DRW50

Sorry - I just meant Robin might have been able to get out of that story the way she did the wedding story. Lorraine did the story but I always assumed it was a directive from up high because it didn't match anything else she wrote for Janet, and when the news came out about Robin staying, it was said that Lorraine had gone to the network with other story projections to keep Robin's Janet around. Nearly finished the book now and I just got to the stuff about Kiberd. No idea what to believe there (although the story with Kiberd and Kate has been around for a long time), but it helps explain why Laurel and Trevor were such a dreadful pairing (I don't think she was great with Jack either but IIRC Felicity was better with Michael Levin on RH). It also makes me understand Trevor's final fate a little more, although that's a lousy way for a headwriter to behave, and she should question herself about treating Cady and Jean Carol the same way for very different circumstances (I read that Jean Carol blurb - it was one of the first soap magazines I ever read - and other than being a bit presumptuous it wasn't anything worth being slaughtered over). Oh dear, I'd genuinely forgotten that. I hope she's better in that spot than she was at AMC. Admittedly, she had a poisoned chalice at AMC by that point. Not to change topics so quickly, but it's weird to read what she says about Leven and Aiden and so on right not long after it was talked about in here. I'd forgotten Aidan was recast for two months. Did we already know that JHC tried to get Megan back involved in 2009 (or use her ideas, anyway)? She truly must have been desperate by that stage. I will say Megan does a better job of running down why soaps lost most of their viewers than many outlet (which often just say OJ or working women).

Honestly Lorraine is one of the people I was 60% sure she might have beef with. I'm glad to hear that wasn't the case. Sad to say some of her comments about certain ABC execs ring a little too true.

That makes a lot of sense. I would assume Robin, with Lorraine Broderick, must have also helped come up with some way to turn around the incredibly stupid choice to have Janet get plastic surgery to look like Brooke. If so, it helps explain why Janet had such a strange, degrading exit story (complete with killing someone with a human-sized candy cane), if someone at ABC wanted to get their licks in. Unfair as some of these anecdotes are, and one-sided as they are, they do help put a lot of pieces together in why AMC was what it was in its last fifteen years. Now if only someone could write a book at the messy-ass mid '80s. The stuff about Susan supposedly not wanting to work with younger women for long - I am trying to remember how often that was true for Erica. I had a vague memory of her being friendly with Cecily or Hilary. I wonder if the reason Megan is so friendly toward Kelly in the book is just because she wanted to get on her show.

I did love watching Constance, even though she was given odd choices like slinking into Chloe's boudoir to kill her. I agree the best way to go would be killing Valentin. The new Cassadine could be the one responsible. He or she would also be a short-term character who might actually off some regular characters and severely, maybe even permanently injure others, causing a lot of fear and unease over the canvas.

The part where McTavish claims to have stopped FMB from recasting Tad with Chris Lawford was a light bulb moment - not because I necessarily believe she alone did this, but because it finally explains just why Lawford was put into a role he was so unsuited to. He wouldn't have worked as Tad either, but at least physically I get the similarity a little more. He was also closer to Tad's age than Charlie's.

Reading through the Megan McTavish memoir so kindly posted in the AMC thread, she claims to have dissuaded Felicia Minei Behr from recasting Tad with Chris Lawford.

I don't really know about all that she is inferring, but in terms of just acting, I can see why Julia would have been upset. The problem is Jim was ruined from the outset. The only way Roscoe could have stayed is with a twin - I do wonder if they had originally intended to create a twin for Jim before Roscoe quit, which is why David Forsyth ended up playing that part for a day or two. Yeah it's a little hard to believe that Agnes was on the side of abortion being a lingering trauma, JER style. Maybe she just wanted to focus more on the depression that some women do have after abortions.

Thanks so much @VelekaCarruthers !

I'm going to have to stop soon but I'm howling at some of this...I can't believe she actually had people find out Agnes' real age and went on about how Agnes repeatedly rewrote her life. I will say she lists some positive points about Agnes as well and it's more interesting than the usual deified narratives.

Reading through some now I see that she offers some praise to Lorraine Broderick (I wasn't sure what their relationship was as many fans used to pit them against each other) and Michele Val Jean, among others. Given that a writer worse than McTavish (Ron) was hired for BtG, maybe we should wait to see if Megan ever pops in... I had to laugh when she suggested Kelly Ripa would promo her book. I am sure Kelly would be so thrilled. I burst out laughing when she said all the writers who undermined her and tried to get her fired can go to hell. Now this is camp, not all the vomiting up on Twitter and tiktok.

I wouldn't be too surprised if that did take up most of Geary's story idea...

Thanks @EricMontreal22 for the Risa story projections. I remember some fans assuming McTavish didn't really want to write for Trevor and Janet, but I guess she did. This type of plot would mostly just work if they cast the right actress as Risa, and the casting at that time wasn't exactly good. This would explain why they wrote Tommy Michaels out (which I thought was a mistake), if they wanted an older recast.

Pikeman is one of those stories which seemed like it was used to answer all questions on the show while not answering any. They can't make these types of stories work in an era where they have no budget for remotes and action sequences. As soon as Sonny was heavily involved in the story, I moved on, because Sonny stories are going to end the same way. The whole poor Sonny med switching stuff just made the handful of characters who were critical of him seem like they were being set up to later repent. I don't know why the show oversold Valentin the way they did, as even when this all started (around the late '00s or early '10s), the Cassadines were not a very frightening family. They only ever were when they were barely shown and just used to bring menace for Luke and Laura. I guess you could count Stavros, in his brief stint under RKK. Helena was also very ruthless, but I never found her frightening.

Around 12 minutes in you get a behind the scenes look at Off the Rack, which ABC threw at Dallas. It's pretty obvious the producers weren't thrilled.

They did. He was a reporter named Shep. I can't remember if he was another swept out by Monty or if he had already gone by that point. They implied at the end of Casey's story that he would be back, didn't they? I'm not sure if Shep was meant to be him.

The numbers also fell during Mulcahey, so they may have had second thoughts (maybe if he hadn't been sabotaged things would have been different). I just hope ABC won't decide no changes will help and pull the plug, because they really haven't tried half as much as they could have.

Wasn't he upset enough about something to throw furniture around or was that someone else?

I think most of that period of Roger was the material we can't see (the '70s), although I do think they circled around that direction again in 93-94. I wonder what JFP's plans would have been for the character if she'd stayed, as Roger goes back to being a full heel (and is more regressed than he ever was in his second stint) under Laibson.

I think it did from Luna's end, but looking at Max's history I agree it doesn't mesh. Unfortunately, I am not sure anything done with Max in his last run did (although I liked the Roxy pairing, even if the show never had any real interest).

If it wasn't originally planned, I wouldn't be surprised, given that JdP was supposedly so against the pairing.

It's nice to see Julie in drama, although her "grandmother's necklace" can be bought on ebay in a lot for about $10 (plus shipping). Would anyone say "forcibly impregnated" when they are enraged? That moment with Kate and EJ looked genuinely good. EJ is such a mess of a character because there have been times I thought he was more evil than Stefano, but the show would always pull back as they knew a lot of fans saw James Scott as a hot piece of ass.

I'm glad they had Trina still thinking of Spencer, not because she needs to wait for his return, but because it was such an important part of her life and shouldn't be forgotten. I saw some fans who were upset over Taggert not being there. I just hope Real is doing OK. A shame the show has dropped the character. I watched the "last" Anna and Valentin scene. It felt like a proper goodbye. Yet the show never seems to want to let the character go. Finola and JPS work well together but it's time to move on.

There were moments where I think she did get the AMC structure, and even had surprising amounts of heart, they were just never properly balanced. Maybe aside from part of her first run.