1 hour ago, victoria foxton said:

Both Susan and Julie were complex interesting characters. I do think Susan was being rather nasty towards David. Felt bad for Susan's mother. An episode from nearly 60 yrs ago. Featuring only six characters. Was better than any of the remaining soaps today.

Thanks for the tag!  I thought Susan was being rather nasty to David as well lol.  It's not like it's only David's fault.  Although I am a little unclear why young Julie is so into him.   He knocked up and married your best friend.  I.....don't think he's much of a catch.   Why would an 18 year old want a guy with a divorce and kid under his belt lol?

Also Poor Susan's mom.  Maybe Susan could have set this up a little better.  Like mentioning David once or twice before this.

On 4/23/2022 at 9:50 PM, jam6242 said:

This is the scene in which Julie is burned by the fire from Maggie’s stove.  It’s a bit longer than the one included in the conversation between SSH and SR that was posted earlier.

 

Thanks for that!  This is surprisingly realistic and well done.  It looks scary and real especially considering the time it was filmed.  I think I have probably seen the smaller snippet, but it looks about as real as anything Days does now lol.  I assume their budget was more than today even without inflation lol. 

21 minutes ago, Khan said:

I think I would have gave a nod toward the Bradys' Irish roots and named the child something like Patrick.  Then, if they wanted to tie in the baby's direct lineage, Ben and Ciara could have given him two middle names: Beauregard Douglas.  So, the full name would be Patrick Beauregard Douglas Weston.

Wasn't Patrick Lockhart assumed to be Ciara's father (and the only possibility we saw on screen to be the dad) until he turned psycho?  They probably would avoid Patrick in particular, but something Irish would be nice.  Although with names like Bo/Roman, the actual Brady's don't lean too far into the Irish lineage with boys names.  I don't know, but I prefer that spawn is not named after Bo lol.

5 hours ago, Khan said:

"Baby Bo" sounds like an animated character on some rancid Disney Junior series.

That is exactly what Baby Bo sounds like lol.  Bo isn't really a kid's name.  It would have to get a nickname, but Bo Jr. and Little Bo (Peep) are out.   They can't even give it two names like Bo-Douglas because Bo D. sounds like you are related to or are Bo Derek.  And you can't go with Beauregard because it's a mouthful and Ciara and Ben probably can't even pronounce that, so I guess I think it's all a dumb idea.  Just give the kid a regular name.  He doesn't deserve a cool name like Bo.

2 minutes ago, Wendy said:

Early Hope had a higher voice, too. Makes me wonder if she took voice modulation lessons or something. Or maybe smoking played a role? Either way, it does seem different.

I always heard it was smoking, but I have no idea if that was just a theory.  I wonder if KA decided to change Hope's voice when she returned much like when she did that weird accent for Princess Gina.  Maybe it's an acting 'choice' lol

11 minutes ago, victoria foxton said:

I've heard wonderful things about 60's and 70's Days. I've always been fascinated by 80's Days. But classic Bill Bell era Days. Would be awesome to watch.

80's/90's Days is just flashier and an easy watch.  I can get lost in those stories, but the more psychological, character based 60's/70's are probably fantastic.  I think the problem for everyone is that era is almost impossible to find and it's bits and pieces but the 80's/90's you can find edits, full episodes, storylines so easily.  If I could keep watching the Susan/David/Julie story after the episode you posted I absolutely would.  Maybe someday.  That's why I miss @beebs amazing 70's recaps.  They were so interesting and also hilarious.

I am wondering if Days should go back to the JER schedule where the A stories were Mon, Wed, Fri and the B stories were Tue, Thur most weeks.  And if the A stories got ramped up it would be 4 days a week and vice/versa for B stories.   At least you were consistently seeing all the stories.  We go weeks without seeing some stories and characters.  Or maybe the show should do more arc stories like the 80's and 90's or even Beyond Salem where most of the cast is involved and everyone doesn't need to be shown everyday, but the story is still moving along via different characters.  The weird cast bubbles the show has now doesn't work well for continuity.

2 hours ago, janea4old said:

 

 

That scene of John and Sami watching strippers together... 
That is not canon John nor is it canon Sami.  That scene is from the noncanon Christmas movie.  The entire Christmas movie was something from Will's imagination about how he would write a Hallmark Christmas movie using Salem characters.  Dead Nick (Blake Berris) is dancing because Brandon Barash got COVID right before they filmed the movie, so the powers that be decide to have Nick be Gabi's love interest in the movie, since none of it is canon.

This scene says more about Will's imagination than anything else.

Maybe they'll eventually have the regular daytime show characters make a comment that Will once wrote a stupid Christmas movie, but the plot within the movie won't be canon.

Right now the only thing that's canon is that, in 2014, Will wrote a movie script about Sami's life, which was never filmed.  In 2021, Johnny and Allie read a paper copy of that script.

Lol!  You know Will spent hours wondering how he could make a Christmas movie that included EJ stripping plausible and nothing about plot.

54 minutes ago, yrfan1983 said:

1/1/73 is available to watch in person at The Paley Center in NYC. I watched a few years ago and wrote up this recap. This is a month before DeniseA left the show. From this episode recap, I'm guessing that Susan still thought it was rape and the hypnosis hadn't happened yet

Isn't this a week or so before the couple of eps where we meet Eric's "roommate" and it's implied they are more than friends??

= = =

At her apartment, Susan tends to her baby in a bassinet. There is a little Christmas tree. Her fiance Greg calls from a hospital room, where he is with a sleeping Eric (Greg’s brother). Greg says his mother is in the chapel and his father went home. He says no change in Eric's condition. Susan feels helpless. Susan hangs up, and talks to the baby. She notes that the babys father is Eric. Susan hears an audio flashback of Eric requesting to see the baby. Susan has an inner monologue “dare I let Eric see the baby? What will people read into it? Maybe its too late… maybe Eric will die before he can see the baby. If Eric dies, all of my problems will be over. Eric did a horrible thing to me. Will I feel guilty if I dont let him see my baby?” Tom Horton arrives. He notes that babies are usually not allowed to visiting sick patients, but he said he got an exemption.

Mary Anderson enters Bills office, and is surprised to find her dad Bob Anderson. Bill had let Bob wait in his office. Mary reveals she said no to Burts marriage proposal. Bob says Julie Banning told him that Mary had been having doubts. Mary said Burt was very upset, and wants her to think about her choice some more. Mary reveals she may have feelings for Bill, but that she sees no interest from Bill. Bob says Bill hasnt shown interest because he thought Mary was off the market.

Eric and Greg in the hospital room. Eric wakes up. Greg tells him Susan is staying home with the baby. Eric has inner monologue “Susan wont bring the baby. Shes not trustworthy. Greg is too good of a guy to get stuck with Susan. Greg has to know the truth.” Eric says to Greg – “you have to know the truth” but then passes out.

Bill walks in his office and finds Mary. She fills him in on turning Burt down. Bill is surprised but hopes the best for her. They review how Eric is sick and Greg is worried. Mary notes that Bill was just as concerned when his brother Mickey was sick.

Eric wakes up and cant remember if he told the truth to Greg. Greg is asleep. Susan walks in with the baby. Susan admits she is surprised Eric wanted to see the baby. Susan said she named the baby Ann. Eric notes that it is his mothers name as well. Eric says that was very clever of Susan to name the baby Ann. Eric asks if Susan is really going to marry Greg, and really going to keep the baby – she says yes. Eric asks if shes only telling him the truth now because she thinks he’s going to die.

This is fantastic!  Thanks for that.  I appreciate everyone filling in the gaps.  I have never been that interested in 60's and 70's Days, as I often found it a little dull when I watched, but the 1966 episode really moved quickly and was interesting to me.  I definitely will have to see what else I can find.  Most of the 70's stuff I have seen is Marlena related and even some of that plods along for me, so I am going to see if there are other rare 60's/70's gems out there.

I have always been interested in the Brooke Hamilton/Stephanie Woodruff stuff as well.  It seems interesting, but then the character is killed off so soon after the reveal.

Thanks for the replies everyone.  It really does sound fascinating, but it's very hard to picture just reading the synopsis.  Again, it makes me curious why the show never tried to bring Susan back even with a recast throughout the years.  Although, I guess her character might have been a difficult fit past 1980, but at the very least perhaps her daughter Annie could have been brought back as a rival to Hope.

1 hour ago, Tonksadora said:

It was such a dark, dark story. And, they wrote him so eccentric as to be weird, off, something off kilter about him. He never smiled. I think they played him as ethnic and that otherness was to his disadvantage. I never had any doubt that she had been raped. I mean, this was DOOL. You couldn't swing a dead cat without hitting a rape victim. NBC pushed violent stories claiming that it garnered ratings. I always wondered if they had any idea what they were talking about. But, she was so full of doubt, dread, uncertainty. I was glad they did the scenes they did in the therapist's office, thinking someone in the audience might get help if they needed it.

Thanks for responding!  Did the show effectively backtrack on the rape in an organic way through therapy or was it re-written as a 'seduction'?  I guess my question is was it believable in it's execution or just a weird story that never made sense?

8 minutes ago, Khan said:

It would just break our hearts too much to see John and Marlena endure that.  

It was a very ambiguous storyline.  Even as I was reading about it, I was never sure whether Eric and Susan's encounter was consensual.  It's the kind of story that could never play today.

I think Ron is perfectly content on having John save Marlena once a year from something sinister and I can't see him ever giving them a story that deep.  I think most fans would hate it as well.

From what I read about the Susan/Greg story I get the feeling it probably was rape, but the show backtracked on that for whatever reason making Susan have consensual sex in the park with a stranger.  I would love to know if anyone on here saw it or even have any of the mags from back then.  I remember @beebs used to do magazine recaps, but I can't remember if they went that far back.  It really sounds like a mess of a story and I wonder if it played as badly as it does on paper.

2 minutes ago, Tonksadora said:

No doubt that they all had good writing. That's a given. But, I remember reading about Denise Alexander's popularity, Schemering said she was probably the most consistently popular romantic heroine of the soaps. And, I always thought what a remarkable compliment that was. Since she'd been working since she was a child, she had lots of credits & tons of experience on the job. I always found her very appealing & liked all of her characters - Susan, Leslie, Mary/Marisa.

Interesting.  DA seems likeable from what I have seen of Susan/Leslie, but I have yet to see the huge appeal.  Granted, seeing clips years later is not a way to assess someone fairly as opposed to those who have seen her day in, day out in real time.  Her stories on Days sound very interesting to say the least.  I am very intrigued about the Peters brothers and the rape/sex in the park story.  It sounds very strange on paper.

9 minutes ago, Khan said:

You know, between his reaction to that striptease and his behavior during the NYE episode, I'm really starting to wonder about John.  Are they setting us up for an Alzheimer's storyline?  (Say it ain't so, Ron!)

I generally think it's Drake himself acting goofy and no one reigns him in.  It's weird how John moved from stealth spy to Grandpa John so quickly.  I also don't know if the aneurysm he had still affects his moods.  I don't think the show ever resolved that. It would be funny if that was Drake's motivation for acting so OTT happy, but the show has completely dropped the idea unbeknownst to him lol.  I would loathe an Alzheimer's story with John.  Could you even imagine?  Ron seems to like John/Marlena a little too much for that turn of events.

3 minutes ago, te. said:

There were an episode or two of post-David marriage available where she showed a bit of a more nasty/bitter streak that I thought was interesting, but I think she's probably one of those characters that's hard to get with random episodes taken out of context.

Hopefully, one day there will be more available to see.  I am definitely interested in seeing the progression of Susan and this storyline.  Obviously, we know what happened to Julie through the years, but it would be interesting to know what happened to Susan.  I wonder if the show ever considered bringing Susan or her daughter back later on or if the show just completely moved into a new era where she wouldn't fit.

9 hours ago, Khan said:

John seems really happy for Sami.  I mean, REALLY happy.

John seems to really be enjoying that striptease.  He probably stole those pants from Sami later lol

5 hours ago, te. said:

Always interesting to see more of Susan Martin, one of those early characters that have always intrigued me.

It's always hard for me to get a read on how/why Susan was so popular in the few episodes I have seen.  I wish there was more of DA/Susan available.  From what I can tell Susan is a much more subtle character than Julie.

14 minutes ago, j swift said:

Isn't there some concern that this isn't really Gwen aka the mask strikes again?

I think the concern is Gwen may pretend to be someone else in the mask not that Gwen isn't Gwen right now, but who knows?

6 minutes ago, Vee said:

It's Ron getting to do what he wanted to do with Franco on GH. He had wanted Roger Howarth's Franco to whisper in Carly's ear (I think) and reveal he had Michael raped after all when the Carly/Franco pairing went south, but got vetoed either by the network on Frank Valentini.

When a character doesn't take, he tries to burn them down or enrage the audience or both.

I have always thought Gwen had more potential than all this mess, but at this point there's no bringing her back so you might as well take her all the way down.  I don't hate it.  At least it will tie up that loose end with Laura.

It obviously could be Gwen just lashing out, but I am intrigued. 

1 hour ago, victoria foxton said:

8-01-1966  @Titus Andronicus@DRW50@carolineg@Khan@vetsoapfan@JAS0N47@slick jones @j swift@jam6242@OzFrog@janea4old@Paul Raven@AbcNbc247@will81@Franko@beebs@dc11786@Michael@Dion@Dr Neil Curtis@asafi@Bright Eyes@Gray Bunny@Wendy@Soapsuds

I loved that!  Thanks for the tag.  Regardless of who was playing Julie, she was always into the dramatics.  Does anyone know why Charla Doherty was replaced?

1 hour ago, Soapsuds said:

With all those strangers extras watching....terrible.

The acting is really bad. So much haming it up by Marci Miller and zero acting by Paul Telfer

I think I would have preferred the small group of people that knew Gwen/Leo/Xander/Craig being there over random extras.  It's not like either couple was popular around Salem, so I would assume their weddings wouldn't have the entire town.  I kept laughing at the horrible extras in the background reacting and wondering who they were invited by. 

I miss the good old Days where a secret would be exposed in front of everyone on the cast and no one would politely leave.  They would all just stay to hear the good gossip lol

I do love they are bringing Laura's death back up.  I was actually surprised by that.

3 minutes ago, AlexElizabeth said:

I'll admit that I was smiling and laughing throughout the whole episode today. I know it's all stupid but I was entertained. I'll take Leo's wedding hijinks over possession or Sarah crap any day.

Absolutely ridiculous that Sonny wasn't there though. 

I'm surprised they showed Leo slapping Craig's ass at the beginning of the episode. 😅

I agree.  It was entertaining.  It's just tough when you don't feel bad for anyone involved lol.  Craig and Xander kind of deserve it.  At least Nancy got to hold her head high and acted with grace.

So, I have lots of questions about today's episode, but is Craig that rich?  Rich enough to target for money?  Sure he's a Dr. and I am sure lives a very upper class lifestyle, but it doesn't seem like he was lavishing money on Leo or anything. 

10 hours ago, Gray Bunny said:

Agreed 100%  Especially when looking back, yes, you had great payoff in the comeuppances of Kristen and Sami, but even in the first half of '97, you can see they were dragging the Marlena/John/Kristen and Sami/Austin/Carrie stories during the winter and spring to have the big summer climaxes. Bo/Hope/Billie/JL King wasn't intriguing enough, and Jack/Jennifer was non-existent with Jack spending the first half of the year in prison. 

The second half was when DAYS started their hokey-jokey junk with the circus story and Vivian & Ivan dressed up as french fries and Lil' Bo Peep and the naroleptic Jonesey and his townhouse. Plus, Susan Banks. After the Kristen payoff in June of '97, Susan's presence was always comedy cringe. 

Yeah it's clear they are dragging both main triangles out to have a summer climax, where I think you could have spread them out better.  In fact, I would have ended John/Marlena/Kristen first and kept Sami/Austin/Carrie for the summer.  I tend to think the Jack/Jen/Peter story stalling might have been a personnel issue, with Missy leaving and Jason Brooks being off the show as well and not intentional.  I don't have much to say about Bo/Hope-almost all the stories JER wrote for them were bad.  He clearly wasn't a big fan lol

The tone got really bogged down after those two major stories ended too.  I feel like entire weeks of show would take place with everyone moping around almost dead Roman's bedside and no one was really happy except Austin/Carrie, but the tide was already turning on that and people wanted her with Mike.   And the attempts at lightheartedness like the Jonesy story gave me second hand embarrassment for Louise Sorel and Ivan G'vera.  They didn't deserve that.  And I agree 100% that Susan outlived her usefulness, but then got significant airtime after the reveal and I kept assuming she'd leave and go back wherever but didn't lol. 

Anyway, after a great 1996 I thought 1997 was rough for Days and GH.  I think GH's 1997 was worse than Days, but GH rebounded pretty quickly in 1998 and I don't know if Days ever did.  

20 minutes ago, Dion said:

That's when the Torres family set off a bomb at some party (I forget what it was for, but it was at Wings). I've always found it interesting how it actually set up story for much of the next year or so.

 Since the hospital was short staffed Chip was forced to operate on Julie who'd been severely injured. Unfortunately a waiter from the party died while Chip was preoccupied with Julie. The waiter of course was Dean Lombard and his death lead to the Lombards filing suit against the hospital. This of course would eventually lead to Roger running over Kimberly (triggering her DID storyline) and Stella trapping Marlena in the Pit. The lawyer representing the Lombards was Lisanne Gardner, who would eventually get murdered by Nicky.

This was also when Shane became paralyzed.

Thank you!  I remember all the aftermath but not the bomb lol.  I will have to look that up again.  Didn't have something to do with art?  

26 minutes ago, Titus Andronicus said:

I'll also throw in the bomb explosion as being an actual 1992 highlight. The fallout mostly wasn't but the scenes around the explosion were quite good. Also a hilarious one in that Alice pops right up in the rubble, with only her hair out of place. Everybody else is seriously injured but Alice is fine.

Can you remind what the bomb explosion was?  For the life of me I can't remember, but I am sure I have seen it lol.

5 minutes ago, Khan said:

But I really don't see this as being specifically about the strong possibility of Bo Brady returning from the dead.  He just happens to be the latest in a long, long line of characters (both on DAYS, and on daytime as a whole), coming in at the point where I have to call a Zach Morris timeout.  To put it another way: if we were talking about Laura Horton (possibly) returning from the dead, and NOT Bo, I still would say what I'm saying now: No. More.

True, character resurrections are but one of many factors that have crippled DAYS creatively, tarnished the legacy that Ted and Betty Corday worked so hard to create, and undermined the power and longevity of soaps in general.  Nevertheless, I'm left the same dilemma: if the viewers have been conditioned over time not to take anything that happens on "their stories" seriously, knowing that even death itself can be retconned, then the emotional investment is gone; and if the emotional investment is gone, then why the hell are these shows (or ANY shows) still bothering to tell stories?

If your audience can't engage with anything you give them, because they can't trust or believe that what they're seeing is "real," then you're just wasting their time.  It's as simple as that.

And yes, I am aware that even Agnes Nixon wasn't above bringing people back from the dead if it meant correcting past mistakes.  What can I say?  Agnes was wrong, too.

I think you can still have emotional investment in a death story and still be happy a character comes back from the dead as well.  Marlena's was death in 1987 still affected me and I was super happy she came back and that was watching after I knew the ending lol.  To me, and just speaking for myself, two different things did happen.  Marlena died, people mourned and moved on, and then she miraculously came back and everyone around her had to deal with that.  

I was talking specifically about Bo.  You are talking about a much broader problem across all soaps, which I agree with.   Days has a problem with people taking it seriously, but also because it's a badly written.  Your point is correct, but in this instance I don't think Bo coming back from the dead is the problem.   It's just another problem on top of already lazy writing.  IDK, I don't think you are wrong about anything really, but I just don't have a problem with Bo being back under this circumstance.