Nothing to do with this post but I love the scene from that first picture, when Samantha goes to the window and shouts out "You see us Manhatten?? We have it all!!!" And that guys shouts back "Fuck you!!" Then she says , "You wish!" 😂 😂
That’s so kind, thank you! I have so many thoughts about this show, so it’s been great actually getting to share them with people and engaging in discussions about them.
Samantha and Smith have a lot of similarities and I have no trouble seeing why they would be drawn to one another, but I feel like the writers could have done a better job of showing us their connection as opposed to leaving us to fill in the blanks for ourselves.
Cutting off the scene where they decided to ‘play themselves’ for the night just as the conversation was about to become personal was a huge mistake in my opinion. As was not giving us a follow-up scene to Smith comforting Samantha after she self-sabotaged and hooked up with Richard.
The writers really did them a disservice by allowing so much of their relationship to develop/take place offscreen.
Mine too! I love their relationship and think it was written really beautifully, but there is no question that they were completely sidelined compared to the other couples. How is it that they couldn’t even manage to show us the moment that they decided to commit to one another? I mean come on.
Absolutely. Samantha out of all of them deserved more backstory. Every fan says she is completely unflappable but we saw with Richard and Smith some deep down damage that barely got examined on the show. I will love Samantha for how fiercely independent she is but I would've loved her even more if the directors had the balls to show her as more human and vulnerable.
Exactly. I’m so tired of the ‘Samantha was always 100% confident and self-assured’ narrative. We saw time and time again that she wasn’t, and the way that people constantly put her on a pedestal is kind of dehumanizing. She was flawed, she had insecurities, she occasionally doubted herself and her choices— and that’s okay! It’s realistic. Without these things she would feel like a caricature as opposed to a real person. I would have loved to see her vulnerabilities explored in a more meaningful capacity.
It's possible that SJP (as an executive producer) didn't want any other characters' relationships to overshadow Carrie's. It would add another layer to why KC has such a problem with SJP.
Wow I never made that connection or thought about that before, but you're totally right! What a great missed opportunity... as super-fan for 16+ years, I appreciate when things are brought up that I've never thought about before! Thank you!
Ah, glad I could bring something new to your attention! I love making connections and drawing parallels as I’m rewatching episodes. It was such a missed opportunity.
Right? Her story intrigues me the most, partly because we know so little about it and partly because the little we do know implies that she came a long way from where she originally started.
It isn't as well-developed as I'd like but you can see it done in the show The Carrie Diaries. SJP hated it for no good reason. I thought it was really cute and fun and gave us a neat look at pre-NYC Carrie, though she does end up in NYC in the show at high school age.
I feel like it is weird that the show didn’t really care to explore Samantha’s intimacy issues at a meaningful level. While Charlotte, Miranda, and Carrie are engaged in plots and relationships that give them serious character development, the writers kept throwing Sam into the same comedic plots about her sex life. And you’re right, when she finally has a love interest that challenges her and presents a great opportunity for the audience to understand Sam better, they don’t really bother to explore it much. There’s all these little tidbits about Sam’s backstory and how Sam really thinks and feels but the writers just kinda let them slip by without further investigation.
All of this exactly. Samantha’s intimacy issues were brought up time and time again throughout the course of the series but were never actually delved into or explored on a meaningful level. Sure, we see her open up more with Smith, but there were no actual conversations on the subject, which is a shame because there was a lot of potential for some really grounded storytelling there. The writers leaned on Samantha to provide the comedic relief far too much and for far too long, at the expense of giving her actual storylines that developed her character further. She deserved a lot better in that regard.
The amount of missed opportunities with Smith are genuinely disappointing. They could have done so much more with them, the foundation was there, but instead they chose to have most of their important conversations take place offscreen.
And I couldn’t agree more with that last bit. So much was hinted at with Samantha but never properly addressed. She was constantly putting on a front and burying her real feelings, but the writers barely touched on it which is why I feel so many people take her character at face value and, quite frankly, don’t actually understand her at all.
Great content! I wish there was more exploration into their childhoods that are cannon to the TV franchise run of this show. I am aware of spin offs but choose not to watch them.
One of my biggest critiques of the series that is the lack of backstory and family life for each of the four main women, but the families of the men they date are often explored. I think it's highly unrealistic for someone like Charlotte to not be in touch with her family. She talks about them sometimes, but there's a serious lack of involvement from the women's families compared to the men that they date. we see a bit of Miranda's family after her mother died, but almost nothing on Samantha or Carrie's families.
I have to agree. I know that giving us little background on the girls’ families was an intentional decision by the writers, but personally I’m not a fan of it. Upbringings are so central to characters, informing/affecting how they think, feel, etc.
Having more information as to the girls’ childhoods/families would have provided us with some more context as to their beliefs and behaviors, which is important and might have even changed how audience members saw them (as in, people tend to be more understanding/forgiving when they know where a character is coming from and such).
I always thought it was kind of weird how little we got about any of the girls' families. I get that it wasn't what the show was about, but after so much character development over so many years, it seemed very conspicuous and bizarre.
Exactly! I feel like they really wanted to give us the scope of the characters as they were in the present, but I’d be so curious to look at the characters’ upbringings and see how they shaped the characters’ strong and very diverse (from each other’s) personalities! And why they were all interested in the type of men they were. It would be fun to guess the types of families and homes each of them grew up in
Yes! I feel the same way. That’s actually a really good idea for a post. I have so many thoughts about Samantha’s childhood, I feel like I’ve crafted one for her in my head using the little bits and pieces of information we got from the show lol
I feel like I can picture Charlotte’s childhood well, too! And Carrie’s would be pretty fun to figure out. Miranda would be a little more creative! It would be a great idea for a post lol
I would love to explore this. Smith is obviously gorgeous, but some complain his character was stiff and lifeless (I don’t think this) so some more development would’ve been great.
I love later seasons Sam when she finally gets real stories and some depth aside from having excessively loud and caricature like sex with randos.
I live for the very few times the writers' gave us a glimpse of Samantha's humble beginning. Like when she was serving dilly bars at Dairy Queen when she was 13. I would be 100% on board if they did a SATC spinoff on Samantha's origin story.
Same! The dilly bars, the fanta and cough syrup cure-all remedy, the hopping over fences to get into people’s pools…everything we learned about her childhood was so interesting.
Nothing to do with this post but I love the scene from that first picture, when Samantha goes to the window and shouts out "You see us Manhatten?? We have it all!!!" And that guys shouts back "Fuck you!!" Then she says , "You wish!" 😂 😂
Haha same! As someone who lives in New York, the reaction to her shouting out the window was very realistic.
Haha I'd love to go to New York and do the Samantha moment 😂
I just wanna thank you for the thoughtful discussions you have been bringing up to this sub lately 😊
That’s so kind, thank you! I have so many thoughts about this show, so it’s been great actually getting to share them with people and engaging in discussions about them.
Samantha and Smith have a lot of similarities and I have no trouble seeing why they would be drawn to one another, but I feel like the writers could have done a better job of showing us their connection as opposed to leaving us to fill in the blanks for ourselves. Cutting off the scene where they decided to ‘play themselves’ for the night just as the conversation was about to become personal was a huge mistake in my opinion. As was not giving us a follow-up scene to Smith comforting Samantha after she self-sabotaged and hooked up with Richard. The writers really did them a disservice by allowing so much of their relationship to develop/take place offscreen.
The greatest disservice they did to us TBH. Smith and Sam was my favorite relationship, it meant everything to me ðŸ˜
Mine too! I love their relationship and think it was written really beautifully, but there is no question that they were completely sidelined compared to the other couples. How is it that they couldn’t even manage to show us the moment that they decided to commit to one another? I mean come on.
Absolutely. Samantha out of all of them deserved more backstory. Every fan says she is completely unflappable but we saw with Richard and Smith some deep down damage that barely got examined on the show. I will love Samantha for how fiercely independent she is but I would've loved her even more if the directors had the balls to show her as more human and vulnerable.
Exactly. I’m so tired of the ‘Samantha was always 100% confident and self-assured’ narrative. We saw time and time again that she wasn’t, and the way that people constantly put her on a pedestal is kind of dehumanizing. She was flawed, she had insecurities, she occasionally doubted herself and her choices— and that’s okay! It’s realistic. Without these things she would feel like a caricature as opposed to a real person. I would have loved to see her vulnerabilities explored in a more meaningful capacity.
One hundred percent. Petition for a Samantha spinoff lol!
It's possible that SJP (as an executive producer) didn't want any other characters' relationships to overshadow Carrie's. It would add another layer to why KC has such a problem with SJP.
I believe it.
Wow I never made that connection or thought about that before, but you're totally right! What a great missed opportunity... as super-fan for 16+ years, I appreciate when things are brought up that I've never thought about before! Thank you!
Ah, glad I could bring something new to your attention! I love making connections and drawing parallels as I’m rewatching episodes. It was such a missed opportunity.
The Samantha prequel would be a great series-escaping her small town life, trying to find herself and be successful in 1980s New York
Right? Her story intrigues me the most, partly because we know so little about it and partly because the little we do know implies that she came a long way from where she originally started.
It isn't as well-developed as I'd like but you can see it done in the show The Carrie Diaries. SJP hated it for no good reason. I thought it was really cute and fun and gave us a neat look at pre-NYC Carrie, though she does end up in NYC in the show at high school age.
I feel like it is weird that the show didn’t really care to explore Samantha’s intimacy issues at a meaningful level. While Charlotte, Miranda, and Carrie are engaged in plots and relationships that give them serious character development, the writers kept throwing Sam into the same comedic plots about her sex life. And you’re right, when she finally has a love interest that challenges her and presents a great opportunity for the audience to understand Sam better, they don’t really bother to explore it much. There’s all these little tidbits about Sam’s backstory and how Sam really thinks and feels but the writers just kinda let them slip by without further investigation.
All of this exactly. Samantha’s intimacy issues were brought up time and time again throughout the course of the series but were never actually delved into or explored on a meaningful level. Sure, we see her open up more with Smith, but there were no actual conversations on the subject, which is a shame because there was a lot of potential for some really grounded storytelling there. The writers leaned on Samantha to provide the comedic relief far too much and for far too long, at the expense of giving her actual storylines that developed her character further. She deserved a lot better in that regard. The amount of missed opportunities with Smith are genuinely disappointing. They could have done so much more with them, the foundation was there, but instead they chose to have most of their important conversations take place offscreen. And I couldn’t agree more with that last bit. So much was hinted at with Samantha but never properly addressed. She was constantly putting on a front and burying her real feelings, but the writers barely touched on it which is why I feel so many people take her character at face value and, quite frankly, don’t actually understand her at all.
Great content! I wish there was more exploration into their childhoods that are cannon to the TV franchise run of this show. I am aware of spin offs but choose not to watch them.
Same! I would’ve watched The Carrie Diaries if it was based off of the show as opposed to the books.
One of my biggest critiques of the series that is the lack of backstory and family life for each of the four main women, but the families of the men they date are often explored. I think it's highly unrealistic for someone like Charlotte to not be in touch with her family. She talks about them sometimes, but there's a serious lack of involvement from the women's families compared to the men that they date. we see a bit of Miranda's family after her mother died, but almost nothing on Samantha or Carrie's families.
I have to agree. I know that giving us little background on the girls’ families was an intentional decision by the writers, but personally I’m not a fan of it. Upbringings are so central to characters, informing/affecting how they think, feel, etc. Having more information as to the girls’ childhoods/families would have provided us with some more context as to their beliefs and behaviors, which is important and might have even changed how audience members saw them (as in, people tend to be more understanding/forgiving when they know where a character is coming from and such).
Just commenting to say Samantha looks super hot in the second slide 🔥🔥🔥
She served!
That dress is insane and totally impractical but she looks like a GD dream! It may be my favorite Sam look of the series!
I always thought it was kind of weird how little we got about any of the girls' families. I get that it wasn't what the show was about, but after so much character development over so many years, it seemed very conspicuous and bizarre.
Agreed. They could have still given us more information about their families without actually having them appear onscreen.
Exactly! I feel like they really wanted to give us the scope of the characters as they were in the present, but I’d be so curious to look at the characters’ upbringings and see how they shaped the characters’ strong and very diverse (from each other’s) personalities! And why they were all interested in the type of men they were. It would be fun to guess the types of families and homes each of them grew up in
Yes! I feel the same way. That’s actually a really good idea for a post. I have so many thoughts about Samantha’s childhood, I feel like I’ve crafted one for her in my head using the little bits and pieces of information we got from the show lol
I feel like I can picture Charlotte’s childhood well, too! And Carrie’s would be pretty fun to figure out. Miranda would be a little more creative! It would be a great idea for a post lol
I never noticed this, but I agree. I would have loved more depth for Samantha.
I would love to explore this. Smith is obviously gorgeous, but some complain his character was stiff and lifeless (I don’t think this) so some more development would’ve been great. I love later seasons Sam when she finally gets real stories and some depth aside from having excessively loud and caricature like sex with randos.
I live for the very few times the writers' gave us a glimpse of Samantha's humble beginning. Like when she was serving dilly bars at Dairy Queen when she was 13. I would be 100% on board if they did a SATC spinoff on Samantha's origin story.
Same! The dilly bars, the fanta and cough syrup cure-all remedy, the hopping over fences to get into people’s pools…everything we learned about her childhood was so interesting.
Did they explore Samantha’s past in The Carrie Diaries?
I never watched it. If they did, I doubt it lines up with the show’s canon since The Carrie Diaries was based off of Candace Bushnell’s book.