titan1978

Well before him it was Shiloh. And Ryan. I think it is their style to have one eat the show villain a year. I do think the Laura angle was added in after they saw the scenes with Genie and the audience response to it. There was a period of time that he was much more menacing with her than he now is, although they have explained that in the story.

Well if Vanessa refused to play a romance with Dante, there is no way she is coming back with Michael’s kid! I never thought they actually had sex. Brenda is impulsive but not with Michael. Jason maybe, but not Michael. Besides she already has one problematic kid.

I think the issue with Vanessa is whatever she wants, Frank is unwilling to give it to her. I always just assumed it was the terms of the contract. The only times I have seen her say anything about him she was complimentary. She has made it clear she does not want to be locked down in a long contract, she likes making her TV movies. Some of that was about her kid, some about how she wants to live her life. She is also incredibly frugal and smart with her money. I love her, but I also think that unless she is going to sign on for at least two years, if not three, then the amount of story she drives is not worth the short term disruption of the entire show. It happened with both her returns, and both times there was a huge gaping whole where Brenda was or should be for months. How do you keep playing Sonny and her as great loves when we know she is going to leave soon? On the other hand- they need star power and a shuffling of some of the decks. And yes, completely ridiculous that they killed AJ off again. And that strikes me as being in retaliation more than anything I have seen about VM.

Outside of Serena appearing. I’m still pissed she isn’t on the show.

It really was excellent. And they just fit right in seamlessly. Not since Luke and Laura returned in 93 has one of these returns been so seamless and also helped energize the whole show. And Tony and Genie returned to a show that still had many more direct connections from the past still there and had not been gone as long as Angie and Jesse, and yet, seamless.

@carolineg Ita just a classic soap trope, which was down extremely well and had lasting ramifications on both DAYS (which lasted a long time), and later Y&R. Victor has disappeared a couple of times over the years with this type of story. I just want anything that allows Maurice to bring back some of the charm he used to have as Sonny. Something completely different than what we have seen since Lily died or since he and Carly fell in love. It really did wonders for Victor on Y&R (at the time), and gave Nikki the first real competition she had felt in a long time, because Hope also had his child.

Sad news. Sean was such a great character. I always loved the special relationship he had with Felicia. I was sad when they wrote Sean and Tiffany off the show.

One of my favorites that was just a throwaway scene, starts at around the 2 minute mark. I also love the music at the beginning of this scene. I wish somebody would stream these shows!!!

That Deception story was ridiculous. Laura as a social worker was such a natural fit, and yet they only had her see one kid that reminded her of the then dead Lucky and then she had the incident with the train and it was pretty much over for her until the Rick story. She just floundered. What I wanted, back then, was for Laura to discover that Lucky was alive and Stefan had him. It should have happened at the same time Luke was searching for him. I think watching Laura piece some of this together and then dealing with Stefan not telling her would have been much stronger than what we got. But by then the characterization of Laura being the little lady sitting at home while Luke was off on an adventure was set in stone. But there were so many issues at that point with both Guza and Riche. The show was sloppy and the casting was off for several roles.

In the old soap days, Sonny would have amnesia and end up with a new love interest once all of this is done. Ava would somehow discover his new life and keep it to herself. And Jason and Carly would absolutely end up falling in bed while he is gone. And in true soap tradition, his new lady would be the complete opposite of Carly or Brenda. Maggie or Hope on the farm type. And it would lead to years of story and possibly actual growth with Sonny. Or at least another real chance for him to claim he wants power above everything else. If he’s going to be there, I want to see him doing something different for a change.

I agree they often styled Sherry to look much older than she was. She looked younger on ER several years later! But part of that ended once she had those much more flattering hairstyles/color towards the latter part of her run. Sherry’s Blake is one of my favorite soap bitches of all time. She’s so much fun in scenes with Alexandra. And Holly for that matter.

Catching up on the last week. I get Carly is older and she has been through this before. But Carly would be screaming at everyone that Sonny is alive and would be a real mess, instead of sitting calmly on the couch. And then her showing up at the docks was ridiculous. Carly commanding the mob is exactly what Sarah’s Carly would be doing, but she would have had a gun herself, not just come strutting out in the middle of a gun fight. And she would never have left, because that is who Carly is. Impulsive and a nightmare at the worst time. This is still supposed to be a soap right? Daytime drama? Then where is it? You have actors capable of selling it- use them. The energy is severely lacking. Also- one episode later and I see they have remembered how awful Carly can be, because she would absolutely kidnap an old woman and be so proud of herself.

The story and the schedule did more to driver her out that anything else. Just a handful of years later (2 to 3), and the schedule issues were gone because the actors with families started to get somewhere with their complaints and their union, (such as working turnarounds where they were there until the late hours of the night or after midnight and still called back to work the next morning at their normal call times), and paying all that overtime to everybody else (crews especially). The story wasn’t going to change- the show wanted it to be her vs Mindy and an overall obsession with Nick. She thought it should have wound up already, and instead was becoming the defining trait of the character. She could do the bad schedule, or a bad story, but not both at the same time for years.

That was the most epic end to that wedding. And the fact that nobody knew it was coming was probably incredible at the time. It’s my favorite scene from the oft repeated wedding, Laura in her purple suit, and Scotty throwing the bouquet back at Luke. I remember Geary saying in an interview that they improvised the jump down, and when he was hanging there he thought this looks like a larger drop than I thought it was.

Are you implying there is only one brain in Salem and it moves to the needed person as the plot dictates? Hilarious! I actually did laugh out loud.

F#ck that guy.

It felt like Roxy adjacent to me. Not quite Roxy, certainly not quite Delia.

I’m glad they are playing the natural beats of their current story, always happy to see Laura and Lesley in scenes together!

Something I noticed over the years I watched ATWT (after Marland’s death unfortunately), was just how lost people sometimes looked during her adlibs, especially the newer actors. I also saw both Martha and Jon Hensley breaking character reacting to her spinning out trying to get back to what she was supposed to be saying. She’s a brilliant actress, but doesn’t come across as always a good scene partner. People like Nancy Lee Grahn, Tony Geary, and Tristan Rogers also ad lib a lot. But their scene partners rarely look as lost or just plain annoyed as hers sometimes did. Not that Nancy and Tony didn’t sometimes derail things and noticeably try to get back on track. It just happened less that when I was watching Lucinda.

Until this site, I never saw people that went for Rattray as Lily this hard. It’s interesting how often people sing her praises here. I get it, I really liked Carrie Genzel as Sky Chandler.

I also think Lesli was as good as she could be with the show as it was at that time. Lois is just not a character that works well outside Labine I am afraid. Her team seemed to really get the full picture- Lois wasn’t stupid, she just wanted to believe the best in the people she loved. She also had a full understanding of how dangerous Sonny was becoming to her friends and her business. I just don’t enjoy Wally as Ned that much, especially as Eddie Mayne or as Guza’s gatekeeper persona. What a waste of that character. I loved Rena though.

Fantastic episode! Good quality GH of this vintage is really rare, and it’s so great seeing. That Jesse and Bobbie scene was really interesting. Always great seeing Gail and Lee Baldwin. This period of the show fascinates me so much. You can tell why the show started to gain viewers, it’s got a great mix of new characters interacting with established ones and all the stories have movement. What I think of as Monty’s style is cemented once PFS gets there, so this early stuff is an interesting mix of classic soap drama turned up a couple of notches, as opposed to later in her run when it really was more like a modern primetime show. Even a talk to scene here has a point of view and more going on than just repeating the plot.

The whole thing led to Josh Taylor’s Roman, so in effect, the character was destroyed.

I had seen Tracy’s run in the early 1990’s, the fountain fight with Monica, her sadness when Edward was dead, her positioning of Ned. I loved her scheming with Marco Dane, and running Jenny down. So I knew what was coming when she arrived and they did not disappoint with that mini story with Jax. I also loved Marlena’s return. It was epic as it should have been, full of emotion and dramatic. The scene on the pier is incredible. And it was exciting when they revealed Wayne. But that story really did suffer and Roman was pretty much destroyed. Eileen’s first return as Ashley on Y&R was pretty awesome. If I remember correctly, didn’t John follow shortly after her, or did he come back just before? Either way, she almost single-handedly reinvigorated that family from years of just Jack. The writers really brought back the Abbotts in a huge way.

It made no sense not to tie that kid to Jax. It’s a dead end. But I guess when you have a pretty good idea Vanessa isn’t staying, then why do the kid at all? I am sure she did ask for more money. At that moment in time she was worth it, and they should have worked it out. From what I recall, the sticking point was the schedule, not the money. Like many times in the past, the fact that she wanted time more than money was a surprise to ABC. I don’t know if it was Frons or JFP or both. But I do know JFP isn’t real fond of maternity issues with women, or women that push back in general. When Steve Burton and Bradford Anderson have a guest I am interested in I listen to their podcast. He just mentioned in a recent one that he was a real dick to JFP when she first got there as he was leaving, and yet he was welcomed back and given all the airtime in the world. If anything, there was a period of time the show felt like it was transitioning to Jason’s POV and Sonny was finally being held accountable for his decisions. Things like this really piss me off, because I know how awful she was to several women who were less or equally demanding and she just ignores or punishes them, and many of them were rightfully important talents on their shows.