Planet Soap

This right here is a life lesson I've had to learn. You can make your point, but after a certain while you have to realize people's minds are set and just walk away. Likewise the weirdos only have power if you acknowledge them. 👏

People: "Soaps have sucked for the last 20 years, the industry is dying, we need a resurgence" *CBS boldly creates a new soap despite declining linear television and local news saturation* People: "Eew no. The cast is the wrong color." You can't make this up🤣 Even if you aren't interested in an all black soap, wouldn't you want to see the success of the first new soap a quarter century because it could possibly reinvigorate the genre? I've seen people suggest re-runs of ATWT from the 70s onwards... Honestly speaking, who outside of us niche viewers is going to watch that? The network also has to cater to the modern day soap audience. People have even suggested re-vamping old soaps. As much as I sympathize with that idea, a lot of those cast members are dead, and modern audiences may not remember some of the old stories.

Surprisingly B&B was new today despite Y&R being a rerun, I always assume they're in step.

I had similar feelings.

In rewatching 1997, what did you all think of the Kurt Costner story? https://youtu.be/INQ3O993vRA?si=dqgbz5pSqEklzmYl

Y&R is my favorite soap but I think General Hospital is the greatest soap of all time. It pulled the largest daytime audience for Luke & Laura's wedding, it invented the super couple, it offers storyline variety: medicine, crime, romance, SciFi, action/thriller, business, and social issues. It also helped transform the genre from a stage play on TV to melo-dramatic action/adventure. Its sweeps events like the train crash and Metro Court were awesome. As for longevity the only soaps I really hear layman/mainstream audiences talk about today are GH, AMC, and occasionally Y&R. I hear people mention Erika Kane and Victor Newman and Luke & Laura more than Bob & Kim Hughes, Alexandra Spaulding, or Asa Buchanan.

As someone said early Carly on ATWT, add to that early Carly on GH, Roger on GL. YES! I think since the Sopranos accelerated the shift away from clear good vs evil dynamics and more situational morality, gray area type characters. Today, we have less good superman stops the evil villain and more Tony who kills people trying to be a good dad. The sad part is, we have shows now glorifying evil doers rather than holding up a mirror to them. I question wether the evil glorification is inadvertent or deliberate. Every soap needs a grand dame. Kay Chancellor, Lucinda Walsh, Iris Wheeler, Felicia Gallant, Stephanie Forrester. A strong, sometimes combative, dignified, larger than life, older woman.

Thanks!

When was this👀 How many people on B&B knew Sheila committed the baby switch. Did Lauren ever tell Eric or Stephanie? I know Sheila threatened to expose Lauren's affair with Brad to negatively impact her custody case. But after Scott died, there was no incentive for Sheila to keep the secret. Yes, Scott asked Lauren to forgive Sheila on his deathbed, but was that really incentive enough to hide she was misdeed especially since she kept doing bad things.

B&B current opening looks to slideshow-ish compared to the original 1987 intro, but it's still the best soap open on TV right now. If BTG can get something like that I'll be excited. About to arguing with other people, I'll take that advice myself. It was particularly disgusting to see white commenters on Facebook soap groups making passive aggressive comments like "ill pass" or "looks to reality show-ish". Even if you don't care to watch an all black soap, the success of BTG could inspire more soaps (with a cast of your preference). It's justifiable that many people are skeptical of this given how poor soap writing has been for the last 20 years. Can we give it a try at least. What better does daytime have to offer, another talk/news show? I must be in the minority because I loved that theme. It was magic when I discovered that was the origin of the Y&R bumper theme. It was like CBS's version of Faces of the Heart. I would take that opening today over the stupid CGI 50th anniversary PowerPoint slide intro. The white open in 2003 was lame compared to the one from 88-99.

But how did trying to mute the TV lead to THAT video lol?🤣

Totally agree about Y&R GH needs a SMALLER cast with more focused stories that have clear direction, and a clear beginning middle and end date. With characters like Cyrus GH seems to be hot with them one minute, randomly abandoned them for months, and then randomly resume their story months later. B&B needs to abandon the Liam/Hope/Steffy; Brooke/Taylor/Ridge triangles and focus on the business of fashion, the drama of navigating celebrity-hood and more creative stories outside of romance. DAYS- i dont watch modern episodes

Some of her most disgusting moments were trying to force Miguel to make her drinks, when she was in denial about her alcoholism. Seen here: Nikki later attempted to fire Miguel, and Jack rehired him. She was also verbally condescending to the "maid" Veronica "Sarah" Landers What's also interesting about this scene is Neil pulling Dru away from Victor. At first she was this wild girl talking in the white writer's attempt to do slang, lol. In another episode, I think it was the masquerade ball, Neil apologizes to Victor for Drucilla's "english" to which Victor replies its delightful. Neil came off as a square black guy in corporate America seeking white approval. He loosened up a bit in the mid '90s though. I always thought he and Olivia should have been together since they were both the same kind of character. Malcolm and Drucilla would have been interesting for a while.

Yeah, its crazy that Katherine was without major storyline from around 1992-1997. At least Kay consistently had story from 1998-2013. Unfortunately those years were filled numerous nonsensical RETCONS Bad Move by Well Regarded William J Bell: Killing of Rex Sterling. Why? The show didn't benefit from this at all. We barely got flashbacks of Kay and Rex in the years following. Katherine still pined over Philip despite Rex being a considerably better husband. Another bad move: Killing off Cassandra. Even if she was written off the show at the time she could have came back in the future. She was really an old Hollywood beauty and the character could have been explored more.

I would love to see both Susan and Erika/Erica & Viki but shoehorning them unto GH is not the answer. Most of General Hospital's stunt casting has been unimpressive. The only stunt casted actor that actually does something is Maura West as Ava. Moreover, I have little confidence the current GH writing regime could do both characters justice. That being said... it would probably be more interesting to see Erica and Viki again rather than half the characters we have on canvas today.

I can only imagine Nikki vs Brooke! But Diane proved to be a formidable opponent during this time.

As bad as the LML era was, she was probably the best post bell EP, unless you give that to Maria Arena Bell. And that isn't saying much. What was it with John Abbott and picking terrible wives? Dina, Jill and then Gloria. Jessica was perhaps his best woman. John would definitely have been better off with Mamie, but maybe that wouldn't have made for interesting television. Bad move by WJ Bell: Missed character interactions. I like that '90s Y&R characters interacted in orbits, and everyone didn't know everybody. That way when two characters interacted things felt like a fresh opportunity. Certain characters would have been gold if they interacted. Don't know if it ever happened but Victor going to battle with Stephanie Forrester in a crossover would have been great. Sheila going up against Victor would have been interesting television.

Yeah that was really dumb, but I never mentioned it because the "well-regarded executive producer" William J Bell didn't do it. That was under the Lynn Marie Latham era I believe.

Cyrus killed Sam. Gee! How climactic.🙄

Totally agree with these. I heard it said that 1992 was the year that made the show popular because of Sheila's crossover? Is that accurate?

Agreed about Nikki, she was a I need a man housewife for a loooong time and grew snotty by the 90s. Her first step toward independence that I liked was joining Jabot in 2000. Nikki was really showing some independence especially in 2009 under MAB, only to have her leave Paul to pine for Victor againl

B&B: The best slap, and Stephanie destroying the vase with her cane afterwards (2005). What gets me is the intensity in Stephanie's despite faking the appearance of a feeble old woman.

I knew that was going to come up. It's true but at least they did realize that killing Cassie off really wasn't beneficial.

I see that Cassie's death did drive story helping break up Nick and Sharon, and putting Nick and Phyllis together. But it was a stunt move that really wasn't necessary. Seems like showrunners regret it because the actress was brought back in another role.

The email was DUMB! 2003-10 was bearable. Loved Stephanie's fake heart attack and discovering she was the true owner of Forrester. Loved Betty white as her mom. Brooke accidentally smashing Oliver was also great. Bold & Beautiful is among my top five favorite soaps. I know it's not the best. It's trashy salaciousness -- basically Inside Edition whereas ATWT was 60 minutes.. But for a period of time B&B was entertaining trash. Once Bold pivoted to Liam/Hope/Steffy, and Susan Flannery --the person who carried the show on her back-- left, it was all done. I cannot fathom how B&B remains the #2 soap. Must be carry over from The Young and the Restless and audience loyalty? Retaining that position must have poisoned Bradley's mind into thinking he's doing a good job, the same way Y&R's cast thinks the show is good because it's still #1.