Soaplovers

I do like that Long was adaptable and able to fix things that didn't go according to plan (how she and Curlee managed to fix the zig zag the show went through during the writer strike is nothing short of amazing). I always thought Roxie going crazy was out of character... she was spirited, determined and had a strong work ethic. She was like Reva, but warmer and earnest. It's a shame that the show never thought to bring her back (there was talk that Kim Zimmer tried to get the show to bring Roxie back in the late 90s, but the writers nixed that idea.. which is a shame since I would have loved to have seen how Roxie/Cassie would have interacted. And while Hawk/Lillian didn't work out.. I did like that the show always mentioned their past relationship.. even in late 1995 when Hawk was trying to resume something with Lillian.. who was receptive till she found out that Hawk was trying to sabotage Annie/Josh's relationship and decked him. However, I would have rather seen Lillian be single and content/happy with her life given the rough start she had in her life.. than being saddled with Buzz...but that is just me.

I could buy Roxie and Reva being excited about Hawk/Lillian. With that said, I did notice once Long came back to the canvas that she did play up the bond that still existed between Hawk/Sarah.. while Lillian was always at work and the two never getting around to setting a date. It looked like Long was setting up a Hawk/Sarah/Lillian triangle as a b or c plot.. but the writer strike happened.. and Lillian broke up with Hawk because of the apparent bond between Hawk/Sarah. Sometimes a head-writer sees a character differently when they take over. I noticed Roxie was more sub-dued and not quite as erratic as she was when Long wrote for her. Was it Long, or the scabs, that had Roxie suffer a nervous breakdown over Johnny's cancer?

I think Warren Andrews was supposed to be a grey character.. not all bad and not all good. He was saddled with that dippy nurse Lesley and once she was killed off during the Dreaming Death virus story.. he became a little darker with his dealings with both Alex and India. He also owned a really interesting looking club called The Blue Orchid that was shown for about two or three years before it got phased out. From watching the November 1986 videos, I just watched the botched Reva/Kyle wedding with Maeve breaking it up with the news that her son with Kyle was still alive.. and a stunned Reva getting hit by a car with the return of Josh. With that said, I think the show reunited Josh/Reva too quickly at this point when the two hadn't spoken in two years.. and I think a slower build toward the two reuniting would have been better than what was done. It was like one day she was all set to marry Kyle, and after calling off the wedding, she goes back to Josh. Too sudden and too quick. I'll even go far as to say I preferred Reva during the two years Josh wasn't on the show because she was allowed to breath and develop as a character outside of the Jeva label. If the show hadn't bought Josh back in late 1986, I wonder where the character of Reva would have gone.

From what I heard, the actress playing Calla was supposed to have been a Trish recast.. but at the last second, created the character of Calla and paired her with Ross (I guess when she was supposed to be a Trish recast.. the actress tested with the actor that played Ross.. and they had chemistry). I don't think Calla/Jessie were a carbon copy of Lillian/Beth.. at least when they first came onto the scene. Calla was a social climber, distrustful of men.. and was trying to keep Jessie from getting hurt.... while Lillian was in an abusive situation and turned a blind eye to the abuse she and Beth suffered. Jessie was sugary sweet and almost too stupid to live.. while Beth (played by Judi Evans) wasn't a wimp, but had a backbone. And I liked India/Simon together... and having them be together would have enhanced the India/Alex feud. I do agree 1986 was an odd year for the show. Pam Long departed in January/Febuary 1986.. with Jeff Ryder as sole head-writer until April 1986.. when he and Mary M became co-headwriters until sometime in the summer of 1986 when she got a new co headwriter by the name of Ellen B... and than Sheri Anderson and her hubby took over by October/November 1986. So with the vast amounts of writer upheaval... that could explain why the canvas seemed boring/pointless.

Or perhaps RHOBH should stop trying to make the 'gang up on LVP' a story. It's as tired and boring as all of Kyle's segments and attempts at showing her life. Dare I say it, but Kyle's only interesting element was being the younger sister of Kim and Kathy.. and that once Kim left the show, she hasn't had anything interesting happen to her?

I don't blame Marland for Toni's departure since it happened a week or so after he started.. just like I didn't blame Depriest for Alan's sudden exit (his last episode was either her first day.. or right before she started). Yet, the Pollock's wrote Anna out fairly quickly when they took over.. but had her accepting a PR job out of state, reuniting with a guy she had dated, and giving some advice to Carolee/Nick/Matt before departing. With that said, he had three months to come up with a suitable exit for Hank.. and it didn't really fly with me. Mike's exit, I agree, was handled better.. and it did look like the show was testing Sara/Mike before his departure (Armand Assante had better chemistry with the actress that played Nola than Sara..imho). I don't get why Sara couldn't have been tied better to the hospital (working in the peace corp could have afforded her some medical experience and/or working in the pedatric wing of the hospital)... than just being a babysitter. I do agree there haven't been any cute Martha/Ernie scenes since Marland took over... Pollacks, Cendella, and Depriest all made sure to include scenes of their 'friendship'/romance. I still contend the Dancy's weren't designed to be long-term.. just lasting for the duration of the Joan Dancy case (at least Sara/Luke). I've also noticed the lack of hospital sets for being used... no more long elevator scenes, break room scenes, and the clinic scenes have dwindled as well. Marland has always said he learned so much when head-writing The Doctors.. and it shows that he made so many mistakes.. but he at least corrected some of them on different shows that he worked on.

I think the closest the show came to finding that perfect combination post Mindy/Beth was Julie/Bridget with Kat as the buffer in the early 80s. I did see that Long kept Johnny and his parents on for awhile, but by 1989 all three were gone. I noticed that the show kept Chelsea on longer than I thought they would have up till January 1991.. and I wasn't sure if she left due to the change of writers.. or if the actress opted to leave. She went from being with Phillip to being with Johnny.. to spending the last six months of her stint being tested with Fletcher (didn't get the logic there) and Frank (they worked better as friends than as a couple). I did like the Chelsea being stalked story with the culprit being Chelsea's old college friend Rae.

If this is the end of 1987 to 1988.. than KL's cliffhanger was Jill Bennett forcing Val to take pill and making it look like a suicide.

From watching the 1984/85 episodes posted again... I was surprised at some of the little scenes that showed that Long had the ability to write human emotion and family scenes.. but with the 80s being about over the top stunts, etc.. it gets overshadowed. The only thing I could say about the Largo story that is positive is that it involved a large amount of the canvas and did have lasting fall out (Lujack's death)... but other than that, it didn't fit with what Guiding Light was known for. And I thought the start of the Susan Piper Story was promising with her interacting with a large number of the canvas.. and the only fall out that lasted was the death of Hilary Bauer. I will say this about Pam Long, when she killed a character.. she meant it. When Fletcher shows up, I noticed the show chemistry testing him with the women.. yet oddly flirted with a Hilary/Fletcher pairing before moving him onto Claire... when there was a scene during the summer of 1984 where he and Katie were flirting.. and there was a lot of chemistry. Hilary kept trying to talk him down to Katie, but I thought that the two life long friends having friction due to Fletcher would have been interesting. And I've heard different rumors about why Trish was written out in mid 1985 (health issues with the actress, etc).. but Long had a great handle on the character and I liked her being the voice of reason (Vanessa could never fill that void) while still being an interesting character in her own right. She had ties to Ross and Alan, was old friends with Vanessa, was the peacemaker in the family fights, etc. I do often think the show shouldn't have created the Calla character, and just had the actress playing her be Trish since she had some of the same mannerisms/essence of what Trish had been written to have. And people complain the show in 84/85 was Reva centric.. but I see a whole lot of focus on Beth, India, and Roxie moreso than Reva..imho.

Fascinating scenes between Lillian and her sister Calla... I believe this was right before Pam Long left. It seems like Calla also was manipulating Lillian during these scenes, but she was correct that Beth needed to get a backbone and not depend on a man. Potentially interesting character that went nowhere fairly fast if I recall correctly.

Love or hate her, Kenya added something. Ironic she got dumped after becoming a wife and mother. Cynthia had an actual modeling career, not naomi Campbell level..but a long lasting one (and she was in a music video back in 5he late 80s/early 90s...when thay meant u were a model with meaning). Eva is pretty, but vacant...just like her stint on soaps. Lets see the new blood before dismissing the season.

Family ties was still in a good position...and knots landing never regained lost ground from the brief move in the 86 to 87 season to an hour earlier.

I prefer quantity over quality. Show in the past functioned quite well with 22 to 26 episodes because the writers had talent and skill to maintain the quality (Roseanne season 1 through 5 had consistent quality) plus actors/production/writers weren't paid as much as they are now either. Reality shows and shorter seasons are the result of greed. With that said, I'm getting used to the show without Roseanne.. but it will never be as good as the original Roseanne.

Call me weird, but I kind of liked the Pre-Barnabas episodes better... all the characters had development/focus. Once Barnabas and Julia came into the picture.. all of the characters outside of them lost any development/dimension. Between the Phoenix and 1795, there was a good balance between supernatural and soap opera... but once 1795 ended, the show became about which horror story to adapt and less about the character.

So from Atlanta... I think I see Kandi, Cynthia and even Porsha?!?! Nene and Kenya have always had a complicated relationship so I'm just assuming this is one of the times where the two aren't speaking. And one of the reasons I'll always love Kandi is that she's the one person that has never bowed down to Nene ever. It has to drive Nene crazy, yet at the same time, I think Nene kind of admires that as well. Nene/Kandi have always intrigued me because there seems to be an unspoken understanding between the two.. and anytime Nene tries her usual passive aggressive stuff with Kandi.. Kandi shuts her down without raising her voice or even batting an eye lash

JE's Beth was never insipid.. and the way she played Beth... I never viewer her as a victim, but as a character fighting through obstacles put in her path. After Philip accidently blinded her in that explosion, there was no way the show could realistically put them back together. BC's Beth in her first stint circa 1989 to 1991 was well written (Pam Long was still head writer).. and once her character regained her voice, she had a lot of backbone and strength. It was her return in late 1997 where I didn't recognize Beth and the show even had other characters remark that Beth had changed. The last few years had Beth going back to how she was written in the early years of her stint. I did laugh when she made mention about how Lizzie was so like her because Lizzie (when Marcy Rylan played her) reminded me so much of a teen Mindy than a teen Beth. Looking at KT playing Mindy.. she had the same mannerisms and tone of voice that Marcy Rylan had playing Lizzie.

I saw Halloween and that makes me happy I will be watching the script writers for these episodes since they could one day become creators of their own shows (season 1 of Roseanne alone had the creators of Home Improvement and Mad about You as their script writers... plus Joss Wheldon and Amy Sherman Palladino later on).

This episode should have been the end of Beth/Phillip... they never should have been endgame. Beth was actually becoming an adult and trying to break away from the dysfunctional relationship she had with Phillip (he was kind of controlling/emotionally abusive like her step father Bradley). Also, a great scene between Bert and Josh

Considering the political climate... I'd settle for seeing Capital rerun.. all 5 years including that infuriating cliffhanger lol

I do admit the Pollock's weren't as good as people made them out to be, but man they could write a climax (but they repeated themselves with the lead character going crazy trope). I think Cendella was trying to develop the characters, but there was little to no plot going on during his stint. I think Depriest had action going, and the day to day episodes were well written with mini cliff hangers at the end of each episode (and she touched on a lot of topics such as feminism, parent/child relationships, mental illness, right to die vs dying with dignity, and also there was the issue of physical/mental disabilities in regards to Paul Summer's child.). Her stories didn't drag, and I thought that she developed the Dancy's quite well (oddly.. Marland is having trouble writing them). She also broaden the canvas since I recall @Khan stating back in the Pollack era that the canvas was to sparse. Marland always said he learned from his mistakes when writing this show (i.e. not killing stories he couldn't write comfortably, changing a show's identity, etc).

He didn't fit the show...and he even admitted as much. He dragged out the stories on the show when depriest meant to resolve quickly

Hmmm..so same old same old on rhobh. U need cary on dallas...u always need a more laid back housewife.

U r in for a treat...you'll even see Margaret Depriest in a small recurring role

Crystal was always kooky...when she left, Jackie took over that role.

I love when Chuck, Ann Marie, and Crystal came back!! All three were important parts of the earlier seasons of Roseanne. I hope the show will deal with the weird enmeshment Jackie had with Roseanne's family... it was like she was Dan's second wife. I know everyone loves Laurie Metcalf, but girlfriend needs to dial it down a few notches. Sit her down and show her tapes of her as Jackie from season 1 though 6 where she was more low key, sarcastic and quirky.. not this over the top idiot that she's playing now. Becky/Darlene still have that sister chemistry