FrenchBug82

As I mentioned above, I genuinely believe it is indeed sometimes better for the audience to be in the dark and along for the ride. In this particular case though, the spectacular aspect of that storyline were those last episodes of the season. The meticulous planning, the tension that rises in us wondering where this is going and those spectacular one-on-one scenes. I woudn't trade that for a mystery on Val's sanity, even if I head on paper that it would have also been a good way to tell the story. Of course I wouldn't dare suggest this is why they never went there but I think that considering what we have seen of JVA's real-life body dysmorphia, it probably would have been delicate for them to write - especially since her thinness which could have been natural gives a different vibe in retrospect. Agree. Once more that is why I somewhat defend the Waleska story. He was a very very ordinary villain. The kind of a*****e that every Walmart has probably one of and every Trump rally a hundred of. He was a good fit for what Knots Landing was - more than drug runners, or snipers through a window or if I am honest the shenanigans on a talk show set or in the offices of a conglomerate. Granted KL had moved some from the initial concept of middle-class folks once Gary got his inheritance and Greg Summer became a leading character but nevertheless even Lotus Point had the feel of an ordinary workplace with ordinary people going about their lives. So very few of the plots that tried to take it up a notch worked well; KL was at its best when it was ordinary people in sometimes extraordinary situations.

Not to mention that I have a personal theory that them having Abby plant drugs on Harold was one of the things that resonated in Donna Mills that they didn't understand who Abby was and wasn't as a villain and that staying on much longer will lead them to villainize the character way beyond what she had worked so hard to establish and thus a factor for why she left. We have had that conversation before but while I agree on PP, I thought SB was good in the role. Specifically because of that mix between ordinary and nasty. Danny wasn't a larger-than-life charismatic villain. He was a small mediocre PoS that was making him feel better by belittling and abusing the women in his life. An ordinary guy who wasn't nearly as interesting as he thought he was but who was still a villain and a threat to those around him. This was, imo, a better fit for SB than Gregory on SB. He wasn't bad in that role but his pairings there required a bit more heat than he gives and he chose to carry the rich and powerful thing through coldness and it didn't quite always work for me. But he isn't a bad actor by any means. Definitely think the story would have been MUCH better structured that way. Definitely agree on the way you propose to remove the contrivances. My only caveat would be what I mentioned above. I think maybe Val's idiocy might have been easier to tolerate if the audience also didn't know for a while whether Danny was really a bad guy. If we have a doubt, we can accept that she would too. IMO They didn't keep the suspense long enough for me so every repeated scene of Val refusing to listen once we saw who he was ended up making her look worse and worse. So maybe up to the point of Gary's interference, they then show Danny "chancemeeting" Val and the audience groans thinking it is a contrivance until it is revealed later he did it intentionally, as you suggested.

If they had stretched the timeline they also should have stretched it for the audience: not knowing whether Danny was indeed nasty or whether the ex-wife was lying. The audience had a taste of who he was pretty quicky - a little longer would have also made it easier to forgive Val for believing in him.

Well, in all fairness, 80% of the plots made Val look like an idiot which she wasn't at the core. But I hear the fact she stubbornly sided with Danny over everyone's warnings made her look bad - the classic contrivance of this kind of plot. But keeping Gary and Val is what the show spent most of its run doing - sometimes well, sometimes heavily. Around that time I thought something like Greg's insta-daughter getting killed after one episode and us supposing to care about whatever dumb mystery there was over it was considerably suckier The Karen stalking storyline was also suckier, coz there wasn't any dramatic payoffs to it the way the Danny story had (arguably the only compelling moment came the following season and even that was cliche). And do not get me started with Aunt Ginny. I am not a FAN of the Waleska story but I don't think it is the worst they came up with

Of course if they are setting up a Gwen gets killed storyline, it might Abigail wearing a Gwen mask who gets killed because why not make it stupid and convoluted.

I actually thought she was pretty good on Titans, dreadful as that show was. She strikes me as someone for whom getting Baywatch was a career drawback in a way. Because of the pretty typecasting and the lazy acting it required, her projects after that were of lower grade than I think she would have been capable of had she focused on her craft for a few years after leaving OLTL. She had the basics and with a few more serious roles under her belt, she could have been a very strong lead for a good drama.

I don't think the Waleska story was well-constructed - the "coincidence" that Gary's phone date ended up being his ex-wife was a lazy contrivance - but honestly that's one of the few stories of the latter years that I remember vividly with some great moments - Danny vs Gary in the barn, the hilariously casual way the twins found out Gary was their father, the murder mystery. I am curious why there is so much hate for it. There were a lot worse plots around on the show during S11-12.

She might be actually pointing while pretending to hold her collar but I like my first reaction better that it looked to me there was a subtle clue that Nathalie was the only one not to point at anyone else.

It has yet to happen.

The first episode of the homeless story was actually pretty good to me. That half makeup scene was obvious but compelling. Indeed, it is when they went back to involving her in capers with that landlord that they lost the plot - quickly.

Do folks think Anne should not have been brought back for these last seasons? I didn't like all the caper stories and didn't find Nick nearly as amusing the writers clearly did but I never questioned Anne being around. Her relationship with Paige was interesting and made Paige a richer character and even if they abused it, the mutual dislike with Claudia made Claudia more interesting as well. The stories for her were often weak but the show was often weak in those years so it never occurred to me that they should have specifically written Anne out for good.

I am fine with standard-issue bland leading man that helps propel stories - and I mean I can buy women being into GV - IF they give him or the people around him decent story. Until now Eric, even under JA, was never given many compelling stories IMO

Another way they could cover JMW's maternity leave would be to have the people who made the Hope doll make a Steffy one, backburner her for a while but insert the Steffy doll in the background for family scenes where she should be there. Never been done before either!

AS MUCH? She attempted murder! Twice! Diane never was dangerous in that way.

While thinking-I-am-someone-else has been done before, that would be a creative way to get around a maternity leave, I'll grant them that.

He is perfectly capable of writing like this. He has in the past. But current-day Brad Bell suffers from terrible ADD AND obsessiveness. He gets one idea that is super enthusiastic about, shifts ALL his writing towards arriving there at the risk going extremely fast and then... he gets bored quickly when no new idea comes, drags the first story because he had thought about how exciting the climax would be without planning the aftermath and stops caring until he gets a new bright idea and wash, rinse, repeat. There is no smooth story rolling into each other; it is a succession of plots. Plots that are often fine on the merits but not integrated in a narrative. It is what he does with stunt-casting and new characters. It is what he does with big moments ("Sheila is Finn's mother! Never mind we killed him off because I have a new great idea for a twist!") Maybe he doesn't have the people around him able to channel his energy and ideas anymore or noone willing to tell him to discipline his writing. And he clearly doesn't have the right structure around him to balance the show and pace things properly, presumably because once he gets an idea he is super excited about, that's all he is focused on and he pressures his team to get there. I actually don't hate most of his ideas on paper, which is more than what I can say for every other HW right now. But the execution is insane and completely ADD.

That was my thought too. Another testimony of the little regard soaps are treated in the press that they thought people would only care about the cancellation of a decade-old show if there was a cameo by someone who later became famous.

Maybe I am becoming too socially conscious for my own good but did noone at Y&R pick up at the connotations of having a scene featuring a white woman hassling a black woman about touching/seeing her hair even after being told no? I know in context it made sense but that's a weird way to accidentally mimic a pretty common real-life microaggression without a trace of self-awareness

I hesitate to offer psychological diagnoses of someone I have never met but he strikes me as the kind of guy who probably thinks he is being funny. You can hear him scoff "Lighten up" at you if he hurts your feelings. Not necessarily malicious but gliding through life thinking of other people's feeling - or opinions as his constant whining about fan feedback on social media shows - as an inconvenience to his blessed existence where he should be able to say, joke and write about whatever he wants.

And he clearly hates Lindsey Godfrey. Imagine having to withdraw from your job for a year because you suffer mental health issues and THIS is the stuff they ask you to play when you feel strong enough to go back to work?

Or maybe no one is a bitch and Love and Family are complicated and everyone can do things they think are best that end up hurting others and people don't handle situations well enough that it doesn't escalate to the point no one knows how to step back from it. It is not movies where everything is black and white. Sometimes everyone can have a point and a reason to do what they do and be in good faith and still hurt people they care about in a way they can't take back. I am OK with the gossip but trying to assign blame on the dispute or pass judgement on how people are handling HH's passing, going to the funeral or not, without one single piece of information about the situation actually is seems rather futile to me.

I am confused about this. What are you referring to that happened during MW's stint that would make irredeemable? Coz as I remember it she was more pathetic than evil during that sting. Diane's two "bad acts" was stealing the sperm - happened under AD - and the pool house fire - under SW. There is nothing that happened after that that was problematic by soap standards. Yes. I am so glad people are seeing it too coz it has been driving me batty. As long as it is PR, it is irritating and misleading but fine. If they start writing her that way, as I suspect they intend to, then Ill be mad,

Why couldn't she just be the one daughter and Nelle an accidental misunderstanding? Nelle is dead and they have squeezed all the drama out of Nina blaming Carly for her "daughter"'s death. There is no need to reuse the uber-tired "forgotten twin" story device. Which show was the first one to do it?

In all fairness that's the problem with watching old soaps knowing full well what will prove lasting and will not.

This was not the twist. This was not even A twist. A twist is something that challenges what the audience believed or thought they knew until now. Finn dying was just something that happened - good or bad, depending on your take. And then there will be a twist. Imminently but we don't know when.