Ba'al

"Do not accept gifts from Baal. They have a habit of exploding, especially when he feels he has been slighted."

- Yu to Daniel Jackson

Ba'al is a Goa'uld, and possibly the last of the System Lords. Once an underlord in the Second Goa'uld Dynasty, Ba'al left Ra's service and rose to a position of power among the System Lords in his own right. After the fall of the Goa'uld at the hands of the Replicators, Ba'al was the only known surviving System Lord and became determined to rebuild his power base. He succeeded somewhat with his clones, but they were all killed with the last being extracted by the Tok'ra and the real Ba'al was finally killed by Colonel Cameron Mitchell who set an ambush for him when he tried to change time. Mitchell shot Ba'al in the head, killing him, and with the deaths of all his clones, Ba'al was gone for good although the host of one of his clones survived.

Second Goa'uld Dynasty
First seen during the Second Goa'uld Dynasty, Ba'al was originally one of Ra's prominent underlords in service to him on Earth where he was thought to be the son of El—who was, in actuality, Ra—by the Canaanites. It was in this role that he oversaw many cultures' development of an agricultural system, the Canaanites and Phoenicians among them. Ba'al's influence spread throughout these cultures so much that he was known over the entire Mediterranean basin and, eventually, most of the planet.

He was rarely seen to be a kind overseer, however, and indeed whenever his people failed to meet his strict food production quotas he very often issued orders for the mass sacrifice of Human lives. Though these measures led to overall prosperity for both the Goa'uld and the people, it came at the expense of many people and so it perhaps came as no surprise that Ba'al was one of the first Goa'uld to encounter rebellion among his people, though it was to a much smaller scale than Ra's later comeuppance. A few smaller villages abandoned worshipping him and so, for their pride, Ba'al struck them down—it was these sort of actions that would later lead to his association with several Judeo-Christian figures, several identifying him as Ba'alzebub and believing him to serve Satan rather than Ra, though his loyalty remained true.

It was during the time that the Goa'uld ruled Earth that he was sent to Kinahhi—under the name Re'ammin the Thunderer—to kill its ruler, King Yahm, when he fell from the favor of the Goa'uld. He cast Yahm's body into the oceans on the planet and erected a floating city, Tsapan, on the site of his death; this marked the beginning of the Kinahhi people's enslavement to the Goa'uld. However, the people of the planet eventually rose up against Re'ammin, using his own technology against him, and forcing him to flee the planet. Sometime after this, while the Goa'uld still ruled Earth, Ba'al was temporarily killed by Mot then resurrected through a sarcophagus by his 'sister', Anat.



After the fall of the Second Goa'uld Dynasty, Ba'al was one of the first to foresee that the Tau'ri would one day rebel and so left the planet for the stars, earning him the wrath of his former master Ra, and causing him to be kicked out of the Sun God's inner circle. Despite this setback, Ba'al managed to maintain control of several Jaffa who had been loyal to Ra and so was able to carve out a small niche for himself within the ranks of the System Lords. Though not entirely loyal to Ba'al, these Jaffa served him out of fear of his wrath for, even though they knew that Ra's wrath on them would be terrible if he managed to defeat Ba'al, Ba'al presented a more immediate threat to them. In addition to this, Ba'al did not hesitate to make examples out of any who betrayed him to their former lord.

Power struggle
"I'm a god. Gods are all-knowing."

- Ba'al

Following the full rebellion of the Tau'ri, Ra's attention was drawn to Ba'al whom he was able to defeat repeatedly until, in desperation, Ba'al turned to Sokar—ironically fulfilling that Tau'ri's belief that he was indeed Ba'alzebub, the agent of Satan. Having been well aware of Sokar's enmity towards Ra, Ba'al offered him a contingent of his Jaffa—several having in fact been servant of Ra himself at one point—to contend with Ra on the field of battle. Although Sokar's forces were more than sufficient to deal with Ra on their own, Ra's former forces provided a unique insight into the workings over their former lord's tactics and so proved extremely valuable to Sokar. In exchange for this help, Sokar took Ba'al under his wing for a time, aiding him in his struggle to survive against their mutual enemy.

This alliance stood for generations during which time Ba'al took advantage of Sokar's help, using both his own and his new "master's" forces to carve out a significant fiefdom among the planets of the Milky Way galaxy. Because many such gains were made with the help of Sokar's Jaffa, Sokar considered the territory to be his though he rarely pressed this issue and simply left Ba'al be, concentrating on his own war with Ra. Ba'al continued to pay tribute and give respect to Sokar for the course of his "servitude", as well as providing a buffer against Ra's forces with his ever-growing territory allowing Sokar to concentrate along a narrower frontier.

Ba'al could not hide his true intentions forever, though, gradually subverting the Jaffa that Sokar left him to the point that he commanded their true loyalty. He eventually became content that he would be able to contend with the forces of Ra without Sokar's aid, Ba'al broke off his servitude to Sokar and declared himself the sovereign ruler of his sector of space. Sokar immediately tried to recall his Jaffa from Ba'al's service but was met with no answer and so sent two of his fleets to reclaim the territory which he believed Ba'al had stolen from him. Having learned of his attack, Ba'al made a daring gambit; when Sokar's fleets arrived in two of the systems controlled by Ba'al, they were met with only two ha'tak's each. As Sokar's fleets closed in to attack the ships, Ba'al unleashed his plan and used the ha'tak's to cause the systems stars to go supernova, destroying everything nearby including themselves and the sixty million inhabitants on the worlds.

Quickly deciding that the price of a war with Ba'al was too high to pay, Sokar and Ba'al agreed to a peace treaty so that they could focus on their prime opponent, Ra. For centuries after this the truce remained, both of the Goa'uld fighting against Ra rather than amongst each other. Though the war rained heavily on Ba'al, he managed to get himself into a position of power and eventually became a System Lord in his own right. Ba'al's war with Ra drew on until it reached a point where the attrition rate became unbearable for both, and so the two agreed to a cease fire, though they still remained enemies at heart. Despite this, the two System Lords continued to inflict covert raids on the other, as well as attacking each other through politics rather than force.

These actions continued for more than a thousand years until, in what was apparently a freak accident, Ra was no more. Unknown to the System Lords at the time, Ra was killed by Colonel Jack O'Neill and Doctor Daniel Jackson who had ringed an enhanced nuclear warhead on board his ship after a rebellion on Abydos. Though the Goa'uld did not know the truth behind the sudden death, Ba'al was quick to swoop in and claim much of Ra's disarrayed territory before Apophis was able to take control of the majority of it. He used this new territory to parlay his way into a preeminent position among the System Lords, gaining even more power than he had previously.

Return of Anubis
When the System Lords held a conference following the deaths of Apophis and Cronus, Ba'al seemed to function as first among equals, conducting the meeting. When Osiris appeared on behalf of Anubis to petition the System Lords to accept him back—on the condition that Anubis would, in turn, destroy the Tau'ri—Ba'al was one of those who voted to restore him to the state of System Lord. What most of the other System Lords did not know was that this was simply a ploy to learn more information about his potential foe. However, this very act earned Ba'al the ire of Yu, an enmity which had previously only manifested in minor tension, which resulted in open hostilities.

The Tok'ra had at least one operative, Kanan, in Ba'al's service though, when Kanan was discovered as a spy, his host was damaged so badly that he had to seek another. When Kanan's symbiote was implanted in Jack O'Neill, he went back to Ba'al's fortress world in order to save Ba'al's lo'taur Shallan, who he had become involved with. Ba'al's Jaffa were able to capture O'Neill before he was able to finish his mission, however, though Kanan left him so that Ba'al could not retrieve the information of the Tok'ra from him. Ba'al tortured O'Neill endlessly, killing him many times and bringing him back to life in order to gain the information that Kanan had left in his mind. However, when SG-1 informed Yu that Ba'al had been conducting weapons research on the planet, he sent a fleet which destroyed the facility and thus freed O'Neill.

Anubis subsequently failed in his attempts to destroy the Tau'ri and moved against the other System Lords, demonstrating an impressively powerful fleet which only the combined fleet of the System Lords could hope to take on. Though Yu was originally given the position to lead the combined forces, his growing senility left him unable to do so and so Teal'c convinced Ba'al to assume control of the fleets and lead the war against Anubis.

After the fall of Anubis, Ba'al took over most of Anubis's former holdings, including the Kull warriors and Asgard beaming technology, so that he could wage war on the other System Lords in order to become the most powerful of them. This led the other Goa'uld into a failed attempt to negotiate with the Tau'ri for their support against Ba'al. Ba'al quickly began to conquer the other System Lords using Anubis's forces and, within a year the System Lords had been reduced to three others, all unable to fight him. However, at some point Anubis managed to return and secretly re-take control of his forces from Ba'al. Ba'al was forced to serve under Anubis, much to his displeasure. At this point, Ba'al began to style himself Supreme Commander of the Goa'uld Empire. Secretly, however, he was serving Anubis.

Fall of the System Lords
Ba'al's advance against the other System Lords was stopped only by the long-anticipated invasion of the Replicators into the Milky Way galaxy. The Replicator armadas quickly overwhelmed and destroyed the Goa'uld System Lords, and Ba'al found himself fighting a losing battle against the invaders. When knowledge of an Ancient superweapon capable of destroying all life in the galaxy was discovered on Dakara, Ba'al secretly assisted Samantha Carter and Jacob Carter in modifying the weapon, along with the Dial-Home Device associated with Dakara's Stargate, destroying all Replicators in the galaxy. Ba'al then moved in to take back Dakara when Rebel Jaffa stormed his ship, forcing him to beam away.

Even with the Replicators destroyed, Anubis still intended to claim the superweapon for himself and use it to destroy all life in the galaxy. Anubis allowed Ba'al to live so that he may bear witness to the end of all galactic life. When Anubis's plan was foiled by Daniel Jackson and Oma Desala, Ba'al was left as the only known surviving System Lord—the others having been killed by the Replicators, except for Anubis who was neutralized by Oma.

Clones of Ba'al
"Over 600 channels and nothing to watch."

- Ba'al to his clones

With his power base gone following the destruction of the System Lords and the rebellion of the Jaffa, Ba'al needed a place to hide. Fleeing to Earth, Ba'al set himself up as a business man and took control of the Trust, at the same time using Asgard cloning technology to make a series of clones of himself. He also made attempts to take control of the Free Jaffa Nation and stole Stargates from other planets to rebuild his empire.

Later, Ba'al managed to regain an army by recruiting Jaffa, largely using mind control. One of Ba'al's clones initiated a scheme to take control of the Jaffa High Council to prevent their rise to democracy with his mind control technology, but the scheme was foiled and the clone was killed by Teal'c.

Ba'al also planned to rebuild his empire by using Asgard beaming technology to steal Stargates from other planets and hide them using a method developed by Nerus, Ba'al's former servant who defected to the Ori and was captured by the SGC. His plan was foiled when Nerus returned to Ba'al and accidentally downloaded a virus into one of Ba'al's motherships. The Stargates were then beamed off the mothership by the newly-built Earth ship, the Odyssey, and the mothership—along with several Ba'al clones—was destroyed by the Lucian Alliance.

Later, Ba'al arranged to have his clones captured by the SGC in an attempt to acquire their list of Stargate addresses. To this end, Malcolm Barrett was (presumably) brainwashed into giving one of the Ba'als his weapon, and all the Ba'als were implanted with locator chips which, when in close proximity to one another, amplified the signal they sent out.

When he discovered the existence of Merlin's Anti-Ori weapon that could not only destroy the Ori, but the Ancients as well, he found the planet where the weapon was located. His ships could not locate it, so he had to come by Stargate. However, the safeguards made by the ascended Ancient Morgan Le Fay made it impossible for Ba'al to reach it. His Jaffa had abandoned him, trying to find a way to free him from a forcefield. He was then forced to work alongside SG-1 and Adria. He was transported to the tomb of Myrddin when the Ancient was awakened who, in his daze, likened Ba'al to Mordred. Ba'al attempted for the remainder of the time to find a way to dial out from the planets stargate which was locked into a random system that beamed the occupants of Myrddins tomb to random worlds in a closed gate system to prevent discovery by the Ori. This version of Ba'al would be killed by Ori soldiers that would finally locate the world.

With the Ori making such advances into the Milky Way, Ba'al devised an ingenious plan. He intended to capture Adria and take her as a host, by ambushing SG-1's plan to capture the Orici. Upon capturing her, Ba'al sent a message to his clones to meet to discuss the situation. Once they arrived, he beamed canisters of symbiote poison into the camp, killing his clones. After implanting himself in Adria, SG-1 boarded his ha'tak and killed another clone. Ba'al offered to help SG-1 in driving the Ori army out of the Galaxy, saying that the Ori were indeed dead. However, SG-1 contacted the Tok'ra, who removed Ba'al from Adria, presumably killing him, but not before he released a nerve toxin into her. Cameron Mitchell also expressed some doubt about whether or not Ba'al was truly dead, fearing that one or more of the clones may have survived.

Final Act
Despite these deaths, both the real Ba'al and at least one clone survived. The clone was ultimately tracked down through its tracking device- the true Ba'al apparently being the only Ba'al capable of removing his device- and the Tok'ra planned to remove the symbiote from the host to kill it. At the same time real Ba'al used a device to track solar flares around the galaxy and then used the Stargate to go back in time to Earth in 1939 to change time. While there, he killed the crew of a ship carrying the Stargate (captained by Cameron Mitchell's grandfather) and set a bomb before leaving through the Stargate to build a new empire in that time. Mitchell's grandfather managed to dump the bomb overboard, where it exploded harmlessly, but the ship ended up trapped in the ice of the North Pole allowing Ba'al's plan to work. In this alternate timeline, he took over many System Lords who all bowed to him as their master with Qetesh as his queen and Teal'c as his First Prime. He went on to attack Earth using his knowledge from the future, but Qetesh turned on him to seize power for herself and killed him after learning about his time travel device. SG-1- who had managed to escape the changes to the timeline by travelling in a wormhole back to Earth at the moment history changed- managed to use his device and the Stargate to travel back to 1929 (the closest time they could get) to stop him although only Mitchell made it through. While waiting for ten years, Cameron set up an ambush for Ba'al this time and the real Ba'al was finally killed when Mitchell shot him in the head. History then returned to its correct course, and the symbiote was extracted from the Ba'al clone and died, killing the last Ba'al. His host survived the extraction, however, and Vala offered to help him cope.

Personality
Although exceptionally ruthless, Ba'al seems to possess a somewhat better understanding of human nature than is typical for the Goa'uld, and he also has a vague understanding of the concept of humor. Unlike the "typical" Goa'uld, Ba'al's personality is generally wry and sardonic rather than melodramatically megalomaniacal; his methods often involve deception and subterfuge rather than brute force, and his style tends toward subtle insidiousness rather than outright cruelty.

In keeping with his more subtle modus operandi, Ba'al also maintains an image of almost entirely non-military refinement, with a rather less threatening appearance than was usual for the Goa'uld. He has a beard, but it is small and kept neat, and even before adopting Earth clothing he was also consistently well-dressed.

Ba'al is also distinct from most Goa'uld in that despite the above-mentioned ruthlessness, his motivations are much more complex than simple evil in a moral absolutist sense. He is rational, adaptable, and less attached to the trappings of power; since the collapse of the Goa'uld Empire, he freely acknowledges that he is not a god (prior to the downfall of the Goa'uld, he would treat his "godhood" rather flippantly to those who already knew about the secret — a marked contrast to other Goa'uld, who gave every impression of actually believing their own propaganda — even admitting that he doesn't believe in it, and saying that other Goa'uld don't really either). During the war with the Ori, Ba'al occasionally remarks that he finds aspects of human culture "amusing", and even goes so far as to largely stop using the voice-amplification distinctive of the Goa'uld, mostly speaking in a natural human voice, only using the symbiote voice when trying to intimidate opponents. Also, he has started to wear elements of 21st-century Earth fashion, even when off world.

Ba'al cares only for his own interests, and is a persistent enemy of SG-1 and the Tau'ri. Throughout this however, he displays a very uncharacteristic ability for the Goa'uld, of recognizing universal threats, and occasionally works co-operatively with SG-1 for brief periods when he recognizes that it is in his own best interests to do so. This would imply that although he is egocentric and desires self-aggrandizement, he is not purely chaotic, but rather that he at times commits actions that would commonly be defined as evil, simply because he sees said means as being the fastest and most direct way of obtaining what he wants.

Ba'al is also extremely intelligent and a brilliant military strategist, but his strategies, while used to defeat his opponents are always aimed at giving him more power.

Trivia

 * Ba'al was the first Goa'uld seen to use the Symbiote Extractor.