On Planet P3X562, the SG-1 team discovers a valley full of broken crystals. Alone, O'Neill finds a whole crystal with blue light emanating from it. Upon touching it, he is struck down and a duplicate O'Neill appears. The double returns home through the Stargate, with the unsuspecting team. Once back, the double seeks out O'Neill's estranged wife, Sara, and tries to find the couple's son, Charlie, who was killed years earlier. Meanwhile, a revived O'Neill returns through the gate, only to realize he's been replicated. Carter and Jackson have discovered that the crystals contain energy beings that can read minds, mimic people and communicate. The beings tell of their tragic encounter with the Goa'ulds and explain that they cannot survive in the Earth's intense electromagnetic field, which means that the O'Neill double is now highly unstable, putting Sara and others in great danger. The real O'Neill and the SG-1 team find Sara and the double in a hospital emergency room. The double explains that he never meant to hurt O'Neill. He was trying to heal him when he realized that the greatest pain O'Neill had was not physical, but emotional; grief from the loss of his son. In a final gesture, the double does just that, taking the form of Charlie and giving Sara and Jack something they never had: a chance to say good-bye to their son.
One of the most unique outings in the first season of Stargate, 'Cold Lazarus' was an episode that was very hard to place. In some ways one of the season's greatest episodes, it was let down by being over-sentimental and tugging a bit too much on the heart-strings. Because of this, a powerful episode about O'Neill's family and a dying race ended up almost falling flat on it's face.
Thankfully, it didn't end up that bad, in fact it's still a good episode. Good enough to be amongst the better...