Sam Winchester
From Fan History Wiki
Sam Winchester is a character on The CW show Supernatural. Sam is the younger of the two brothers on the show. When Sam was six months old to the day, his mother, Mary Winchester was killed in his nursery by a demon. This is the single event that sends John Winchester on a lifelong hunt for the supernatural creature who murdered his wife and to find out why. To that end he raised both his sons to also hunt out all kinds of supernatural evil, setting up the show's premise of demon and ghost hunters ever on the road.
Sam wanted a different life and at eighteen left his father and brother to pursue his dreams of college and a "normal", "safe" life by securing a full ride scholarship to prestigious Stanford University in California ('Note: Sam's actual age and the timing of his departure of college is sometimes a point of confusion, primarily due to an admitted continuity error in the show's pilot, admitted to by the show's creator Erik Kripke).
The teaser of the show for much of the first season, showed the horrific details of Mary Winchester's death as well as the time stamp of "22 Years Ago", establishing Sam's age at the start of the seres as 22 years of age (give or take six months). His brother Dean is ostensibly 4 years older.
At the end of the pilot, having spent a weekend with his brother after a 4 year (or 2 year) separation, Sam returns to his college apartment and his girlfriend, Jessica Moore, only to discover her pinned to the ceiling of their bedroom, stomach slashed open and bursting into flames, dying the same way his mother did, above him. Dean arrives in time to pull Sam from the burning building.
Revealed in subsequent episodes, Sam, is also the recipient of some potent, if uncontrollable, psychic gifts. The predominant one is his ability to foresee the deaths of other people: he had dreamed of Jessica's death days before it happened. Subsequent visions appear to be connected to the demon and to other "special" children like Sam, who have been touched or influenced or who are just of interest to the demon the Winchester are pursuing.
Sam has exhibited one incidence of telekinesis, in which he moved a heavy sideboard from a door with only his mind, after seeing an intense vision of Dean being shot and killed.
References within the show portray Sam as being extremely intelligent (full scholarship to Stanford, scored 174 out of 180 on the LSAT). While friction occasionally arises between himself and his brother, he is overall portrayed as likable and trustworthy, occasionally stubborn and willful, and possibly less empathic and/or patient with his brother than he is with other people as is common among siblings, especially close siblings. He is often the "research" arm of the team, and is less inclined to kill or destroy perceived evil without some thought.
The moniker of "Sammy" is one Sam has evinced some dislike for but in certain situations will tolerate it form his brother and father.
Despite clashes with Dean over fine details of their life, the mutual devotion of the brothers is fairly obvious and main drive behind the adorations of fans regarding the show. Sam has gone to great lengths to save his brother's life (Faith), even to sacrificing his own (Croatoan) for fear of being the one to cause harm to his brother.
[edit] Physical Notes
Sam Winchester is a very large young man. Jared Padalecki, the actor who portrays him, is listed as being 6'5" in most bios, and numerous interviews (and visual evidence) indicate that he has spent a lot of time working out to prepare for his role as Sam. His co-star Jensen Ackles is reported to be 6'1" and no small man himself, but the disparate height of the pair is often used for some subtle and not-so-subtle visual humor in the show.
[edit] Time Line of Psychic Episodes
- Bloody Mary - Sam is revealed to have had dreams of girlfriend Jessica Moore's death for days before it happened. Bearing the secret in silence was enough of a lure for Bloody Mary to come after him when he set himself up as bait. See also Sam/Jess.
- Home - Sam has visions of the house in which his moth died, and of a woman screaming for help from within.
- Nightmare - Sam has a series of visions portraying the horrific deaths of people connected to fellow psychic Max Miller.
- Salvation - Sam's visions lead he and Dean to save the infant, Rose, and her mother from Mary Winchester's fate.
- Simon Said - Sam after a vision of a murder/suicide in a hardware store, Sam and Dean arrive in time enough for Sam to stop the deaths in the store only to have the man in his visions deliberately walk in front of a bus moments later.
- Croatoan - Driven by visions of Dean killing a bound, unarmed man, the brothers arrive in a town the middle of what appears to be a demonic plague. The man in Sam's vision is not killed although Dean does kill two other possessed/infected people. The man Sam saw is later revealed to be possessed.
