titan1978

She’s so perfect as Marlena, especially the early version through her first exit, that it is easy to see why she was such a fan favorite and became beloved by fans. She always had an easy charm and also showed a lot of empathy as a character. One of the things I loved about Will’s coming out storyline was how well Marlena was used as both his grandmother, and her therapist roots.

I have read around various soap sites over the years that he didn’t want to work on an hour soap. From 76-78 it went from 30 minutes, to 45, to an hour.

I love her, and it has been a long time since Y&R had that Bell style, so maybe she could do something with what the show is now. But I would never have put her there back in the day, I don’t think her style suited Y&R before it’s DNA became so mangled in the last 15 years. She would have been wonderful with Curlee’s GL team, and I still wish the rumors of her taking over ATWT had come true.

Jax without Brenda and no longer married to Carly is an easy character to say goodbye to. He’s not tied enough to anyone else left to make his scenes/stories have enough impact. And I would never subject NLG to having more scenes with him, even though that pairing should have happened back in the day.

Another Brenda connection- she actually lived in the Quartermaine mansion before. Instead of all these fakes they keep putting in that set.

I think it speaks to how much many online soap fans want romance. Any romance at this point. Even a boring one. He still has more chemistry with Chase.

In the last decade we have had Easton’s characters, Howarth’s 3, KA had two with Starr and original Kiki, and TB with Kim. We had Faison/Duke mask, Luke and Fluke (and talked about Bill)! It’s been beyond enough. When I think about this show not throwing money Vanessa Marcil’s way for another year contract, or that they fired Genie and she only came back because of fan uproar…yet these folks keep getting hired on the same show. And most of them aren’t even beloved from GH. It is so baffling. It’s worse than FOJ’s at this point. And for people that don’t care for Brenda- I get it. But she is at least capable of bringing in actual GH viewers and when used correctly invigorates the corner of GH that the show demands always stay front and center. This would be great!

Has there ever been a miscarriage as controversial as HBS and GM’s Tom and Margo? Nicole’s just break my heart.

That week was the best Maxie has been in years, and KS did awesome with it. It reminded me why I liked her as Maxie and the character in general. She used to be fun to watch. I appreciate that back in the day a story like Cyrus holding anyone hostage would have involved the entire Sonny crew. But here we got a logical person for him to go to with character ties to him- Portia, and Laura and Curtis putting themselves in danger made perfect soap sense. Think of all those Sonny Crew plots from decades past that would have been greatly helped by someone else playing the hero and other characters getting to shine!

It was so bad. And I gave VM a lot of credit for some great acting on the show at several points, especially when Sonny left her in the rain, the wire, the shootout in the shower, lots of times really…but she was so awful in that story. Sometimes actors surprise you in a good way-Lynn Herring really surprised me with more range than I gave her credit for with the Serena storyline. Vanessa playing crazy…not so much. I am glad Peter is gone mostly because of the collateral damage he was doing to Anna, Maxie, etc. His acting wasn’t great, but I’ve seen some awful acting on all the soaps left airing in the last couple of years, even from people that usually do competent work.

The fake-out with Robin was later era Guza, when she had short hair as I recall, and he was hardcore recycling his greatest hits before he got fired (and then shortly after Wendy was fired, although it could have been a year earlier it was hard to keep track the show was so miserable at that point). The Nik situation was the shootout in front of Luke’s when Guza came back to the show after Sunset Beach. It might even be the same episode where Carly tells Tony that Jason is the father of her baby. I have a vague recollection of Alan and Monica finding out Jason did the trach, and having one of those what could have been moments. When all the details of stories mattered Oh Brenda’s breakdown…what a disappointment that was. They didn’t do much with Nikolas having his speech issues either.

I was not spoiled about Lily. It was one of the most shocking twists I had seen on GH in ages, if not ever at that time. I also thought she was going to crawl out of the wreckage somehow, maybe having lost the baby but still be alive. That Guza/Harris stint between Labine and Culliton was so good. Didn’t they do a Robin fakeout clink/boom? I seem to recall her slow motion walking towards a car outside Luke’s, with Jason looking on.

The fact that Sony and Corday, who own DAYS and have their entire catalog intact have not been able to come up with a way to have a DAYS streaming service with classic episodes tells me that it’s going to be nearly impossible in the current climate for anyone else to do it, especially with shows that have been cancelled and companies without employees at high levels that even know what they have when it comes to those shows. And Corday has been talking about this for years, with no results. If we get anything close to a streaming service with classic episodes on it, I would imagine the Bell shows and DAYS would be the ones on it, just due to having their catalogs intact and still airing.

Well mission was certainly accomplished with Donna Mills as Abby. She really brought a lot to the show, and Abby quickly became one of my all time favorite soap characters as soon as I saw her in action. I especially loved those first few years, and her and Gary together at the ranch.

It’s not so much any individual artist. I remember and Indy film director a few years ago wrote a letter to two artists in the hopes of getting discounted song rights, one of them was Dolly Parton who agreed because she liked the story. I wish I could remember what that film was, it was in the director’s commentary. It’s the publishing companies and studio conglomerates that have been buying those rights for decades/already had them- they set prices that are too high. Which is hilarious, because we know many soap couple themes in the 1980’s helped drive the sales of those songs. GH used a lot of music and helped a few bands score bigger hits. I hate corporate mentality! Also some bands just flat out refuse. When they released WKRP a couple of years ago, they got about 95% of the music cleared. It made the box set expensive, but that show really needed the music. Pink Floyd, who had allowed them to use it back in the day during the original broadcast flat out refused. From what I read at the time, the dollar amount didn’t matter, they just did not license their music any more.

I appreciate the many classic elements GH is using in their current stories, even if I don’t love all of it. We have the normal GH action, we have friendships being shown, there is an active attempt at romance with several characters, we have a couple of medical stories being told, and I’m happy to see GH actually using their Black cast. Even though I don’t love Kevin with Laura, I enjoyed the show following up with them after Cyrus was in custody, and the acknowledgment that she put herself in danger and that this is who she is.

Kristin Storms. What’s the line from Steel Magnolias? When it comes to suffering, she’s right up there with Elizabeth Taylor! I think she did some of the best work she has done in a long time in the last couple weeks. The mommy stories have got to stop after this and they need to reinvest in Maxie as a person, not a tormented heroine/baby machine.

This is such a small nit-picky thing, but it bugs me every time a day player is used in the hospital scenes to convey information or treat the characters. Back in the day, even the less hospital focused 1980’s, you still had major characters there- Monica, Alan, Dr.Hardy, Jesse, even Amy to play these scenes. And for all the complaints I have about JFP’s tenure, she and Guza had a strong group of hospital characters for several years. It is already hard to care about what happens to Brando because he is barely a character, and his mother is annoying. Being told her condition is serious by a day player doesn’t help.

Yeah no. Stan all you want but facts are facts. My post one page ago calls out how ridiculous it has been having both of them playing several parts on the same show. “Even if he was the greatest thing to ever hit daytime- the issue with RH for me is that he is on his third character on by this show. Easton is on his 3rd as well (more if you count the vampire revisit), all in the same decade. It’s beyond ridiculous. And I like Roger. They have wasted the potential of casting choices that could reinvigorate parts of their canvas to cater to two actors that aren’t even popular from GH. It’s not like we gave Michael Sutton a new part, or had Stuart Damon return as Alan’s twin.” When he was playing Silas he was roasted all the time. The only reason Finn has been remotely tolerable is because of Anna and Chase, and we could easily keep them and move on from Easton too. They tried to tie Franco to Liz for maximum propping potential, and it still didn’t work out enough for them to keep him as Franco.

That is such a great line and tells so much about both of their characters. A simple phrase that reveals a lot.

E. All of the above!

As much as I morbidly enjoyed the Brent/Marion storyline, the show was pretty awful and their first year or so really shines. There is a sense of community again, pairings with rooting value, and the Annie story is so much soapy fun and uses the right characters. Josh is a little stupid at times, but nothing compared to the men on Reilly’s DAYS at the same time.

It’s disappointing that they (and I’m sure Rauch) decided to lean towards his less grounded OLTL tenure after this, with the Clone and the mystery island and all that.

As someone that came to the show after Marland, while I like Martha and think Lily had a place on the show, I just don’t get how central she was. She can be so insufferable, and often not held accountable for it or even other characters discuss her behaviors but they end up on her side. And every man still wanted her. It’s confounding. And I usually like the normal characters just as much as the over the top ones. Give me a Maureen Bauer any day. Or someone like Laura on GH who straddles both lines. From what I have read about young Lily and Marland’s writing for Laura on GH, they have very similar characterizations. The only difference for me as a viewer is Genie, especially when she was younger, could and did play both the vulnerability and the volatility of Laura. She could be awful and full of heart, sometimes at the same time. Her life was more traumatic than Lily’s, but still similar themes.

I feel like I read somewhere that Carly was created on paper by Marland, but not used on screen until after his death.