History Film / StarGate

** If researching conspiracy theories counts, Daniel drops an actual ancient-astronauts talking point during his failed lecture, when he claims that [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Vyse Colonel Vyse]] faked his discovery of Khufu's name inside the Great Pyramid. This theory was proposed in 1980 by Zecharia Sitchin, an ancient-astronauts theorist who more notably invented the Nibiru conspiracy theory.

--> '''Daniel.''' Well, the translation of the inner track is wrong. Must've used Budge. I don't know why they keep reprinting his books.

* CuriosityKilledTheCat: While his kin panicked and fled the approach of Ra's arrival, the human boy whose body the false god would come to possess went in the opposite direction, right towards his doom.

* ArtisticLicenseMilitary: While the film's treatment of the military is far from accurate or flattering in general, there is one military error that could have been corrected by ''anyone'' with a little military experience. At one point O'Neil calls Kawalski, his second in command, "Lieutenant". Not only that, he's credited as "Lieutenant Kawalski" in the credits. The problem is that his rank insignia are a pair of silver oak leaves, which he wears throughout the entire movie in plain sight. Those silver oak leaves mark him as a ''Lieutenant Colonel'', a considerably higher rank than Lieutenant. It can be presumed that filmmakers Emmerich and Devlin were simply unaware that you don't call a Lieutenant Colonel "Lieutenant" unless you want him very, ''very'', angry at you. If you don't want to use his entire rank (and have enough standing yourself that you even get to decide that), you'd call him "Colonel."

* KillTheCutie: [[spoiler: Nabeh.]]

* EnhanceButton

** O'Neil countered this that it wouldn't be the case if Daniel knew the coordinates to Earth so he and the team would return to Earth while Daniel stays behind to use the bomb.

* TheCuckoolanderWasRight: Daniel Jackson is first showing being laughed at and his audience walking out when he completely rejects the Egyptological consensus on the origin and antiquity of ancient Egyptian culture during a lecture. It is heavily implied that he's living on the cusp of poverty due to his eccentric theories (it's most probably because he can't get a good academic job). When he travels to the other planet and sees the pyramid, he sighs "I knew it", his theories fully vindicated (although even he didn't explicitly claim ''aliens'' were behind ancient Egypt).

* JerkassHasAPoint: Jackson and Kawalski both call out O’Neil for bringing a nuclear device with him and not telling them about it, but Jack counters it was a precaution against a hostile force trying to use the Stargate to get at Earth. (Which is ''precisely'' what happens) He also tells them that none of it would matter if Jackson was able to get them back like he told them he could.

* JerkassHasAPoint: Jackson and Kawalski both call out O’Neil for bringing a nuclear device with him and not telling them about it, but Jack counters it was a precaution against a hostile force trying to use the Stargate to get at Earth. (Which is ''precisely'' what happens) He also tells them none of it would matter if Jackson was able to get them back like he told them he could.

* JerkassHasAPoint: Jackson and Kawalsky both call out O’Neil for bringing a nuclear device with him and not telling them about it, but Jack counters it was a precaution against a hostile force trying to use the Stargate to get at Earth. (Which is ''precisely'' what happens) He also tells them none of it would matter if Jackson was able to get them back like he told them he could.

* ArtisticLicenseHistory: Naturally, even aside from the aliens, the film premise depends on this. Jackson claims the Pyramids are much older than Egyptologists have found them to be, the evidence for them being made for the Pharoahs was forged and that Egyptian culture sprang up without precursors. Obviously this is not supported by the real evidence for this. The film itself portrays Jackson's theories as laughed at, though naturally he turns out to be right nonetheless. He is genuinely correct that Budge has long been debunked however.
** Hilariously though, while this is clearly fictional, it has precedence in Egyptian history. Countless pharaohs actively rewrote their own history to take credit for past events now attributed to their predecessors. The best case is Ramses the Second (Ozymandius for those familiar with Percy Shelley) whose countless achievements were either claimed by other pharaohs either claiming to have accomplished them or have simply been Ramses.

* LostLanguage: The Abydonians speak an Ancient Egyptian dialect, and Daniel Jackson, being a Egyptologist, is able to communicate with them once he figures out the pronunciation.

* BackFromTheDead: Ra has a kind of medical "coffin" capable of reviving people who are recently deceased (and presumably it's also the source of his immortality, as he's been alive for over ''ten thousand'' years).

* AncientAstronauts: Ra. And the Pyramids were, indeed, landing platforms for spaceships.

*** They're also all in alignment (all on the same side of the planet at once) -- the tidal forces on that planet would be ''insane''.

*** While we're on the subject, constellations are not "points in space" as Daniel Jackson claims. If anything, they are *directions* in space, from Earth, and there's no real way to turn six *directions* into a point in 3-dimensional space.
*** The TV series uses this as a HandWave to explain why they never found any other gates until they thought to make the dialing computer take stellar drift into account. Apparently the DHD network as shown in the series does this automatically, so the symbols wind up being more like a phone number than coordinates.

* RecycledTheSeries: ''Series/StargateSG1''

* ShownTheirWork: Creator/KurtRussell gets a detail of military etiquette right that some people who actually were in the military often forget (or choose to ignore): you don't salute civilians. When the young rebels salute him, he clearly appreciates the gesture and wants to return it, but doesn't until his own men salute him so that he can salute ''them'' in return. Of course, he's also the one that made the aforementioned "calling a Lieutenant Colonel a Lieutenant" mistake.

** The snide little shout-out to Egyptologist E.A. Wallis Budge. Budge was an Victorian Egyptologist who wrote extensively on hieroglyphics, but his translations as well as his interpretations of Egyptian religion and culture were unfortunately all too influenced by his Victorian attitudes. [[http://fannyfae.com/2013/09/05/using-budge-bad-idea/ This essay explains why the line is appropriate and accurate.]] If you're interested, [[http://ask.metafilter.com/46687/Is-E-A-Wallis-Budge-still-worth-reading here's some recommended reading.]] [[GeniusBonus The remark will fly right over the heads of 99% of the audience, but will have any Egyptologists watching rolling in the aisles.]]

* SicklyNeuroticGeek: Daniel. His allergies act up when ''traveling''.
** He's apparently allergic to ''sand'', considering the lack of vegetation on Abydos for there to be pollen from.
*** Could just have sensitive sinuses in general. Thus not only are they getting sand in them, they're drying out. ''Ow''.

* SufficientlyAdvancedAlien: Ra. Did anyone say "Goa'uld"? Hmm...

* VocalDissonance: Ra, whose teenage vocal chords somehow produce the [[EvilSoundsDeep voice]] of the ancient alien monster he truly is.
* WhatTheHellHero: Daniel gives O'Neil one when he sees the nuclear bomb; O'Neil's team joins in once they find out what the plan with the bomb was.

* FakeNationality: The inhabitants, who presumably should be ethnically Egyptian, are played by actors of various nationalities. Most of them are Hispanic.

* ChekhovsGun: Two of them -- the pendant and the bomb.

* CynicismCatalyst: Colonel O'Neil originally left the military and went basket case because his son accidentally killed himself with O'Neil's own gun. He only joins the mission to the alien planet (from which there is little chance of returning) because he's downright suicidal.

* DeathSeeker: Jack O'Neil.

* DidntThinkThisThrough: Daniel just assumed the cover stone with the symbols needed to dial the Stargate back to earth would be nearby when they came through. He also didn't know what the seventh chevron (the point of origin) was going to be (see also IdiotBall). The fact that he didn't tell anyone this ''really'' pisses off the guys he came with.

* DistantPrologue: The movie begins in 1927, where a team of archaeologists and workers uncover the gate.

* HoistByHisOwnPetard: Attempted by Ra, who plans to use Earth's own Nuke against us. Actually pulled off by the heroes, who use the teleport rings and Anubis's controller to give it back to him, seconds from detonation.

* HumansAdvanceSwiftly: While Ra's been living the [[MedievalStasis same lifestyle]] for ''thousands'' of years, Humans have been busy.

* HumansAreWhite: Strongly averted. The Abydonians are all clearly of Egyptian descent, which is really the only way it would make sense given that Egypt was where Ra got them from.

* BadassBookworm: Daniel Jackson. Within a few months of work he decrypts the true meaning of the inscription he's working on (despite being purposefully kept out of loop), then manages to crack a dead language within few hours of co-ordinated effort. He also is a surprisingly efficient combatant for a NonActionGuy.

* ConspiracyTheorist: Daniel Jackson.

* ConvenientlyClosePlanet: Averted -- the earth-like planet is in a completely different galaxy.

* BadassBookworm: Daniel Jackson. Within few months of work he decrypts the true meaning of the inscription he's working on (despite being purposefully kept out of loop), then manages to crack a dead language within few hours of co-ordinated effort. He also is a suprisingly efficient combatant for a NonActionGuy.

** The military didn't really give Daniel time to think this through, using ConflictBall. They pressure him into a snap judgement, merely asking if he can get them back despite the fact that he knows as exactly as much about the destination as the military does -- practically nothing. Of course if they would have thought this through the movie would be lacking, and TropesAreTools.

*** He does note, however, that he can only learn it so fast because he can already speak ancient Egyptian. On Earth it hasn't been a living spoken language in millennia, as Daniel notes, and at first he doesn't realize they're even speaking Egyptian until he hears some words that sound similar. At this point he merely has to learn where Sha'uri's people's dialect diverged in pronunciation from the ancient form, rather than learning the whole language from nothing. This would be equivalent of only reading [[Creator/WilliamShakespeare Shakespeare]], then learning modern English soon after first hearing it.

* BigBad: Ra. An [[AncientAstronauts Ancient Astronaut]] using his advanced knowledge to enslave two planets, putting on a GodGuise and ruling his subjects with iron fist. Any sign opposition is resolved by killing scores of people. His reaction after finding out how far Earth went on its own? Trying to nuke it out of oblivion simply ''because''.