All My Shadows

That Matlock/Diagnosis Murder/In the Heat of the Night block would have made my late grandmother so, so happy. Then it starts right after Hallmark's morning Golden Girls block. The late 80s/early 90s really were the halcyon days for geriatric television.

I want to see some of this, too! I'm glad we also have audio from Mary's death, but she seems to have been a popular character in the show's first five years. It's crazy because we usually just hear about Tara, Phil, etc. when it comes to the early days. We have some short scenes of her brother Dan (he was her brother, right?) out there, too, with Brooke, so there's that. There's just this whole world of Pine Valley that existed in the 70s that was gradually wiped out in favor of the new characters that would come to form the show's core in the early 80s. And of course, the Cortlandts and Chandlers are important and beloved and became just as rooted as the show as anyone else, but my heart will always yearn for those first ten years.

Ah, I see. That's basically what I meant, though. The very thing that's always drawn me to the character of Margo is the foreboding sorrow she carried with her, the loneliness, the aging, etc. Part of me wishes she had stuck around, but it's understood why a character like her doesn't stick around for long. Whenever Krystal and Babe were introduced, I'd sorta projected what I'd read about Margo onto Krystal, and in my mind, there was always a sadness under the surface. Of course, the show itself really didn't give that impression, so it was mostly fan fiction in my head.

You start off by saying that Margo wasn't involved with Jason then go into detail to explain exactly how she was, in fact, involved with Jason. I don't understand. Were Margo and Claudette on the show together for very long? From the sounds of it, they were not. I didn't know that Claudette appeared much later. I know she was still on for at least two years after Margo left town as she's listed in the closing credits of Tom and Erica's wedding from 1978.

I always imagine poor Margo taking a nice long sip from her champagne when learning of Anne's death several years later.

Yes indeed! You can hear some good audio from that storyline on YT via Danny Hill. As SFK can tell you, Margo is the soap character I'd most like to see any kind of footage of.

Yep, Margo was Erica's mentor/roommate when she moved to the city to model, and they were both involved with Jason Maxwell.

I'm enjoying it, mainly for the weekend binges. The weekday schedule leaves a lot to be desired, and I don't understand how/why the documentary stuff is still such a focus. Expanding the "Television Through the Decades" block to all day would be an obvious improvement. Or at least make that the theme for the daytime schedule and then have primetime be a microcosm of that. Something like: 7am-10am: 50s 10am-1pm: 60s 1pm-4pm: 70s 4pm-7pm: 80s 7pm-8pm: 50s 8pm-9pm: 60s 9pm-10pm: 70s 10pm-11pm: 80s And then maybe do the weekend binges on rotation by decade. This weekend a 50s show, next weekend something from the 60s, on and on. Still wish they let us know what the binges were ahead of time! I'm not interested in The Commish at all, and I've already made plans for next weekend I'm gonna be "sick" the following weekend for PW.

I've been watching Tarzan off and on this weekend on Decades and I'm in love! It's like a western but not. It makes me so happy when I can still find classic TV shows that I've never watched and enjoy them. In two weeks, they're doing Police Woman, which is another I've been wanting to see for a long, long time.

AMC really seemed to change a lot between 1975 and 1985. I'd of course give anything to see anything from the former. Margo and Claudette have always given me the feeling of a 70s version of Krystal and Babe. When did Mona and Charles become a thing? Were the signs there from the very beginning like with Joe and Ruth or did it start later? I know that Charles was visibly unhappy early on.

RIP! Growing up, there wasn’t much Aretha in my house at all, but I’ve come to appreciate and respect her musical legacy. I’ll have to marathon some Got 2b Real this weekend in tribute. I always was Team Ree over Team Patti.

When I see the name Jean Rouverol, I immediately think of the near-Thanksgiving 1977 episode of GL from the DVD set. Her Wiki page says she left the show in 1976, but her name appears on the writers list immediately following the Dobsons.

I wish they'd do more on the weekends now that school is open again. I don't even need huge blocks, just two-hour blocks would be fine.

Bailey Chase, was paired with Alison in the form of Jessica Dunphy

I'm interested in IAL, for sure! I've gotten so spoiled by streaming websites that it's hard for me to make it a point to tune into something on cable regularly. I haven't been watching the Angels (or Alice over on Antenna), but somehow I always find the time for three or four episodes of Gunsmoke on Saturday mornings.

The yellow/black bumpers that matched those ads were also well-done! The gorgeous BW photos plus the music that sorta matched each character - just really nice! Erica had this really grandiose piece of music that you can hear a little bit under MEK's announcement:

I’m watching Carol Burnett on MeTV, and she mentioned AMC and even had Nick Benedict in the audience and pulled him onstage for a quick talk and some questions (most of the questions were edited out). I don’t think there is any video floating around of his Phil (not from his heyday on the show with Tara and Erica, at least), so it was nice to see. Very macho and brooding. I just can’t shake how different in appearance and demeanor he was from Richard Hatch’s gentle, sensitive Phil.

Chit, are you sure it wasn’t just gone in your area? I don’t think it left my affiliate at any point.

None that I can find. I didn't post a picture because I only found professionally-done head shots and hoped to maybe find something more candid (which I did - but it's from 10 years ago!). I'm not sure how old the head shots are, but here's a nice one. There are more here. Ignore the tab that says he's worth $2 million because they mixed him up with another man named Todd Harrison. He's low-key giving me Mark La Mura in all of these photos. Yikes - I had not checked on him in a while, and baby's looking a little rough. It always felt like he was on the cusp of something, like he SHOULD have made it big, because lord knows he kept working and working and working, but he never did. I still bump "She's No You" on the regular.

This comment made me go looking for the guy that I myself had it bad for in my early AMC watching days (besides Jesse McCartney), Todd Harrison, who played Jamie from 2001-2002. He's grown up quite nicely, too.

Tommy Michaels really IS FINE as hell! J. Eddie Peck is older than MEK, which always blew my mind way back when they were on the show together. I certainly did not recognize him in that photo until he was mentioned by name here.

Is there a full list of who attended? It's such a delightfully random group of people. Bill Christian! Rebecca Budig! Terri Ivens!

Andrew Trischitta is my whole life.

I wish two things: to see more of Mark and Ellen's early courtship (here I go again begging for more late 70s AMC) and that Mark had been brought back more later in the show's run. It's great that we got him that few times we did, but each time just showed how much Erica having family that wasn't her children or grandchildren truly grounded her. Once Myrtle died, no one on the canvas knew her and her entire story, who she was before she became "La Kane." It was perfect that Mark was there for her intervention in 2004. I'm currently making my way through that long compilation of 1985 stuff, but I'm looking forward to getting to the late 80s. I really am not familiar with most of the stories from that era besides those that were still being referenced 20 years after the fact (mainly Brooke/Adam/Dixie).

I believe Texas and The Catlins aired together in an hourlong block. Texas was either split into 30-minute episodes or edited.