Amanda Tapping, who plays Maj. Samantha Carter on Stargate SG-1, told SCI FI Wire that she's eager to begin shooting the show's sixth season when production starts up next month. The show will move to The SCI FI Channel, beginning in June, from its current home on Showtime.

"I have no idea what's going to happen in season six," Tapping said in a telephone interview from her home in Vancouver, B.C. "It's always frustrating." One thing is certain: series regular Michael Shanks (Daniel Jackson) will leave the show at the end of season five. "I kind of saw it coming," Tapping said. "But nonetheless, when it happened--when it actually came down to it--it was very sad. ... It's going to be very strange. I mean, the dynamic is so solidly in place, and now it's changing. I know that for Michael and Christopher [Judge (Teal'c)] and me on the last day, we just hung out together all day, and we couldn't stop crying. We could barely get through a scene without bawling our eyes out. I really have no idea what season six is going to be like without him."

As for Shanks' character, Tapping revealed what may become of him. "There is a possibility that he could come and visit every now and again," she said. "He's ascended basically to a higher plane of existence, but I'm sure that that's not aired yet, so I'm not sure if I can actually say that. ... Any scenes where there's crying involved, it was real."

Will Shanks be replaced? "Certainly the door's been open for another character to come in, but I'm not sure whether or not they're going to use this character or not, and I keep trying to find out, and I keep getting, 'We don't know yet, we haven't decided yet,'" Tapping said. "So, it's very frustrating going back into season six with no idea who's going to be on SG-1, or whether it's just going to be the three of us and guest stars, or whether we're going to have a permanent member. We have no idea."

For her part, Tapping said she is continually finding new ways to keep her character fresh. "It would be so easy to lapse into autopilot," she said. "I actually issued myself a challenge at the beginning of season five, because I knew the character had developed so much over the four years, and I didn't know what was going to happen to her in season five. And so I sort of issued myself a challenge of finding a new way into the character. Which meant everything from the way she walks to rediscovering her whole physicality to rediscovering her love of certain things and what makes her tick. ... It helped me to reinvent her in my own mind, which made it interesting then to play her."

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