Vee

1 minute ago, carolineg said:

Anyway, it's just another man that's at odds with Sonny and Jason, another guy who was with Brenda (although that's completely non-relevant at this point), another guy that's going to be sad when she runs to Jason/Sonny eventually and protects them etc.  It's just so obvious and done before.   I just don't know how the show is going to make this pairing new or different.  I am willing to see it out though.

I don't care that much about it either, but I do think they have some chemistry and nice interplay. But I have also never seen Laura shortsell a pairing yet, ever. She didn't put him down or disengage, she was right there. Dear God he needs a haircut though.

3 minutes ago, carolineg said:

I have to say I did enjoy the Carly/Wagger scenes as well.  I just think it felt too predictable.  

At least Nina got the point of view yesterday that the hotel took up too much time and effort and that she didn't like it.  It makes me feel better about Carly taking over.

I am tentatively open to more Carly/Wagger but I agree that blond on blond is a hate crime lol. And yeah, I don't care about Nina giving it up. Giving it to her always seemed arbitrary on par with the endless job carnival nonsense on Y&R; just a timefiller, not something she would actually care about. I still prefer Carly going back to her humbler roots at Bobbie's though, so I hope she'll keep that.

4 minutes ago, carolineg said:

I thought JJY's Lucky was the Deception photographer for a minute, but I could be wrong

I believe he was. I will never forget his and Dr. Sarah's kinky softcore photo session where she like ordered him around under the hot lights lol. But I thought someone had him model for half a second too.

As far as the last week or so goes I actually enjoyed a lot of the Carly/Wagger chemistry test, with the exception of the occasional rambling about Nina. The stuff with Carly talking about how much she'd invested in her time with the Metro Court was solid character work for me, and I could see something of the throughline from Sarah Brown's working-class Carly to the older woman who finally got to live out her dreams of being at the center of a luxury hotel and then lost it. I of course liked Drew and Nina, and the stuff with Alexis re: her license and talking about it with Molly and others has been consistently character-based and well-written, almost making me forget the presence of Contest Winner/Crewmember's Relative Molly #8. I think Tracy and Stella was in there too, and I have been very surprised to enjoy the Heather recovery stuff. The rest is a blur, but there's also been too much Sasha for me to tolerate and a lot of silly stuff I just don't care about, like goofball Nina rushing in to tell 3 different men in a business meeting all about Carly and Wagger. I like Nina as the crazy socialite but who cares? Why did they all sit through that lol?

Also pleased to hear that apparently Cyrus' radio preacher man thing is over. Thank you, PM/EK.

Just now, titan1978 said:

Me too! But a year of terrible stories and the last two days in overalls have left me beyond numb to poor Sasha. Time to cut that character. Let her get an amazing job offer from Home and Heart that takes her out of Port Charles and we wish her the best!

If this was really PM's Santa Barbara, Comet the horse would trample her to death.

1 minute ago, titan1978 said:

I have no doubt Frank Valentini is still very much the EP here. But his show is starting to look and feel like GH did before his time, including stronger day to day writing and way less focus on his friends from OLTL. 

I'll agree with all of that. I'm going to be very curious to see how May and the BLQ/Chase wedding stuff goes, even if I find him infantile and boring for her. I expect fireworks next month at least, possibly in conjunction with that wedding. And I hope Drew and Nina kick it up in and out of bed and the office. It's very strange to be suddenly invested in those two of all people.

I hope they step it up with Natalia being the momager from hell tbh. That could be fun and actual conflict vs. the magic of Sasha, and it would give KM bigger story than waiting for this baby to either pop or preferably die.

I thought JY's wooden Lucky might have modeled a little in the early 2000s, but I may be totally wrong.

Circling back to GH re: these crossovers, I still can't get over how the strike business with Martin (remember him?) being married to Blair from OLTL went absolutely nowhere. He has some big dumb secret about getting alimony from her and does Lucy ever find out or learn that the Deceptor was apparently stolen from Blair by him? I don't recall so. Pointless.

3 minutes ago, Khan said:

IDK whether this counts, but I do remember AMC's Erica Kane launching a "Man of Enchantment" campaign for her cosmetics company way back during the Clinton administration.

Am I crazy or was Charlie Brent the Man of Enchantment?

Just now, Khan said:

Speaking of OLTL, I'm genuinely surprised that Frank Valentini has yet to find a way to bring Andrew Trischitta (ex-Jack) onto GH.

I think poor Andrew (who did improve a bit on OLTL 2.0 with actual rehearsal time) is a teacher or something now. Probably for the best!

6 minutes ago, ranger1rg said:

Can't disagree with any of that, especially regarding Home & Heart and Soap Twitter.

If we're getting more Morgan and Luna, then Frank needs to move to Grey Gardens. I appreciate Morgan Fairchild and I love her politics, but she's not needed on GH. Frank is such a wizard with the budget, yet he spends money on these two?

I have my doubts there is anything Frank wouldn't do to keep employing the OLTL cast (like Batten) at this point. Only #MeToo has kept Todd Manning from Roger Howarth's umpteenth contract return, and then there's poor little Patrick Gibbons' recurring role as the boy scout Wyatt when all that poor non-acting teenager wants to do is go play hockey back home.

If Sasha and H&H (or ME) finally exit, then we'll know something has begun to really start to change.

4 minutes ago, dc11786 said:

i'm hoping to see some real stories develop for the characters you've listed. I've been impressed with what I've seen of Brook Kerr as Portia in the hospital setting. I am looking forward to how Portia will handle the Heather Webber conviction issue when it eventually goes to court.   

BK/Portia is so much stronger and more committed onscreen than DT/Curtis it's depressing. I would cut him in an instant and free her up for a new man, because she has carried a lot of material over the last few years and her reward for it is just more Curtis and Marshall.

I do think Easton has made a real effort with the Gregory stuff, particularly of late. I just am tired of watching him onscreen and I think the majority of the audience is as well. The weary look in Liz's eyes in their 'romance' of late also screams "you again?"

3 minutes ago, ranger1rg said:

I mean, this Deception/shopping network story is a mess onscreen, and I doubt it looks any better on paper. It looks like Chris and Dan got rid of Sasha, and that PM and EK want her back there. If so, they needed to make that happen more organically  and not to be so cringe.

It's not really a story IMO. Just filler. But it needs to go away. IIRC it was PM/EK that had Sasha quit as the Face though, not C&D. But you could've done this "Sasha stays on as the home shopping girl" bit at the same time as her quitting the model job without making me watch more of Home & Heart. Unless Frank insists on more of Morgan and Luna Moody.

It doesn't help when Soap Twitter is an absolute nuthouse. You have folks using all caps in every tweet about how terrible it is that Ava is doing typical Ava things or whatever. I thought SoapZone was bad back in the day, but so much of the second by second live reaction on Twitter now is entirely skewed around people's fan preferences vs. the reality of watching the show. If Ava and Nina's ridiculous friendship is busted up it is suddenly the worst thing ever and so out of character! For as much as I find Home & Heart or Diane's latest diatribe about Carly/Nina tiresome, there's also a lot of that histrionic reaction based on stuff that is totally out of sync to what's actually onscreen.

3 minutes ago, Khan said:

Like I've said in the "Gates" thread, I wonder whether EK and PM are still working off whatever outlines/projections/post-its their predecessors might have left behind.

I suspect people are right that they had very little time to work on long-term plans. The slow character focus for the last month suggests that to me. Unlike others I was never convinced they had a bible in place because frankly I don't think the networks have been giving any soap people much time to work on that when they are hired on anymore; I don't think what happened at Y&R with Sussman was an isolated incident, and we've seen so few new HW hires in the last decade anyway that weren't just internal people or recycled like Griffith. They're just handing someone the baton with very little lead time to work up plans and saying 'go'.

Hopefully they can put more new things in motion soon enough, but it's time to start culling hard. I've enjoyed the character depth and a lot of changes in pacing and focus, but I never want to see Home & Heart again.

They have been having the same conversation for over a year. Just let the horse kill her.

Just now, carolineg said:

Weren't they basically already lol?  Sasha was and Cody was her sidekick/male model/whatever.  Blaze has been an option the show has been teasing for awhile and I don't love it, but I don't know why they'd go back to those two.  

I find all three options singularly uninspiring, but Blaze being the Face at least gives me less Sasha to deal with.

Just now, Soapsuds said:

Has GH improved? Of course!  A lot?  No

Didn't ask!

3 minutes ago, ranger1rg said:

I'll be honest. I see some improvement in GH since PM and EK started, but I really expected more.

I was very high on much of the last month but It's been a rough week or more, I've liked and cringed at stuff in equal measure the last however many days. But that's any given week on most soaps. I am hoping sweeps gets out of some of these doldrums.

1 minute ago, Khan said:

Why do I feel like TPTB (including the new Co-HW's) are overlooking a potentially good storyline where Cody and Sasha are named the Faces of Deception?

Oh God, please no. I can't take any more Sasha than I'm already getting. Getting her out of being the Face was at least a step away from Princess Slow-Talker.

4 minutes ago, dragonflies said:

Improved is a strong word lol. It's still the Sonny, Carly, Jason show. 

Do you actually watch it these days or are you still just posting tweets?

Just now, dragonflies said:

Honestly it's Frank IMO. Nothing is going to change with him at the helm 

I think time (and watching the show) will be the judge of that. 

I think GH has improved a lot but has a long way to go.

16 minutes ago, Darn said:

I asked you this the other day (which you ignored)

That's because I was asleep!

10 minutes ago, BetterForgotten said:

Disney+/Marvel are totally playing into the soap opera element Claremont cemented with the X-Men with this promo:

 

Oh, that's great. @Darn @DRW50 take a look!

15 minutes ago, titan1978 said:

I wish Lucy had a real friend or confidant on the show that is not Scotty. Maybe rekindle her friendship with Felicia? Because I would like a scene where Lucy admits her bulldozing has more to do with her inability to deal with her life outside work, and her overbearing nature with Deception is because that’s all she has as a legacy. She is desperate for the name Lucy Coe to have some kind of meaning. They could even tie it in to her reaction to Bobbie’s death, and how much an entire community grieved for Bobbie and how little Lucy feels her absence would even be noticed.

Speaking of which, where is Felicia? For the faults of Chris and Dan and Frank V, I hope the new regime recognizes the show was saved by weaving those legacy and fan favorites back onto the canvas. I don’t want a Frons level show again where we only see Carly getting story and a rotating cast of youngsters.

Give me a real story for Liz, for Laura, and Anna. Not just rotating them into other people’s stories. When PM was on Guiding Light, it was an ensemble and nearly everyone had something to do. Portia could also use something deeper than Trina’s mom. And just like several other times on this stupid show, where is Trina and why won’t they use her as a lead?

I suspect it's the usual guarantee merry-go-round re: Trina and others atm, plus FV continuing to be gunshy about a Black female lead. I sincerely hope that changes as the new regime's stories continue to take shape. I agree about Lucy and Felicia.

5 minutes ago, carolineg said:

Anyhow, I get the feeling at this point, no one gets Lucy or understands the character.  It is obviously is all in flux now, but Lucy's not stupid or entirely oblivious and that's how the last few shows have portrayed her.

They have been treating her as campy window dressing since she broke up with Kevin. She deserves more than this but she is regularly used as the butt of the joke for far inferior characters (starting with slow-talker Sasha).

42 minutes ago, carolineg said:

I was always of the mind that Deception was going for a higher end market than a home shopping network, so none of this nonsense really fits.   I get that this was a quick way to make money for them, but it needs to stop.

It feels like it's always just been an excuse for FV to use Morgan and Susan Batten from OLTL. I'm tired of seeing them and this mess.

And yeah, I haven't often liked the use of Lucy since at least 2015 (not that Ron's use of her was exactly stellar, but he did bring her back and highlight her for a good stretch). Lucy is part of a supercouple and is a major beloved character; I know Lynn can sell anything but she needs to be treated with a bit more respect onscreen.

Ava is obviously going to keep the truth about the pills to herself. I wouldn't be surprised if she tracks it back to Valentin and cuts into his operation for her own ends.

10 hours ago, Khan said:

The Tracy/Gregory material proves my point that there was nothing wrong with Gregory Harrison joining the cast as Chase's dad except that they weren't using him properly.

I'm of two minds. Like I've talked about with Darn, I think GH has a real erudition and intelligence in some of his scenes with Tracy and Alexis (when he isn't there to mansplain their feelings or choices) that clicks with them. He and Jane especially have chemistry. At the same time, do I care about his health story or fate - not very much. Had he come on as a more vital mover and shaker or complex business tycoon figure, a la some of his '80s roles, I might feel differently.