Perna tells Beckett that Meril has been found dead. The cause is still unknown. Beckett urges her to cease the inoculations, but she admits that she cannot be a part of it -- she herself was among the first to be given the drug.
Soon the hospitals are overwhelmed with patients. Fifty percent of those inoculated are dying. To Sheppard's dismay, Druhin believes these are perfectly good odds, and says the entire population is going to take a vote on whether or not to administer the drug to everyone. Sheppard cannot believe what he's hearing, but is assured the word of the Chancellor that everyone will have a say, and the majority will win victory in the decision. Meanwhile Teyla informs Carson of bad news: Perna has become one of the sick. Beckett goes to her deathbed. Perna assures him she will die with peace -- they have accomplished the unthinkable, and she has no regrets. Beckett stays at her side until she passes away. The results of the vote are in. 96 percent of the Hoffans are in favor of disseminating the drug among their people, no matter what the cost. Druhin says that when next Sheppard's team returns, they'd like to discuss plans for passing the drug to all the worlds in the Pegasus galaxy, but John believes that no one will be around when they come back.
PRODUCTION
"One day on the set, Martin Wood, who directed 'Rising,' had mentioned to me that there was a big Beckett episode coming up. He suggested that I go have a chat with the writer, Damian Kindler, so I did. Damian and I talked about the story and my character, and when I received the script I was just blown away. Beckett has so much to do in it. He even has a love interest, so to speak. "Out of all the episodes my character has been in, this one is by far the most dramatic. You get a strong sense of who Beckett is and the human side of him is really apparent. I think the passion of the Scots comes out. He has a big heart and can shed a tear as well." (Actor Paul McGillion ["Dr. Beckett"], in an interview with Starburst magazine [#314])"There was one [episode] just recently [shot] where there was a question of using a prisoner for scientific research. And it was a very military and scientific decision, and she got the final say. I think that, to begin with, she felt bowled over that ... she didn't actually have the choice, because she's not the one actually out there on the lines. These people are going out ... and seeing these worlds, and she's back here trying to keep Atlantis going, so she's making decisions based on their information. And it was a very difficult journey for her ... to give up her own sense of ethics and right and wrong and her own need to fortify her power in that moment. ... She eventually said, 'OK, yes, I condone this action.'
"Joe had a great line where I was bringing up the Geneva Convention and those ideas, and his line was, 'Well, if the Wraith were at the Geneva Convention, they would have ate everybody.' So you suddenly realize ... this is a different world, so a different set of values. So that was a fun arc to play." (Actress Torri Higginson ["Elizabeth Weir"], in an interview with Science Fiction Weekly)"Every culture that we encounter has been vastly handicapped by the fact that the Wraith come in, wipe them out within 5 percent of their population, and allow them to propagate. They leave after they harvest their life force, because they're like space vampires, they drain their life force. And then that population is left for a hundred years or so to repopulate, and then they're wiped out again. So their technology can only get to a certain amount. "And the way in which they deal with this continuous harvesting is fascinating. All the worlds are post-apocalyptic, and they all have different ways of dealing with it. Some of them go underground, some of them think that they have to commit ritual suicide to stay away from them, others try to use antiviral medication to try to put the Wraith off, some of them try to become androids. They're all very desperate because every hundred years, 95 percent of their population is completely wiped out. So they all deal with it in different ways. 'Poisoning the Well' is in fact what I just said, which is a culture that is trying to develop an antibody that will prevent the Wraith from feeding."And that's a big episode for the Beckett character, the Scottish guy, Paul McGillion. Paul McGillion is great, by the way, and so is McKay. They're just hilarious together. Love those guys." (Director and consulting producer Peter DeLuise, in an interview with the Richard Dean Anderson Web Site) | 
