Sam Carter/Amanda Tapping Discussion/Appreciation

[Skydiver]

I don't know much, if anything, about how military personnel get promoted. But I would think that it would take more than just her c/o to get her promoted.

i am sure that all jack did was put her name on the list and recommend her promotion. and i am sure that it's all on the up and up...but people WILL make the worst of a situation if they want to

[astrogeologist]

Along with promoting Carter as his first act of his new office, O'Neill should then have been seen training her to be a leader, teaching her how to take command, but that didn't happen. There could have been some wonderful scenes between the two of them around that theme, which, in turn, would have launched Carter's military career in the field. Instead, they were drawing farther apart, with the focus primarily on what it meant for Jack to get his promotion. Sam's promotion and its consequences were never fully addressed.

I was thinking along the lines of how the bulk of Season 8's episodes did not show Carter in command, or struggling with difficult command decisions... or showing her as the 'hand signal person in charge'... or letting her be the lead hero in the field... 'no one stays behind', so that she makes everyone go through the gate before her while she stands her ground and holds off the alien barrage so that the others get through safely...

And I also like the idea of Jack mentoring Sam... where she comes back from a mission where she'd had to make a really tough call, and she's struggling with whether or not she should have done A or B... or perhaps whether or not she could have made a different decision that might have saved more lives... and Jack mentors her on how to deal with the aftermath of command decisions made in the field...

Season 8 *did* feature Jack trying to find himself in *his* new position, but Sam's promotion to Lt. Col. and command of SG-1 wasn't dealt with much.

I've said it before (and I'm going to say it again and again and again, so please bear with me ), I'm hoping that Season 9 shows us a strong Sam Carter, one who's comfortable with herself and her life and whose on screen time is focussed on major scifi plotlines that show our plucky gal struggling against great odds.... and ultimately triumphing (bent and banged up, perhaps, but not broken).

Sam's promotion and its consequences were never fully addressed.

exactly. Ok, i have no issue with sam being promoted. i think it was definitely time....BUT

(you knew there had to be one, didn't ya?)

Jack did it. Her direct co. which, in the minds of jealous little folks, will bring up the rumors that 'eh, she just slept with her boss and got lt col because of it'

It's too bad that Hammond couldn't get it done before he left, or did it FOR jack.

i mean, it never would have passed if it wasn't warranted, but by jack being the driving force behind it, he makes her promotion look like a reward for saving his life or something else questionable

I don't know much, if anything, about how military personnel get promoted. But I would think that it would take more than just her c/o to get her promoted.

i am sure that all jack did was put her name on the list and recommend her promotion. and i am sure that it's all on the up and up...but people WILL make the worst of a situation if they want to

I too was not happy with how they portrayed Sam's promotion to Lt. Col... I felt that it was a more than deserved promotion, but the way that they wrote it made it come across as if Jack did it 'cuz he could (which implied that she may not have deserved it....grrrrr).

I really like Sam as Lt. Col. Carter and I like the possibilties and potential storylines for her character. For saving the world countless times, all of the members of SG-1 deserve promotions, medals and other such awards showered upon them - and I've found it odd that they haven't shown a few more medal ceremonies or some such (to include commendations and such for Daniel and Teal'c as well as Jack and Sam).

I however, like many of you have commented above, would have written the 'Sam gets promoted to Lt. Col.' dialogue differently - there needn't have been much said, but it would have left no doubt about the propriety of the promotion.

That all said, I felt that the ceremony was nicely done. If I'd been writing it, I would have added a little bit of humor, though... something along the lines of: Jack is reciting the words that Sam is supposed to repeat - and she hesitates and he looks questioningly at her... she then looks around and 'up'.. and then she shrugs apologetically and mutters something about 'expecting a flash of bright light', 'Thor' and 'crises to save the galaxy'...

Or... simply have Carter beamed away by Thor just as Jack reaches to pin her new insignia on (having it be Jack who is beamed away again would be boring, but having it be Carter would be a great balance - and I can just picture Jack's reaction as played by RDA ).

Something like that would add a little humor to the scene at the same time that it would tie back to the events in earlier episodes such as Fair Game - I'm one of the fans that loves that kind of thing
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[blueiris]

i am sure that all jack did was put her name on the list and recommend her promotion. and i am sure that it's all on the up and up...but people WILL make the worst of a situation if they want to

It could be that he was not even the one to put her name on the list. I'm sure there are many other people who would receommend her for promotion, just as I'm sure O'Neill was in approval no matter how many people were involved. But yes, some will read what they want to into it. But it seems silly to think one man could have someone promoted. There'd be nothing but generals and admirals and whatever is high ranking in no time if that were the case.

[MajorSam]

I mean Sam is a more than able officer and should have got the promotion but i can see that people would think she only got it from sleepin with Jack?

You know I can't believe it but the thought that she got the promo from "sleeping with Jack" or from jack's own favour, never even occured to me. The only thought I had was "About bloody time!!!!"

I'm amazed that people would think she didn't deserve it, or that she got it for means other than the AMAZING things she's done over the past many years.

Threads spoilers

Spoiler:

Although I don't know how many exactly... they were going on about how Jacob only got Selmak 4 years earlier, instead of 6, like seasons, so obviuosly time is different in SG land

Still, I never thought once that she didn't deserve it.

I, like you all though, feel it was definately not addressed right. Jack had lots of episodes to show how he's handling it. The only one I can remember for Sam is Icon, which was a silly Daniel episode, and It's Good to be King, which they Brought Jack in for as well, so the limelight was taken away, somewhat, IMO, by jack's whole "ah I miss offworld missions"
We don't hear anything about Sam saying "ah, leadership" or anything. She's just... there... we dont' know how she feels, how she'll react in hostile situations. They've had Jack in countless obvious leader roles, making tough decisions and stuff. I want to see Sam thrown into some of them, get the good old "go to planet, things go bad, have to fix" storyline. (Without the cause of fixing being Daniel ranting on about morals and what's right)

[Coley]

Hi everyone. Hey I'm a little bit out of sync with everyone here!
No sooner that I comment on a topic and y'all have moved onto the next one!!

Tok'raHostess - LOL re the quotes from the female comediens on pain!!

Major Sam - Buy one get one free?!!! - Oh my god!!! Quickly reaches for the hankie to mop fevered brow, fervently counts all beans, slides a few counters on the abacus, mops brow again - whew!!! Yes given a reasonable selling price we can just about fund the offer - bound to be a popular one - so may just break even!! Phew - reaches for the sloe gin, sits back and relaxes into reading posts again!!

ChopinGal and Astrogeologist - and just about everybody else - you are making some wonderful comments on your posts re Sam Whumping and her promotion - as I haven't seen season 8 yet I shall have to wait and see what the fuss is about!!!

Thanks for all the links you are putting up for great samfics!!


[SIZE=2]YES!![/SIZE] I pick up first DVD for season 8 next week. Are they already out over there in the US?

[Tok'Ra Hostess]

It's called a rotating 'php' file...

Oi! You folks are all so smart about this stuff!

BTW, AstroG think you can find any pics of Carterchic? (Love that ) I don't remember any ep where we get a closeup of Sam's combat boots.

Mucho rep points to anyone who can point to a specific ep/scene of Carterchic.

[deepspace]

I really liked the promotion scene, and never viewed it as anything but her deserving it after so long. After all, which season was her promotion to Major? 3?

Thanks Astrogeologist, for the screencaps of POV. I like all the alternate reality ones. It's been a while since I saw it.

And thankyou for helping with the spoilertags, more simple than I thought!
And it was really nice of you to answer my whole post like that.

Everyone's discussion right now is great, I just need more time to read it. And I'm not going to be near a computer for the weekend. Will look forward to reading all Samandan news when I next come here.

[astrogeologist]

Major Sam - Buy one get one free?!!! - Oh my god!!! Quickly reaches for the hankie to mop fevered brow, fervently counts all beans, slides a few counters on the abacus, mops brow again - whew!!! Yes given a reasonable selling price we can just about fund the offer - bound to be a popular one - so may just break even!! Phew - reaches for the sloe gin, sits back and relaxes into reading posts again!!

LOL at the image of you counting the beans (actually still chuckling over the image of MajorSam's keyboard with beans all over it).

ChopinGal and Astrogeologist - and just about everybody else - you are making some wonderful comments on your posts re Sam Whumping and her promotion - as I haven't seen season 8 yet I shall have to wait and see what the fuss is about!!! YES!! I pick up first DVD for season 8 next week. Are they already out over there in the US?

No - we won't get any Season 8 DVD's here until probably next Fall... it was just this past October when we could get the Season 7 DVDs!
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[MajorSam]

Oi! You folks are all so smart about this stuff!

BTW, AstroG think you can find any pics of Carterchic? (Love that ) I don't remember any ep where we get a closeup of Sam's combat boots.

Mucho rep points to anyone who can point to a specific ep/scene of Carterchic.

Does it have to be an episod!?!?




Cause that's all i've found so far... i'm off to search through my thousand Samanda pics though...


EDIT: What about this...sry for the black and whiteness...

[Tok'Ra Hostess]

Slightly OT here but a good place to bring this up: when AT does the audio commentary for Resurrection she handles herself so professionally and it's a joy to listen to her talk with so much passion and precision about her work, her craft. On the other hand, IMO, some of the other directors, who have been doing this for years, reduce their commentaries to sophomoric ramblings about bodily functions and animal-house jokes. Amanda (who certainly enjoys joking around and is no prude) showed by her narrative that there is a time to be serious and grown-up and take pride in your profession. Sorry, I've been carrying this bad taste in my mouth around for quite awhile and needed to get rid of it! I'm sure some of you may not agree, but it irks the hell out of me.

Oh, no, not me. I do so very much agree.

There's nothing I hate more than to have a so-called commentary ruined by stupid, vapid "Oh, look, I had hair! I was so skinny then. You were so hot in that scene," etc.

ugh!

AT has an easy eloquence that makes her a pleasure to listen to. She puts me in mind of JMS (the creator of B5 - sorry I just can't remember how to spell his name). I love listening to his commentaries, too. Now there's two intelligent, and well-spoken people.

I'd watch anything that AT directed, because I know she'd do something intelligent with the material.

[astrogeologist]

Does it have to be an episod!?!?

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...Carterchic.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...m/bootsbig.jpg

Cause that's all i've found so far... i'm off to search through my thousand Samanda pics though...

EDIT: What about this...sry for the black and whiteness...

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...m/51jaunty.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...Sam/boots2.jpg

Great pics MajorSam! (tried to rep you but it still demands that I go forth and spead the jello elsewhere first)

Do you have any more full body promotional shots from earlier seasons?
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[MajorSam]

Great pics MajorSam! (tried to rep you but it still demands that I go forth and spead the jello elsewhere first)

Do you have any more full body promotional shots from earlier seasons?
.

Hm... like, FULL full??? and Early seasons??? I don't know... I have these:






I also have more head shot/upper body promos...

[astrogeologist]

Hm... like, FULL full??? and Early seasons??? I don't know... I have these:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v626/MajorSam/53sg1b.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...m/53aaawww.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...arious60th.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...ous59thart.jpg

I also have more head shot/upper body promos...

Those pics aren't showing up for me...I'm just getting little boxes with red x's

[MajorSam]

Those pics aren't showing up for me...I'm just getting little boxes with red x's

Ah crap, I know why, stupid mistake I fixed it!!!

[NearlyCircular]

exactly. Ok, i have no issue with sam being promoted. i think it was definitely time....BUT

(you knew there had to be one, didn't ya?)

Jack did it. Her direct co. which, in the minds of jealous little folks, will bring up the rumors that 'eh, she just slept with her boss and got lt col because of it'

It's too bad that Hammond couldn't get it done before he left, or did it FOR jack.

i mean, it never would have passed if it wasn't warranted, but by jack being the driving force behind it, he makes her promotion look like a reward for saving his life or something else questionable

When I watched it, I didn't think that people would necessarily assume that she slept with Jack, but they could very easily have assumed she got the promotion just because he wanted her to.

It didn't help when the timing of the sequence went from Jack saying

"I'll be able to do whatever I want." and Sam saying "Within reason, sir"

directly to the change of command ceremony, where he says

"...The other reason I took this job was so I could do really cool stuff like this. It is with great pride that my first order of business as Commander of this base is the announcement of the promotion of Major Samantha Carter to Lieutenant Colonel."

That could be interpreted to mean that she only got the promotion cause he thought it would be cool. The line probably meant that getting to make the announcement was cool, but it just didn't sit right with me.

NC