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From this extended promo, it looks like Sami has a busy week...

1 hour ago, KMan101 said:

I also always resented Daniel because I would have rather had Mike Horton. He could have been paired with Kate. Imagine THOSE fireworks! lol and then they could have done Mike vs. Lucas instead of Daniel vs. Lucas. 

 

Speaking of that, does anyone know why they didn't just cast Shawn Christian as Mike Horton? He's about the right age, and he doesn't look that dissimilar from the previous couple of Mikes. And like Daniel, Mike's a doctor...

30 minutes ago, carolineg said:

Wasn't AP's Austin just in Chad and Abby go to Paris or whatever on the Web App.  He doesn't look too bad here.  It's hard to find a pic but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯  He's still pretty good looking.

Thank you! I thought I might be the only one who thought Austin Peck was still hot. When I watched that web series, I could totally understand why Abby would consider cheating on smug, miserable Chad with him. I sure would!

Will and Sonny are kind of a-holes, aren't they? 

"We've got good news, Gabi!... We're moving to Arizona (and taking your daughter with us)."

Whoever wrote those Sami scenes today has a great grasp on her particular psychopathology. The scenes right after John's collapse, where she's unable to realize that he needs help and thinks that he just wants her to apologize--those rang so true to me, because my dad did something similar when my mom had a brain-cancer related seizure while they were arguing. My mom actually had to dial 911 mid-seizure, because my dad (who had Narcissistic Personality Disorder, just like Sami) thought she was just being angry at him. 

Eh, it could be worse. They could be bringing Greg Vaughan back. 

Today's show had double the normal number of cliffhangers. They didn't even end with Phillip's surprise appearance, because they had something to top it (that great scene with Sami and John). I feel like certain other soaps' writers need to watch Days to get lessons on how to get viewers excited about tuning in tomorrow. 

4 hours ago, WebberFan said:

 

She is awful. And so incredibly miscast in the role. Every scene she's in I'm just distracted by her line delivery and her bug eyes. She does this weird thing where she over pronounces every word? It's so bizarre to watch. Lulu was nearly unwatchable to me towards the end of JMB's run but ER... oof. 

I loved Rylan on Guiding Light, and I even liked the little bit that I saw of her Abby on Y&R (back when the character had a personality), but I totally agree with you that Lulu's a bad fit for her. She's great at playing fun, over-the-top characters (like spoiled heiresses Lizzie and Abby), but Lulu's written as such a mopey character who doesn't seem to have much of a life outside of being a wife and mother. 

That's a relief! Gabi's at the center of the stories that are working best right now (including that whole Gabi-Jake-Gwen-Chad quadrangle going on at the mansion), and she's the kind of character who can really drive storyline. I hope the show continues to give CB a lot of frontburner material, because she's one of the main reasons I watch Days. 

I guess this extended promo answers the "What happens to John?" question:

1 hour ago, Neil Johnson said:

There's nothing wrong with casting a deaf character.  That could have been great.  But in the 1980s, making her a villainess just didn't work.  I'm not even sure it would work in 2020.

 

I didn't watch Another World at the time, so I can't weigh in on the character of Brittany (whose storyline sounds terribly executed, at the very least). But I would LOVE to see a soap today introduce a deaf villainess/bad girl (and, of course, cast a deaf actress to play her).

I actually think that would work perfectly on Days, and Ron C would be the right writer to execute something like this. They could introduce Benjy Dimera's daughter, who would be deaf like her father. She would appear very sweet, and everyone in Salem would treat her with kindness mixed with pity. But after a few months, the audience would get the reveal that she's actually man-hungry, out for revenge, out to take over Dimera Enterprises, or all of the above. 

4 minutes ago, Paul Raven said:

Ron could have three guys i towels sitting on the bench at Horton Town Square...

I'm just waiting for the scene where the air conditioning goes out in Jake's shop, and he and Ben have to repair bikes in their underwear. 

5 minutes ago, Faulkner said:

GH actually came back pretty stable demo-wise, all things considered. Y&R’s return is what I’m most curious about.

Although when you see how GH managed to shed nearly 400,000 viewers between Monday and Friday, that's not a great sign...

4 minutes ago, AbcNbc247 said:

Lmaooo Ron was burnin' for those Ford brothers

Oh man, those Ford brother scenes! I can't tell if that was Ron or Frank's idea (or both), but so many of the scenes with them played out like gay porn setups: 

I swear Days must have at least one breakdown writer who's been tasked with finding ways to get Brandon Barash shirtless. Not that I'm complaining!

54 minutes ago, Mitch said:

I agree..maybe because Simon never could express any emotion besides that pursed lip thing..I really do think they did indeed need to recast Ed when Simon left, as it would almost be a start over for the character..why did they never bring the Ed before him back?

 

Parker's acceptance was gracious and a kind of FU to JFP, talking about the people writing in for Maureen, that's a hard line to walk. I wonder why no soap ever hired her for something?

They did recast Ed not long after Simon left in 1996, with Robert Gentry (who'd played Ed in the mid-1960s). For whatever reason, it didn't last long. I wasn't watching very frequently at the time, so I couldn't tell you why. 

1 hour ago, Paul Raven said:

Just watched the Kevin/Esther scene and the natural thing would have been for it to end in an embrace but instead they sat apart. Just have to get used to it...

I saw that episode too, and I thought the Kevin/Esther scenes were really good, as were the Jack/Victor scenes. The problem I'm still seeing with the show is that there's no forward narrative momentum--almost nothing in a given episode makes me excitedly think, "I wonder what will happen next!" From the two episodes I've seen this week, the only scenes that got me remotely curious to watch more were the ones where Phyllis and Amanda pull some dinosaur fossils out of a cardboard box--and in that case, I only wanted to see more because the storyline seemed so bonkers. But I guess bonkers is better than boring!

2 minutes ago, AbcNbc247 said:

To soon to tell. I thought she held her own in her scenes with Allie and Sami, but she did seem a little like a different character.

Exactly. I'll give Isabel Durant a few more days before I make any real judgments, but I do wish the directors had encouraged her to watch some clips of ORK's performance, just so she could get some of the character's vibe at first. Obviously, there will be a transition any time you change actors, but the show could have done a little more to help ease that transition. 

First impressions of nu-Claire: she seems like a pretty good actress, but she also seems to have retained almost none of the original Claire's personality traits. Which is pretty jarring since we just saw ORK onscreen two days ago.

Whoever had the brilliant idea of putting Jack and Jen in those scenes with Gwen deserves a raise. They were the funniest parts of a very entertaining episode today. 

I wonder if any actors under the age of 60 made the other two covers. 

1 hour ago, Fevuh said:

I only tuned in once in a while before COVID because everything was so boring and there were no "stories" on the story as my Granny used to say - we called thme the "Stories". and when I tuned in today for a couple of minutes today, there isn't anything I want to watch.  There's just nothing interesting.  I watched several of the classic episodes and it made me sad for the show that I knew.   Won't be coming back, it's too late for me.  The characters are just so boring.  There's just no fire.  This will be hard for people to stomach and it's just my opinion but the actors and characters and show are so much far worse than when Guiding Light was cancelled.  Far worse.  There was something likeable about that cast and people.  There is just nothing going on in Genoa City and no one I want to see.    

As you say, I think the main problem is that the characters are just so boring. What's more, most of them seem interchangeable. I think that's probably more of a writing problem than an acting problem (although the acting doesn't help). The younger cast in the 1980s included some actors who were a little green (like Lauralee Bell or Michael Damian), but you weren't ever in danger of confusing Cricket with Nina or Traci or Lauren--they were each very distinct character types with their own unique voices. 

Maybe I haven't watched enough of today's Y&R (because I do always get bored after a few minutes), but I just haven't seen much of that distinctive characterization. It's too bad they can't take more cues from Days, which has a young cast of female characters who all have their own voices. Even if you were just reading dialogue on the page, with no names attached, you'd be able to tell which belonged to Ciara or Claire or Allie or Gabi or Gwen. 

11 minutes ago, Vee said:

Can't wait to see the 30th attempt to "give Abby a new start"

I'm not a regular Y&R viewer, but I caught the first couple of minutes of today's episode on YouTube, and I have to ask: Hasn't Melissa Ordway been on this show for 7 years now? How has she not learned how to add inflection to her lines? 

2 minutes ago, Vee said:

 

I know!! Of all the actors for that?! To say nothing of the story being gross and unnecessary.

It's hilarious that THIS was CBS's idea for an inter-soap crossover event like the ones ABC had done so successfully: Amber and nu-Alison on Y&R, stripping and drugging Cane. What a surprise that didn't bring a ton of Y&R viewers over to ATWT!

4 minutes ago, Vee said:

 

She was a revelation in a recurring role on the brief OLTL 2.0 as a fast-talking TV producer in 2013. I thought she was a terrible drip before then, completely unsuited to Alison.

MS was just always so prim, I found it surreal whenever she had to talk about Alison's past as a meth-addicted porn star. And I still don't understand why ATWT kept Alison on the front burner in its waning years, while barely using Alexandra Chando's Maddie.