piece of mind

sketchbook details 🌕✨

"I'm so disappointed with what they did to Sam! He was so mature in the books, I remember his explanation for not wanting to date Percy yet being articulated so well that it almost took me out, I was like "teen boys are not this self aware" lol. And the emails were like that too, like the emotional logic was just flawless.

In the show, his side of the breakups aren't explained well at all. It feels like he dumps her twice for no good reason and the little he tries to explain sound like excuses. It's a fine line to walk because we need to believe Percy's reactions are justified, and imo, in the show they are and in the book they aren't. Show Sam was dumb boy making dumb boy mistakes. Book Sam was mature boy with his eyes on the far future trying so hard not to screw things up. Like he was so stressed during the internship and put so much pressure on himself and we didn't see any of that. Book Sam was always thinking about his future with Percy. He trusted that that was DEFINITE."

Is it true? If it is, then they did him so dirty in the show... Now most people ship percycharlie and it doesn't shock me at all because if you compare this to shows with actual triangles? The percycharlie ship is typically the endgame. Sweet older bro saves girl from horrible younger bro... Honestly, I've never seen a show where the person you're supposed to be rooting for to be the main character's endgame, to be done so dirty... I am genuinely asking: are we really supposed to root for sampercy (in the show) and like Sam?

Side note: If I had a nickel for every time Matt played a character that is hated by most of the fandom, I'd have two nickels. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice. What's weirder is that in the second instance we're supposed to be rooting for him. Or who knows, considering how many changes they have already made from the book (according to people who read the book), they might make percycharlie endgame or create a love triangle with Alice or find Percy a new endgame. What a letdown this show has been...

Yes I agree with so much of that reader's thoughts! Sam definitely wasn't perfect in the book and in the way he handled his relationship with Percy, which is something he acknowledges in the present timeline when he's grown up and able to look back at their past and see how they both contributed to the issues in their relationship. He acknowledges that he had this mindset that him and Percy were "meant to be," so their relationship would all just eventually fall into place on its own. But his trust that the relationship was a definite wasn't something he communicated to Percy.

So it's a much more nuanced situation, where as you read it, you understand that Percy's insecurities are leading her to read these situations as worse than they are, but maybe Sam could have also communicated with her better and not taken their relationship for granted. You understand where both of them are coming from. But you can always feel how much Sam loves her, even when Percy doesn't pick up on it. It's actually impressive to me that we have so much more depth to Sam as a character and we can feel and see how much he loves her in the book despite only getting to see him from Percy's POV, versus in the show, he has his own POV, yet we don't get nearly as much depth, and it seems like he's barely into Percy (especially in the present day). We had the space to actually get into his experience during the internship and the pressure he put on himself, more of his yearning for Percy, etc., but instead we get less of him?? He really was done SO DIRTY.

Both Sam and Percy are HARDCORE yearners in the book, but in the show, the yearning is mainly on Percy's side. He seems kind of into her in the high school flashbacks, then he's like "we can't date because we have to focus on the future," but then he has a girlfriend?? And in the present, they're barely given any scenes together, and he's mostly angry and bitter towards her (even before the reveal, which is wild to me because from his POV in the show, he broke up with her OVER EMAIL and then showed up a few months later like "actually I love you" and she was like "yeah no you can't just do that," a perfectly valid response).

In the book, Sam is so consistently kind and loving to Percy, and it hits so much harder because one, you see how much Percy is struggling with self-loathing and beating herself up over all of her mistakes, and two, you find out that he already knew her secret (which was painted more in the territory of cheating in the book) and is STILL choosing to be so kind and loving.

Charlie also comes across so much worse in the show, but yeah, it does seem like Sam is barely into her and then breaks up over email, versus she's actually enjoying herself hanging out with Charlie, who's being there for her. And this isn't supposed to be a love triangle situation so you know they fumbled badly if people are flocking to them over the main couple 😭

It's sad because I think people are blaming Matt for what's more on bad writing (sidenote: in general the dialogue was weak and had a lot of second screen writing, so I think a lot of the complaints people had about the acting should be more focused on the dialogue because they all truly did the best with what they had) than his abilities. Like they really wanted him to just be angry and whiny most of the time, and when he was given a chance to look at Percy lovingly, he took it.

And while in the case of EJ, the hatred was so unfounded and out of pocket, in this circumstance, yeah, I completely get it. Sam kind of sucks in the show, and that's not at all how we're supposed to feel about him.

he had twelve years to process everything that went wrong in their relationship, come to terms with the fact that they were both young and full of insecurities and handled things poorly, and forgive her for what she did. it's what makes the ending of the story believable. like, these characters are older, they've learned from their past, there's been time and space for empathy and forgiveness, which are the core themes of the book.