Why Amanda Tapping Hardly Appeared In The Stargate Franchise After Atlantis Season 4

"Stargate" was a tweener of a box office hit. Directed by Roland Emmerich from a screenplay he wrote with Dean Devlin, the film made $197 million globally on a budget of $55 million in 1994, which is very good but not the kind of runaway smash that automatically gets a sequel. Though Emmerich and Devlin had loose plans for a trilogy, several things got in the way, namely "Independence Day" and the opportunity to spend three times the budget of "Stargate" on a "Godzilla" remake and star-studded disaster movies. (You also have to wonder if Kurt Russell, who initially didn't want to be in "Stargate," would've come back for the sequel.) Did they choose wisely?

Fans of "Stargate SG-1," the television spin-off that aired for five seasons on Showtime before moving over the SyFy for another five seasons, would emphatically state "No." Emmerich and Devlin might've had nothing to do with the series, but its dedicated fanbase didn't care. They got caught up in the galaxy-traversing exploits of Richard Dean Anderson and his SG-1 crew, who are tasked with thwarting potential attacks from a variety of hostile alien species. The production values dipped more than a skosh in the transition from movies to television, but a game cast that included Michael Shanks, Christopher Judge, Beau Bridges, Corin Nemec, and Don S. Davis gave the show a fun, familiar sci-fi feel.

Aside from Anderson, the most popular character on the series was Dr. Samantha Carter, played by Amanda Tapping. She catches on with SG-1 in the series pilot, and works her way up the ranks throughout the show's ten seasons. She also made guest appearances on "Stargate Atlantis," and joined that series full-time for season 4. After that, however, her appearances on the series grew fewer and fewer until the show ended. While she might've faded as Sam, Tapping didn't walk away from "Stargate" entirely.

Tapping had a busy dance card throughout the 2000s, and not just because of her "Stargate SG-1" and "Stargate Atlantis" duties. She appeared on "Millennium" and "Earthsea" before toplining the science fiction/fantasy series "Sanctuary" for SyFy.

It wasn't just the acting, though. Tapping got bit by the directing bug when she helmed the "Stargate SG-1" episode "Resurrection" in 2004, which led her to start getting steady director gigs in 2009. Aside from the "Stargate" franchise, she's been behind the camera on episodes of "Sanctuary," "The Magicians," "Supernatural," "The Flash," "Batwoman," and "The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina."

Curiously, Tapping hasn't directed for the "Stargate" franchise since 2004, which seems a bit odd given how busy she's been elsewhere. Of course, the "Stargate" franchise has been pretty quiet over the last decade (after setting a Guinness World Record for its longevity), with only the brief run of "Stargate Origins" in 2018 to give fans a taste of the good stuff. Hopefully, if they ever get those last two installments in their trilogy out of development hell, Emmerich and Devlin will give Tapping a shot at directing "Stargate" for the big screen (which would be a better deal than remaking the film, as Emmerich once considered).