K'tano: The Jaffa will be free.
O'Neill: To follow you.
Teal'c and Bra'tac bring news to Earth of a Jaffa warrior named K'tano who has gathered a large following among the free Jaffa. The team set out to form an alliance with him, but O'Neill quickly grows suspicious of K'tano's true motives.
"The Warrior" provides examples of the following tropes:
- Awesome, but Impractical: After K'tano dismisses the P90 as "primitive", O'Neill has Carter demonstrate its effectiveness versus that of the staff weapon. While Rak'nor — described as one of the best marksmen among the Jaffa — is able to hit a target with the staff two out of three times, Carter totally obliterates the same target while it's moving, and then switches her P90 to single-shot and severs the rope holding the target in place on her first try.O'Neill: This (holds up the staff weapon) is a weapon of terror. It's made to intimidate the enemy. (throws it away to the side) This (holds up the P90) is a weapon of war. It's made to kill your enemy.
- K'tano turns this around on them in private, noting that, as awesome as the P90 is for combat, it needs to be reloaded while a staff weapon does not. So for political reasons they can't make it their primary armament since that would mean being dependent on Earth for regular supplies.
- But for Me, It Was Tuesday: Bra'tac warns that many of the Jaffa he will meet have met him before in battle, and that jaffa have long memories.O'Neill: That's good because I... don't.
- Conflicting Loyalty: Throughout the episode, Teal'c is shown to be torn between his place on SG-1 and his loyalty to the free Jaffa.
- Continuity Nod:
- It's mentioned that Earth's allies are somewhat thin on the ground following the attacks on the Tollan and the Tok'ra.
- Rak'nor makes his return and is now a prominent member of the rebel Jaffa movement.
- Teal'c mentions that Daniel witnessed Yu getting stabbed by Osiris.
- K'tano mentions that the souls of the dead Jaffa would make their way to Kheb.
- Culture Clash: The humans find it difficult to understand K'tano's methods, while the Jaffa are resistant to any attempts to interfere with their long-held traditions, which makes it difficult for the two groups to find much common ground between them.
- Dance Battler: The Jaffa practice the martial art Mastaba, which is capoeira with the
Serial Numbers Filed Off (a lot of the extras are actual capoeiristas the film crew hired from a local studio). This is showcased fully in the fight between Teal'c and K'tano at the end of the episode. - Does This Remind You of Anything?: K'tano sending fanatical young men off on suicide missions with promises of reward in the afterlife.
- Everybody Hates Hades: A very weird play on the trope, and expressly Lampshaded by Daniel. The historical Imhotep was a man of success, popularity, prestige, respect, and importance. The Goa'uld Imhotep was a nobody, and that was the only reason K'tano was able to survive the reprisal for his backstabbing. Then it turns out Imhotep was alive the whole time, and the System Lords barely care until he starts suicide-bombing them.
- Fantastic Fighting Style: Enforced with mastaba, which is just capoeira under a made-up name. There happened to be a local capoeira studio which put on an exhibition right around the time the episode was being planned.
- Fish out of Water: For once it's the human characters who are out of place, particularly O'Neill.
- Five-Second Foreshadowing: During their duel, K'tano calls Teal'c "shol'va", meaning traitor. So far, only Goa'uld and their loyal Jaffa have called him this. Shortly thereafter, it's revealed that K'tano is actually the Goa'uld Imhotep.
- Foreshadowing: While observing a pair of Jaffa sparring with Mastaba, Bra'tec notes that the Jaffa are overcommitting to their attacks, leaving themselves vulnerable to counterattack. The Jaffa explain that K'tano teaches his Jaffa to fight with an all-or-nothing Death or Glory Attack philosophy, and Bra'tec accepts this, respecting the methods of another Jaffa Master even though they're different from his own. Ultimately, K'tano kicks Teal'c ass in their duel but dies because he tries to finish off Teal'c with a fancy diving attack, leaving him vulnerable to Teal'c simply stabbing him through the chest mid-leap.
- He Who Fights Monsters: K'tano seems like an example of this trope, with a bit of a Malcolm Xerox vibe, until the end when it turns out that he was just an opportunistic Goa'uld all along. However, it could be said that this revelation is merely literalizing the metaphor of becoming the monster which one claims to be fighting.
- I Die Free: Said by Teal'c when it appears that K'tano is about to defeat him.
- Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Teal'c stabs K'tano with the broken edge of the wooden training staff he had been using during the fight.
- Klingon Promotion:
- The episode introduces the rite of joma secu, whereby a Jaffa can challenge his superior to a fight to the death, and if victorious, assumes leadership. Teal'c invokes this against K'tano at the end of the episode after finding out his true identity.
- Imhotep, a minor Goa'uld functionary, collaborated with Lord Yu to organize the Jaffa revolt in hopes of gathering the majority of the rebels in one place so they could be exterminated, but then turned on him hoping to overthrow him and become a System Lord himself—though Teal'c kills him in a joma secu challenge before he can pull it off.
- La Résistance: The first time that the rebel Jaffa movement is shown as a serious force to be reckoned with.
- Not Afraid to Die: Gets deconstructed somewhat, as K'tano's followers are so unafraid of death that he can get them to rush headlong into missions that have very little chance of success — and even outright suicide missions — without them ever questioning him. O'Neill in particular finds this troubling rather than admirable.O'Neill: Well, they have no problem with dying. I have a problem with that.
Daniel: You've got a problem with dying, or you've got a problem with the fact that they don't have a problem with it?
O'Neill: Both, I think. - Orbital Bombardment: Yu's mothership initiates one against the rebel Jaffa base, but SG-1 helps the rebel Jaffa escape through the stargate before it does any significant damage.
- Politically Incorrect Villain: K'tano calls Carter "the female" and makes no attempt to disguise his doubts in her abilities as a marksman when O'Neill calls on her to demonstrate the P90, which acts as an early tip-off that he's not quite the stand-up guy he's supposed to be.
- Pragmatic Villainy: Yu informs Teal'c of K'tano's true identity and allows him to go free after capturing him — not out of the goodness of his heart, but because he fully expects Teal'c to kill K'tano for him, and his mothership is already on the way to attack the planet.
- The Reveal: K'tano is actually the Goa'uld Imhotep, posing as a Jaffa in order to gain followers among the ranks of the rebels.
- Rousing Speech: K'tano is fond of giving these.
- Spanner in the Works: Goa'ulds' Chronic Backstabbing Disorder. Imhotep and Lord Yu collaborated to create the army of rebel Jaffa, intended to give them an opportunity to purge most of them all at once. Fortunately for the protagonists, Imhotep turned on Yu, hoping to use the rebel Jaffa to pull a Klingon Promotion. Yu, in turn, considers getting back at Imhotep a higher priority than destroying the rebel Jaffa, and explains the plan to Teal'c, who then kills Imhotep in single combat; SG-1 helps the rebel Jaffa escape through the stargate before Yu's mothership can bombard their base.
- Suicide Attack: K'tano sends a Jaffa to attack one of Nirrti's strongholds with a naquadah bomb strapped to his chest.
- This Is Something He's Got to Do Himself: Bra'tac warns O'Neill against intervening when Teal'c is getting the crap kicked out of him by K'tano, as to do so would mean that Teal'c had forfeited.
- Uriah Gambit: K'tano tries to do this with Teal'c by sending him to attack Lord Yu; unfortunately for him, he didn't count on Yu allowing Teal'c to return in one piece.
- We Come In Peace: According to Daniel, this is the meaning of the Jaffa greeting tek'ma'tek.
- We Have Reserves: K'tano is remarkably blase about sending Jaffa to their deaths, yet another indicator that there's something not quite right with him.
- You Wouldn't Shoot Me: K'tano walks right up to the staff weapon of one of Nirrti's Jaffa and practically dares the guy to shoot. He doesn't.
- Your Days Are Numbered: Discussed;K'tano: Imhotep himself declared your days were numbered.
O'Neill: Well, that's fine. As long as it's a really big number.
