titan1978

Not to mention the remotes! Did anyone else go outside as much as Monty? First it was little things here and there, then whole scenes, then whole story climaxes happened on location.

GH- 1973- Denise Alexander jumps ship from DAYS to create Lesley, becomes a pivotal lead her entire run on the show, and her soon to be added lost daughter Laura has a major impact on everything to come. Her arrival ultimately displaces Audrey and Jessie as leads within a couple of years and they are never frontburner again.

It is interesting because I have read that Tom Donovan had reinvigorated the show, but then it fell apart when it went to 45 minutes. So it must have been rocky a bit before he got there too. I would love to see more of that period, especially more episodes where Jessie was still a lead, early Lesley, Phil Brewer’s murder.

💀 For everyone wondering why there was no build-up in this Craig storyline- it’s Ron. He skips past the beats. Look at Possession II: the Stupidity.

DG was doing a good job as Michael too. Jacob Young, not so much as Lucky. Still not a great way to treat your co-workers.

It is hard to say, isn’t it? Because Marlena had moved into the central heroine role with Roman. And I loved how involved in their lives Tom and Alice were. Would Doug and Julie have lead to less of Tom and Alice? Or more likely, Mickey and Maggie? I can’t imagine the show as it was then keeping both sets of characters, even if M&M were mostly on the backburner or in C stories at best.

What was the point of Trina even going on the trip if she wasn’t going to be central to the action? I hate this. Another promising actor and character and the show can’t make it work. Also- in what world is this compelling television? The chemistry is there with Cam and Esme, and Spencer and Trina. Instead Joss is the centerpiece again. When Stanford was there and fighting with teacher Willow it was like a giant neon light was above her head saying I am your daughter.

In my viewing lifetime- 1980’s- Y&R. Though they had a rocky start to the decade, it’s hard to deny the complexity, look, appeal and storytelling of Y&R in the 1980’s. From bringing Jill/Katherine back to the forefront, introducing characters like Lauren, Nina, Cassandra, the Abbott family…all that glamour and yet always grounded in stories about emotion, especially passion. And so loved GH back then. But with more critical analysis at the age I am now, Y&R takes the decade. 1990’s- GH for me. Wendy Riche really grounded the show and all of her major head writers-Levinson, Labine, Guza, and Culliton really told emotionally gripping stories with high stakes. There was still that element of action and adventure. But it was more grounded and the characters were very rich. I didn’t even hate the part of the decade before Wendy got there. Special mention to that magical period on Guiding Light in the early 90’s, mostly when Robert Calhoun was EP (although it carries over a year or so for me with JFP there). I think that was a perfect soap, completely unraveled by an EP with no idea how to recast major characters and storytelling tastes that I just don’t agree with. 2000’s- this one is hard for me, as almost all these soaps drove me away from daily viewing. I will give some credit to OLTL for trying new things while maintaining many veteran characters. And GH really did have excellent day to day writing and pretty decent production, even if I didn’t enjoy the show overall. 2010’s- hmmm. I got nothing. No soap has consistently been good for the decade for me.

It is hard to discount Monty’s GH from overall impact to the genre IMO. Every soap suddenly had a performer with an accent, and even Y&R told a couple of action oriented storylines. And though that classic era of GH is slow compared to today’s version of a fast pace, it was faster than classic soaps before it, and again, even Y&R sped up some compared to the decade before. I also think Edge needs a mention because the mysteries really did have an umbrella storyline effect, with other mysteries starting and moving along while the main one played out. And GH took that and ran with it. Every soap that I can think of did their version of this in the 1980’s, taking their cue from GH. DAYS especially. I think only Y&R and AMC avoided becoming umbrella storytelling central. OLTL certainly had many times where one story was dominating at a time, and everyone was involved in it.

As a viewer I had already started to see Sonny as insufferable before this happened. I also wanted Jason/Carly (even if Steve fought it the whole time) even if just for a little bit for them to realize it would not work. Brenda and Luke are why I liked Sonny back then, and pairing him with Carly seemed like more of a reaction to needing a strong actor opposite him after failures than two characters that should end up together. It was also clear at the time that they were going to eat the show up. There was just so much I did not enjoy about the show at that time, even if it was way better than what we got later on, especially with these characters. The highs of Labine/Guza’s first run, mixed with the beginning of his second tenure kind of fell apart after Lucky died. There was only darkness and breaking everything apart, mixed with terrible casting decisions.

I thought she had kind of a mini edge, which worked for how they used her. I liked that she wasn’t just a retread of Luke or Laura, but she still felt like a Spencer. I also thought she had good familial chemistry with all her family, Luke, both Lucky’s and Nikolas. I also thought she was really great with Genie when Laura woke up from her coma. But I can also see why people did not enjoy her.

It’s not just too many cast members. It’s the way the show is produced now. Short scenes, based more around budget and creating a generic product. Often the actors are the ones that bring anything to their roles- look at Chase. That is all the actor’s natural charm shining through a very ill defined character. I think the show is filmed and written in a way that it is easy to produce above all else. So things seem disjointed and bland quite often. And then you add the obvious interference that keeps happening behind the scenes when things are really moving again and it just hurts the show we are watching.

All the characters had more depth when Labine and her team was there, and also early Guza. Those scenes were long! They had a lot of character defining dialogue and motivations being expressed and set up back then. The sets felt lived in and the characters felt defined. And Guza’s team of writers in the 2000’s knew how to write motivation and give the story depth and character. I have said it many times- I didn’t like what happened on the show under Frons/JFP/Guza…but I can’t deny the writing was stronger and had a lot of depth and feeling. I would say Dante is the last character that I feel was fully fleshed out on GH and I felt like I know them and the why they do the things they do. But he has been misused horribly by FV. JMB’a Lulu also was a strong character that became nothing.

I agree with this. The only thing I ever felt was close to an actual couple to enjoy and root for was with SK as AJ. I liked them back then and when he came back. I had already soured quite a bit on Sonny by the time they put him and Carly together. I have only really enjoyed him with Brenda and the original Kate. Carly and Sonny together kind of diminished both of them. Even with Sarah there it often looked more like let me show you how good I can act instead of feeling like a couple that should be together. It’s kind of why I don’t enjoy Tracy with Luke- it’s too much all the time.

Liz becoming a nurse, Robin and Patrick, Noah’s returns, and the other hospital characters really did breathe new life into that part of the show. I know people were upset they were not using vets and they stupidly killed Alan. But the hospital was a major part of the show again. And you are right, RC tried to keep it going.

I think watching the horrible tin foil killer story and finding the Aztec dolls from 1997 would be better than what we see today, and I was so upset back then how the quality had gone downhill. Who was Jennifer Smith talking to? It didn’t appear to be Victor.

I kind of consider the Robert Scorpio era of the show to have less hospital focus. The late 1970’s through 1981 you still had characters like Jeff, Anne, Diana, Peter, Alan, Monica, Lesley, Bobbie, Rick, even Amy and the original vets like Steve, Audrey, and Jessie weaving in and out of story as leads and supporting. Noah Drake was brought on as a doctor too. By the time Luke left the show, and Robert was the central male lead, the show really moved away from the hospital. I think Lesley’s death was the beginning. I read somewhere that Rachel Ames went recurring during this time too due to lack of story. Wes Kinney made the hospital more of a fixture again when he was EP. We got the first adult Tom Hardy, Simone, and saw the Hardy’s at the hospital more. Not until Claire Labine was it as central as it was in the 70’s again though. I will give JFP credit for having a stable of important hospital characters during her run, but part of that was due to the popularity of Grey’s Anatomy.

Even Guza was working a transition in his last couple of years. The center of the show moved almost fully to Jason and Sonny was being called out more and more. His new creation Dante was paired with Lulu and was really frontburner. I think you have even mentioned before that Dante/Lucky were kind of the next generation and it was moving in that way. It very much feels like keeping the lights on.

What I really will never understand is the longer the show focused completely on Sonny/Carly/Jason, the ratings just continued to erode. And they keep doing it. When the 50th anniversary started, and the story wealth started to be spread out more, and the show became more of an ensemble piece for a couple of years, the ratings went up. The highest ratings surge the show has had in the last decade was not because of Sonny and Carly. Their fans might be vocal, but how is that translating to actual viewers? Luke was always in story too. Always. But his vacations gave us a break, and there was more variety. Luke was in family stories, relationships, action, comedy, dark and light thematic topics were touched. It feels like Sonny and Carly are telling the same story for most of those 25 years. Jason even had more variety than they did! At the mania height of Luke and Laura, the whole show was still good and full of interesting stories and characters. Since the Frons era of ABC, the focus has been so dramatically on Sonny/Jason/Carly and they won’t shake free of it.

And have had zero romantic chemistry since Laura started playing her. After all this time and storylines spent trying to make something work that just does not. Maybe we will get Sonny/Nina and Carly can just go find a new man. Not Austin.

Yep. I would be shocked if Frank is fired before he either wants to retire or the show is cancelled. And from all accounts he is a workaholic so I don’t think he is close to wanting to retire.

The problem is I don’t see Frank being fired from GH at this point. Which is a shame because I would love to see her work on GH again. Back in the day I didn’t think she would be a good fit at Y&R, but now I’m not sure. Because that show has almost zero of its identity anymore. GH, though bland, still has its Monty era DNA somewhat intact, it is recognizable as GH to me. Y&R has been strip mined- the look, music, direction and melodrama are all gone from the handful of episodes I recently watched.

Is The Bay over? She was EP and part of the creative team. I doubt she would want back in the daytime game with networks as they are now. I would love to see what she could do again though.

He and Dante really worked well together too.

Is it strange that I think Krista Allen would make a better Hope than she did Billie? Even though I would be shocked, I also thought a Hope recast first. Is it possible #2 is Ciara and she is no longer able to work on the show as much as they want her to? Or has she been there too long to be considered “rising”. I hope it’s not SM, as I would hate to loose her as Trina.