarms the young Marine before he can shoot, and hands him back his weapon, telling him that he's shooting at shadows. She then drags him out of the way of a culling beam as a Wraith dart passes by overhead - having earlier rescued Sheppard in much the same way, although that time, she saved him but couldn't stop from being culled herself.
That disarm is neat, by the way. Teyla doesn't just drag it out of his hands, she nips it from his fingers, flips it around and hands it back to him.
The Long Goodbye
When Sheppard and Weir are taken over by hostile aliens seeking to kill each other, Teyla's the one who captures Thalen/Sheppard so Phoebus/Weir won't make good on her threat to poison half the city. She tricks Phoebus into thinking she's disarmed by holding up her hands - having relinquished her weapon to a supposedly-unconscious and formerly-possessed Sheppard mere seconds earlier.
Once Phoebus/Weir is disabled, Teyla then informs Sheppard that handing him the weapon was her Xanatos Gambit, since whether he was Sheppard or the possessing alien, he would have disabled the alien in Weir anyway.
Phantoms
Teyla's moment of awesome comes right at the end of this episode, when she takes one look at Rodney's work in trying to turn off a machine that's making them all hallucinate things that aren't there, and sees where he's at and how close he was to completing it. One look!
Of course, even once she's identified how to turn off the machine, she then has to appeal to Sheppard to pull the plug since she got injured back in the first fifteen minutes of the episode. Did I mention that Sheppard's hallucinating his time in Afghanistan and has gone crazycakes? Yeah, Teyla has to get through that, too - and does so in time for John to pull the plug before Ronon shoots them.
Submersion
Teyla goes up against an ancient Wraith Queen three times, mind to mind, and if there's no TKO, she does manage to play out a Batman Gambit on the Queen.
Classic blunders by the Wraith: The first is never get involved in a genocidal war in Pegasus. The second, only slightly less well-known is this: never go up against an Athosian when death is on the line.
Reunion
Teyla kicks assorted asses throughout the seasons of the show. This time, she kicks Ronon's.
While blindfolded. Yes, that's right. Mr. Survived-Seven-Years-Hunted-By-The-Wraith-And-Can-Kill-You-With-His-Pinky is beaten by a blindfolded Teyla.
Spoils Of War
What's a pregnant woman to do in the Pegasus galaxy? Just keep going? Daily life doesn't stop just because you're pregnant! And sometimes 'daily life' involves flying Wraith hiveships to secret rendesvous points where your enemies are trying to start an SGA version of the Clone Wars, and sometimes 'daily life' involves taking over the minds of Wraith Queens so you can save your team-mates from being fed upon.
Todd's exclamation of "Impossible!" was a nice touch. But someone should introduce him to Vizzini - Sheppard, maybe? "Inconceivable!" has a nice rhythm to it.
The Prodigal
Having kidnapped Teyla's people, turned her baby's daddy into a hybrid drone, threatened her son, and tried to kill her and her team-mates more times than Ronon's completed a mission report, Michael finally overreaches himself while trying to get hold of Teyla and her son one last time. After spending most of the episode either defying Michael or on the run, Teyla finally gets the opportunity to deal with Michael.
And she does. She kicks him off a ledge.
There's no handwringing, no overly-elaborate plots to kill him; Michael's a threat, Teyla deals with it. She also rescues John, who was pretty much getting his ass handed to him on a platter by Michael.
This isn’t an execution at the end of the gun, either; this is up close and very personal. Michael has time to make one plea for mercy while hanging by his fingers...then she kicks him off the ledge and watches him fall. Game over.
There are other moments, sequences, and plots in which Teyla is specifically awesome - as compared to being generally amazing - but these are the ones that stick out for me.
Teyla Emmagan: Made Of Awesome
Rising
We'll start with Teyla going back for Aiden Ford after their escape from the Wraith hiveship. He's shooting blindly at unseen foes, confused by the 'phantoms' that the Wraith project as they cull.
Teyla appears out of nowhere, disarms the young Marine before he can shoot, and hands him back his weapon, telling him that he's shooting at shadows. She then drags him out of the way of a culling beam as a Wraith dart passes by overhead - having earlier rescued Sheppard in much the same way, although that time, she saved him but couldn't stop from being culled herself.
That disarm is neat, by the way. Teyla doesn't just drag it out of his hands, she nips it from his fingers, flips it around and hands it back to him.
The Long Goodbye
When Sheppard and Weir are taken over by hostile aliens seeking to kill each other, Teyla's the one who captures Thalen/Sheppard so Phoebus/Weir won't make good on her threat to poison half the city. She tricks Phoebus into thinking she's disarmed by holding up her hands - having relinquished her weapon to a supposedly-unconscious and formerly-possessed Sheppard mere seconds earlier.
Once Phoebus/Weir is disabled, Teyla then informs Sheppard that handing him the weapon was her Xanatos Gambit, since whether he was Sheppard or the possessing alien, he would have disabled the alien in Weir anyway.
Phantoms
Teyla's moment of awesome comes right at the end of this episode, when she takes one look at Rodney's work in trying to turn off a machine that's making them all hallucinate things that aren't there, and sees where he's at and how close he was to completing it. One look!
Of course, even once she's identified how to turn off the machine, she then has to appeal to Sheppard to pull the plug since she got injured back in the first fifteen minutes of the episode. Did I mention that Sheppard's hallucinating his time in Afghanistan and has gone crazycakes? Yeah, Teyla has to get through that, too - and does so in time for John to pull the plug before Ronon shoots them.
Submersion
Teyla goes up against an ancient Wraith Queen three times, mind to mind, and if there's no TKO, she does manage to play out a Batman Gambit on the Queen.
Classic blunders by the Wraith: The first is never get involved in a genocidal war in Pegasus. The second, only slightly less well-known is this: never go up against an Athosian when death is on the line.
Reunion
Teyla kicks assorted asses throughout the seasons of the show. This time, she kicks Ronon's.
While blindfolded. Yes, that's right. Mr. Survived-Seven-Years-Hunted-By-The-Wraith-And-Can-Kill-You-With-His-Pinky is beaten by a blindfolded Teyla.
Spoils Of War
What's a pregnant woman to do in the Pegasus galaxy? Just keep going? Daily life doesn't stop just because you're pregnant! And sometimes 'daily life' involves flying Wraith hiveships to secret rendesvous points where your enemies are trying to start an SGA version of the Clone Wars, and sometimes 'daily life' involves taking over the minds of Wraith Queens so you can save your team-mates from being fed upon.
Todd's exclamation of "Impossible!" was a nice touch. But someone should introduce him to Vizzini - Sheppard, maybe? "Inconceivable!" has a nice rhythm to it.
The Prodigal
Having kidnapped Teyla's people, turned her baby's daddy into a hybrid drone, threatened her son, and tried to kill her and her team-mates more times than Ronon's completed a mission report, Michael finally overreaches himself while trying to get hold of Teyla and her son one last time. After spending most of the episode either defying Michael or on the run, Teyla finally gets the opportunity to deal with Michael.
And she does. She kicks him off a ledge.
There's no handwringing, no overly-elaborate plots to kill him; Michael's a threat, Teyla deals with it. She also rescues John, who was pretty much getting his ass handed to him on a platter by Michael.
This isn’t an execution at the end of the gun, either; this is up close and very personal. Michael has time to make one plea for mercy while hanging by his fingers...then she kicks him off the ledge and watches him fall. Game over.
There are other moments, sequences, and plots in which Teyla is specifically awesome - as compared to being generally amazing - but these are the ones that stick out for me.
Teyla Emmagan: Made Of Awesome