Vala Mal Doran

Vala Mal Doran is a fictional character in the television series Stargate SG-1 played by the actress Claudia Black.

Background & History

Very little is known about Vala during the early portions of her life. Towards the end of season 10, we learn that Vala was very close to her mother and had a strained relationship with her con artist father. Although it's never explicitly stated, the implications are that Vala's mother died sometime during her youth, and her father remarried a woman named Adria, whom Vala held in very little regard. According to Vala (and this information may be suspect), she had also been engaged to someone shortly before being taken as a host.

Vala was eventually taken as a host to a Goa'uld named Qetesh (named for the sex goddess of Chaldean and Egyptian mythology). It's not clear how long Vala was a host, but the fact that her father is still alive and seemingly unaware of his daughter's time as Qetesh implies that she is only as old as (or slightly older than) she appears. She claimed that the Tok'ra eventually incited an uprising and the Goa'uld symbiote was removed. However, Vala also claims that the Tok'ra forgot to tell the people of the village that the person who had so harshly ruled them was not Vala herself, but another being controlling her, and as a result the villagers stoned Vala, mistakenly thinking that it was Vala who had enslaved them. The Tok'ra supposedly rescued her before she was killed, and nursed her back to health from near death. As a consequence, Vala has Naqahdah in her blood and can operate most Goa'uld technology, including the Healing Device.

Although Qetesh is never mentioned before Vala's appearance, in the episode "Insiders," it is stated that Qetesh had a formidable fleet that was able to cripple the fleet of the System Lord Ba'al. It is implied that there may have been a relationship or flirtation between Ba'al and herself. In "Dominion," Vala is recognized as Qetesh by a Tok'ra named Ta'seem. His icy reception suggests a connection between the two in the past (although it is never explained).

After she was freed from Qetesh, Vala became a thief and a con artist. She had ties with the Lucian Alliance, but double crossed them as she did many of her criminal partners.

Seasons 8-9

Vala first appeared in the Season Eight episode "Prometheus Unbound", in which she attempted to steal the Prometheus to trade for weapons-grade Naqahdah, but her plans were thwarted by Daniel Jackson; as was later revealed, this gave her and Daniel a bad name with the Lucian Alliance. Vala eventually escaped from the Prometheus on a captured Al'kesh.

Vala later sought out Daniel Jackson on Earth after she obtained a tablet written in an Ancient cipher; she bound Daniel to her with a bracelet which renders the wearers unconscious and eventually dead if they become separated for too long (originally used by the Goa'uld Cronos to assure that a prisoner did not escape from a Jaffa guard). The consequence of this binding, to which Daniel had not consented, was that he missed his passage to Atlantis on board the Daedalus. The tablet Vala had brought (which Daniel now grudgingly agreed to decipher) led to the discovery of an Ancient/Alteran chamber containing an Ancient communication device and a book which identifies the Avalon of Arthurian mythology to be the name the Ancients called Earth. Together, she and Daniel Jackson use what is apparently an Ancient communicator found as a result of the tablet, to encounter a village in a distant galaxy populated by descendants of the Ancients. There they encounter the Ori for the first time. The Ori turn out to be Ascended beings who dictate that those who do not follow them are evil. Vala was killed by a Trial by Fire after she was accused of being evil and possessed, though she was soon resurrected by one of the Priors (humans loyal to the Ori who are granted special powers). After this, she and Dr. Jackson were taken to the city of the Ori, where they were kept as prisoners; they were returned to the village to be burned. At this juncture, however, Lt. Colonel Cameron Mitchell and Teal'c successfully destroyed the Ancient communication device by throwing it into the vortex (unstable opening state of a wormhole) of the Stargate, obliterating it and saving the lives of both Daniel and Vala.

Prior to meeting the Tau'ri, she had used a voice-altering device on a planet formerly ruled by Qetesh to pretend that she herself was Qetesh, thus gaining the minute quantities of Naqahdah still in the planet's mines. She was by and large a fair ruler, but she did employ forced labor. She invented a trial-like proceeding called a "Mal Doran" on that planet.

Vala appeared to die in the process of stopping the Ori from setting up a Supergate in the Milky Way but later reappeared in "Crusade" where we learn that she was thrown to an Ori homeworld where she lived undercover.

File:919Vala.jpg

Vala, heavily pregnant, in Crusade

After recovering the communications device in the Ori home world, she takes over Daniel's body in an attempt to transmit information back to SG-1. She tells them how she was rescued by a man, and lived undercover, trying to blend in. Then Vala drops a bombshell: she tells SG-1 that she's pregnant. The biggest mystery is that she did none of the necessary acts to become pregnant. Fearing for her life, she marries the man who saved her and convinces him that she is carrying his child. She discovers the truth about the child—that it's the "divine" work of the Ori—by overhearing a conversation between her husband and a Prior. As she starts to tell SG-1 about the army approaching them, the link is severed and Daniel is back to himself.

Vala is last seen in the closing scene of "Camelot" at the end of Season 9 aboard one of the invading Ori battlecruisers. She appears very far along in her pregnancy at this point, and the season ends when she senses she is going into labour.

Season 10

After the battle, Vala gives birth to her daughter Adria, known to the Ori as the Orici. The child grows rapidly, and Vala, along with Daniel Jackson, who had ringed aboard the ship during the battle, attempt to turn the child away from the Ori. Tomin, Vala's husband and a soldier of the Ori army discovers their plan and attempts to stop them. Before they can take the child, however, they are beamed away by the Odyssey.

Although Vala is allowed sanctuary at the SGC, she is only accepted to SG-1 on a provisionary basis at first ("Morpheus") For the next few months, she helps out SG-1 on several missions, including one to capture an Ori ship, where she comes face-to-face with her fully-grown daughter for the first time. Adria again attempts to convert her mother to Origin, expressing her willingness to expend as much time as possible trying to bring her mother to the "path of enlightenment." However, before Adria can take Vala (and the rest of SG-1) back to her fleet, they are beamed out by the Odyssey and flee.

In Template:Sgcite, while Vala is on a "date" with Daniel Jackson, a Goa'uld known as Athena kidnaps her in an attempt to access her repressed memories as Qetesh. When the SGC tries to get her back from Athena, a firefight ensues and a stray Zat shot hits the memory device attached to Vala, effectively wiping her memory. Confused, she flees the building. After she wanders into a restaurant, the restaurant owner gives the now-amnesiac Vala a job. When she stops two criminals from robbing the diner, she's hauled down to the police station for questioning. Both SG-1 and Athena are then alerted to her whereabouts and attempt to get to her before the other. Ultimately, Daniel Jackson is able to convince her to come back with him and the rest of SG-1. Back at the SGC, her memory is restored and she is made a full member of SG-1.

In Template:Sgcite, while SG-1 was helping the people of P9C-882, the Ori invade, and Vala gets captured by Tomin, who was ordered by Adria to educate her in the ways of Origin. After a harsh argument ensues, Vala tells Tomin about the true story behind the Ancients and Ori, which makes him question their wisdoms. He helps her escape via rings when the Prior controlling the Ori ship planned to destroy the village below.

In Template:Sgcite, we learn a little more about Vala's family life when her father returns to help out SG-1. It is revealed that her father was and is a smuggler and scam-artist who was rarely there for Vala and her mother when she was growing up. After helping SG-1 stop an attempt against earth, Jacek, her father, is granted sanctuary. However, he soon gets into trouble when he tries to pull various illegal charity/merchandise scams. At first, Vala refuses to have anything to do with her father but her friends urge her to talk to him and maybe give him another chance. However, by the end of the episode, it turns out that Jacek was pulling another job and betrays Vala and SG-1. However, the team sees his betrayal coming and scams him first.

In Template:Sgcite, we get the final showdown between Vala and Adria. The episode starts out with Vala playing some sort of game of cards, which Adria crashes. As it turns out, Vala was accused by the IOA of being compromised (because of her connection to her daughter) and they intended to send her to Area 51. However, Vala managed to escape and planned on going back to her old life, although clearly shaken up and hurt by the betrayal/silence of her friends. As it turns out, Vala had devised a plan to capture Adria that required the team to implant false memories into her head so that Adria would buy her story of betrayal. After learning the truth, Vala rejoins SG-1 and attempts to rescue Adria from Ba'al, who has her captive and has taken over her body. After SG-1 recaptures Adria, they try to force Ba'al out and replace him with a Tok'ra. However, Ba'al decides instead to poison Adria's body so that nobody else can have her. As she lay dying, the team makes the decision to inject Adria with a drug that will essentially kill her. However, Adria stops this from happening and ascends. Vala is left to celebrate/mourn the loss of her daughter.

In Template:Sgcite, the "romance" between Vala and Daniel finally comes to fruition. After they spend three months aboard The Odyssey, which is stuck in a time dilation field, they share their first kiss and presumably sleep together. Through various scenes that take place over the 50 years the team spends aboard the ship, it appears as if Daniel and Vala are in a serious relationship and are so for the entire 50 years. However, when the time dilation field gets reversed, the relationship and all linked memories get erased as if it never happened. Before this happens, however, Daniel tells Vala "I want you to know, even if you are going to forget, that I wasn't with you all these years because we were trapped on this god-awful ship. I was with you because..." Vala cuts him off with "I know." This solidifies the feelings the two characters share for one another, and shrugs off the idea that their relationship was only one of convenience. After time is reversed, only Teal'c is able to remember what happened in the alternative timeline. While Vala asks him repeatedly about it, he refuses to give her an answer, even when she asks who she "hooked up" with. The end of the episode finds Vala with the rest of the team, waiting to enter the gate. Everyone begins to share proverbs, and Vala brings up the phrase "life is too short," which is a direct parallel to the same line Daniel says right before they kiss. This, perhaps, hints at a possible future for their relationship, but everything is left up in the air as the team walks through the gate for the final time.

Important Relationships

• Daniel Jackson: During Vala's short time with the SGC in season 9, she had a very antagonistic relationship with Dr.Jackson. However, when she returns in season 10 the two become close friends. Daniel is instrumental in convincing General Landry to let Vala stay and join SG-1. Throughout the season a deeper attachment begins to develop between the two, reaching its peak in the final episode "Template:Sgcite" when she finally admits her love for him.
• Tomin: After surviving the Ori beachhead's destruction, Vala is rescued and taken in by the disabled outcast Tomin. Learning that she is pregnant, Vala quickly gets an already smitten Tomin to marry her in the hopes of convincing him that her child is his. Despite her questionable reasons for marrying him, Vala seems to genuinely care for Tomin. His fervent belief in the Ori seems to be the biggest obstacle in their relationship. However, the last time we see Tomin he begins to believe Vala's assertions that the Ori aren't gods and risks his life to get Vala safely off an Ori ship. His fate will be revealed in the upcoming DVD movie Stargate: The Ark of Truth.
• Adria: Vala's daughter by the Ori. Although born in season 10, Adria is fully grown by episode 7. Despite her role as the leader of the Ori army, Adria always has a soft spot for her mother. One of her major motivations throughout the season is to convert her mother to Origin and have her take her rightful place as the mother of the Orici. In the second to last episode, Vala watches Adria die and, subsequently, ascend.
• Jacek: Vala's father. A thief and con artist, he was rarely there for Vala as a child. There is still tension there, only worsened by his repeated betrayal of her trust.

Episodes before joining the main cast

• "Prometheus Unbound"
• "Avalon"
• "Origin"
• "The Ties That Bind"
• "The Powers That Be"
• "Beachhead"
• "Crusade"
• "Camelot"

Key character episodes

• "Prometheus Unbound"
• "The Powers That Be"
• "Beachhead"
• "Crusade"
• "Flesh and Blood"
• "Memento Mori"
• "Family Ties"
• "Dominion"

Trivia

• Claudia Black and Ben Browder starred on the cult sci-fi series Farscape. This was the source of an in-joke in the ninth season premiere when Vala sees Mitchell and remarks "I know we haven't met. That I'm sure I would remember."
• Episode "200" featured a parody of Farscape with the SG-1 cast playing various characters from Farscape, Vala herself is imagined within the role of Aeryn Sun.
• It is not known if this is purposeful, but Vala Mal Doran is an anagram for Amoral Vandal.
• When the writers of SG-1 decided to bring back Claudia Black at the end of season 9, they had to write her real-life pregnancy into the script (the result being her daughter, Adria).

Quotes

• (talking to the head of the appropriations committee) "Well it's just all so amusing, isn't it? I mean only an idiot would assume that this backwater of a planet is safe because you have a few ships with decent shield technology. You don't look like an idiot to me. So I have to assume that the reason why you would want to build more ships is… like other men you like big machines with big engines… that fire big missiles… because you have a deep-seated need to overcompensate for your own shortcomings." (The Ties That Bind)
• (when asked by the psychologist how she's doing)"Very well! Very well…well, you know, all things considered. I mean, you'd assume I'd be a prime candidate for acculturation difficulty, enduring feelings of…displacement and alienation. Perhaps even a little paranoid ideation. But the truth is, I was able to adopt an abstract attitude which allowed me to…release some of my repressed feelings, ultimately providing me with a cathartic actualization. How are you feeling?" (Morpheus)
• "There's nothing to be gained by second guessing yourself. You can't remake the past, so look ahead… or risk being left behind." (Counterstrike)
• "Well, I don't mind telling you, I've been looking forward to this little date all week. (DANIEL:I wouldn't exactly call it a 'date') Oh, I've watched enough of your television to know what a date is, Daniel. It's a romantic event typified by dinner, movie and/or karaoke and, usually, culminating in a night of…" (Memento Mori)
• "I know you think that everything that comes out of my mouth is a lie. I've deceived you too many times to change that now. But there's one thing I want you to know that is the truth. There were real moments between us. I did fall in love with you. In your heart you were a good man; not because Origin told you to be. I know you can't possibly like what you've become — what this faith has made you do." (Line in the Sand)
• (when asked by Mitchell's parents if their "relationship" is serious) "Absolutely! Well, I mean at first it was just sex, sex, sex, in all rooms of the house at all times of the day! But uh, well, once we got a chance to get to know each other, we formed a deeper connection. A spiritual bond, you might say." (Bounty)
• "I didn't attend school. As much as I was sold as a domestic servant to a weapons smuggler named Fierenze. After I killed him and won my freedom, I considered my education more or less complete." (Bounty)

External links

• Character biography from StargateWiki. Visited May 14, 2006.
• Character description from GateWorld. Visited May 14, 2006.
• Fan Site for Vala Mal Doran. Visited May 14, 2006.