Sam Carter/Amanda Tapping Discussion/Appreciation

[Tracy Jane]

LOL ... little Page, when did you become a jester?! This is delightful, your comments on the tent and then your wanting to be chainmail one day because your playmates never gave you the chance!

Samandans, come on, be honest: how many of you would have been the Princess and how many of you would have been the Knight as a kid?

I always wanted to be a cowboy and a knight and a soldier - never was much into that whole little homemaker gig! What about others? Something tells me there were a lot of Sam Carter Juniors from the Samanda crowd ... care to share?

I never wanted to be the knight or the princess. I wanted to be the dragon or Merlin.

[ChopinGal]

A CALL FOR SIGNATURES!

Ladies and gents,

Some of you know (and some of you don't) that I'm something of a sketch artist in my er... ample spare time? (whenever I'm not making models of space ships or absent water bottles as the case may be! ).

In any case, I'm working on a little GABIT project which I'm hoping to have okay'd by the GABIT crew (I have yet to approach them because I want to see if it'll work first), whereby I'm going to professionally print a poster-sized comic-book type sketch of Lt. Colonel Samantha Carter, decked out in full SG-1 gear (similar to one you may have already seen by me). Around this sketch, I would love to have SAmandan signatures, accompanied by a small note of accolade or encouragement for Amanda - and by small, I mean 250 characters or less (not words mind you, characters).

Amanda always signs autographs for her fans, I thought it'd be super cool to give her something signed by all of US for a change. Also something she could keep and that would remind her of how much we've all loved watching her play Sam Carter for the past decade or so.

If the GABIT folks say it's okay, I thought it'd be really neat if we were able to present the poster to her with all the signatures and little messages on it, some time during GABIT itself. Then have it couriered back to her in Canada (so she doesn't have to carry it in her luggage). If it's not okay with the GABIT folks, I suppose we could always try to just send it to her somehow, but I'm really hoping they'll say yes. It's just a poster-sheet, after all.

So... how will all the fan signatures end up on the actual poster, you may ask?? Good question!

I'd want them to appear *EXACTLY* as they were written. Choose your message. Choose your pen color (mind you don't use a giant marker, I won't be able to give anyone more than about 300 pixels width so use a pen, ok?).

Sign a WHITE PIECE OF PAPER as though you were signing a group birthday card, for example. Then ... have your paper SCANNED into the computer as an image. Set the DPI at 300 - if you don't know how, you can have it done at a local copy-centre, or ask a friend!

You've only got about this much space:


Once you have your image (signature/message), save it as a (JPG - 300 DPI ) Again, if you need help, ask a friend or have your copy centre do it for you.

Then... email it to me at:
FanSigsForAT(at)gmail.com

Use the subject header "SIGNATURE FOR AT"

I will be filtering mail that way, so if you don't use that subject, your signature may be lost. We've got some time to do this so don't panic. Think about what you want to say (and how to say it in 250 characters or less!). Obviously I will be reading these before I put them on the poster and censoring rude, crude, personal or otherwise inappropriate comments - which won't even be an issue since this is SAmanda and who here would even think of saying something inappropriate!? My recommendation would be to keep it light and happy, you only have about 250 characters after all.

I was thinking of keeping this in the SAmanda family - a SAmandan project since this is a place I've come to view as very special since I was welcomed here a few months ago. However please also feel free to pass this on to anyone else you might feel would want to participate. Even if that's on another group. We're all friends, right?

I hope to contact the G4 about this as soon as I know whether it will work and see if it's doable. It could be really awesome if it works out well.

Thanks guys so much ... love and hugs to you all !!

minigeek

-

Brilliant idea! Count me in! It will be a labor of love, I'm sure. Are you going to create a brand new drawing for the poster? What fun! Amanda will treasure this for sure. Prediction: somewhere in her house there will be a memorabilia corner with the GW/Samanda autograph poster and the "red book" sitting nearby!

[the dancer of spaz]

Hey!

I hope everyone's weekend was just swell. If you're a bit pressed for time, skim through this or skip it altogether. If not, have at it.

I've watched Off The Grid three times now. The second time was so I could understand where the HECK they were going with this episode, and the third time was for further clarification purposes. I'm not exactly the smartest tack in the box, but I'd like to think that it doesn't take three times to see an ep to fully understand it, unless there are serious plot holes. I typically re-watch eps for pleasure, or because I think I have something akin to OCD...

Everyone's stated the pros and the negs enormously well. I went into this ep feeling rather neutral towards Cameron. I still feel like there's hope for the guy... I really do. Whether that potential will ever be realized is a whole other issue entirely. I didn't go in expecting to be so annoyed by him, but (naturally) I was.

I don't like to think that it's Ben Browder's acting. And I'm certainly not gonna say he's bad... He's obviously proven his talent with his work on Farscape. I just feel that his own interpretation coupled with TPTB's bizarre take on Cameron has culminated into something quite disturbing. As everyone has said, you'd think that Cameron's behavior was a deliberate attempt to destroy his credibility.

But I don't think they're all that self-destructive. I just don't think the writers/directors (a) have it in them to go against the grain so blatantly, or (b) honestly see his flaws in the first place. Perhaps the mentality is split. Maybe the same ol' political BS has reared its ugly head in certain issues, and it's a complex tug-of-war. Again.

Whatever the deal is, I'd be surprised if Cameron was the same kinda guy next season. Then again, since Sci Fi doesn't seem to follow simple logic, I guess we shouldn't be surprised either. As Mandy pointed out, however, it seems that the cast/team structure is going to be way off at times. Not only has the cast gotten too large, but people seem to be jumping ship for real life issues and Atlantis as well - which leads to more and more opportunities for poorly-constructed crossovers that they originally promised we'd never see. I feel bad for the fans who are solely fans of Atlantis. That's gonna blow. There's a reason why Sam, Daniel and Teal'c are all called "The Big 3" these days. And it probably won't fare well for characters like Teyla, Ronon, or even Weir. Fantastic.

In regards to Cameron's relationship to everyone else, I have to say that TPTB have once again gotten it very twisted. Cameron is portrayed as The Guy, The Hero. He's portrayed as the lead in the most horrible of ways. He's a main source for reaction shots, one-liners, and the one who apparently is so dang dedicated to the SGC and his team, that he's willing to risk his life for them. Yet, when the time comes for a big decision to be made, or for the team to get into huge amounts of trouble, they portray The Big 3 as looking upon Cameron as the moronic noob that he is. Instead of showing TB3 as (however illogically) agreeing with his antics, they show them basically AGREEING with the audience. Yet he's still focused upon like he's the one who's rightfully in charge. There's no other episode in S9 that portrays SG-1 as a true and twisted democracy as much as Off The Grid. Cameron's not in charge! And if he is (heaven forbid), Daniel, Sam and Teal'c are simply allowing him to officially give "orders," while they plan for their next Cameron Saving tactics.

And Sam, along with Daniel and Teal'c, DOES seem to be portrayed as subservient to him. However AT/Sam, again along with MS/Daniel and CJ/Teal'c, makes the most with what relatively little she's given. So much so, that I do not think Sci Fi anticipated it ever being a question as to who was leading SG-1 after The Fourth Horseman, Part II. Before then, it was rather ambiguous. They hadn't gone off-world as a whole team much more than once, that we saw, yet they were leaning towards favoring Cameron. And then, bam!, as soon as they go off-world more regularly, it becomes glaringly obvious how inept Cameron can be in the field, despite they're "telling approach." And also, amazingly, how much Sam STILL looks like she's leading SG-1 and is more capable of doing so, despite what the script is telling everyone.

The most telling for me? When my nine-year-old brother plopped down on the couch at my parents' house, watched a bit of the ep, and asked disdainfully, "Is that Cameron?"

"Yes," I answered.

"He's freakin' stupid."

Outta the mouths of babes...

Finally, I have to say that I've always gotten an agitating vibe from Landry, despite Bridges' stellar performance in this ep and a few others. Landry, though a good character, is the character manifestation of Sci Fi's current hero worship of Cameron Mitchell. To me, it's always seemed like Landry has favored Cameron over the others. And, while I tried not to sound like a raving nut, I could never quite shake it.

Landry is written as a by-the-book General, who doesn't take crap from anyone. Yet we continue to see blatant disregard for Cameron's actions. It's getting rather old, rather fast. And it's slowly killing General Landry's credibility for me as well. And it's not that I want Cameron to get reamed. I just want him to stop making ream-able decisions.

I said I was going to try not to bash Cameron so much, so I'm sorry that this has become a sort of bashfest. Cameron, on paper and pre-Babylon, is a really, good character. And I'm truly sorry that Cameron fans are offended by all of this. I completely understand how they feel. Also, I honestly don't think this is Browder's fault. I just wish they could write these new characters in a way that highlights SG-1; not some network agenda.

On a lighter note:

I laughed at the "I'd make a better drug dealer than you" moment. Yep, the Mary Poppins crack and Sam's reaction made me laugh out loud, too. Though I still think a good thwap upside his head would've been a nice addition to the joke. You gotta love Teal'c, ever the mediator. The scene was simply ludicrous, which is why my hysterical laughter was borne of more than just great comedic timing on everyone's part.

It was a nice romp, plot holes aside, which made SG-1 and Atlantis feel like the Sci Fi version of Mr. and Mrs. Smith to me - especially John and Elizabeth. No discernible plot or logic in sight for either series...

The Long Goodbye

Spoiler:

Even though our base commander has been taken over by an alien entity, we think it'd be an absolutely grand idea to let Shep do it, too. On purpose. Oh yeah, and did we mention that the other entity is the first one's husband?

Let the hardcore ship wars begin anew. Shoot, we thought Sam/Jack was bad? Oooh baby... We ain't seen nothing yet.

... Yet you got the pleasure of watching a bunch of pretty people shoot at people/eachother and blow things up.

Oh yeah, and leather. Lots of leather. Amanda Tapping looked great, and the guys looked hot. Even Beefcake!Teal'c.

As long as they don't have Sam and Vala in these get-ups next season, I'll be happy.

[ChopinGal]

I never wanted to be the knight or the princess. I wanted to be the dragon or Merlin.

Ooh, that's dark and quirky, TJ ... You would have been a fun playmate, even if you were a little dangerous!

[Lys]

LOL ... little Page, when did you become a jester?! This is delightful, your comments on the tent and then your wanting to be chainmail one day because your playmates never gave you the chance!

Samandans, come on, be honest: how many of you would have been the Princess and how many of you would have been the Knight as a kid?

I always wanted to be a cowboy and a knight and a soldier - never was much into that whole little homemaker gig! What about others? Something tells me there were a lot of Sam Carter Juniors from the Samanda crowd ... care to share?

My dear Chopingal ! You, a cowboy ! Is our Royal Hen turning all John Wayne on us ?
Hehe, I've never wanted to be the knight nor the soldier but I was an Indiana Jones wannabe when I was little. Always exploring old things, always wanting to discover and go on adventure. And when I wasn't turning my grandparents' attic upside down in search of a treasure, I was reading every history book I could get my hands on. How is it that I became a pharmacist ?

[Deejay435]

Samandans, come on, be honest: how many of you would have been the Princess and how many of you would have been the Knight as a kid?

I would have been both. I would have been a princess who took up the sword and kicked some medieval butt. THat's how it always went in my fantasy games.

[the dancer of spaz]

Samandans, come on, be honest: how many of you would have been the Princess and how many of you would have been the Knight as a kid?

Heh heh. I think I was a bit of both, with an emphasis on the knight part. I always wanted to explore, and my sister, our neighbors and I used to pretend like we were in some sort of grave danger all the time, with a race against the clock to save ourselves in the nick of time. Very intense stuff there. It was kinda hard to do that in a dress, I must admit, much to my mother and grandmother's dismay.

[Uber]

A CALL FOR SIGNATURES!

Ladies and gents,

Some of you know (and some of you don't) that I'm something of a sketch artist in my er... ample spare time? (whenever I'm not making models of space ships or absent water bottles as the case may be! ).

In any case, I'm working on a little GABIT project which I'm hoping to have okay'd by the GABIT crew (I have yet to approach them because I want to see if it'll work first), whereby I'm going to professionally print a poster-sized comic-book type sketch of Lt. Colonel Samantha Carter, decked out in full SG-1 gear (similar to one you may have already seen by me). Around this sketch, I would love to have SAmandan signatures, accompanied by a small note of accolade or encouragement for Amanda - and by small, I mean 250 characters or less (not words mind you, characters).

Amanda always signs autographs for her fans, I thought it'd be super cool to give her something signed by all of US for a change. Also something she could keep and that would remind her of how much we've all loved watching her play Sam Carter for the past decade or so.

If the GABIT folks say it's okay, I thought it'd be really neat if we were able to present the poster to her with all the signatures and little messages on it, some time during GABIT itself. Then have it couriered back to her in Canada (so she doesn't have to carry it in her luggage). If it's not okay with the GABIT folks, I suppose we could always try to just send it to her somehow, but I'm really hoping they'll say yes. It's just a poster-sheet, after all.

So... how will all the fan signatures end up on the actual poster, you may ask?? Good question!

I'd want them to appear *EXACTLY* as they were written. Choose your message. Choose your pen color (mind you don't use a giant marker, I won't be able to give anyone more than about 300 pixels width so use a pen, ok?).

Sign a WHITE PIECE OF PAPER as though you were signing a group birthday card, for example. Then ... have your paper SCANNED into the computer as an image. Set the DPI at 300 - if you don't know how, you can have it done at a local copy-centre, or ask a friend!

You've only got about this much space:


<<snippety doo da>>

-

Wait...your name is Cindy Loo Hoo?!???

I distinctly remember you're calling yourself "Amazon" a few pages back.



&#220;ber(the disillusioned)SG-1Fan

[minigeek]

Wait...your name is Cindy Loo Hoo?!???

I distinctly remember you're calling yourself "Amazon" a few pages back.



Über(the disillusioned)SG-1Fan

Yes. Well. I have many names. In many cultures. Weep not.

[SunKrux]

Samandans, come on, be honest: how many of you would have been the Princess and how many of you would have been the Knight as a kid?

I was the kickin'butt, takin' names kind of Princess. I rarely played the way most women were portrayed on telly when I was a kid. I couldn't stand the "nambypambywimpyIneedamantosaveme" kind of female characters. Use to piss me off no end as a kid, still does considering that most women I know are NOT that way.

Who needs a Knight when you're a kickin' butt, takin' names kind of Princess?

[jckfan55]

It's part of the general dumbing-down (maybe so Mitchell won't stand out so much?<<g>>). I couldn't believe in "Ethon", for example, that they went along with that idiotic "deal" what Daniel "worked out" (I guess, to avoid getting shot)--and then they all, Sam included, seemed shocked, shocked, that Rand reneged. Was anyone here surprised at that??

I would have preferred some actual drama to come out of this deal Danny was trying to set up:

Sam would have responded to Daniel's deal by saying "Blue leader, proceed with the mission." When Daniel would sputter his next lines Sam would retort with passion. "They murdered Colonel Pendergast and 37 of his crew, Daniel! Murdered them after they'd surrendered. What's to stop (the Prez) from activating the sheild the moment the lights go back on down there?"

Daniel would take one look at President Fanatic and know Sam was right. Daniel would, in a selfless gesture, tell Sam to go ahead. Cam & Teal'c would blow the satalite out of the sky.

In the ensuing dramatic pause Sam would say, "Mr President, I've dispatched two flyers to pick up Doctor Jackson. I've rigged the <insert impressive technobabble here, resulting in....>"If he's not returned to us unharmed they'll turn your unsheilded bunker into an oven."

Prez Fanatic could still have gone psycho, Commander Perneaux could still have been injured while playing the hero to save Daniel, and later the two superpowers could still have blown themselves to bits, but we'd have gotten the pleasure of seeing the satalite go down spectacularly and Sam showing her command mettle(not to mention some sorely needed angst over the loss of a good character, Pendergast).

Oh, if only you were on the staff. (sigh)

[Myrth]

Exactly jckfan, and the fact that she would be under more pressure.... or any pressure is wrong on so many levels. We have a modern day killer pandemic on our hands, created out of negative body image pressure. Eating disorders... and frankly hollywood and ludicrous standards set by flawed ideals, has a lot to answer for there..... which is part of why it's so important to have people like Amanda who have the courage to say.. I will not abuse my body for the sake of my child.

Far as I'm concerned she's the most stunning woman I know of and the standard by which I'm rapidly coming to judge... which is a hugely high standard. You know I'd be fine without her example, but I'm so much better with it.

I'm gonna start going on about how great and gorgeous she is... but I have to go to work... so.. well you guys know... Amanda is the real deal.

She's letting people tell her she's too big? She's tall, but quite slim and still looked good even in the first ep. back after the baby for crying out loud. I remember reading that she said she was going to be sensible about the weight loss b/c she was breastfeeding. I bet that took some guts on her part and I admire her for putting her family and her health first.
I look at these female so-called ideals and I just want to feed them a milkshake. They look positively ill. In one of the commentaries for season 8 one of the people was kind of joking about how little AT eats--well duh, she's not behind the scenes like you, donut boy. I bet the MS & CJ have a bit of pressure to stay in shape, but nothing like what AT does.

[Mandysg1]

Originally Posted by ChopinGal
Samandans, come on, be honest: how many of you would have been the Princess and how many of you would have been the Knight as a kid?

Well when I was a kid, we actually played out side (that's right we didn't have computers or nintendo ) We had a group of kids that would play together and it didn't matter if you were a boy or girl, you either played the good guy or bad guy However the boy across the street always wanted to play house

[Tok'Ra Hostess]

Oh, if only you were on the staff. (sigh)

Ah, gee, thanks, folks, but I'm just Monday morning quarterbacking, here.

I'd only be useful to the PTB if I had my own time-traveling Puddle Jumper so that I could jump ahead and offer fixes to their generally terrific story ideas(including fixes gleaned from the pages of the ep threads and the Great Character threads here on GW, of course. ) And I do feel that the writers have presented some very interesting situations for SG-1 - they just don't... can't... won't... do anything with them! :ripshairfromheadsmilie:

[Mandysg1]

Ah, gee, thanks, folks, but I'm just Monday morning quarterbacking, here.

I'd only be useful to the PTB if I had my own time-traveling Puddle Jumper so that I could jump ahead and offer fixes to their generally terrific story ideas(including fixes gleaned from the first ten pages of the ep threads and the Great Character threads here on GW, of course. ) And I do feel that the writers have presented some very interesting situations for SG-1 - they just don't... can't... won't... do anything with them! :ripshairfromheadsmilie:

Maybe we should get intouch with Thor, the Asgard play around with time don't they? He could take us back to the beginning of S9 and fix things up, after all he does owe Sam a few favours