RIP

The Notion of Sam McCall As A Viable Character Finally Dies
After four years, character finally reaches the point of zero rootability

YOU KNOW THAT SHE'S NO GOOD Despite attempting to jump on the Amy Winehouse beehive bandwagon, Sam McCall remains a horrible character

LOS ANGELES--After a tumultuous four years that found her character sleeping with two men in one night, being a kept woman to a local mobster, wasting precious hours in an inane ballroom dancing plot, killing several men in self defense and sleeping with her mother's husband, the notion that Samantha "Sam" McCall is in any way, shape or form, was killed.

"You know, it wasn't easy, coming up with ways to completely decimate Sam as a character," a General Hospital writer, who wishes to remain anonymous, remarks. "No matter what we did, Kelly Monaco managed to bring some sort of charm to the role and people still liked her".

Writers knew that drastic measures must be taken to ensure that the character was stripped of all positive attributes.

"Yes, of course we wanted to see Sam stripped", a statement from the office of Brian Frons said. When told that the statement was referring to a metaphorical stripping of good qualities and not of clothing, the next statement released was a concise, "Well...then, no comment".

Viewers tuning into the "Who Kidnapped Baby Jake" storyline on General Hospital today saw Sam having a flashback to the day the baby was taken, where she creepily lurked in the park like a creep, watching Maureen steal the baby. Her repeated lies about her knowledge of the kidnapping, coupled with a horrific scene in which she remarked to the distraught Liz that, with the loss of Liz's child, they were "even, marked the end of Sam's reign as a character that people could root for.

"It's pretty awesome," the unnamed GH writer exclaims. "I don't know why we want people to hate Sam, but we do, and it's going to be near impossible for her to rebound from this. I mean, she [expletive] with the kid of the Port Charles messiah. You don't [expletive] with the kid of the Port Charles messiah!"

The writer continues, "We're not sure what the fallout is going to be, we haven't written that yet...we usually write scripts the morning that they're being filmed. But I'm pretty sure we're going to learn that Alexis is at fault in some way because, you know...it's Alexis".

Viewers are encouraged to deal with their grief by watching scenes from happier times, when Sam was not insane or part of a kidnapping, and to urge Kelly Monaco not to renew any contract with General Hospital, ever. 

Comments

[penny]

LOL

[Megan Q]

Sam is a lying manipulative hooker and I am glad GH finally showed us what kind of trash she is can't we kill her and be done

[shay]

Oh my word! Todays episode must have been a doozy! I am with you, Sams character is no longer watchable. If I have to listen to her whine Jasons name, or bury her face in her hands in frustration, much more, I will start drinking wine right out of the bottle. Maybe since she is now the root of all evil, for keeping the secret, they may as well write in the Sam/trophy wife/con-artist/money stealer/storyline at which she can rip Jason off and he can become even more tragically cool........ Also does he look especially swollen? The boiler room shirt off scenes were disturbing. Is it safe for the muscles on top of your shoulders to be so ...lumpy?

[Stephanie]

The vast majority of the audience for soap operas is women. Yet this new regime at General Hospital has essentially destroyed every strong female character they've ever had. I guess we're only supposed to find inspiration from the male pillars of Port Charles: gun-toting, murdering, greasy hair, mobsters. Oh, goody!

[Jessica]

Duh! They are telling you to root for Jason and Liz. To do that, they have to destroy that which is not Jason and Liz and that which may go againt the coupling of Jason and Liz....in other words, Lucky and Sam.

[Michelle]

They have destroyed her and they are trying to do the same with Lucky all in the name of Liason. Its terrible, and getting way old!

[Regency]

If they're trying to destroy everyone else for Liason why do I suddenly detest Jason and Liz so much more than ever? I would be perfectly obliged if all four of them went up in might flames at the coffeehouse.

Jake and Cam can go live with Emily or Audrey or anywhere really until they grow up.

[Darcy]

I never did like Sam, not even when she first started...But now i absolutely can't stand her. The character is pointless, spineless and trashy, not to lately her only two modes seem to be whine/cry or whine/yell which is getting really old fast...oh yeah THIS is what women should aspire to, way to go writers.

[Natasha Cassadine]

I have waited for this destruction since Sam decimated Alexis' life ... and the only thing that is left, that would make this AFF happy - is to have it come out that Sam scammed Alexis - and she is NOT her daughter. Mission accomplished. *THEN* Kelly M can leave. LOL

[jase]

Again: Never liked her. Glad she's getting the Courtney treatment. But then I'm the fucker that called Adrienne Leon a werewolf.

[Kazou]

Classic, as usual, PI.

Personally, I wanted Sam to hit bottom so I could watch the inevitable redemption and see what KeMo did with it. (Of course, I didn't expect "rock bottom" to mean tapping all the way down to Earth's molten core.) I wanted her out of Jason's orbit and independent, or if she had to be an appendage, sucked back in after some good soapy angst. And I wanted Liz to lose her marriage, realize fantasy ain't all it's cracked up to be, admit that she just can't handle Jason's mob life, then discover that safe and "boring" can be wonderful. She would have to work hard to earn back Lucky's love after (say it with me) more good soapy anguish as punishment for her lies. Even as late as yesterday I was positive TPTB had started on the road to Sam's redemption (what with Amelia looking more and more one-dimensional, shrew-like and BSC in her vendetta, and the extended graphic flashbacks of that vicious beating). I'm still not convinced Amelia won't be the fall guy or that Liaison is the end-game, but man, today's show is gonna be hard to come back from, character-wise. Are we sure Sam won't blame it on a booze blackout that she's just now remembering? (However, that doesn't solve the problem of her viciousness in refusing to allow Liz & Lucky on her show.)

Oy! At this point I don't know WHAT TPTB will do. Usually that kind of suspense is a good thing on a soap but in this case it just seems to be a big downer.

[jase]

For me it's a couple things. One, it's ABC's long love affair with Kelly Monaco as their Next Big Thing a la Courtney, Ryan Lavery, SaSon, etc. Any goodwill or appreciation I had of KM from PC or anywhere else was eradicated quickly. Plus, not only has Sam been completely subservient and lifeless and slavish to the mob lifestyle, but she has also been consistently self-righteous and yelly about it for years. Meanwhile, veteran actresses like NLG or Becky Herbst - who I NEVER cared much for before - waned on the backburner as Saaaammm got all the screen time or were trashed.

The Jason/Liz chemistry took me by surprise last year. I had never cared about their first go round because I hated Jason and found Liz deadly boring. But she woke me up with GV; I enjoyed them together and I found I also was stunned by the sexual chemistry of the Jizz Explosion, as I call them. So for me, though I hate Jason, hate that Lucky is being screwed, acknowledge the horrible writing, etc., I simply choose to view this as karma for the way so many vets were treated while Sam got the throne. A vet took it back.

[Mia]

Totally disagree. Not only is Sam a popular character but KeMo has a HUGE fanbase. She is getting awesome material and is rocking her scenes. She's getting the material b/c she has proven she can handle it. On the other hand, BH makes me cringe everytime her face comes on screen. She simply isnt frontburner caliber material and now we know why she hasnt been for so long. Her acting during this entire kidnapping storyline have been subpar.

[Evil But Twinless]

I like Kelly Monaco (if you're a regular reader or you do a search here you'll see that we both do), but what the hell "awesome material" has she gotten, in at least a year? The awesomeness of Sam turning into a spineless, baby-crazed, increasingly alcoholic, whining pile of sobs? The awesomeness of Sam knowing who kidnapped her fiance's baby but choosing not to tell him because she's too insecure and threatened? The awesomeness of a beyond-ridiculous talk show hosting gig that seems tailor-made for my fast-forward button?

Kelly Monaco deserves better than this crap, as does just about every other actor on this show.

[IlovetowriteSMP]

Great column. ITA that the writers have screwed Sam. I like KeMo just fine but the character of Sam is nearly destroyed. Only going back to her Cassadine roots might save her now, but the Cassadines aren't SaSon so her airtime would be like two blinks a week anyway.

Kelly should really move on. She can do better than this show. Two straight years of crying as Sam is enough for any actress, or auidence, to suffer through.

[lurknomore]

I have hated Sam McCall since her first introduction. They have given this character retconned background after retconned background in increasingly desparate attempts to get the audience to love her. They finally managed it when they paired her with Jason, who for some inexplicable reason has never had an unsuccessful romantic pairing, then threw a few more back stories her way to try and link her to the canvas more strongly.

Ironically enough, this last story wrinkle may have established the character as truly vile, but for the first time I've actually been able to watch her. KeMo was loads of fun as evil Livvie, and I anticipate the same of drunk evil Sam.

[Jess]

I've never been a Sam fan, but dang she's psycho lately. I feel justified in all previous Sam hating.

Kelly should have just been brought on to play Livvie. Damn you, GH!

[Miry]

If only she did, perhaps we could have had Livvie's daddy come home as well... Kevin!! :D
(We need a *real* shrink, cuz Lainey sucks The Big One!)

[Miry]

To add on:
I have also hated Sam since she messed with Jax's car just so she could keep those damn cards, causing him to not get to his daddy in time to "save" him. ::rolls eyes at the sheer ridiculousness of that storyline::

THEN, fast-forward a bit... she allows Sonny to kidnap her b/c "he seems like a good guy..."

THEN, fast-forward a lil' more to the time of that god-awful hotel fire, and she sleeps with two men in the same day WITHOUT TAKING A SHOWER IN BETWEEN CONQUESTS. ::full body shudder::

Then, she became super all needy and whiny and cry-y (I started calling her Same, cuz it was the same shyt every day), and all I wanted was for her to leave Jason and/or die.

Final straw: Sam sleeping with her momma's husband to get back at said momma & Jason for breaking those two up (I don't care about the re-writes, we all know that's what she did; she was being "seductive" for weeks), and somehow, the second after Same was undoubtedly satisfied, she turned everything around on Ric so that (insanely) it was ALL HIS FAULT!!(??) After that, I was completely done with Sam & I hated her more than I hate Bob Guza & Brian Frons put together. Ever since then, I have been (impatiently) awaiting for her death/demise. Buh-bye KM!
(Only come back as Livvie or Alexis' real daughter, & not that weird dancing twin of yours).

[paddymcpaddy]

she should have just been fucking livvie. who i loved. to death, hell, she could have brought her poisoned fangs with her. KeMo is my girl 4 lyfe. sam mccall? booooooooring.

[Jan]

I can't believe the writers want everybody to hate Sam. She is a much better actress than Liz is anyday. If they take Sam off and put Jason with Liz, I will be sick and I will not watch anymore.

[sam aka me]

sam is so pretty y u all hatin????shes a good person just some frustration in her life shes been alone and never lasting relationships gve the woman a break..but than again this is just a soap oprah duhh dnt get so into it.

[Val]

Elizabitch sucks!