Vee

I mean, I don't think it can be disputed that the Lewises, Spauldings, etc. were wildly popular and successful. I don't like how the earlier families got degraded and marginalized either but it happened to so many soaps in this era, and I don't think you can so easily divest GL of a lot of those performers. I think a better mix of characters would've worked in the latter part of that decade because I know they had some rough years, but look at the Nancy Curlee era - I don't think anyone can in good conscience say that GL's being destroyed.

I know @EricMontreal22has been searching for the Bourbon Street pilot for years. I'd kill to see it too. Malone apparently recycled a ton of it for AW and probably OLTL 2003.

Oh, I already did that earlier. I just hope you'll eventually answer the question for somebody else. Best of luck in future discussions.

I'm pretty calm; I'll take whatever penalty I get, I'm sure I've earned it. But I also just don't think you have anything substantive to say as to why on Earth this deeply unwell person should be back on Y&R in the 21st century. Sure hope you can prove me or somebody else wrong.

So no actual reasons on why Brenda should be back today then, besides Y&R episodes from almost 40 years ago? Got it. And yeah, I'll take whatever they give me.

Your interests historically speak for themselves, unless you want to explain the rationale behind your belief that Brenda Dickson in her current mental state and condition should be welcome back on the show in 2022. I think it's unconscionable and unacceptable no matter how many big hats she wears and how fierce she was in 1985. As for what I think of your taste, if you don't like it take it up with a moderator; I'm sure I can handle a formal warning. Won't be my first in the last 15 or however many years.

Elsa, you have no interests but high camp in an 80s time capsule even if it employs a known lunatic on the show and that's no one's taste problem but yours. Move on.

Yeah, but you're nuts.

Until Locher can dig up Ellen Bethea for OLTL, the wheels don't come off this train!

The problem is this mess renders them doing the Devil again radioactive for however many years, if ever. If you played it dead serious and sinister, took your time and built and built - which is what the original story did, IIRC, as well as The Exorcist itself which did it much better than both, the source material of Friedkin's film and William Peter Blatty's book - you could have a deep examination of the medical mystery involved with possession, the spiritual mystery, the social trauma, etc. before really going apeshit with the supernatural. That's a story that could take up most of a year, like I believe it did the first time. Instead they just camp it up and who's gonna want to touch it again?

I would point to 1992 for OLTL, as I believe Gottlieb only took over at OLTL in August of '91 and the first months were rocky. I don't think they fully soared until Megan's death and Billy Douglas, though the pieces certainly began being put in place in '91.

Oh, for me, it was. They both sold the hell out of their reunion physically and emotionally in a major way and were 100% committed, and RSW later basically came out and said in the oral history book that it had been his mistake not to re-pair them earlier; 'we could have been printing money all those years.' There is an apocryphal legend that not long after pointedly hanging both of the actors out to dry at the Paley Center OLTL anniversary special in 2008 where a fan asked why Bo and Nora had not reunited and either Frank or Ron promptly threw it to RSW/HBS to answer, that FV supposedly went to them later, had a Come to Jesus meeting and said it was time to reunite Bo and Nora in order to help keep the show alive. I don't know if that story is true, but they did do it within a year. Frank has made many mistakes since then but it was the right thing to do, and it worked and sold a ton of story with them, Matthew and Clint before the end.

This is why I don't text you more.

It is indeed OT, so all I'll say about that story is I thought the initial Georgie arc - Bo's scheming assistant going Fatal Attraction on him and Nora and faking a videotape - was a great idea. RSW and HBS did a joint interview at the time talking about how thrilled they were to be off the freezing backburner and into a story with some heat. The show felt like it had stakes again when JFP first arrived after a lot of meandering around for a couple years post-Malone (haha). This changed in a matter of months for the actors and the audience, because by the end of the year or shortly thereafter Hillary was lobbying the head of the network to first stop the Sam/Nora ONS and then to have Nora killed off in childbirth.

I suspect there was some truth to it, but I don't think it was the bigger story behind it. It didn't last, clearly; the only younger woman he was with was Lanie.

This is going to tank another pre-baked narrative. I said I felt media backlash and poor polling about Biden was peaking too soon for the midterms, and I think i was right.

I think if not for COVID it might have had a shot. I think with time and tide interest has waned. Granted, I also think AMC is a better fit for serialized streaming a la the Prospect Park revival than attempting to wedge into the increasingly-clumsy, ADHD box that network primetime dramas have largely become. But we've discussed that up front. I just think the buzz is gone and ABC doesn't care. But we could all be wrong.

I blame the show, which seems allergic to drama. I've seen Burgi play some crazy shít on cable and especially film, he's got a pretty funky range. But soaps don't have the creativity or energy these days for either nuance or wild swings. You've got talented folks playing largely staid ciphers.

We both know that's not true, you filth

He has no plans to return because he's blackballed!

I mean, it's still pretty dead atm. Susan Lucci saying "I sure hope it happens" is not movement.

I have to because some people don't know us! Now they do though which is why I can say I will beat you to death.

I don't think it's some big enigma. Felicia basically had a midlife crisis when she got sprung for Luke (also in his own midlife crisis at the time) and rediscovered the adventure '80s with him, and it wrecked everything. The girls were still kids then, though Maxie was becoming a teen, and I think it was easier for Felicia to keep digging the hole once she was already in it. She went off to Texas supposedly to take care of Mariah, but that didn't last; Guza had her claiming she was off doing missions with Frisco in the mid-2000s when she returned briefly after Georgie's death. And it made a sort of dysfunctional sense at that point - she'd destroyed her life with Mac and the girls, so once she'd already left town she ran off again with the man who had been an even worse parent than her. I assume there is some stuff with Maxie excoriating her in 2007 or 2008 or whenever Georgie died and Kristina came back that has Maxie probing at this a bit, because God knows RC didn't bother with deeper exploration in dialogue. Ron and Frank wrote a conclusion to this stuff very poorly when they brought her back in 2012, because they dumped virtually all the longtime dialogue writers and cut scenes/segments to the bare minimum length per Frank's preference; it never really got dug into much beyond the surface drama and behavior. But Felicia did recommit herself to Maxie and Mac over the next couple years and it redeemed the character for me. I just wish that stuff had been better written.

I'm going to beat you with soap in a sock. *He said with love.