Vee

Mo is too tired to be frontlining the show. He was too tired ten years ago. He's even more haggard now. Ron knew this (for awhile), even Bob Guza knew it which is why he began transitioning Sonny's role in the late 2000s, possibly in part due to his own flagging interest in MB/Sonny. It was a wise move and felt organic. caroline and I have already outlined what we'd do about this so we won't go over it again as we prepare our master plans. 👍 He was! I would kill for the new MST3K (going strong on its own new app/platform) to do some of ATWT, SFT, or whatever is available at the same length. They still do shorts, and just did one last week. But I bet the rights issues are even thornier today. I seem to recall one of the stars/writers commenting on their affection for morose Jessie Brewer.

I've said it before, but Chloe has had every demeaning story short of being impregnated by aliens. She is worn tf out. I love Nadia, but they squandered her initial edgy return under Sheffer which was working out very well and was sophisticated initially, and ever since then she's become another town whipping post and workhorse. She needs a loooong break. I'm biased, but I blame Corday and/or the network for a lot of what happened with McPherson and Thomas. I remember clearly that the show felt written for adults again for the first time in IDK how long when they started, but the production value, FX segues, cheesy country music cues, etc. all continued to work against them, same as Sheffer's early promising start. Ultimately the HW still has to take their share of blame, but a lot of things under McPherson and Thomas especially felt aborted in the crib, which is something Corday is known for. Bringing back Carrie (and I guess Austin) as a lawyer full time was smart, and was wasted. I have never bought Belle the lawyer (or Belle the anything, really). I think the follow-up hacks got a lot of credit down to a) Eileen's return and b) some solid day to day writers migrating to the show from OLTL, etc. Without that material it's another story.

I have said my piece about Drake before, so I won't again, except for this: I've always liked him, he always delivers what they want from him and he has always had incredible chemistry and warmth with people, from his love interests to young children like Christie Clark back in the day. He's unfairly slated, and he probably should've stayed Roman. You can say a lot about Drake but you can never say he doesn't give 100%.

Stamos claimed they only wanted him back to play drums and maybe do a gag at the Nurses Ball with Demi Moore - where "Jackie and Blackie" would return married, haha. He felt it was superficial and wanted something substantive to play, and therefore refused the invitation. Ron did not take it well. I believe it because of Tony Call's story from OLTL which was similar - that Ron wanted Herb Callison and Karen Wolek to return married, as a gag re: their classic roles in 1978. Call didn't like it either.

The MST3K GH shorts never fail to crack me up.

I know they tried to bring back Quinn (claiming they wanted to model him after Warren Beatty in Shampoo which, uh, okay) but I'm not sure how long that lasted. I do remember them writing Carly, Chloe, etc. out vividly. As for the thread, I think it can handle some more widespread discussion on the weekend in addition to to more equally on-topic giant-size pictures of Chandler Massey's nipples.

Every time they've tried to write Genie out in the last decade it's been because Frank tried to lowball her or use her without a contract. Each time he's had to bend and bring her back. She's now Mayor of Port Charles, and Denise/Lesley appears reasonably often, and Laura is active in story. I think she's in as good a position as she can be in right now, though I don't necessarily love the stories.

Zombie Stephanie! We all know it's coming.

I know what I'd do with Kevin and Laura ending, but I would take the time to break them up pretty slowly and move him back to Lucy, and her to someone new and more in the mold of Luke or Scorpio. Kevin and Laura have their fans, the actors love it, and there's a lot of drama to play with Ryan, Lucy, Victor, etc. in there through the process before getting to the result. (The Luke factor would only come into play if TG committed to a limited run, and probably only to end in killing him off.) Plus IIRC Jon Lindstrom is still off contract, and that's the way Frank likes his vets. If he can't have Genie off-contract, her easy-bake mate is the next best thing.

They ragged on his body in the scripts, yes. But we don't know what the origin of their actual beef with him was, and I suspect it came down to personality. (Ron beefed with John Stamos similarly at the time, who was much more outspoken.)

Don't get me wrong, I think Kevin and Laura are boring, inexplicable and comfortable even if Genie clearly loves it, I'd break them up and give her a new man, but Scott and Laura Round 89 is an exercise in emasculation.

Scott and Laura hasn't worked in aeons. And the show made her way too indulgent of him in recent years when he would do insane shít and she'd just cluck "oh, Scotty!" I love Kin Shriner and I want him on the show, but putting them together post-LNL is always a one-way train to humiliation and Cuckville. There's a slim chance you could've tried it when he first came back to the show around 1999, with serious, full-on commitment from the writing team for him as an older lead. They never had that or gave him that. It's been dead for almost 50 years and the 2013 revisit was just humiliating and insane for both of them and completely unnecessary. It was one of Ron's many forgettable plot widgets. You barely even noticed they were briefly 'remarried', because there was almost zero physical affection and everything had happened offscreen. It was done to try to goose story for Luke and Laura, and this was happening even while a) Tony refused to play Luke and Laura and b) Frank was nickel and diming Genie off the show again.

I think it's all of a piece with what we've all discussed before: The fact that they never really invested in Roman as a lead again outside of Drake, and that's what led to just hiring Corday's golf buddy to play foil to Dee and Drake for what feels like centuries.

Oh God that's right, I thought I'd dreamed that. This is why I can't with Nicole, even now! I actually loved Josh Taylor on 90210 and his other primetime work. A long time ago. I'm sure he's a very nice man but the whole thing has never worked, with the very narrow carveout for him and Lauren Koslow.

It's increasingly painful to see HQ episodes of ATWT inadvertently updated by randos alongside B&B getting put up more and more via official channels.

The Roman/Billie thing with Krista Allen and JT has never left my dark thoughts. I always thought that was so gross. WN and Lisa is another story, somehow.

Yeah, that's what I thought. Yeah, IIRC Carly left and Dee/Drake returned within days of each other.

We might as well loop @Khanin on this, since I know how much he loves WN - I actually think they could've sold Wayne Northrop's Roman with Lisa's Billie at one point, a la Hal and Emily on ATWT. The world weary cop with the troubled younger woman. I was under the impression Lisa's Billie only came back under McPherson/Thomas. I remember they were the ones who finished writing Carly out when they came on (along with a brief appearance by a, for once, age-appropriate and adorable Nicholas when she was in rehab). I wasn't aware that LR and CC's time ever intersected in that period. I thought Carly had already been gone maybe 3-6 months when Lisa's Billie turned up. At this point Billie being ISA is baked into the character, but I don't have a problem with her doing both that and CW fashion/cosmetic stuff, which is how they've seemed to handle it in both recent returns that I know of. John ran Basic Black for years too while also doing the usual John things. He was excellent on QS, but I think so much of what has been done with him on DAYS has come down to every creative that gets involved having bigger priorities than him. For Dena Higley, Gary Tomlin, etc. it was Shawn Christian or Galen Gering, for Ron it's many other men. I think you can never discount the Corday of it all too in terms of creative interference.

Jensen made reference to DAYS not long ago on IG. I think Jared Padalecki or someone trolled him with pix or a clip of Eric or something. I despised Ari's first run as Nicole, and I've never gotten over it. I thought she sparkled with E.J. in the late 2000s/early 2010s, but I think she looks so tired and worn down now, not unlike the Billie recasts. I think it's long since over and they should've just kept her with GV's Eric and let them be happy. But they've never fully utilized him either, though that is in part due to Greg's recurring run on the excellent Queen Sugar. I would add about Lisa - I didn't see much of her 2011-2012 run, but I heard it was another bust. I know they got her involved with Countess Wilhemina again which was wise. I am one of the very few boosters of that brief era under McPherson/Thomas which I think started out very good, but I know it apparently went off the rails fast and I was unable to keep up with it for long at the time; DAYS is extremely hard to find online at least for me (if anyone knows an archive I can watch stuff at, PM me lol), so I can't speak to that progression. I was very pleased with McPherson's AMC 2.0 a year later, but that's beside the point. Anyway, that's a longwinded way of saying I'd be interested in hearing details on Billie in 2011/2012. Since I've been rewatching a binge of OLTL 1993 today, it's worth noting that Peter Reckell's Bo is a prime example of a character who got to take off and spread his wings where John Loprieno as Cord on OLTL - a similar performer and character type - couldn't or wasn't allowed to. Loprieno could've easily had just as many hot pairings and stories, and was at least as good an actor as Reckell (better IMO, for anyone who's seen him on Star Trek) I did not finish Beyond Salem, lol. I will try again.

She has never really not been a loser since Lisa first left, minus a few shining moments here and there. I've made no secret how I felt about Krista Allen's unrecognizable take on the character, and Pinson's Billie carried the energy around like a weight and just felt like a joke to me. And most of Lisa's brief returns just feel like novelty bits for me that either go camp or are rough for other reasons. If she was willing to commit to 6-12 months, or some sort of Alison Sweeney situation, I'd say go for it with Lisa. But otherwise, don't bother.

That has been the biggest issue, and yes, they should've invested in someone else for Rinna (or Pinson, in a pinch). But they never have, they just treated the recasts like her mother: The town mattress. Absolutely. I like Julie Pinson a lot, I loved her on PC where she had the same energy as Lisa. But Julie Pinson got plugged into too many forced roles on too many shows, most especially ATWT, and that includes using her as a sort of shadowpuppet version of Rinna on DOOL. Billie had no agency as a character after LR's original run and that really hurt Pinson too. These days when people bring JP up I just roll my eyes, sadly, because she's had enough ill-conceived runs on enough shows. It's not her fault. But no, no one has ever compared to Rinna for me or ever had the same stature in the role.

I never got over Bo and Billie's breakup, and I never will!

I don't remember Kanan ever publicly trashing the writing while he was on the show. I've always assumed his personality simply rubbed Frank and Ron the wrong way, and they responded accordingly by dragging him onscreen. I've certainly heard things about some folks finding SK obnoxious as hell, but that has nothing to do with whether he or any other actor delivers onscreen and is popular with the audience, and they shouldn't have made it personal. The way they treated him and A.J. was low.

The larger bulk of the Russian people have no interest in toppling Putin, IMO. They've been dealing with autocrats and maniacs for centuries. It is a cultural and historical thing that will take god knows how long to change in that part of the world. AFAIC the best we can hope for in the short term is a more malleable, less deranged oligarch in power in that country, who does not believe Ukraine is his manifest destiny. And I'll take it. As for Putin, I think whatever of Ukraine he 'takes' will increasingly be its ashes. Those people are not going to give up. And if he can't make them give up, he will level the country. In other news:

The soap press are too cowed bc they're on life support even more than the shows, so they don't care. And no one else cares about the soaps, so no one cares. It's unconscionable. But it's typical CBS at this point, too, where these things keep happening.