Dion

Probably because Mike left the show on his own and Carrie stuck around for a few more months. Then when it was time to leave Mike came back (on a horse I think?) and whisked Carrie off to Israel.

I did like some of the 97/98 stuff because I felt the show was finally opening up a bit more after years of the show feeling somewhat insular. The major storylines of the Reilly era finally had payoff and there were some new character combinations to look forward to. Sami/Franco was an interesting pairing and Nicole was also interesting as basically the first majorly successful post-Reilly character. Unfortunately the rest of 98 dragged on and on. Being a few years behind in NZ (a fact that I probably don't mention enough) meant that I knew what was coming and I wasn't interested in sitting through a year of Hope as Princess Gina. The Salem High gang didn't pique my interest all that much either so I never really came back to the show until the Salem Stalker era (but had watched here and there). And then the show was yanked off the airwaves during Melaswen, by which time I had lost interest again anyway.

I think Marlena was a bit flustered and all over the place due to lack of sleep from Stefano's nightly visits and was also already possessed (The Desecrator - Marlena - burned the Horton Centre Christmas presents after Marlena finished talking to Alice).

Another classic Y&R cue, which I suspect most here would know, particularly from 0:39 onwards:

Both Belle's nanny and Brady's nanny had taken the Christmas period off and there was noone else to cover during the Christmas period so Alice suggested that Gina could cover for both nannies during the holiday season. I believe Alice thought that Gina would benefit from being around John for a while as he'd had similar experiences to Gina.

That reminds me how the show once again rewrote John's past in 2014 (making him not Colleen Brady's son after all) all so Brady and Theresa could hook up without them being second cousins. Like c'mon, they were toxic anyway, them being second cousins wouldn't have mattered lol!

I think CarJax was mainly about Carly having this brand new post Sonny life with a new man more than anything else. The fact that it was Jax who had a prior history with Sonny was an added bonus that they could mine but if LW had not sparkled with IR and had instead sparked with someone else ( Lorenzo and Nikolas were also potenital love interests or Carly could have been the main spoiler for Patrick/Robin) then Jax would have been left right out in the cold and probably written out years earlier than he eventually was (in 2011).

Yes, he definitely did adore them and never lost sight of them as endgame. And the series of "punishments" they endured also helpfully gave the other characters a chance to plausibly forgive and start rooting for them. Except Sami of course. She has never fully forgiven them.

Another thought that just occurred to me is that someone (maybe Reilly) thought Jarlena (and Marlena in particular - with the obvious double standards at play here) needed to be punished for a bit as their relationship was adulterous.

From 93 - 95, John and Kristen were outwardly written as if they were a traditional supercouple but I think that was really a giant red herring all along; the seeds for a John/Marlena reunion were always there. Notice how John never really accepts anything that Kristen tells him even if it's the truth, but trusts anything that Marlena tells him implicitly even if it's actually the MarDevil (until MarDevil threatens to keep Belle away from him, which John knows is something Marlena would never do). It's a theme that carries on during Aremid (this time with Marlena trusting John and Kristen not) and finally pays off at the Elvis wedding when John instantly knows that it is Marlena who is telling the truth, not Kristen. Anyway, yes, outwardly the writing seems as if its pretty much John/Kristen with Marlena as the problematic ex pretty much all the way up until Marlena dies. After that it's John/Marlena but it's been seeded all along. Oh and yes it wouldn't surprise me if NBC wanted John/Kristen but Reilly, who could play the long game like no other except for Bill Bell, just went along with it until he got his own way.

I think I may have stumbled on the same playlist and I think you are absolutely right. She's even dressed very formal and mature. It's also interesting how Marlena's style in the late 70s, early 80s has changed by the mid 80s (post Roman of course). She's more glamorous and yet casual at the same time.

Me too, it'd be quite easy to say now that Brad was sentenced by the same biased judge who sentenced Shawn (actually I don't remember whether we ever saw Brad's sentencing play out onscreen so there's a chance I might be wrong), prompting his release and then have Ms Wu ask Jason and Carly to leave Brad alone as they owe her a favor.

I don't know if that's the case but actually yeah that would make sense; i.e they were planning a Marty/Esther pairing then Ngahuia got pregnant so they wrote it in and made it Curtis' for all the longtime fans of that very popular pairing with Monique being brought back to keep Marty occupied while Esther's pregnancy plays out.

Actually we haven't yet seen any of the COVID truncated storylines yet, production would've ceased on August 17 and if they were 8 weeks behind then it means that we won't see the effects for another three weeks or so. Ngahuia likely had her baby sometime after August 17 as well. I expect that in roughly three weeks time we'll see Esther leave abruptly. Anyway, the good news is that production of the show will most likely resume Wednesday

Fun fact, Oliver Driver once played a nurse back in the 90s (Mike Galloway, 1998 - 1999) but if his character was to reappear today literally noone else on the canvas would know him as he was on during the years (1996 - 2000) Chris wasn't on the show. I have wondered why the number of episodes screened each week hasn't been reduced like it was last year...they must have only like 3 - 4 weeks left at the rate rate of 5 episodes a day.

Oh definitely. They had a catfight over Brad when Lauren's lovin' sent him to hospital with a heart attack! lol

Lucas brought Lynn as his date for a New Years Eve party right at the end of 1997 to taunt Sami but I think she just dropped off the canvas after that.

Nurse Lynn (remember her? I always liked how she was used across a couple of different storylines) had also told Sami that she'd used drugs on an ex-boyfriend to get him into bed, so the idea of drugging Austin came from Lynn. After Carrie and Austin's failed wedding, Sami did try to blame Marlena for influencing her to go after Austin but Marlena didn't remember and then realised that it must have happened while she was possessed. Sami of course thought that it was awfully convenient Marlena could blame her actions on being possessed. But really, Sami's actions were all her own. Not really Sami but one scene that Alison Sweeney was involved in during the possession storyline was when after Marlena broke free from the Devil on Horton Island and sought sanctuary with Father Francis, the devil managed to lure Marlena out by having the late Curtis Reed (now a demon) hold "Sami" hostage. Of course once Marlena rescued "Sami" from Curtis, "Sami" disappeared into thin air and Marlena became possessed again.

😂 That is so true 🤣

Nadine

Tanner's brother and Molly's mother...there were several posts about how useless they all were in the scheme of things about a month ago (roughly 4 pages back) 🤣

I think I read somewhere that Mickey had mumps as a teenager so became concerned that he might be sterile but then was so happy that Laura was pregnant that he didn't bother looking at the results; the idea that Laura might be pregnant by another man, let alone his brother (who had raped Laura), didn't cross his mind at all.

Around 7-8 months, depending on whether you start from Stefano drugging Marlena into a dream state and playing out all those fantasies with her which ultimately left her vulnerable to possession (November 1994); or whether you start from the first acts of the Desecrator (December 1994). Marlena was revealed as the Desecrator and started levitating etc just before Christmas. She wasn't free of the demon until the following July.

Someone did spoil that on Twitter about a month ago but as the Twitter community for Shortland Street is quite small so the tweet was mostly ignored.

I had assumed the same so I was actually surprised to find a scene between Christie's Carrie and Anna during Marlena's 1986 coma. In the scene Anna persuades Carrie (who was still wary of RoJohn at this point) to stay with RoJohn to help out with the twins.