DRW50

Thanks. I'd never seen that. I wonder if they got into any hot water over that - I can see some old pious woman writing a strong letter from her armchair. It's very pretty. Sometimes I imagine the show giving Ricky a reggae music career to match Sid Owen's own...career. It makes me laugh. But it would have been better than most of Ricky's later stories.

In the show's earliest, roughest years, we would have been hearing tra*** and other comments, but the characters had enough integrity and inner life (the gay or POC characters) to where it didn't seem like a cheap "issues" storyline or an attempt at controversy. The show in recent years doesn't have that. It's always so clumsy. The way they write disabled characters is just awful - they always come in being rude and aggressive in some type of "we're not being PC here!!!!" clumsiness. I hope they won't do that with a trans character. Just be matter of fact about it. Don't play games or pat yourself on the back. Just trust the audience. If you trust the audience they'll go along with you.

Soapcentral is usually wrong. Peggy returned for part of 1979, mostly just behind the nurses' desk. I don't know if she ever had a real exit. She's there up to Jackie's miscarriage - not sure after that. I guess you could say it's passing the torch to the newer nurses like Katie and Hilary. Kind of sad though that a character who literally grew up on the show didn't get a bigger goodbye.

In one of the 1977 or so episodes available of her, she had longer, darker hair. It's weird because usually women on soaps with hair like that are/were presented as bad girls or troubled women. Yet Cindy said they wrote the character more sympathetically because of her performance in the role. It's another example of GL's women defying convention.

Thanks for finding that. I saw "She's better than Anita Dobson!" comments. She's a better singer, yes, and it's a pleasant enough, horribly dated song, but not dated in the cheesy fun way that the main EE tune (and Dobson's version) is. The main EE tune always reminds me of the old Brookeside theme - of a time, but also timeless. That version, while I did grow to like it, just makes me sleepy. DTC says they will be bringing in a transgender character, ideally played by a transgender actor. http://www.mirror.co.uk/tv/tv-news/eastenders-introduce-first-transgender-character-5250950

Cute Angie/Jessie bit at the start. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVgwFfOQBgs

(that one made me laugh as many of the people in it were gone by the end of the year, or soon after) (I'd never seen that one - nice to see more Max/Lee)

The person who put up the 1982 episode and the V/N wedding episode is back. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCGd-CMhNwvTZ_b7flg44FdA

I think those may have been from the DVD sets. I'm not sure. Anyway, the person who put up GL videos and got taken off Youtube (for other videos) is back with a new channel. They're uploading some new content - full March 1979 episodes. These have been on Youtube before in clip form, but not the full episodes (full episodes is how it should be always if possible IMO). https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCGd-CMhNwvTZ_b7flg44FdA

That's an awful photo of Helen Slater (looks like a mug shot) but I'm happy they cast her. I've always liked her, and she was Supergirl, flop movie and all. It's a nice way to honor the past.

Yes. When I say dangerous I don't mean she's going to cut somebody, I just mean she knows how to really hurt someone with her words. She's always on the edge mentally so she strikes hard and fast and first. I think we've all known people like this...I can't imagine what it's like dealing with her, although I will admit she's good TV when she's in this mode.

It sort of feels like there are several different shows - Yolanda's on one, Lisa V is on one, Eileen/Lisa R and Kim/Brandi (Kyle in the middle) on the other. I do wonder if they might cut at least one of Kim/Brandi to shake that, but who knows. Lisa V must really enjoy that she can now bring up the Paris incident without any criticism. She's mentioned it over and over in her blogs. I guess I can't really blame her. I sort of like to imagine her writing it with a smirk though.

It's very clever deflection from Kim (if that was the intent). She's a very dangerous person. I guess it's good drama, but I really wonder if they can keep her on for another season. I think it would become too toxic.

Billy Bush is annoying as hell. Like that woman said, I almost hope that was staged, as breaking the wine glass and so on is a little extreme otherwise.

Clearly that wasn't the case here.

Joan had an interview with a Star Trek site last month. http://www.startrek.com/article/exclusive-interview-legendary-tos-guest-star-joan-collins

He was taking photos of her from afar (he'd done this with Belle for a while too before Belle's mental problems drove him away). He started sending her gifts. She didn't think it was anything serious (she didn't know about the photos). On her birthday, she was drunk, and he was waiting for her alone. He gave her another glass of champagne and he had one himself. While she dozed on the couch, he put his fingers inside her. She woke up during this and was horrified. He insisted she'd led him on and he'd done nothing wrong and it was what they'd wanted. With her sister's help she quickly went to the police.

He reminds me a ton of Ted and Michael on QAF. He could be their son. Awkward, quirky guys looking for love as we root for them to find happiness. Otherwise, I agree, there aren't that many similarities between the shows. I would want someone who just has a little more personality and can play against the material. I take it that Richie is supposed to be Patrick's soulmate, but in these early ones I just don't see it. I don't think Patrick needs a man, he needs a lot of time alone to learn to accept himself and not push his issues all over people.

That was way more graphic than I'd expected. I thought they'd just cut away. I have to wonder if they realized if they did, some fans wouldn't believe he assaulted her. Idiots are already complaining to OFCOM, even with a warning before the episode aired. One thing Emmerdale does better than most soaps when it tries is setting up atmosphere - they did a great job in the last few episodes of showing what an increasingly dark presence Lachlan was becoming. The scene in this episode when David was outside with him and wouldn't even leave, because he had this feeling and he was so clearly unsettled by Lachlan, was the perfect harbinger for what was to come. I was also affected by Chrissie going through all those photos and knowing, absolutely knowing, even if deep down she can't admit it to herself. They really laid out every trope against women who have been raped or sexually assaulted. Alicia was wearing revealing clothes, she was drunk, Lachlan "only" used his fingers (which to some idiots is no big deal), she was friendly to Lachlan. It's a brave writing choice. In a way it makes me nervous, if this story is another that tells women not to go to the police, but I hope they ultimately say she was right. Natalie Anderson was wonderful, effortlessly going from the bubbly Alicia to the violated Alicia to the numb Alicia in the space of 45 minutes. The ending broke my heart, with Alicia trying to pretend everything was fine as Leyla and David looked on helplessly. It was so much like something Corrie excelled at many years ago - literally kitchen sink drama. As someone who was a Leyla fan from her very first scene and shakes at my head at material like worrying over that twatface Jai, it was a nice surprise to see her so involved in Alicia's story. Many soaps, especially American soaps, would have her exploit her sister's rape to bed David, as some type of big revenge. Instead she was right there with her the whole time, proving the strength of a bond between sisters. The Rodney/Georgia stuff was decent comic relief and also dovetailed a little into society's idea of what is expected of women (Rodney happily assuming Georgia was fine with their breakup and even willing to be his bed buddy). The Rachel stuff didn't do much for me, although Sam dumping Tracy amused me. I notice they're now dressing Sam slightly more upmarket. I think James Hooton is a wonderful actor and the little boy who plays Samson is a very good child actor, but I feel like it's time for Sam to go. Have he and Samson and Rachel and Archive move away for a fresh start. As for Jai - I just don't care about this deeply unpleasant, childish man. Not to make light of Alicia's agony, but her scream of "NO!!!" cutting right to a Jai scene...made a great deal of sense. I actually feel like Megan has some potential when she's away from Jai. When she's with him she always weakens. The only way I can tolerate this pairing is if she crushes him. Perhaps literally, Rosemary King style.

Watched the first four episodes of this... - I wish there were more scenes of the three of them as friends. There was one when they were helping Augistin move and I actually liked all of them and wanted to see more of them joking and annoying each other. - At first I felt nothing for Dom, as his friendship with Doris is lacking in believable connection as well as believable dialogue (they remind me of those endless, endless conversations in interchangeable indie movies between the gay lead and his straight female best friend), and the whole thing with the ex he gave money to should have been much more interesting than it was - onscreen it ended up being a cliche of a cliche of a cliche, one I cringed at by the time of those awful hotel scenes. I was a lot more interested when they brought in Scott Bakula, who is giving the usual Scott Bakula performance (not good or bad, just Scott Bakula), but works well with Murray Bartlett and adds a different perspective on the gay experience. - I just don't like Patrick, nor do I find him interesting. I guess we're supposed to feel sorry for him in struggling to accept himself and see him as endearingly awkward, but to me he comes across as exceedingly self-absorbed, bitchy, and whiny. His bad date episodes were excruciating and instead of pitying him I just cheered the doctor and Richie for pushing him away. I don't think Jonathan Groff was the right choice for this role. The character feels like something shat out of QAF, but with a different actor, ideally with a less annoying voice, I would care more. - Augistin is very interesting to me. I'd never seen the actor before but he's charismatic and handsome and manages to make some cheesy dialogue (like the whole bit about uncut men and being Mexican and so on) seem natural. His identity crises and his relationships with the other characters and that sense of not being able to find peace. The scene where he told his boss how terrible her art was, half-joking, half-truthful, and she fired him, felt "real" in a way many other scenes don't. - I wanted to see Russell Tovey, but the first meeting with Patrick was SO contrived I ended up regretting it. All the awkward romcom cliches in the world don't make up for a lack of chemistry.

Sorry if this was already answered... I'm up to the episode where Liz brings Penny a record, and we hear several songs. Does anyone know what the album was? Was it just one of those generic cover albums that were popular at the time? I'd guess the show wouldn't have paid to have new people sing the songs and I can't imagine Retro TV did either. It was just weird to "hear" the songs without hearing the original singers. I will say Liz has great taste in music - "Working My Way Back To You, Babe" is a classic, and "Groovy Kind of Love" and "Hey Girl" are two of my favorite songs of all time. Did anyone else notice that the episodes around this point suddenly started getting new camera angles? We saw a different version of Maggie at the filing cabinet, we got a POV shot from the nurses' desk (which I don't remember ever happening before), and weird angles in some of the bits where Steve was wooing Karen. I wonder if they got a new director or if someone was just bored.