dc11786

Thanks for confirming. I had seen him in a later sequence with Tom Lignon going off about a missing Jack and I thought it was him, but couldn't be positive. I think most of the significant changes were network dictated. Marland had no issue doing the interracial romance several years later, albeit with a white man and a black woman. That seems more like a network issue especially since the character of Lyle Turner doesn't seem to appear until later in the show paired off with Terry Hindman, Art's daughter. With that said, the Terry / Lyle coupling was ripe for conflict given what was to come with Jack's trial and both of their fathers involved in the case. It would have been easy to just dump the character of Lyle, but bringing on Terry seems to suggest there may have some plans. I do think given that the show is given a rather public turnover in early 1984 with network dictates, it would suggest that the changes weren't internal. Thinking of other things that didn't happen in the bible would also suggest network interference. Billy Bristow's impotence is dropped before it aired, presumably. While this isn't something Marland would tell again, I do think it seems more like network insecurity over the writers. The problem becomes once you start to pull threads out the other stories start to fall apart. The Rita Mae / Mike affair made less sense when Rita Mae's lust had less rationale. With Roger dying, Patrick's death would seem like overkill in the same period. I also have to wonder if the sexual issues were added so that Nixon could play the game and get the incest plot through by offering up another tawdry tale as a peace offering. In addition, the decision to not include Jake Vochek, the father, seems like a network who doesn't want too many older characters. I like Marland's work, but I don't think he was the right person to launch the show. Nixon should have done it solo. The writing staff in those early years doesn't seem pleasant. Dan Wakefield departs during pre-production. Mulcahey complaints about Nixon's notes. Marland leaves and his creator credit disappears. Given the creative environment of ABC in this era, I could see Nixon frustrated trying to fight for a show that was grounded in realism rather than escapism. Part of me wonders how Pat Falken Smith would have paired with Nixon. Probably a behind the scenes nightmare, but never boring onscreen. After Ava brought a gun to a showdown with Stacey, I'd say its a bit of just desserts.

@slick jones Robin Givens' character is Terry Hindman. In her conversation with Stacey, she acknowledges that she is Art's daughter and the connection between Mike and Art being on the police force together. Her boyfriend is Ron Turner's son, but I am not sure what the name is. It does sound like Lil, but I think it's Lyle Turner. It's worth noting that, in the bible, Ron Turner's son was to marry Lorna Forbes in an interracial romance story that wasn't focused around race. I didn't realize that Ron's son had actually appeared onscreen in 1983. Terry and Lyle would be a pretty unique couple in the sense that they are two children who's family units completely ignore them even though other siblings are introduced down the line for both of them. It's wild to think that the show could have had such a vibrant African American canvas in the early-mid 1980s had they committed to the characters. Robin Givens and Susan Walters fighting over Tony Todd would have been something. @Vee @DRW50 I apologize. I feel like I've read posts by one (or maybe both of you) talking about some of Tony Todd's work. Am I wrong in thinking this is him?

I only skimmed a bit. Terry Hindman… is this the character in the scene with Billy Bristow asking about where Jack is? I think it might be a young Tony Todd, but I am not great at identifying people especially without their original voice

I think that the first year material is good emotional material, and probably more mature than a lot of its the same era when the "love on the run" stories were taking over everywhere. A lot of the show's domestic drama is potent, but its hard for me to appreciate it without the original Englsih language track. Lorna's failed seduction of Doug was wonderful and there were so many nice connections built between characters that this whole inconvenience could have fueled a series of interactions given that Lorna is Roger's daughter and Merrill has recently called off her engagement to Doug to be with Roger. I do hope we someday get more English language material, but until then I'll survive. I think Ralph Ellis is credited in the scripts as headwriter even though he isn't credited on screen. I'm not sure exactly when that is though. I know the late 1986 stuff I watched felt very much like reheated Search for Tomorrow, but I've seen Nixon previewing the April Hathway story in mid 1987. King and Taggart with Joe Hardy isn't my favorite material. I cannot remember if there was any point it was King, Taggart, and Joe Stuart, but I don't think so. The stuff that was good in those sequences online recently become even better in 1990, but so much of the story doesn't work for me. I know this is sacreligious, but I don't like Trisha and Trucker. To me, I could probably tolerate them as a C-couple, maybe a B-couple, but they carry too much story and Trucker isn't that interesting a character to do that. Trisha and Trucker work better as a concept when it was Trisha and Steve. By the end of the couple's run, Trucker basically is a surrogate Steve without the connection to the Rescotts. 1991 is strong from what I've seen, but not perfect. I think from Jackie Babbin to Fran Sears and Taggart/King to Taggart solo to Mary Ryan Munisteri is pretty engaging. There is definitely big turnover with the change in EPs. Sears overseas the departures of Clay, Abril, Rio, Rocky, and some of the supporting players like Walter Bobbie's Denny and Ilene Kristen's Norma and we get Ally, Matt, Flynn, Dinah Lee, and Giff. This is after, earlier in 1991, we see off Cabot, Isabelle, Curtis, Alex, Egypt, Dane, Elizabeth Savage's Gwen, and Monty to the second murder mystery in under a year. I am one of the people who thinks (at least in 1992) the show leaned too much into the younger set. The soft launch of the college revamp in the fall of 1991 worked well because it focused on the established players (mostly Trisha and Trucker) and included a solid crossover (Jeremy and Ceara). Once you launch the sorority storyline, it's a lot of new characters at once in a single story (Cooper, Staige, Kent, and Casey). Hannah and Ally are the carry overs. I also didn't like sacrificing Carly, Flynn, Michael, and Paul, but Walsh didn't write for them well anyway. Also, the revamp is such a hodgepodge of the two headwriters obscure soap opera work. When Casey/Revel is originally mentioned in the scripts (December, 1991), he is one of Giff's three sons and he is a musician. There is immediately a storyline in January, 1992, under Walsh that involves Matt joining a band and an attraction between Aly and one of his bandmates, James. Munisteri had very recently written a similar story on Tribes and had also had a plot where a young woman accused a teacher of something sexual in nature the way Ally, under Walsh, also accused Giff of getting her pregnant. It is my hypothesis that Walsh revised Munisteri's existing story projections to run out the story for the characters she inherited while she built up the younger crew. While Munisteri cribbed from Tribes, Walsh recycled from her work on Riviera with Cooper Alden arriving on the scene just as Beatrice and Laurent de Courcey's niece and nephew appeared after the tragic death of their parents. In addition, the romance between an illegitimate de Courcey, American Sam, and his presumed half-sister Gabriella de Courecy, was upended by Sam's paternity reveal while it was revealed in the concluding episode that Gabriella was the product of an affair between Beatrice and another man. I wonder if Wnlsh was considering a Shana / Clay romance. Haidee Granger's arrival causes its own shockwaves. Yes, Paul Anthony Stewart stated that the show had no headwriter by the middle of the summer of 1992. I believe the crux of the conflict between Granger and Walsh was over the Cooper sexual assault plot with Granger rewriting the story to suggest that Cooper initated the encounter with Selina, the nanny, which Walsh rewrote in her return in September, 1994. It is never clear to me if Walsh came back in 1992 though she was credited until January, 1993. Things turn around a bit in late 1992 when they start to reshuffle the canvas and decide what the direction is with the younger set involving Ally-Casey before Ally becomes pregnant. It isn't really until Guza and Taggart return in January that the show really ignites.

The quantity of new Loving material is a pleasant surprise. The quality is definitely mixed. I am not a huge fan of Taggart and King's 1988-1989 material, but I will say that the Jackie Babbin led stuff in May into June 1990 is very engaging to me. The 1989 material feels very on brand for what I have seen of ABC Daytime in general of that era so there seems to be a stronger sense of network identity and unity in the show. It's nice to see some of the Curtis / Rocky / Todd stuff in context of entire episodes. I don't know if the scene was uploaded by Albers, or I just missed it, but the scene where Curtis admits he fears that he will revert back to his old ways because of Lottie's death was very enlightening. It gave the choice of killing off Lottie much more depth. A lot of these 2 nicish guys, 1 girl scenarios are usually played with younger appearing males which typically dilutes the (presumably) unintended homoeroticism of the storyline (unless you are Search for Tomorrow 1984 staging a queer production of Flowers in the Attic with twins Chase and Alec Kendall). The Dirty Dancing sequence followed by the girls night with Trisha, Stacey, and Shana shows what Taggart, King, and Joseph Hardy are aiming for, but it never completely hits for me in the way it appears in these episodes. I really like Juliette Crawford the more we see of her. Ron Nummi's Rick (Stewart) Alden remains a hidden treasure that was never truly maximized to his fullest potential. One of my favorite scenes in the 1989 set is when Rick and Curtis are having breakfast in the Alden dining room and Curtis speaks of using his trust fund to refurbish the train depot and Rick realizes how he remains and outsider having to fight for everything on his own. I didn't love the framing of Rick's point of view regarding Stacey's pregnancy. I cannot completely blame King and Taggart for the worst of the Alex / Clay spy saga because so much of that was embedded into the backstory that you really cannot ignore it. I liked James Horan much more in seeing him in stretches of episodes (in 1989 and 1990) where the character has more layers than in someof the more consistent 1991 stuff I've seen. Parlato's version seems like a natural extension of Horan's version. Malloy's Clay just doesn't work for me. I think leaning into Clay's feelings of betrayal were smart and it gave Clay more of a point of view than I expected. The Clay / Ava tension was good. So was Ava side stepping the truth and telling Cabot that she didn't know Alex was pretending when she married him, while neglecting to mention she had known for a good amount of time by March, 1989. Alex is the fictional Latin American nation does little for me. Though, I do see some similarities between the Alex / Clay story and the later Buck / Curtis / Tess material which was equally wonky, but all driven by Taggart and Guza, making me think that Taggart liked the concept enough to reuse it. I've only watched a bit of the December (or maybe November), 1986 - January, 1987 episodes. It was odd seeing the trailend of Judd Beecham and this floundering period where Ava bounces between one forgettable one-shot love interest to another. The extensive flashback of Tony and Marie was something. I had forgotten that Marie and Tony were raised as siblings with Tony as the ward of Marie's gangster father. I get the point of it (to give insight into the danger that Trisha faces being involved with Nick), but its a lot of story space for characters that don't feel super important . Everyone fretting about Trisha seems tedious. I did like the idea that this was supposed to represent some sort of foolish rebellion on Trisha's part and howit ultimately is a case of Gwyn getting her just desserts for ruining Trisha and Steve's romance. I don't know if he's being credited, but I would safely bet Ralph Ellis is guiding the show through late 1986. It is very much a retread of the work he did on Search for Tomorrow when it moved to NBC. Clay, the believed dead spy father, is a revision of the Rusty Sentell plot. The River Palace seems reminiscent of the River Boat restaurant. Nick Diantos is a Warren Carter type with the two Jennys (Loving's Jenny Baylor and Search for Tomorrow's Jenny Deacon). I don't think it happens in these episodes, and I know its a common soap trope, but the Cece / Steve story ends up playing out similarly to Kristen / Brian with Kristen/Cece miscarrying and lying that she's still pregnant to keep the man. It was nice revisiting some of late stage Addie Walsh and early Taggart / Guza. As much as I find Walsh's 1992 run generic and listless, I did appreciate the small town, class conflict element embedded into the Aldens vs the Mayberry girls even if Hannah, like many of those country girl types the Nixon soaps tried in the 1990s, is a washout. I could care less about the breakup of Hannah and Cooper, but Dinahlee lamenting in the bowling alley that she feared that Cooper would ruin her reputation was a nice beat. I really enjoy Taggart and Guza. I thought they wrapped up the gaslighting plot well even though it isn't one of my favorite Loving stories. I also love Gwyneth putting all the pieces together with Clay, Isabelle, and Tim Sullivan. The music is very evocative and I know several pieces are shared with General Hospital. Maybe not specifically in these episodes, but I know there are one or two shared music cues. I watched a couple of the clips from the Italian episodes from 1983. Most seem to be from August - November from what I can tell though they all aren't in order because we bounce back and forth between Peter Brown and John Shearin at some point. There is a very nice flashback to Mike returning from Vietnam and Doug and Merrill welcoming him on the eve of Founders' Day, which gives another layer of depth to Mike's Founders' Day speech crash out. There is a nice sequence where Doug is seduced by Lorna, who plies him with champagne after his break up with Merrill. Doug gently rejects her and the writing and acting is well done with Lorna maturely accepting the rejection (at least initially) and not making a scene of things. I don't think I knew that the Trish personality Lily had seemingly got her name from her alias when she and Jack were on the run. Jennifer Ashe is intriguing in the dive bar with Dirk?, who oozes that sort of swarmy sexuality that reached its peak in the late 70s/early 80s. Lily's premonition of the future encounter between Jack and Garth felt James E. Reilly esque. There was some nice stuff between Merrill and Clem Margolies, who I don't think I realized was Roger's good friend on top of being the Alden Amily attorney. I believe they briefly tease a Clem / Merrill pairing and Margolies hangs around past Marland for a bit if I recall correctly. Clem confirming that Roger was ambitious and basically would never back out of his marriage for that reason was a harsh truth for Merrill to face. Shannon Eubanks is just stunning and its a shame she was dropped quickly. Callan White works in a very different version of the character. I really liked the 1990 episodes, but I am not done so I'll save that for another post.

I watched a bit of January, 1987, this weekend. I had seen bits of late 1987 with the Maddinghams and I thought it was decent and more compelling than the stuff I typically see on Crossroads, which I think stylistically just isn't my cup of tea. The stories are light hearted and quaint in the early years through the Phillip Bowman era with Bowman going more posh and William Smethurst going more reality based. In January, you have several significant events taking place. Tommy "Bomber" Lancaster arrives as the new owner of Crossroads having purchased it from MIH, its previous owners, despite a local attempt by Jill, Adam, and Nicola to reacquire it. Smethurst said to the press at the time that he wanted the show to be more reflected of the Midlands where it was set. Lancaster is bombastic and seems very ill suited on the more staid, reserved show that Smethurst inherited (maybe it was bigger under Bowman but Lancaster seems bold even for Nicola Freeman). There is an odd attempt to tie him to the past by digging up Amy Turtle, who had appeared since the late 1970s, claiming that she was friends with Lancaster's late mother. Lancaster's arrival is played with a bit of shock, with us only seeing the back of his head initially. I guess he appeared late in 1987 in a one off or so as a guest at the hotel in the same role. This is immediately followed up with the Amy appearance so it's quite a bit of the old and the new. There is a lot of hand wringing about what will happen to the staff as well as what Bomber plans to do with the property in general. Some characters are already starting to scatter to the wind with John and Kathy taking a post in the near future at a boarding school and bartender Barry Hunt make plans to return to Austailia or Tasmania. It is simple workplace soap. The real oddity is the sudden appearance of the Grice family, who literally appear out of nowhere and are suddenly moving into a unit near where Kathy and John are temporarily lodging before the move in a housing complex. The family is not only disconnected from the rest of the story the conflict is immediately watching what feels like an attempt at poor man's EastEnders/Brookside with a tale of two cookers. It's jarring. With that said, I don't hate the family as its assembled, but they just are disconnected from the rest of the show. Mother Margaret Grice is going to run the corner store and I think they live above it. And when daughter Beverly runs away a few episodes in, its a bit wild to think how much story is given to this entirely new lot of characters. There are other silly plots like spoilt Daniel Freeman running all around the leisure center and hotel making out with his girlfriend Fiona as well as his feud with Charlie Mynecroft resulting in the kidnapping of a stuffed dog. Frenemies Ann Marie and Lorraine both have potential holidays cancelled. Everything else seems up in the air. I can see why fans would initial be displeased with this period.

I remember a soap fan from danfling's board claiming that the Emily Benson storyline involving Royal Dunning was written from a story projection developed by the Dobsons.

For Search for Tomorrow to survive, what the audience wanted and what the network thought they wanted would have need to match up, and I don't think it ever truly did. At times, the show was close to being a strong contender. What I have seen of the Joanna Lee / Gary Tomlin era, they were the closest to match audience and network expectations. If Lee had stayed, she would have had to stream down the cast size as her canvas was large (I believe in anticipation of an unlikely switch to an hour). She also would have needed to just focus on producing a decent show as her attempts to get eyes on the show (Cher/Michelle Phillips guest starring, the Live episode) wasn't as powerful as just well produced story that she and Tomlin were cultivating. I can only imagine what Monty would have done to overhaul the show. If it was anything like her return to General Hospital, the show would have been better off dead. I do think that AI might produce a hilariously devastating vision of what that would look like. In terms of new people, I would be interested in what someone like Jorn Winter or Jacquelyn Babbin might have done as producer possibly paired with Peggy O'Shea, Henry Sleasar, or even Barbara Morgenroth Reverting back to Liza as the sole female lead was foolish. When Lee and Tomlin were in charge, Liza and Travis were part of a larger ensemble and their main story revolved around Liza's desire to have children with the birth of Tourneur and then later with fostering Bilan (or whatever the baby's name was) and T.R. Tomlin / Barrett set up Hogan and Sunny well as the seconday couple until Forsythe's exit in the late summer of 1984. I don't think Sunny ever really recovers from that. The show had two strong younger female leads, Lisa Peluso's Wendy and Terri Eoff's Suzi, but Paul Avila Mayer and Stephanie Braxton sent the characters into different story orbits (Wendy with Quinn & Sarah and Suzi off with domestic drama as a young wife in the emotionally complicated McCleary family). Even in these separate orbits, there stories were playing out within similar story spaces (the McCleary family) that could have and should have kept things interesting. People will probably disagree, but I probably would have returned Brian Emerson in the summer of 1985 as a romantic complication for Suzi and Cagney as well suspecting that Quinn was up to some underhanded things (like Warren Carter) which could have given him animosity with Wendy. Jo was on the town council for many years. I agree that it was unlikely that anyone would be able to save the show. How do you think Falken Smith would have done with Search for Tomorrow given how she did on Ryan's Hope? They aren't necessarily similar shows, but tonally very different from General Hospital and Days of our Lives. Falken Smith would probably have done very well with the Warren / Suzi / Wendy triangle if that had been going on at the time still. I also wonder how she would have done with Brian and Kristen or if she would have dumped them as well. I think the Corringtons returning would have been wonderful, but I don't know if they would have written the type of show NBC was looking for in the mid 1980s. I do think they had a great understanding of what the show had been and had they arrived post-Gary Tomlin in 1984 I think they could have done some good work if they weren't stymied by Ellen Barrett. The story was well set up for Travis to return in 1985 before Sherry Mathis left by Jeanne Glynn. I believe Glynn was writing with Tomlin when the backstory between the Kendalls and the Tourneurs was explained involving a failed business deal involving airplane parts that I believe resulted in the death of soldiers during World War II, the bankruptcy of the Kendall clan, and the patriarch's (Lloyd's father) suicide. This, along with the fact that Lloyd had raised Martin Tourneur's son Steve as his own was fodder for a long running feud between both families. Having Travis die saving TR, Kendall's lost daughter, only would have added to that complexity and having TR wanting an insta family with Lloyd and Liza after Travis' death would have been brewing conflict between Lloyd / Liza / Travis if Travis were to return from the dead. I don't think Sherry Mathis would have been thrilled, but I think Jerry Lanning would have been a very different Travis recast if he has suffered a lot during his missing year(s). Sherry Mathis, Rod Arrants, and Peter Haskell playing all those parts would have been ideal, but most likely unfeasible.

I am not a huge fan of Sunset Beach, but came across this when searching for information on Gary Tomlin Never Say Goodbye: An oral history of Aaron Spelling's Su...As the short-lived sudser turns 25, take a look back at the cult classic with the cast and crew themselves!It's an interesting read. Some details I definitely hadn't heard before including that Pratt was offered a chance to headwriter in 1999 that he turned down and that the plan with the Rosario jewels storyline was to reveal Phillip Vargas was a vampire, but that the twist was nixed because NBC wanted the supernatural for Passions. There are probably other details others might have known like Lisa Guerrero auditioning for Maria Torres.

Dalton was Steve Kendall’s sports agent on “Search for Tomorrow” in May, 1983. I believe the episodes are online

Wright plays every version of Ally well. I thought she was great in her more rebellious work paired with Eric Woodall's Matt Ford. A Matt / Ally / Casey storyline in 1992 would have been brutal, and I believe that was the original plan when Casey was set to be a musician and most likely Matt's band mate. Her work as a more scheming Ally under Addie Walsh also worked before she settled more into the romantic heroine / single mom role. With Jessica Collins as Dinahlee, Trucker and Dinahlee were hot. Elizabeth Mitchell did not Collins' charisma or energy. I suspect the plan was to kill Dinahlee off in 1994 in the plane crash that took " Lily is around from March, 1987, until late August, 1988, I believe. She was brought on as a romantic spoiler for Stacey and Jack. She emotionally manipulates both Jack and Stacey at different times, and, teams up with Rick at one point. She doesn't revert to her multiple personalities, but she ends up faking a suicide attempt, I think.

I'd LOVE to see the projections Don Chastain submitted that got him fired. To an extent, I get what Chastain was thinking with Travis in outer space. You could easily do a crisis style story during sweeps month, but it wasn't sustainable. It was merely an event. In a post Ice Princess world where the show was doing the jade necklace story, I think there was a way to build tension in the marriage of Travis and Liza over Travis desire for adventure. I just don't think that was the route to get to that point. Chastain seems like he could do some decent character work when in more grounded stories, but that was more than likely working off Harding Lemay's blueprints that gave him that edge. It's just wild to me that he openly speaks about working during the strike in the press given the union. I believe Rainbow's End was set in the rock industry.

I loved "Grosse Point." I believe they toned down Marcy Sternfield (the Tori doppleganger) after the pilot episode. I don't think she ever mentioned her wealthy relative (I cannot remember if it was her father or an uncle). I also think they dropped any allusions to the character having an eating disorder. Ironically, Marcy became the more sympathetic character, usurping the female lead (in my opinion) from the show's original entrance point character, Courtney, with her pairing with Dave, who I believe in the original pilot script was actually supposed to be paired with Courtney. I didn't watch much of the WB after the trifecta cancellation of "Grosse Pointe," "Popular," and "Buffy."

I believe both Van and Meg ended up in New York briefly in the late 1950s. For some reason, I thought it was slightly longer. I know the parents stopped appearing in the mid 1950s, or at least according to the soap books. I'm very curious on how Bruce entered the story. I imagine that he married Van and brought her home to Rosehill, but that has always been my assumption. I am unsure if the marriage took place in Rosehill, New York, or even Barrowsville. I believe Jean McBride, Bonnie Bartlett, and writer John Hess all leave within a year of the show expanding to a half hour. The shift to Rosehill would be within the year of the transition as Bruce is introduced in January, 1959 and the wedding of Bruce and Van is in April, 1959, when Audrey Peters assumes the role. Original headwriter John Hess' script collections is stored at Darmouth. The scripts run through July, 1958. So some of that would be covered. I don't think the modern soap community considers this as gay content, but I do think that this content in film is often considered in films of the time as having a queer interest. I think there are probably a lot of lost "gay adjacent" storylines that have fallen by the wayside. Brad Vernon was actually assaulted in prison around the same time (I can't remember if it was before or after). Also, wasn't Bill Horton "attacked" in prison in a way that suggested he may have been sexually assaulted or was that a completely aborted story? Then, there was the "Sympathy and Tea" storyline on "How to Survive a Marriage" with Brad Davis' Alex Kronos who was attracted to Rosemary Prinz even though his father suggested he was too weak or something along those lines.

I've been following the thread for the past few weeks, but I didn't respond so I'll just post my random responses. Gus' messy paternity was never a favorite story of mine even when it was being written by Taggart and Culliton. The original Gus / Selina / Miguel story was under Labine , I believe, or at least I think Labine set the story in motion. I thought it was Lucky Gold who killed that story with the insistence that Gus couldn't have been adopted and was the Augusts biological child. Then, Taggart and Gold revisited it when they were building a Gus / Harley vs. Phillip thread that, as I recall, started with Harley wanting custody of Zach. I seem to recall Phillip having Harley arrested for trying to take Zach from the Spaulding mansion. The Journal was mentioned as late as 2005. In May, there was a thread building around a Spaulding takeover launched by Josh Lewis and Roger Thorpe's children, Sebastian Hulce and Blake Marler. I don't remember what the impetus for the story was, but I felt like Sebastian was trying to avenge Roger or continue his legacy. At the same time, Alan and Holly had spent some time together as Alan was interested in purchasing the Journal. Holly ends up selling him part of the Journal or all of it in exchange for shares in Spaulding Enterprises. Blake has a conniption fit because it was somehow going to disrupt their plans. This was all scrapped with the budget crunch and Sebastian was shipped off and Maureen Garrett stopped appearing. I felt like the show was going to try a Holly / Alan pairing. In terms of gothic storytelling in 2000s, I do think the dreaded Maryanne Carrouthers storyline from 2003-2004 would also fall into the catefory. The atmosphere in that was very well done. Very moody and haunting. I thought the climax was decent at the house of mirrors, but there wasn't a whole lot happening between the reveals. I don't hate Conboy and Weston as much as others do. I thought Ben becoming an escort made sense with who the character had been with Bomer in the part. He had made that sex bet regarding Marah and was pretty worried about money all the time. I could see Ben turning to sex work. I didn't love how Ben's sexual abuse was treated like a post script, but I wasn't as mortified as others. I felt a lot of the online reaction was a bit insane like saying there was no one Ben could have been molested because Fletcher would have known which was more degrading, in my opinion, than Ben actually being abused. I don't think Regina / Sister Lucia was used appropriately. She wasn't just Gus' mother, but she had also been Phillip's (retcon) nanny. If you are looking to do a longer Phillip vs. Gus narrative, this was something that should have been considered. Though, I didn't really have much use for Gus in general, to be quite honest. Gus and Harley were fine as a B-couple, but didn't work in the A-couple role for me. Looking back at the Dobsons, there were references to a woman in black at the end of the tenure. I think people have speculated this would have been Amanda's mother. I wonder if they recycled any of this for Santa Barbara with Sophia Capwell. Who was the writer that proposed the initial Janice Stafford storyline? Was it Doug Marland? I would be curious if Janice (or some iteration) wasn't the original intended mother of Amanda. The Dobsons had Sophia "die" in a boating accident. It could be coincidence, or just another reference reference to A Place in the Sun. It's interesting hearing that they didn't want a strong headwriter after Marland and that was, in part, what led to money issues with Pat Falken Smith and her quick departure. If available, I imagine Smith would have been better suited to continue after the Dobsons rather than Marland. Stylistically, the Dobsons and Falken Smith seem more psycho-sexual in their writing than Dobson while having their own flourishes.