All My Shadows

I thought St. Elsewhere was a permanent fixture on Hulu? I'd check, but once they merged with Disney Plus and the subscription fee went up, I bounced out. A lot of people share the opinion that MTM was great all the way through, but I think there was a huge shift after Rhoda (and to a less extent, Phyllis) left. Mary had no real friends, and the newsroom no longer had the apartment to really balance it out.

I was actually rewatching some of the 1975-1976 stuff with Matt/Dorian a week ago, and it's funny, I've always beat up on OLTL for going in and out various identities over its run, but it really dawned on me how that "street urchins trying to make good" current stayed present in some form or another all the way through the end. In a very vague way, Matt and Dorian hanging around, plotting schemes, and rolling eyes at one another low-key reminded me of Dorian and David decades later. It's almost a riff on the haves/have-nots trope. When you're lucky enough to come across AMC from the late 70s or early 80s, the episode almost always starts off with a sense of warmth, happiness, comfort, etc. Myrtle's dusting fixtures at the Boutique, Kate's drying her hands in the middle of cooking, etc. OLTL starts right off with the drama, tension, characters who look like they're about to sht themselves because they're a breath away from getting caught up. And both shows worked beautifully. When soaps really leaned into their individual vibes, there was truly nothing better.

I'm glad it's on YouTube. I still have basically two whole box sets to go with the DVDs (just finished the first disc of Part 4), so hopefully it's still there when I finish those. On the one hand, it sucks to just have the crappy quality TV rips, but on the other hand, I'll be glad to not have to constantly change discs lol

For a while there, I really felt like it was only a matter of time before Shout! Factory announced a complete series release, much like they did with Mary Hartman Mary Hartman. PP, to me, is a show that you just bite the bullet and release all at once in one big set. It'll either sell well or it won't, but you're giving the people who are dying to own it the chance to do just that. Putting out a little bit at a time and watching the profits just whet our appetites while knowing that the chances of the whole series coming out that way were slim. I've picked back up with watching the show, currently just a bit past the 100th episode. Stella's just appeared, and Leslie Nielsen's guest arc is just about done. Everything is great, but what's pulling me in the most at the moment is how far the show is willing to go with David Schuster creeping on Alison.

I wouldn’t think it’s anywhere else as this is an official avenue through which the show is streaming, so they’re working with what they have and not just repurposing YouTube videos/clips and charging people a fee for it (saying absolutely no names but donna’cha someone was doing that via a poorly put together Roku channel). Every time someone on their Instagram page asks about the US, they reply that they’re working on it. Hopefully it’s soon.

I don't want to say that Bob was a complicated man, because it's really not hard to understand (as in comprehend, not empathize) his different facets, but it's easy for me to separate "Bob" (the host) from "Barker" (the BTS figure). Being able to regularly watch the classic episodes from the mid-80s has really solidified how incredible of a host he was. It feels like there were never any "off" episodes for him where he was in a mood or disinterested or anything. He kept the show moving, knew where to find the fun side moments to have, knew how to draw out the suspense, hyped up all the prizes no matter what they were, etc. I view his work on TPIR as the greatest daytime game show hosting of all time because it did exactly what I believe daytime game shows should do - offer a warm, comfortable, familiar, carefree place for viewers to spend part of their morning. Of course, you have to give just as much credit to Johnny, Janice, Dian, and Holly. Together, they were a great unit. That being said, he was also gross in soooooo many different ways, and I've had to turn it off sometimes because of the truly cringe-worthy comments he would make in regards to women's bodies and immigrant contestants (never racist, just completely tone-deaf). Forcing women to dig into his pocket for the $500 exact-bid bonus was weird, especially because he just handed it to men. If it wasn't meant to be a weird sexual thing, then why did women have to reach in but men did not? At the same time, you have Richard Dawson doing his thing on Feud. With that being said, I'm curious as to if the Barker Era channel plans to rotate more 70s episodes in. I know the demand for Rod Roddy + grey-hair Bob was high from day one, and so they wisely jumped ahead and added 1988-1989 into the regular rotation, but the allure of a classic TPIR channel for me has always been the chance to see late 70s episodes.

Thanks @DRW50 . I feel like it's very rarely, if ever, happened where a the US remakes a UK series that's already been established here (and vice versa). If the audience already knows and accepted the original series, what's the point of trying to do it all over again in a form that you know will fall short? Filming it rather than taping might have actually saved it by welcoming less comparison and allowing it to have a different vibe/style. Side note, it's pretty amazing that "Musical Chairs" has been mostly recovered and preserved. Gives me so much hope for other games/soaps.

This is so random bc she’s in the episodes of Peyton Place that I’m currently watching, playing a deaf girl named Kim.

Yes, it’s commonly referred to as the Hughes Family theme or Nancy & Chris’s theme, which is how it’s labeled on Charles Paul’s album of his themes and character themes from various soaps. It originated on the organ in the 50s and was still heard, in orchestrated form, as late as 1979. I would imagine it was scrapped when the show was “modernized.” It starts here at 2:14.

Ah, okay, that makes sense! Since I'm not regularly participating in conversation about any of the current soaps at the moment, my opinion doesn't really matter, but for whatever it might be worth, I think this is a good idea.

I'm confused, because we all know what threads are, but I feel like you might be talking about the individual sections of the whole community? So, instead of there being separate sections for current soap discussion, classic/cancelled soap discussion, and spoilers, they would all just be together in one place? Or, there would be one section that is all things Y&R (current discussion, classic discussion, spoilers, etc), one for BTG, one for GH, etc. I personally think it's fine the way it is, but I do think it's no longer necessary to have separate boards for the various networks/streamers over in the primetime section.

The AI thing is so weird and murky for me, but if I'm being completely honest, if someone spent the time to feed it scripts from the early years in order to make recreations of episodes that were wiped, I would absolutely be interested. If it's something that simply doesn't exist anymore and is impossible to see in its original form, then roll it out.

Oh, I am ready to dig into these! I watched a bunch of the Pantyhose Strangler storyline from 96 on YouTube years and years ago, and I adored it, so I'm excited to be able to watch so much more of it! I've never looked too much into The Box, but since it's available, I'm definitely going to get into it. Thanks for putting this up!

Mark La Mura will always be my number one. This is one that's completely out of left field, but look, just hear me out. Lyle Sudrow, GL's Bill Bauer throughout the 50s.

I am definitely of the Dawson’s generation. During the original run, I was too young to care about it, but it was everywhere, and so by the time I started high school, I had my VCR set to record the TBS reruns every morning. I’ve said it before, but I love TV shows that give us a world that I want to live in. Dawson’s did that in spades, and so much of it was due to JVDB’s energy. It’s just devastating to think of someone so closely associated with youth now no longer here. I always get emotional when I see the final montage from the series finale, but now, it’ll hit even harder.