Samantha Manson

Sam
File:SamManson.jpg Sam Manson
Publication information
Publisher	Nickelodeon
First appearance	"Mystery Meat"
Created by	Butch Hartman
In-story information
Alter ego	Samantha "Sam" Manson
Team affiliations	Team Phantom, None
Notable aliases	Sammy-kins, Sam
Abilities	Experienced in ghost fighting, usually reliable, vast wealth.

Samantha "Sam" Manson is the gothic, vegetarian best friend of Danny Fenton and Tucker Foley in the Nickelodeon animated television series Danny Phantom. She is voiced by Grey DeLisle.

Appearance/History

One of Danny's best friends, Sam is a goth (much to her parents' dismay) and a strict ultra-recyclo vegetarian. She considers herself as such with her taste in dark clothing and interest in the subliminal and netherworldly, but with her outspoken attitude over her vegetarian lifestyle combined with the rights of animals and the future of the environment, one would probably see her more as a Greenpeace activist than a goth. Her personality is also less dreary than the traditional "goth" persona.

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Sam dressed for a dance from "Parental Bonding".

Her parents are extremely wealthy, having inherited from the great inventor of the deli toothpick cellophane-twirling device; although she keeps this a secret with only her two best friends knowing, as she'd rather earn real friends, rather than through popularity and fake friendships that come with wealth. She has an often strained relationship with her folks due to their optimistic, colorful personality as oppose to her more darker outlook in life.

She's known Tucker and Danny from since at least the 2nd grade and has remained a constant friendship with them. However for the case of Danny, she has since developed a crush on him, possibly blossoming into love. Her testimony of her love for Danny has sent both of them into emotional circles as she often has to watch as Danny move on with other girls, or at one point when she had a boyfriend herself, leading to awkward situtations.

Personality

In spite of her wealthy upbringing by her parents, Sam is not so much spoiled as she is bossy and can sometimes be hypocritical. For example, in Mystery Meat, Sam forces her Ultra-Recyclo Vegetarian diet on the entirety of Casper High, despite her claims of individuality, which angered the spirit of a double-personality lunch lady. That diet ends up turning against her in "Urban Jungle" as she ends up the only human uneffected by UnderGrowths terror. Instead, she is vegetized, becoming "Queen of Amity Park" and fights Danny while hypnotized. Also, in "Splitting Images", she advises Danny against using his ghost powers for abusing bullies, but then later demands that Danny uses his ghost powers to scare people away from buying environmentally-threatening trucks (as shown in "Memory Blank"). Ironically, it is probable her outspoke nature and general forceful attitude is attributed from her parents who have been known to do the same thing. Due to her outspoken nature and disdain for anything mainstream, Sam is often a polarizing figure for fans of the show.

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Sam controled by Undergrowth in the episode Urban Jungle.

However, all of this can be attributed to the immaturity of her age (after all, they are only 14), but despite it all, Sam is a true friend and fiercely loyal to Danny. It is apparent that she would do anything she could that would help him during his numerous battles with his enemies as well as keep him out of trouble ("Kindred Spirits") and has often been the one out of Danny's two best friend to take whatever risk necessary to save/help Danny.

That said, out of the three, Sam's also the most rational and mature, often thinking on a realistic level compared to the two as well as pointing out to Danny to focus more on ghost hunting when the situtation should ever arise. However expressive she may be though, Sam still harbors her inner most feelings inside, especially her secret crush on Danny which she has trouble revealing (and quite often then not, this is trouble for her as other girls slowly warm up to him).

The Love Issue

There have been many differing fan opinions as to the relationship between Danny and Sam. But ultimately, only Butch Hartman and the rest of the “Danny Phantom” staff know the true nature of that relationship. The characters themselves on the show constantly deny any romantic attraction, although Sam's affection for Danny is quite obvious to most of the other characters on the show.

There is also the fact that Danny is extremely attracted to Paulina (a popular, shallow, but very beautiful girl) who detests him but is in love with his ghostly alter ego (although later episodes seem to indicate otherwise that Danny may slowly be losing his crush on her), and has built up a friendship and romance with Valerie Gray (who likes the human Danny and hates his ghost self).

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A "Fake Out Make Out" between Danny and Sam.

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Danny and Sam smile at each other in Memory Blank

Sam's issue stems from the fact that she is often too shy or afraid to tell Danny her true feelings for reasons of her own. Her only level of intimate reactions to Danny were through the two "fake-out make-outs" with Danny, both to create a distraction and avoid danger (the first planned by Sam while the second by Danny himself).

At the beginning of the special "Reality Trip", Sam asks Tucker "Tell me again, WHY do we hang around a kid who has ghostly enemies?" To which Tucker replies "Becaaaase you have a crush on him?" Which is the first time it's really clarified and spoken in the show that Sam has feelings for Danny. Whether it truly is a returned feeling remains to be seen.

The episode "Double Cross My Heart" however showed Sam falling for a new goth kid named Gregor, who claims he is from Hungary, but later dumps him when he turns out to be a fake (he is actually from Michigan with his actual name as Elliot). It is during this episode that Danny shows many signs of being jealous of "Gregor" and Sam's relationship, and admits that he is unsure of whether or not he likes her as more than a friend.

Sam and Danny's relationship can be easily compared with the relationship between Archie and Betty. Danny may be strongly attracted to another girl such as Paulina or even Valerie, and completely misses the fact that Sam might me the perfect choice for him. This is reminscent of Archie's relationship with Veronica.

Sam's voice actor, Grey DeLisle, has stated in an interview that "We all know Sam loves Danny. I just wish she'd say something about it!" In another interview, David Kaufman (Danny's voice actor) has said, "He can fight an incredibly powerful ghost monster, then turn around and be completely baffled on how to deal with his affection for Sam."

Relationship

Danny Fenton/Phantom

Danny is considered one of Sam's best friends. The two often get along well, but they are at times at odds whenever Sam gets bossy towards him (usually for him to take his ghost hunting duties seriously or her outright forceful protests) as well as share awkward moments when the two exhibit some signs of love for each other.

Tucker Foley

Sam also considers Tucker her best friend, but the two are quite opposites (his meat habits as oppose to her vegetarian, his lighthearted behavior to her more down-to-earth method) and they often bicker over even the mundane reasons. She also sometimes considers him to be an annoyance, but has shown to still enjoy his company.

Jeremy and Pamela Manson

Case in point, Sam's relationship with her parents are often strained as they often share different opinions. The parents want a more chirpy, happy daughter, trying to remove her away from her gothic nature while Sam cannot stand her parents' sunny personalities. She's often annoyed with them as well whenever they get involved in her life (ironically, something she has a habit of doing as well), but still shows love for them both, concerned when they're in trouble and the likes.

Ida Manson

While she's not shown often, Sam seems to garner more respect for her grandmother then her parents as she supports all of her granddaughter's individualist decisions, having been a bit of a nonconformist in her youth.

Gregor/Elliot

After first meeting him, Sam fell in love with the foreign exchange student from Hungary. She spent most of ther time with his since going as far as sharing a kiss with him. Afterwards they almost became a couple until he finally got fed up with Tucker and insulted him, accidentally slipping and revealing he lied the whole time just so she would like him (He's actual name is Elliot and is from Michigan). Afterwards she choose to never interact with him again.

Trivia on Sam Manson

• Sam is a big fan of punk, metal, and techno/electronica music, as well as anime, monster movies, and Akira Kurosawa's samurai films.

• Along with posters of her favorite bands wallpapering her bedroom walls, Sam has a collection of old vinyl punk-rock records from the 70s and 80s.

• She has openly admitted to being a "cat person."

• Danny and Sam were originally supposed to have a 'psychic connection' that would let one know where the other one was. However, this was nixed right before the premier, since Danny already had ghost powers and Sam already had many other attributes, and Butch Hartman didn't want them to seem too already developed. However, during the episode Urban Jungle, when Danny return from the Ghost Zone he was looking around at the city and he heard Sam calling him, but Sam was all the way across town and hidden in vines before revealing herself to him. Weather this is a psychic trait on not is unclear at this point.

• Sam owns a moped.

• In "Teacher of the Year", Sam's username for the on-line computer game Doomed, a parody of Doom, is Chaos.

• Sam shares a last name with Marilyn Manson, which can be taken as a possible reference to her goth lifestyle, however it is highly debatable whether Marilyn Manson is considered Goth or not. It might also be a reference to the Manson Family cult, as Sam's mother once said during the "Control Freaks" episode: "If there's one thing us Mansons know how to do, it's whip an angry mob of parents into a frenzy."

• In "The Fright Before Christmas", it is revealed that Sam and her family are Jewish, based upon the fact that they celebrate Hanukkah. Her Jewish background was also hinted at when her grandmother called her "bubeleh" in the episode "Control Freaks."

• Sam has the same pattern on her top that Danny has on his tee, only hers is purple and his is red.

• Sam also has some artistic ability shown in "Memory Blank" she was drawing different designs including the DP design that Danny now wears. She is responsible for the DP design on Danny's costume. While it technically should have vanished at the end of "Memory Blank," when Sam wished Desiree to return everything to normal, she specifically asks for the logo to remain because she "really likes it."

• In some close-up scenes, Sam is portrayed with a purple wristwatch. On that wristwatch's dial, in the place of 3,6,9 and 12 are a spider, a black cat, a bat and a skull. All are colored black.

• Her favourite female movie monsters include Femalien, Terminatra and Nightmerica. (These are all parodies of science-fiction movies, except Terminatra can be loosely compared to the gynoid assassin T-X "Terminatrix" Cyberdyne Systems Terminator. Femalien is also the title of a soft core movie spoofing Species.).