Sam Carter/Amanda Tapping Discussion/Appreciation

[AGateFan]

i wasnt' just meaning things that we'd change about sam, i meant things that sam would change

what does she regret at 2am? what does she look back and go 'if only', what would SHE go back and change

My answer remains the same.
I think she is embarrassed by the Gemini situation and its ability to allow people to question her fitness for leadership.

I do like the answer about slapping down the lesser officers who challenged her leadership though. But ultimately if only one thing can be changed I would say it has to be the "giving the replicators the means to defend themselves from the only weapon capable of killing them".

[Skydiver]

i agree with you about replicarter. i think she regrets not killing her and...you know, the sam/daniel angst folks have a gold mine there because daniel died because sam didn't stop RC.

[Simhavaktra]

i wasnt' just meaning things that we'd change about sam, i meant things that sam would change

what does she regret at 2am? what does she look back and go 'if only', what would SHE go back and change

She'd call her Mom and tell her not to get in that cab; she'd scream and carry one and cry and pitch a fit and threaten to disassemble every device in the neighborhood to keep her out of that cab - and then talk one of the neighbors into taking her to pick up her Mom when that didn't work. (And hopefully not get hit by the drunk driver themselves.)

She'd try harder to save both Martouf and Lantash, and, probably, to make some kind of accord with Jolinar, too.

She'd bring as many Tollan, including Narim, through the Stargate with SG1 to Earth when the Goa'uld attacked as she could. Maybe they wouldn't stay. Maybe they wouldn't help. But, at least they'd be alive.

She'd invent her Goa'uld control circuit frequencies jamming gizmo before Amonet tried to fry her host's husband's brain with a ribbon device. And then she'd cheerfully hand Amonet and Sha're over to the Tok'ra for Sha're to be de-Goa'ulded.

She'd try to find a way to sustain a Jaffa immune system without a symbiote before Drey'auc died.

She'd get Jack to send her with Janet on 666 instead of Daniel.

She have a Significant Talk About The Contents Of THAT Room with Jack right after Grace.

I'd hope that she'd let herself fly more often, ride her bike more often - let her spirit soar more often.

And... because I see Sam as a highly compassionate person, I think she'd find a way to give the Jack O'Neill who kept his side arm in a drawer a little boy can get into a swift and sturdy kick to his 'sure-I've-got-it-covered' attitude before it gets covered in Charlie's blood - even if it meant that Jack and Sara stayed together, and many other things happened differently, or never happened at all.

[Traveler Enroute1]

i wasnt' just meaning things that we'd change about sam, i meant things that sam would change

what does she regret at 2am? what does she look back and go 'if only', what would SHE go back and change

I think she would go fishing with Jack. Get to listen to him, talk to him. Face whatever vibe she was getting when around him and study it.

Just sayin'.

[Skydiver]

She'd call her Mom and tell her not to get in that cab; she'd scream and carry one and cry and pitch a fit and threaten to disassemble every device in the neighborhood to keep her out of that cab - and then talk one of the neighbors into taking her to pick up her Mom when that didn't work. (And hopefully not get hit by the drunk driver themselves.)

She'd try harder to save both Martouf and Lantash, and, probably, to make some kind of accord with Jolinar, too.

She'd bring as many Tollan, including Narim, through the Stargate with SG1 to Earth when the Goa'uld attacked as she could. Maybe they wouldn't stay. Maybe they wouldn't help. But, at least they'd be alive.

She'd invent her Goa'uld control circuit frequencies jamming gizmo before Amonet tried to fry her host's husband's brain with a ribbon device. And then she'd cheerfully hand Amonet and Sha're over to the Tok'ra for Sha're to be de-Goa'ulded.

She'd try to find a way to sustain a Jaffa immune system without a symbiote before Drey'auc died.

She'd get Jack to send her with Janet on 666 instead of Daniel.

She have a Significant Talk About The Contents Of THAT Room with Jack right after Grace.

I'd hope that she'd let herself fly more often, ride her bike more often - let her spirit soar more often.

And... because I see Sam as a highly compassionate person, I think she'd find a way to give the Jack O'Neill who kept his side arm in a drawer a little boy can get into a swift and sturdy kick to his 'sure-I've-got-it-covered' attitude before it gets covered in Charlie's blood - even if it meant that Jack and Sara stayed together, and many other things happened differently, or never happened at all.

wow. great post

remind me to green you when they get the rep thing fixed huh?

[parsifal]

She have a Significant Talk About The Contents Of THAT Room with Jack right after Grace.

Some nice thoughts (although the Tollans didn't get a bum deal), particularly the one I singled out , but I think it's important to remember who Carter is and what she believes. I don't think she would change purely personal events (e.g., Charlie's death) that would end up having such a significant impact on history.

[Strix varia]

I think she would definitely not disable/tinker with the safety protocols in order to go to K'tau (Red Sky).

Nearly causing the destruction of an entire planet and the resulting deaths no doubt keep her awake at night.

[Simhavaktra]

I think she would definitely not disable/tinker with the safety protocols in order to go to K'tau (Red Sky).

Nearly causing the destruction of an entire planet and the resulting deaths no doubt keep her awake at night.

Excellent call, Strix!

I suspect that K'Tau will account for sleepless nights for Sam for the rest of her existence.

And there's probably a fine story out there in the ether, never to be written, produced or broadcast, about Sam having to save the day, Earth, the galaxy, universe, whatever, by circumventing those Gate protocols, knowing what will happen to another world, if she does. Would she refuse to do it unless ordered? Would she do it if ordered? Would she think her way to another solution? (My personal bet ) And, if this happened in the era of Landry in command, and she'd disobeyed his direct order, and maybe his Golden-Boy Mitchell's order too, in the doing, what would happen when she came up with another successful solution? I see Landry as exercising his fondness for yelling at people, regardless; while Hammond, for example, would have read her the riot act, then given her a commendation.

[Uber]

i wasnt' just meaning things that we'd change about sam, i meant things that sam would change

what does she regret at 2am? what does she look back and go 'if only', what would SHE go back and change

Let me get all deep on you all for a second.

She wouldn't change anything.

Why? Actually there are two reasons.

First, in Avenger 2.0, she told Jay: "I need you to get past feeling guilty and focus on finding a solution." I think this suggests Sam's basic life philosophy includes not dwelling on past mistakes but rather learning from them for the future.

Secondly, Sam understands the fact that things happen for a reason. For example, if given a chance to, she would not go back in time to kill Replicarter this time around even though it led to Daniel dying (again).

But let's say she did go back in time and changed history and killed Replicarter. What would be the result of this action? Well, fact is, our guys would be dead...two times over...and that's only the consequences we know about.

Let's play this "if she had done things differently" scenario out for a moment so you can see where I'm coming from.

If Sam had killed Replicarter in Gemini, Daniel would not have been taken by her and therefore, he wouldn't have gotten control of the replicator army to the point of slowing their advances...which was the only thing that gave the others time to regroup before they were overwhelmed by the onslaught of mechanical bugs.

Also, Daniel wouldn't have died and been taken to the diner. He never would have had those very important and poignant conversations with Oma and Jim. He never would have found out about Anubis's plan and never would have given the speech that compelled Oma to in essence sacrifice herself by battling Anubis for all eternity and the "others" wouldn't have been moved by Oma's actions and wouldn't have stopped Anubis's life eradicating device.

So...bigger picture here...if Sam ever did go back and kill Replicarter like many have griped she should have done to begin with, all life in the galaxy would be gone.

Sam understands the intricacies of a wide variety of temporal paradoxes. In Moebius 1, she was scared to even step on a bug for fear that it would alter the future timeline. Going back in time to fix something you think you messed up could in actuality make things significantly worse by sparking a chain of events that came to be from your correcting a perceived misstep.

So, I say again...Sam wouldn't change a thing.

[parsifal]

Sam understands the fact that things happen for a reason.

I think it's less "things happen[ing] for a reason" than inability to adequately predict the outcomes (Sam is, after all, a good little quantum mechanic). There is no 'right' timeline except the one that exists, and how much one is willing to sacrifice to obtain one that is perceived to be 'correct'. The universe doesn't care whether the human race (or Daniel) lives or dies. Clearly there are some instances where Sam is willing to alter the timeline to align it with her conception of what is right (e.g., "2010"). Everyone is constantly affecting the timeline in generally minute ways with his/her actions in the present. It's just a question of being willing to do that on a larger scale and being willing to accept the consequences.

I do agree with your main argument that Sam wouldn't change things in most cases.

[Uber]

I think it's less "things happen[ing] for a reason" than inability to adequately predict the outcomes (Sam is, after all, a good little quantum mechanic). There is no 'right' timeline except the one that exists, and how much one is willing to sacrifice to obtain one that is perceived to be 'correct'. The universe doesn't care whether the human race (or Daniel) lives or dies. Clearly there are some instances where Sam is willing to alter the timeline to align it with her conception of what is right (e.g., "2010"). Everyone is constantly affecting the timeline in generally minute ways with his/her actions in the present. It's just a question of being willing to do that on a larger scale and being willing to accept the consequences.

I do agree with your main argument that Sam wouldn't change things in most cases.

I mostly agree with you but I think the 2010 was such an extreme case as to bar exemption from this particular argument...because literally, had they done nothing, all life on earth would cease to exist.

My guess is that even though future Sam understood full well that this was a MAJOR change in the timeline bound to have limitless unforeseen consequences...and of course she acknowledged to Jack that she didn't know what would come of this change except that they would prevent the end of all life on earth...the cost of inaction was so apocalyptic and catastrophic as to warrant actively resetting the timeline, unforeseen consequences be damned. And of course, we know now that one of those consequences was the loss of Janet Frasier.

You're right about my wording...as I waxed poetic and wrote it with more of an existential edge rather than a scientific one, which I'm sure Samantha would probably have preferred.

[majorsal]

riiiggghhhttt just a couple of days

so, we need a topic. something more fun than the sam/vala saga

ok, let's pretend you're sam. if you could go back any time during the show, seasons 1-8 (since a lot of folks haven't seen s9)....and you would be able to change any ONE thing, what would you change and why?

the first thing... okay, scratch that, the second thing that came to mind was having sam end up with baal instead of jack.

maybe sam was the one that got real sick in 'frozen'. she either declined the symbiot offer and was taken by the tok'ra for other healing options, or she accepted, but either way, *she* ends up the one in baal's hands.

why? because i think amanda would have done *fantastic* in those scenes. and i'm sure they (the writers) would have shown more after-effects for sam than what they did with jack. but to imagine sam going through that horrible ordeal... meaty indeed.



sally


ps - btw, my first idea was 'NO PETE THE BOYFRIEND!'

[majorsal]

i wasnt' just meaning things that we'd change about sam, i meant things that sam would change

what does she regret at 2am? what does she look back and go 'if only', what would SHE go back and change

the first thing that came to mind? 'red sky', where she macgyvered the computer to go ahead and dial to the planet. all the ppl would have died if it wasn't for the asgard's actions. but i'd think that that would weigh on sam's mind that she almost caused a world-wide extermination of an entire planet's population.



sally

[majorsal]

My answer remains the same.
I think she is embarrassed by the Gemini situation and its ability to allow people to question her fitness for leadership.

I do like the answer about slapping down the lesser officers who challenged her leadership though. But ultimately if only one thing can be changed I would say it has to be the "giving the replicators the means to defend themselves from the only weapon capable of killing them".

i didn't question either of those scenes/eps. the only time i've questioned sam's decisions was when she very gladly accepted being treated with an extreme lack of respect. (talkin' about the pete-must-know-everything-so-he-finds-out-behind-sam's-back fiasco)



sally

[minigeek]

I need a few seconds to vent. I know this probably doesn't have relevance here but I need an ear that'll at least understand.

A few months back, I started posting to help out some other SAmandans in spreading some positive remarks about Sam over in the "official" forum. I took a break and stopped a while back because it was just too hostile (in general). Well, after I did that CB sketch, I thought I'd share it over there in the CB thread, since that seems to be where a great majority of CB fans are. I have a history of defending the Carter character on those boards, but I figured that wouldn't matter. So I posted the sketch. Want to know the ONLY reply I got? As a PM on the "official" boards, I got this:

too little too late

Now I realize it wasn't the greatest sketch in the world, but what the heck does that mean? I'm definitely not into pidgeonholeing people or forming generic stereotypes, but I simply cannot help but compare two groups of people when something like that happens. I worked for a while on that sketch, and while I wasn't doing it for fanfare, I certainly wasn't doing it for some kind of insult. I have to say, that is the last time I share anything with that particular fan segment. I'm really sorry to say that. But it certainly seems to me that AT's fans seem a heck of a lot friendlier to chat with than some of the others I've met since joining these forums online. I don't know why that is, and it's certainly just my own experience, but I have to say it none the less.

Before I go I should mention that one Vala/CB fan did send me a nice PM. But it was here in GW. Rather ironically, I received *several* very sweet comments and PMs from SAmandans about it (imagine that!), so again, I think that case is resting rather soundly.