Vee

From an hour ago: The binary code says '3 hours to go', presumably til a full trailer.

We used to chronicle the misogyny day in and day out on TWOP back in those days. It just got worse and worse in 2003-2005 or so. You could never have gotten some of that onscreen at 3 PM today, and I think part of it was just part and parcel of the very crass TV landscape with the Bush-era 2000s. That element toned down somewhat once Pratt was gone, but the repetitive, Toho Studios Godzilla-esque 'now here's a bigger mobster!' cycle remained. As I said a week or two ago, at least in the 2000s they tried to differentiate them and make unique characters some of the time vs. the various anonymous (to me) heavies of the late '90s/early 2000 period. But it was still way too many. To this day I have no idea what happened to Manny Ruiz, or his 'good' identical twin who I think was a priest. I said it recently but Guza clearly just wanted to hire Robert LaSardo as his character from nip/tuck and that's all Manny really was. He came back 3-5 times like Wile E. Coyote and it got so ridiculous. By the time they got to "Karpov" nobody was taking the mobster cycle seriously. The Balkan story was a nice idea on paper but the writers were running on fumes, and it was a waste of poor Adrienne Barbeau. The very gothic Zaccharas at least felt lived in and had texture and layers to their backstory that could've powered more varied story outside just the Sonny sphere, but that got worn out quickly too. (And the less said about the Garin Wolf period with Tracy's 'wacky' marriage to Anthony the better.)

Like a lot of soap stars who crossed to that genre Finn Carter will always have the love of horror fans for Tremors, me included. That audience never forgets. I hope she takes care.

IIRC J.R. did try to lean on Val briefly over Capricorn Crude, but he didn't get very far or seem very committed.

Happy anniversary. Maybe I'll get back to my slight backlog this weekend, I've been so busy with other stuff IRL and now there's a bit of a GH historical binge for Jackie Z. I'm still not through with the very end of Season 6, and eps are hard to come by at present.

They tried briefly but very poorly - Faith had a tortured romantic past with Mfundo Morrison's Justus. It was as bad as it sounded, and by then Faith had already dry-humped men while killing them with her thighs, tried to murder half the town, etc. Faith was there to be a heavy and a fetish object, nothing more. It's just chance that Cynthia Preston played the hell of it (allegedly it put her in consideration for Tina at OLTL during that period, which should've happened). She still works, but I'd love to see her back on a soap. I'd even accept an excuse to have a scarred Faith alive and making trouble for a little bit on GH, better her than Olivia (or as they now insist on constantly calling her due to the other Olivia's presence, "Liv") Jerome again. There's a lot of parallels to be made and discussion to be had onscreen and off about how Ava - who came on with almost as dark and dangerous an introductory period as Faith - has survived but Faith did not.

Another great clip I dug up while going back through Bobbie's classic stories: The climax of the D.L. Brock saga with David Groh (warning: Brock roughs up Bobbie). Rhoda Morganstern dumped him and he's real mad. The one good thing from moments like these is you get to take a tour back through a soap star's past and discover or re-discover so much history. Jackie in particular was a constant through so many very different and unique eras of GH, everywhere you look is a new tapestry. 1984-85 is no different.

I'm a Dallas tourist, but the strongest stuff for Victoria Principal for me is easily that first season so far. She's very good and then they were a hit and it all goes to the men. Patrick Duffy was very handsome and talented, but David Jacobs should've stuck to his guns about the show being Pam vs. J.R. IMO.

Sure, I understand the need for increasing Neil's stature a little via a light retcon. But when this point is repeatedly hammered in while Dru is barely ever mentioned, that's egregious.

It's not a bad idea. Nor is revisiting the commune/cult she was in (though you'd have to differentiate it a lot from the Dawn of Day mess). I don't think they did enough interesting stuff with Laura's past when it came to the whole Gordon Grey angle with Laura's brothers - Jeff Kober is a great heavy from the heyday of '80s/'90s thrillers, but as Cyrus he just came off as an ineffectual blowhard to me. Who cares that this mobster is whining about not meaning to run over their dad with the family car in the driveway (a scene that actually happened)? MEK is great as Martin but they need to play him and Laura together more. I think there is more to mine with Laura's early history.

I don't think it really counts since she died after the show went off the air, but Patricia Elliott's last scenes as Renee on OLTL near the end were lovely. She was at Asa's grave reminiscing with Bo. You could tell they put them in there just for her because she might not appear again, and I think she already had cancer at this point.

I remember watching that scene live. I had no idea she was ill at that time, but somehow I knew it would be her last. It felt very much like it. That was true fate.

God, I'd forgotten about the scandal with these two weirdos. I know she and Melissa Archer are still BFF but woof.

I didn't write it, don't look at me. What is essential knowledge is that daytime is one of the last bastions of dependable writing income in the current industry conditions.

Days fans might find this info worthwhile, though I imagine you are all already on top of this. It's from Ron in a solid article Vulture ran with soap personnel re: the strike (in the WGA strike thread):

A surprising front page Vulture article with daytime writers (featuring, yes, Ron). @DRW50 Remember to use Incognito mode or archive.is to bypass the paywall. This being mainstream media, of course, they get a few things wrong. Ron was not heading OLTL in 2013. I also have zero recollection of the event Cascio mentions. Could it have been Britt on GH? She 'faked' pregnant at one point.

It really is insulting how they pretend Neil was World's Greatest Dad with Devon and that their relationship was the central axis. I barely ever watch this show and even I knew back then that adopting Devon was Dru's focus, that he was her project and that she got the entire family onboard, to say nothing of the fact that the entire storyline was Victoria Rowell's brainchild in the first place.

You usually hear the exact opposite in situations like this, but that speaks to Kelly's personality. I've always liked her, I hope she cleans house.

Yes, I did know the Webber influx was another attempted revamp. So Marland and Monty inherited David Hamilton, that's interesting. I believe Kin had come on in that summer just a month or two before, and then the later team leaned hard into both. Thanks!

Don't take the weak bait.

She was also essentially treated as a misogynistic fantasy blow-up doll for Guza and Pratt - some of the shít Faith did (humping an old man while he stroked out) or had done to her (getting manhandled and assaulted by Sonny in front of a room full of mobsters) would never make it on-air today and would get GH cancelled in at least one sense of the word. But nonetheless, Preston was excellent.

I think she just burned through story and was an irredeemable character. I loved Preston though.

That was Claudia, who was born in that world. Of course there was one specific thing that doomed her (getting Michael shot). Curtis and Portia are horrible. She deserves so much better but won't get it because this show will not invest in two black women. Trina is enough of an imposition for them and I still don't trust the show not to have Spencer turn around and fùck Esme.

This zeroes in on the ratings failure, which is ultimately all CNN bosses will care about vs. the rank and file: