Jack O'Neill (Stargate)
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Jack J. O'Neill is a fictional character in both the science fiction feature film Stargate and the subsequent television series Stargate SG-1 played by actors Kurt Russell in the former and Richard Dean Anderson in the latter.
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Events of the movie
Colonel Jack O'Neill, of the United States Air Force, was married and had one son, Charlie. But after a tragic accident when Charlie shot himself with O'Neill's personal gun (a Beretta 92 series pistol), O'Neill went to pieces, retired from his position and didn't talk to anyone. When the Stargate was deciphered by Daniel Jackson, General West knew that O'Neill was suicidal and therefore perfect for the mission (in which he would go through with a team and detonate a nuclear warhead near the Stargate if there was any sign of danger), and had him reactivated.
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On Abydos, O'Neill and the team found the indigenous population to be simple desert-dwellers. He made friends with a boy called Skaara, the son of the ruler. The team soon discovered the threat of the Goa'uld Ra. As the motion picture played out, Ra attempted to escape, only to have O'Neill and Jackson transport the bomb to his ship, destroying it in orbit. O'Neill returned to Earth with all but Jackson, and lied that the Abydos gate had been destroyed.
In the movie, Jack's son is apparently named Tyler, however he is not named in dialogue. Also, the Colonel's name in the film is O'Neil (one L), a fact which becomes a recurring gag in the TV series.
Stargate SG-1
With the Goa'uld Apophis's incursion through the Earth gate one year later, the military knew that the Stargate was still a threat. O'Neill was recalled by the new base commander General Hammond. O'Neill admitted that he hadn't destroyed the gate, but only after a plan was revealed to send a more powerful warhead through "just to make sure".
After returning to Abydos, they discovered a cartouche which contained a list of Stargate addresses. From that they learned that the Stargate led not only to Abydos but to hundreds of other worlds as well. O'Neill was re-reactivated and made the team leader of SG-1, the lead field unit of Stargate Command. SG-1 is comprised of himself, Dr. Daniel Jackson, (then) Captain Samantha Carter and Teal'c.
The corresponding character in the original Stargate feature film, played by Kurt Russell, was named Jack O'Neil. This was ignored, but there was once a joking reference to another colonel who happened to be named Jack O'Neil who had "no sense of humour" (because O'Neil in the movie was brooding and serious, only to become witty and deadpan during the series).
Incidentally, some fans consider the "Stargate" O'Neil and the "Stargate SG-1" O'Neill to be, in fact, two different people. In order for this to work, they need to also posit that there were two colonels with the same name working on the Stargate project, with identically-named wives, each with a dead son who had been killed by an accidental firearms discharge. There are also references made within the SG-1 series to interactions between Jack and Daniel that were depicted in the movie, making this position somewhat untenable. The two O'Neils do, however, have radically different personalities.
Events in the series
While visiting the planet Argos, O'Neill had a short relationship with a young native woman and became infected with nanites that caused rapidly increased aging, turning him to the equivalent of one hundred years old in a matter of weeks. It turned out that the entire population suffered this, and they were purged of the nanites with help from Major Carter and Doctor Fraiser.
Jack's life was turned upside-down when the Repository of the Ancients (builders of the Stargates) was accidentally downloaded into his brain. He slowly lost the ability to speak, write, and even comprehend English. He entered hundreds of new gate addressed into the dialing computer that were not on the Abydos Cartouche, formulated a new system for calculating distances based on gate addresses, and translated Ancient text for Daniel Jackson. He finally built a device that produced enough power to allow the Stargate to dial Othala, a planet in the galaxy of Ida and home to a colony of Asgard, using an eight-chevron address. The Asgard there were able to remove the knowledge from O'Neill's mind and return him to normal.
Jack was trapped on a planet for months when a meteor hit the local Stargate. He thought it destroyed, and eventually gave up hope of being rescued, starting a relationship with a local woman. The gate, in fact, had only been buried under tons of dirt, creating a sort of "natural iris." SG-1 found a way to disintegrate it with the unstable vortex the gate created when opening, and eventually rescued O'Neill.
Over several years, O'Neill fought a personal war with Colonel Harry Maybourne of the NID, a government organization dedicated to the examination and application of technologies retrieved by the SGC, and later leader of a rogue group of NID agents. Their relationship improved as Mayborne helped expose corrupt NID agents, threaten the corrupt Senator Robert Kinsey, and save Carter from Adrian Conrad. Jack and Mayborne were trapped on a planet with only each other for company, became paranoid from a toxin in a local plant, and were saved by the rest of SG-1. Jack partially reconciled with Maybourne and offered to help him retire to a peaceful planet somewhere.
Jack was again forced to download the Ancients' knowledge into his mind in order to protect Earth from attack by the Goa'uld Anubis. He led SG-1 by Goa'uld Cargo Ship to a planet where an Ancient outpost stood in ruins, and showed SG-1 the location of the Lost City they had been searching for. He removed the power device from the outpost and SG-1 returned to Earth to find a fleet of Anubis's starships ready to attack the planet's surface. They flew to Antarctica to find an identical outpost where Jack launched Ancient Drone Weapons that tore through the fleet like tissue paper, destroying Anubis' body, though not killing him outright. Jack finally put himself into stasis to save his own life.
SG-1 attempted to contact the Asgard, only to find that the humanoid replicators had escaped and were again threatening the Asgard. Thor returned with SG-1 to Earth and removed the knowledge from O'Neill's brain, but not before he designed a weapon to destroy a replicator instantly by severing the communication between their blocks.
O'Neill was promoted to Brigadier General and put in command of the SGC after Hammond was promoted to lieutenant general. He faced new threats: Baal took over Anubis's power vacuum and nearly defeated the System Lords, the replicators returned, and Anubis was found to be still alive. He continues to try to adjust to life on the quiet side of the gate room glass, envying his former teammates' journeys and joining them when he can.
Character developments
O'Neill has focused his free time on the more important things in life, fishing at his pond in Minnesota that contains no fish (until the events of the two-parter episode Moebius), watching 'The Simpsons', doing crossword puzzles, and drinking Guinness.
His character will be faded even further into the background during season 9, in which O'Neill will only appear in 4-5 episodes. This means that he will no longer be a main cast member. He will be 'replaced' (Not directly, but in the sense of 'filling a void' left by O'Neill's departure) so to speak by Major General Hank Landry (played by Beau Bridges), who will take command of Stargate Command. Producers have suggested O'Neill will be promoted and take over as head of Homeworld Security, a position which his predecessor, General Hammond, held during the eighth season.
Unlike Anderson's other famous on-screen persona, Angus MacGyver, O'Neill has no aversion to firearms. He is a career special forces operator, owns at least one personal firearm, and becomes extremely agitated whenever it is suggested he and his team go anywhere unarmed, including places known to be safe for SG-1 and where said firearms may be a liability.