Vee

It reminds me of Erika Slezak's unexpected second career in primetime post-OLTL when she decided the same re: retirement (which didn't surprise me). Sadly that seems truncated due to her recent tragedies. I'm so glad we have Jane and she seems hale and hearty.

It is so bad. It shows how little they regard her at this point, too. She could be doing Gio, but that would scandalize people. Or I'd take that secret Ward heir! I don't care! Anything else!

Cody overcome one of the most wretched and intensely unpopular introductions I've seen for a new character in quite a while (I still don't know why people were calling him "Truck Nuts"!) to win me over as the easygoing, kind, witty and somewhat himbo-ish stablehand for the Qs. Why they would go back to shít that does not work for this character - presumably because Frank and CVE remember him playing scheming Cutter on OLTL - is beyond me. He can get into capers and stuff, but let's not get stupid.

Uh, sure. Nina/Drew/Willow is the closest they've come to that and that's not originally their work.

I liked Karla's trashy dress!

Man, Cindi Rinehart. What a hoot she was.

Jason has evolved a bit over the last few years since his return in the late 2010s re: the Qs, largely IMO because the show was trying to compensate for Billy Miller's NuJason/Drew being much closer to them and to Monica than the genuine article was and they wanted to make Steve look good too (which is why they also tried to graft the Drew/Jake relationship onto him, which never quite worked). But this is a big step and Steve did bring it. I think the roots of it, though, are in the scenes in the 2000s that Jason had after Alan and A.J.'s deaths where he apologized to both of them for his choices and mistakes. I think he even told A.J. (who was 'dead,' naturally) that he'd been wrong to take Michael from him. He was emotional at those times and again now. It's not about to make me care much for Jason, but he has changed minutely more and more over time for various reasons both in story and BTS.

Dixie's short hair traumatized all of us tbh. The only thing worse was Cady's horrific red hair and bangs in one of her later, less fortunate ATWT stints.

I need to finally finish the last Netflix season. I've always been a big DD fan from the comics and the show, but I'm pretty MCU'ed out at this point. I've heard sketchy things about how they handle the Netflix supporting cast here but we'll see how it goes. I'll try it out of my love for Matt Murdock.

That's the one. Crazy how these things happen. I am still curious if Diana DeVegh ever aired as Anne though, to bring it back to the topic.

I think some of the recent analysis of Willow's past and character by the other characters re: her cult background is actually fairly incisive conceptually. It could be much smarter in the actual dialogue, though. And explored more deeply onscreen going forward.

It was absolutely hysterical. And cheap! On paper though, it seems like the psychosexual stories, archetypes and ideas are pure Marland in a lot of ways.

I actually believe Trish Van Devere was Meredith for the first six months or so. I think she claimed she did it to fund her downtown avant-garde theater work. I'm not sure if I am conflating both of them with Viki though lol. I don't think so.

It would be lovely to get a fuller recap of the event. I hope one surfaces.

I think Katelyn MacMullen can absolutely play bitch Willow. You used to see those flashes in her all the time back in the era when Korte had Willow and the rest of the cast humiliating Nina twice or three times a week. There's a reason half the forum wanted the storyline of Willow faking her cancer. I would still get rid of Willow down the road, but there's plenty of mileage to be had in the scheming wife of the Q scion raising hell for awhile. And in a better world you could then bring back a recast Michael to wreak classic Quartermaine vengeance in a year or 18 months. Hell, you could even still do the fake cancer story as Willow tries to get folks back on her side. (While long-suffering Nina, of course, knows the truth.) Nonetheless they'll surely squander this like they have much of the gold in this story. One thing is on point though, it's clear they want Drew and Willow to be the heavies and bad guys, not the pure love match and heroic couple.

Offing everyone left in the cast at the runway (where the characters representing Tim and Grace Stoen, who both survived IRL, get gunned down) was the issue for me. Little stories like LeVar Burton and Madge Sinclair's family or the Brenda Vaccaro subplot (she really goes for it) are one thing but I just can't believe they took that kind of liberty with such a recent and serious tragedy.

So did Diana DeVegh even air as Anne? Or is she the one who, like the alleged original Viki at OLTL who I can't remember the name of, where they removed them even before taping? I think that happened with Viki anyway; I believe there was a name attached in very early press materials. I hope I'm not imagining this or conflating it with DeVegh.

Yes and yes. I know DRW is a fan. I enjoy many of the performances but it is pure sleaze. IIRC Madge played the character analog to real-life Christine Miller, who was one of the few who protested on the final day in Jonestown. Anyway, we're way OT!

That would make sense.

I'm willing to bet she just did it. I didn't mind it. Laura always knows the tone and level to go for.

The lovely scene a day or two ago with Tracy and Stella (their Mulcahey-era friendship suddenly remembered) about Monica seems like it was teeing this up, too. I do wonder if they deliberately asked Jane to stay on in recent years in part because they knew Leslie didn't have long. Leslie was a fairly active and regular Q presence in the late '10s and very early 2020s from what I can recall (agan, credit to Frank and the show), and Tracy has picked up the slack since her injury and illness. Stella even says the Qs will live on through her when Monica goes. This clip is lovely - I think this may be Monty II, and one of her wiser choices (reuniting Alan and Monica for good post-Lucy).

I will say this: Original(?) Linc, James Karen, is one of the greatest movie character actors of all time. Even if you don't know his name you've seen him in something (Poltergeist, Wall Street, The China Syndrome, Return of the Living Dead, you name it). If he couldn't do the job it had to do with the taping schedule.

Same lol. But I know her best from Star Trek and the tacky Guyana Tragedy miniseries.

I understand why many actors refer to it in that way, as some (like Nathan Fillion, who says Bob Woods and others taught him everything he knows) do approach it very positively in that context. But I also understand why Moore feels differently. Even she acknowledges (including in this interview) that she learned so much as a young and inexperienced actor from being there day in and day out with the veterans and being shown the way by people like Tomei, so a lot of the same stuff is coming across albeit expressed in a different way. The reality, too, is that a lot of talented actors today like a Jonathan Groff or Melissa Fumero or Amanda Seyfried or Michael B. Jordan or whoever also came up in a much more difficult period for daytime, not the Marland heyday. So their experience may be more about the learning how to be a professional onscreen vs. the heights (or lack thereof) of their material.

See, to me Avery was also a thankless part with a low life expectancy. Only Jessica Collins put that over for so long - she was what people cared about, Avery herself was not very popular. I also don't think LW is suited to playing a character that was often the calmer alternative to more brash characters. (I do think a soap today probably could use Jessica Collins again, but she couldn't use them.)