DRW50

Darlene was a wonderful actress. She always gave Sally dignity and heart, and pathos, which carried a lot of potentially degrading stories like Clarke/Sally. They bungled many of her stories, or cut them short (as they did with the Adam story above). The bungling of Sally and her family is the main reason I will never believe Brad Bell is a good writer.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKGngDtqQUQ

I thought they had chemistry and the show should have gone further instead of ending it for noble reasons, blah blah. Maggie did nothing interesting after that. Dylan just had that silly stripper story.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ClKVAs0u6iA&feature=mfu_channel&list=UL

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6s9LzlLpUY http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5N-vVZV-xDE&feature=mfu_channel&list=UL

Holy crap, I can't believe Cecily was actually trying to pass herself off as a high school senior! Then again, she didn't look much older than Brian Gaskill... I guess these were some of the plans for Cecily which later seemed to be scrapped. Were they trying for Cecily/Del? Oh, it looks like they were pushing Cecily/Charlie even here. Bleh. I never knew Joel Fabiana, dull as ever, was on this show. At least they had a few fun scenes with Joe and the kids, goofing off. You saw that with Joe very rarely.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6pA7chjumg&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGEVQRj2U64&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQl0RYIkvK8&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gE_nHgDSYF8&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVRBWuCcoWE&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2U8hHGSR4A&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZHUjDFxFlM&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSx9OOIc9ZU http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_5Oi8vNWnQ&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uPdXKtOu0H0&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL That whole dance class lasted about five minutes. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDaORiP0C44&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL

Geez, these scenes with Julia and her friend in the hospital made me tear up a bit. At first I was annoyed that for whatever reason all the ABC soaps at this time (minus Loving) had stories about heroines who were watching people die of AIDS (it seems, for lack of a better word, trendy), but these scenes are beautifully acted and written, and bring back too many memories. By the time I started watching AMC I felt like Julia had no personality beyond being Noah's girlfriend. At least here she seems to have some type of view of her own. The show seems so incredibly heavy at this time. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKUHFF0iKLc

It seems very plot-driven that Brooke would think Hayley would poison Adam, although they do a good job in this episode of showing Hayley's very mixed feelings about Adam (in later years it just seemed like non-stop Adam bashing from Hayley for the sake of it). I do wish they'd actually done something to make Adam look like he was ill. I wonder if they should have tried to get James Patrick Stuart again in later years. He has such a natural talent and charisma. Charlie almost looks happy when Brooke says Hayley is poisoning Adam. Such bad acting.

A new Youtube channel is putting up some AW clips from 85-86. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DliA4gOrUNo

Thanks for sharing these. I never would have seen them otherwise. I know there was a lot of backlash over killing her at all. I do wonder what they would have done with her if they hadn't killed her off. Longterm, I can see her being a bad mother to Hope as she was to Julie.

Given how much Whitney's last years resembles MTV's toxic shows you'd think they would show more. I guess it's not as much fun if you think Teen Mom or Real World or Jersey Shore ends in death.

I don't ever know how to feel about McTavish because I think she can balance light and dark very well, and anchor her gimmicky stories. Then other times, she's just too much. For instance, one early 1995 episode I saw had Julia struggling with whether to have an abortion, Maria mourning over not being a mother, talk of Dixie sacrificing her ability to be a mother, and Gloria losing touch with reality over the death of her child. What I've seen of 92-94 seems solid, sometimes very good, but if I were a longtime fan I may have felt different. I also wonder how longtime fans felt about the cheating story with Tad/Dixie when he was with Brooke.

Wow - can VH1 fill all that time without constant cutaways to Z-listers and failed comedians smirking over their one-liners? I might actually have to watch.

I should watch more of 89-90 before I really say - it's just some of the material of that time (Trevor and Jeremy brawling in the museum, insta-psycho Marissa and Jeremy's insta-child, Billy Ray's machine gun spray, Adam wanting Dixie to be in a mental institution, Palmer and Mr. U, Erica and Barney the Clown), all coming around the same time, seem so alien to what I think had made AMC a success in the 70's and 80's.

http://en.wikipedia....i/Lucy_Benjamin If you want to see more Lucy Benjamin you should watch Jupiter Moon. You should watch it anyway, you'll like it, it's a nice show, cheesy but with heart and likeable characters and good space opera.

That's Brynn Thayer as Jenny Wolek, the show's main heroine in those years, and the man in the bed is Steve Fletcher as her screwed up, on again off again husband, Brad Vernon.

I thought this was a very good article on the lives of those who talk about how the "social safety net" needs to go, even as they themselves depend on that safety net. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/12/us/even-critics-of-safety-net-increasingly-depend-on-it.html?pagewanted=1&ref=general&src=me

I think they kept it up in one form or another for quite a few years. I was mostly interested in this because it was recapping something set before SOD debuted, whereas most of them are only material after SOD started (mid or late 1975).

Timberlake does pass off smugness as talent - like all the hoopla where he expected to get an Oscar nomination and wasn't too thrilled when he didn't. Not to mention how he left Janet high and dry after the Super Bowl fiasco. Christina just seems like she's passing a kidney stone. It's a shame that 80's is often remembered for bad hair and clothes or for the talking head "comedians" on VH1 with the frozen smirks and badly scripted one-liners. The artists of that era just knew how to put on a show and there was a certain style you don't get now. Look at all the HIgh School Musical people - you can't tell them apart from any random Disney Channel name from the last 20 years.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqrG6P6jLng http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTIlYa0tNps&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL