This was not originally written as a 2-part episode, but, after filming the dialog, the story would not fit into a single episode. It was turned into a 2-parter by filming two additional scenes and using some extended action sequences.
Colonel O'Neill says that his favorite person to have dinner with would be Mary Steenburgen. Richard Dean Anderson later claimed that he used "Hello this is Mary Steenburgen..." as a mock cell phone message in his own voice and the jokes about Mary Steenburgen just continued from there without there being any real relationship or connection between himself and Mary.