Soaplovers

I had a friend of mine recently start watching the show and I was explaining to them about how Dani/Andre seemed to be a happy surprise and that the show listened to viewer feedback and kept them together as a couple instead of what I think was the intended plan of Andre/Ashley (which seems pretty much dormant now if today's episode was any indication). The friend asked me why Dani/Andre only seem to be shown in bed and having sex vs having actual deep conversations that a couple should have. I told them that there had been numerous conversations between the two in the past.. but that they just happened to watch during their sexy time phase of the relationship. What I liked about today's episode was the Chelsea/Kat conflict because I saw both sides of their arguments... but it is Kat's decision what she wants to do. I have to admit I like that Kat is establishing boundaries and having a life for herself away from her family. The timing is off because of what Anita's going through, but she'll visit her grandmother once she has worked through her own internal fears. And Ashley continues to excel as the supportive friend and wondering if the show will actually keep her in this realm a bit longer before trying to throw her into another insta-relationship.... time will tell.

I faintly remember Michael visiting the Cory mansion and interacting with Ada because Rachel was supposed to meet him somewhere, but he couldn't find her... and I believe that was when Rachel was knocked out on the pier and had issues with her vision. And I think during Vicky/Jamie's brief marriage.. Michael/Donna interacted with Ada whenever Steven was being watched by her. I remember one particular episode when Rachel was still having trouble with her vision that she was at the studio where Felicia had her talk show and there was a cat and mouse chase scene between Rachel and Carl I believe in 1991... the filming of it was well done. And I do remember Michael and Rachel's brief relationship, it was after his relationship with Stacey went bust. I viewed it as the writers not sure what to do with either of them so they put the two in one another's orbit. I remember she turned him down at the last minute before he left town.

Because Vanessa is a member of the club and guests of members are permitted and it wouldn't be a good look if he was rejected because he wasn't the 'right type'.

Hilary being killed off was pretty sudden and unexpected in the fall of 1984 so I wonder if that was a last minute decision due to the issues between Kobe and the actress playing Hilary? To me, watching the summer 1984 episodes.. the show seemed to be hinting at a possible pairing between her and Fletcher.. and the two had a good rapport with one another. It was probably being done because the actor that played Jim probably had indicated he wouldn't be staying beyond his contract (I know the actor said he signed a shorter contract of a year or so and he opted to leave after that expired) and the September 1984 episodes did seem to indicate a Jim/Annabelle bond that both Tony and Hilary had taken note of.

Jenner had a good arc as Abby's ex husband.. it was a short, but effective arc that helped with establishing Abby as someone not to be messed with if you cross her. Noone had potential as Claudia, she was just given a bad character that she couldn't make heads or tails out of. What baffled me was that Karen Fairgate, the know it all, was friends with her and hung out with her without ever sensing that she wasn't trust worthy. Claudia made Abby seem like a girl scout sometimes. Otherwise, the other parts seemed more like short term cameos or badly written parts.

Joey and SPS/Leslie were the highlight to me.. it was good that the show finally inserted other scenes/stories instead of focusing just on the Anita story. Ashley in supporting mode is where she is best right now, but I must confess she has better scene chemistry with Shanice than she does with Naomi in terms of friend scenes. I still wonder if she's connected to Joey as his daughter and that's why the two haven't interacted with one another yet on the show. Izaiah and Eva have chemistry, but I'm not seeing the conflict and/or forbidden aspect of their coupling like there was when she was with Tomas. I'm going to assume that either his ex will be coming into the picture to provide some conflict or the show will try to insert Tomas as an obstacle.. or maybe the show will actually make the Hawthorne's the second family of the show and have them be the obstacle for the two. I like how the show writes Vanessa and her friendships with both Dani and Nicole. With Dani, Vanessa displays a bit of that naughty element that's been missing while with Nicole.. she becomes more together and supportive. This kind of writing goes a long way in making a character more layered because you don't interact with all your friends in the same manner. Vanessa and how she interacts in 1:1 scenes with Dani and Nicole is a prime example of that.

I could have seen Mike being involved in the Barbados story based on the scenes/interactions between him and Alex... plus he had some interactions with Susan Piper as well during the summer 1984 episodes I believe. I have a feeling what Long had mapped out for that story had to be altered drastically due to Kobe and her tendency to fire performers. It sounded like another umbrella story that would have involved Bauers, Reardons, and the Spauldings... and I recall Reva having a scene with Susan Piper about real estate so perhaps the Lewis family was also going to be tied to the story for some reason. Had a male or female Spaulding family member had stayed on past the Barbados story, I think it would have been a better story... although I do remember Susan Piper was a great short term villainess and the way she was disposed of was pretty memorable. It's a shame that Alan still wasn't on the canvas during that time because of his complex relationship with Brandon.

That's been my biggest problem is that the show is too Dupree focused without other characters/stories that aren't connected to them being featured at the same time. You can tell the B & B influence in that aspect, but on a half hour soap.. you can get away with that.. not on an hour soap. And I was glad to see more of SPS/Leslie, Eva, and the Hawthorne men being focused on for a bit because it gave the show a bit of balance and showed that the world wasn't so claustrophobic. I know MVJ mentioned that Izaiah's new job that he recently got was going to be the first step to focusing on the campus.. so let's get those steps in. I say this after watching 80s/90s Guiding Light, ATWT, and even old school B & B that had such a large canvas and community that wasn't so contained. I hope season 2 will expand beyond the Duprees and show more of the community and world that isn't tied to them.

Except that I don't care about Chelsea or Madison.. and I don't ship them because the writers haven't spent the time focusing on them for viewers to care about them. I would keep Madison over Chelsea since we need more non Dupree's on this show.

I kind of feel after the show hooked Eva/Tomas up then he tossed her aside, he seemed to have lost the one aspect of his presence that worked.. his connection and rapport with Eva. I wish the show would pull the trigger on him being a social climbing player because the way the actor is playing Tomas is a low key player trying to pretend to be the perfect boyfriend. The writing and his performance seems to be clashing. With Ashley.. Jen Jacob isn't a bad actress and seems to play Ashley with an edge that isn't in the writing for her character 90 percent of the time. The only time where the writing and the acting come together was during that brief time she was onto Hayley and the two had that exchange at Uptown. She and Hayley had a good rapport during that exchange... but since then, the writing seems to want to portray Ashley as a Mary Sue when the actress has more back bone that conflicts with the writing. Derek always seemed to be a throwaway character to MVJ and co so naturally he was the first individual downgraded. I still think Chelsea and Madison should be written off/downgraded as well... since it doesn't seem as though the show really feel motivated to give Chelsea any sort of focus/story unlike Naomi and Kat.

I always thought some of Beth's actions post Lorelei like the Coop story, the Alan story, etc.. were a result of her DID persona Lorelei still calling the shots instead of Beth. It wasn't until the last months of the show that Beth became more like the Beth of the early years.

As a Joey fan, I'm so glad that he was added to the opening credits because the show needs characters that don't worship the ground that the Duprees walk on (and yes, I felt that way about the Capwells on Santa Barbara.. which I still think heavily influenced this show). Derek being downgraded makes sense even though he was a sweetheart, but the show heavily invested in Ashley. As a friend of mine told me, Ashley is connected to the canvas due to her job as nurse, her friendship with Naomi is focused on, her mother provides background/details over her past, and other places also share the theory that Joey might be her father. I still that could be a possibility only because of the brief scene where Vanessa introduced Jan and Joey and the facial expressions that both Jan and Joey had hinted that they weren't comfortable with one another (and also could be viewed as both trying to be there for Vanessa after Doug's death). With Guza gone, might be out of the window and perhaps the backstory of who Ashley's father is might have changed... but Joey did mention his ex recently in a conversation.

Lujack and Beth were the real deal, and he died in her arms. I always contend that Lujack was her true love and that she only went back to Phillip out of familiarity. Which is why I thought she was acting so unhinged during the 1997/1998 period because she was adrift.. not because she was actually in love with Phillip. I would agree with your sentiment about Fiona. Jenna had been watered down quite a bit especially compared to her 1992-1993 stint when she was more like an India type than the soccer mom she was turned into by 1998.

Oh yeah they did test Lucy with Matt when he first came on. In fact, I think the plan was that Vanessa/Matt were supposed to be a short term thing with the long term plan being Lucy/Matt. They had the standard bickering introduction that soaps do when they want to signal an enemy to lovers situation. Lucy/Josh wasn't so much a testing, but it was due to a dating site or video dating site where they ended up getting paired up.. and I think they had more of a friend date than an actual date. I know that he helped rescue her during a fire.. and that was where he met Annie Dutton.. but again the details are fuzzy because I haven't watched that era since I watched it live as a middle schooler.

It's been years, but I recall when she first blew into Springfield.. it was right when Harley and Mallet were getting married and going to Florida. She had more of an edge and spoiled when she first came to town and she was gunning for dad Buzz because he had taken money that was supposed to be hers in order to pay for Harley/Mallet's wedding. She and A-M started kind of dating and were interested in one another in late 1993/early 1994, but two factors seemed to break them up. First factor was that Lucy had admitted to Buzz or Nadine that she was still a virgin and that made A-M pull back a little. Second factor was that Eleni and Frank had marital troubles due partly to Mallet's sister Julie making advances to Frank so she left Frank.. which gave A-M fresh hope that he could win her back. By mid 1994, A-M had accepted that Eleni loved Frank while briefly being paired with Tangie before Alan came back and took her from him, plus the show hinted at A-M and Gilly without any follow through. Meanwhile ,Lucy ended up interacting with Bridget, David, Dyland while at first the show tested her with Matt Reardon and later with Josh Lewis before she was put back into the Spaulding orbit with working for A-M and going out with Brent. In fact, there was a scene where Lucy was accusing A-M of either making her work longer hours or dictating what she did with her time because he was jealous that she was dating Brent. I don't think that was the case, but I could understand how a new viewer coming into the show when you did would be unaware of Lucy/Alan Michael's first attempt at dating in early 1995.

I thought how Roger/Holly interacted between 1989 and 1992 was a tentative balance between hate and tolerance. I noticed in 1992/1993, the focus changed to them being in love, but because of the rape.. it couldn't progress to an actual relationship with Roger realizing he was at fault. The two having a relationship again in 1993/1994 seemed so backwards and a disservice to anyone that was a victim of abuse because it was telling people it was ok to not only forgive your rapist.. but to resume a relationship with them. The only credit I gave McTavish was during her brief stint as head-writer, she kept Roger and Holly in different orbits and only interacting when it came to their daughter Blake. Which was the most realistic way to handle things. Upside was that Ed and Holly did end up together at the end, which was the Dobson and Marland's intentions during their writing stints.

I assumed they would do what Peacock does, keep the previous season episodes up. I guess CBS doesn't understand the whole concept of binge watching. Soaps were designed and written for binge watching, and some people prefer to do a week or two rewatch at a time vs watching day to day.

I always viewed Passions as kind of a send up of a traditional soap opera with their hamster wheel stories, slower pace, dialogue that was repeated non stop, etc. With that said, there were moments where the soap had potential to become something more than a spoof.... but it just didn't want to utilize those moments.

I remember Suzy Cote said that Calista Flockhart (Ally McBeal) was heavily in the running for the role of Sam... so I'm gathering perhaps Calista was whom Long had in mind for the role of Sam. She later played the bit part as a babysitter that neglected Marah causing Marah to be kidnapped during the Sonni story so perhaps the casting people threw her a bone with that bit part after going with Suzy Cote as Sam. To everyone's point about GL and their lack of long term rivals, I kind of liked that the show didn't operate with that trope. There were times watching Y & R with Jill/Kay that I thought the long term rival trope really diminished both characters and made them both look petty and pathetic. Nadine/Vanessa didnt like one another and it was usually stemming from two particular elements.... classism (Nadine was working class that wanted more while Vanessa was a purebred snob) and over a man (originally Ross and later Billy). Once Billy finally opted for Vanessa... Nadine eventually retreated back to the world she tried to escape and actually grew as an individual.. becoming a warmer person that learned to love what she had instead of always focusing on what she didn't have while Vanessa eventually moved on with Billy and later Matt. I recall that Nadine was even at the wedding of Vanessa and Matt.. which surprised me, but perhaps they let bygones be bygones. To me, the only examples of long term feuds I could think of were Roger/Ed (with periods of a truce between them), Alex/Mindy (and that diminished both characters after awhile), and Alex/India (benefited from India coming and going on and off during the years).

I say the same thing about Chelsea. I don't see the point of her character being on screen

I don't recall why Sloan opted to quit the show, but I think one of the rumors was that she was frustrated by the lack of movement/direction with her character and wanted to quit. There was another rumor that once she realized that a new head-writer was coming in, she had second thoughts.. but it was too late and her character was killed off onscreen. Maeve was the ultimate Nicole from what I recall, but I did think Sloan had some of the essence of the original version of Nicole. Someone that carried herself as confident and someone that acted as though she was raised in an upper crust family.. and carried herself off as being older than she really was. I think she was 30/31 when playing Nicole though she acted/carried herself off as though she was in her mid to late 30s vs Jayne's Nicole that seemed like a 20 something year old in looks and aura.

People were all about Bill/Dani/Andre since the first weeks of the show.. and because the show films/scripts so far ahead.. it took too long to course correct. People were also bummed TT wasn't given anything to do except those speeches and finally the writers are giving her a story. Since the early weeks I was awaiting Joey and SPS meeting up and doing battle... didn't realize I'd like SPS/Marcel together so bonus! There was talk that Ben Gavin wasn't in the credits, yet his social media has him hanging out with the crew so I'm wondering if he's been downgraded to recurring and the show is going to slow fade Derek from the show. Ashley is being invested in so I'll be interested to see where season 2 takes her.

I think that's probably why Dani partly told him because Anita became kind of a surrogate mother figure for him. That's my theory anyway.

Why not? The lack of Ben Gavin listed under the main cast when he was previously contract is more interesting to me than the Greg Vaughan conversation.

Locher kept trying to get all 'role of women in the 80s' and other basic modern day questions while she kept basically saying that as an actress, you have to become the character and not try to interject your own personal thoughts and feelings.. or else you're not playing the character. I wish more modern day performers would understand that in order to be good performers, you can't play yourself.