Originally posted by minigeek
I'm having a Sam Carter appreciation morning. And I'm shamelessly OK with that. LOL 
ACTUALLY... I'm rendering out some stuff and so I have about a half hour to kill here, and I figured what better way than to sign on and say something about SAM.
The thing about Carter that I adore in terms of her character for television (and which I just explained to one of my colleagues here), is that she's somehow managed to jump the bar on a character "type" (if you will), that normally ends up either:
* an over-the-top version of "I am woman, hear me roar and get the hell outta my way because I have more ISSUES than you have ideas..." feminist cliche [See "Starbuck" in BSG - sorry BSG fans
]
OR
* an under-the-top scientific genius / total social outcast lacking any social/interpersonal skills [See Dr. Temperance Brennan in BONES - sorry BONES fans]
But Sam Carter is NEITHER of those extremes. Regardless of how abysmally the last season of SG-1 has played out, I do have to tip my acknowledgement to the writing team for engendering her character to begin with, smoothing out those cliche potentials and coming up (copiously assisted by Amanda) with a character who rings not only believable, but real.
Sam Carter is a (beautiful) woman, a (likely certified) genius, a (stand-up) soldier, and a psychological conundrum who (all things considered) could far more easily have turned into someone's ill-conceived Mary Sue than she might have become what she DID turn into - a guilelessly visceral female role model.
Quite frankly, I honestly admit that I'd never have given much credence to a television writingteam's ability to come up with such a character to BEGIN WITH, nevermind provide nearly a decade of her, in such a strong, well balanced light. Of course, Amanda played no small role in that development, either. She's the lifeforce behind Sam Carter. But there is a lot to be said for dodging the status-quo where the Carter character is concerned, and I think credit is due all around therein.
I'm certainly a tough audience to please when it comes to my "strong" female characters. Because far too often, the role is distorted, overcompensated for, and made glaringly fictional.
Before I 'met' Sam Carter, if anyone had told me they were writing a character who was:
* a genius
* a pilot
* a soldier (and a good one)
* proficient in high level hand-to-hand combat
* a physicist (PhD)
* a mechanical engineer
* an afficionado of motor sports and classic cycles
* drop dead gorgeous
I'd have said... "Oh yeah, that'll come out looking real."
But... Sam Carter DOES. She IS. Somehow, Amanda and the writers have managed to convince even me of the fact that not only can such a character exist in good narrative, she can grow (because lets face it, she started out pretty damn 'special' to begin with). They've convinced me that she's got flaws, that those flaws aren't huge and overstated to the point where they take over her life and make her into an emotionally unbalanced (necessarily loose-canon), but that she (like any other 'normal' person might choose to) deals with her issues on a case by case basis, and many of them emerge to surprise even HER.
I'm still surprised each time I watch an episode that features her character, at how MUCh they packed into a single soul, and yet how little it seems to affect her persona in any cliche sense.
That, to me is the biggest reason that Sam Carter is a great character. Because she raises the bar - without question. Because she's a hero without resorting to insanity or imbalance. Because she makes mistakes, and has to learn from them. Because she doesn't embody a burlesque. And because she tackles each of her fictional challenges from a Human perspective, despite the scientist in her, despite the soldier. Through the Sam Carter character, Amanda and the writers have engendered a personality (albeit a fictional entitity) who embodies both strength and femininity, not to mention the kind of down-to-earth rationale vis-a-vis problem-solving that we might all hope to achieve in ourselves. Perhaps despite all of that, she still comes across as real. I've said it before and I'll say it again:
SAM CARTER IS THE BEST DAMN FEMALE CHARACTER ON TELEVISION TODAY.
In my books at least, that is no small basket of potatoes to lay claim to.
mini(the unashamed Sam Carter fangurl)geek
-
ACTUALLY... I'm rendering out some stuff and so I have about a half hour to kill here, and I figured what better way than to sign on and say something about SAM. The thing about Carter that I adore in terms of her character for television (and which I just explained to one of my colleagues here), is that she's somehow managed to jump the bar on a character "type" (if you will), that normally ends up either:
* an over-the-top version of "I am woman, hear me roar and get the hell outta my way because I have more ISSUES than you have ideas..." feminist cliche [See "Starbuck" in BSG - sorry BSG fans
]OR
* an under-the-top scientific genius / total social outcast lacking any social/interpersonal skills [See Dr. Temperance Brennan in BONES - sorry BONES fans
]But Sam Carter is NEITHER of those extremes. Regardless of how abysmally the last season of SG-1 has played out, I do have to tip my acknowledgement to the writing team for engendering her character to begin with, smoothing out those cliche potentials and coming up (copiously assisted by Amanda) with a character who rings not only believable, but real.
Sam Carter is a (beautiful) woman, a (likely certified) genius, a (stand-up) soldier, and a psychological conundrum who (all things considered) could far more easily have turned into someone's ill-conceived Mary Sue than she might have become what she DID turn into - a guilelessly visceral female role model.
Quite frankly, I honestly admit that I'd never have given much credence to a television writingteam's ability to come up with such a character to BEGIN WITH, nevermind provide nearly a decade of her, in such a strong, well balanced light. Of course, Amanda played no small role in that development, either. She's the lifeforce behind Sam Carter. But there is a lot to be said for dodging the status-quo where the Carter character is concerned, and I think credit is due all around therein.
I'm certainly a tough audience to please when it comes to my "strong" female characters. Because far too often, the role is distorted, overcompensated for, and made glaringly fictional.
Before I 'met' Sam Carter, if anyone had told me they were writing a character who was:
* a genius
* a pilot
* a soldier (and a good one)
* proficient in high level hand-to-hand combat
* a physicist (PhD)
* a mechanical engineer
* an afficionado of motor sports and classic cycles
* drop dead gorgeous
I'd have said... "Oh yeah, that'll come out looking real."
But... Sam Carter DOES. She IS. Somehow, Amanda and the writers have managed to convince even me of the fact that not only can such a character exist in good narrative, she can grow (because lets face it, she started out pretty damn 'special' to begin with). They've convinced me that she's got flaws, that those flaws aren't huge and overstated to the point where they take over her life and make her into an emotionally unbalanced (necessarily loose-canon), but that she (like any other 'normal' person might choose to) deals with her issues on a case by case basis, and many of them emerge to surprise even HER.
I'm still surprised each time I watch an episode that features her character, at how MUCh they packed into a single soul, and yet how little it seems to affect her persona in any cliche sense.
That, to me is the biggest reason that Sam Carter is a great character. Because she raises the bar - without question. Because she's a hero without resorting to insanity or imbalance. Because she makes mistakes, and has to learn from them. Because she doesn't embody a burlesque. And because she tackles each of her fictional challenges from a Human perspective, despite the scientist in her, despite the soldier. Through the Sam Carter character, Amanda and the writers have engendered a personality (albeit a fictional entitity) who embodies both strength and femininity, not to mention the kind of down-to-earth rationale vis-a-vis problem-solving that we might all hope to achieve in ourselves. Perhaps despite all of that, she still comes across as real. I've said it before and I'll say it again:
SAM CARTER IS THE BEST DAMN FEMALE CHARACTER ON TELEVISION TODAY.
In my books at least, that is no small basket of potatoes to lay claim to.
mini(the unashamed Sam Carter fangurl)geek
-
The green jello fridge seems to be locked for me. 
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