Mitch64

Bolger was good..just not as Phillip..he came off as older then Phillip (who along with all of the 4 Ms, forgot they should be college students) I dont remember any scenes with him and Rick, its like they were no longer friends. He was one of the few guys who had that kind of chemistry with MKA..but they threw her at Simon and tried to get him back with Beth, who he had no chemistry with. It would have been nice for Phillip and India to have a love/hate relationship of fighting and sex, for a bit before they found someone with proper chemistry with Bolger, and of course, India had Alan waiting for her, which I thought was interesting but they didnt do anything with it.

A proper recast for Alex, who pulls the strings behind the scenes (and doesnt HATE Amanda like MarjAlex did) would be great..at that point I see her having her fingers in the pie just to make sure it all doesnt go to hell. My rival for Phillip would be my fan fiction of a kid of Ed and Ritas. Somehow Roger got a hold of him, made him think he was Alan's kid ( I would think Rita would push him as someone who could get a piece of the Spaulding) and secretly raised him to HATE Spaulding and work to take them all down...of course the truth comes out that he is Ed's kid, so we have a "bad" Bauer who is Phillip's match, and Rick is stuck in the middle trying to make a relationship with the brother who HATEs his best bud.

During Taggert Alan mentions Amanda as his "daughter" while that most likely is a writers slip up, I like to think it was a retcon. They never have Alex, on any of her frequent trips back mention Amanda as my sister, etc. I know they just want to forget it and Amanda was probematic in her marriage to Roger (i.e. MADD's decree that Roger will never be mentioned again..) Again, they could have easily brought her back with a handwave from Alex or Alan saying it was a trick from Brandon. There is Amanda, AM and ALL the various offspring Phillip created. Plus head of family means head of Spaulding. I would have thought it interesting if Phillip becomes more like Alan (but in the gray area he always was, not outright cartoon villain RR Alan) and AM comes back with more of his Bauer coming out and wanting to do things on the up and up..maybe AM became a lawyer like his grandfather in the missing years...and Amanda could play both sides against the other. But also they could have brought someone like Kyle Sampson back to rival Phillip and the Spaulding (maybe Amanda married him) but then, of course there would be ANOTHER man horning after long in the tooth Reva!

Well, you wont be happy at all because I think Marcus of all people shows up..you know they have to have a scene were Dahlia is swimming and Marcus joins her..despite the fact that he is a decade older then her. You could tell they were trying to make them the next big thing but then, just dropped it. The whole wedding was also one of the reason McLaibey was so short term.

I would have to say FD was the luckiest man in daytime who stayed way past any reason for him to be there, but yes, totally agree that Alan should have died at that point, which would have spared us more years on mustache twirling bombasity. I know it was a big get to bring Joan Collins on, and I loved her Alex, but it would have been great at that point if they had just brought Amanda back. Phillip is named by Alan and Alex as the successor or head of family and head of the corporation, with the board and investors approval. Amanda (who is back to being Alan's daughter, it was one last "screw you" from Brandon to try to get Alan and Alex at each others throats) gets pissed and comes back to stake her claim and be a thorn in everyone's side. Meanwhile Liv is suddenly REALLY interested in Phillip as he will have a longer self life then Alan. Things unfold much as they did with Amanda coming back to thwart Liv as Alex did..and when the truth comes out Alan really does have a heart attack and kicks (for real, for good, no fake outs, no returns, he's dead..dead.) and then AM comes back (as Taggert originally planned before Weston came to stink up the place.) to make his claim also. Phillip' guilt over Alan's death and having no final reconciliation ( On his death bed Alan could say, "I am proud of you son, you have finally become a real Spaulding," right before he kicks. ) I also agree that Phillip was not always likable, which really I give GA credit for being brave enough to make him that way, which is exactly how Phillip should be. Ed and Chelle were there, but she ran off the plane to chase J...(I kid you not, that is why we started calling her Slutchelle) and Ed ran after her. The reason they, and no one else was at the wedding was obviously to save money, so it would have made more sense to have it on an existing set then that dumb Universal Studios thing.

Agreed that Phillip most definately needed to stay on the canvas if GA was going to play him. Too much history going back to the Dobsons there. Also, they were not hamstrung on Phillip/Beth the way they were on Jeva, so the characters had room to move on to others logically and stay in each others orbits...(I am not saying what they chose to do with Beth in Ruachieville was good but..) I think Reva should have been brought back to cause trouble for Josh and Annie, go through angst, get together with Josh and leave town together. There was no where else to go with them after that as post Annie is when all the ridiculous things happened to keep them on screen. But Zimmer had been in Hollywood where a Khan said about O'leary..."Realized they couldnt get arrested" lol and she was bound and determined to keep going (not that I blame her, a check is a check) and the Jeva nuts (prompted by Zimmer and Newman at times) would scream if they were off screen for 5 minutes. The only possible story for Reva was for Josh to be killed or for him to finally have enough of her and leave town. I thought Reva was most interesting during that weird post RN period when she broke up with Kyle and was living with Cane...she had jobs, she was involved with a lot of different people and was not always the center of the story.

Oh, poor Henry had to wait for the grave to finally come "out"! The whole things was McTavish plot dictated so that Hart could have money to pull off his scam of Roger later. The fortune is totally forgotten later. Which reminds me WHY did they fire Hilliard who actually could kinda pass for a midwestern farm boy..from JOISEY Grillo? AM and Lucy's wedding has got to be the weirdest wedding up to that point and really exemplified the McLaiby cheesy run. Universal Studios? And the Spauldings shut the place down for the wedding that only involves 6 people??? Its not even that weird that Bridget and David arent there...they didn't even invite AM's Mom or Grandfather...

Eve was one of those characters that had the "Jessie Brewer"role. They had heavy storyline, they burned through it and now they are there for support and a touchstone in the community (Marland wanted to give Jessie story, but I agree with Monty...she best served in her connecting role, and keeping that damn Amy Vining busy so she keeps her nose out of things) So charcters are important and why they should have kept characters like Bridget around (even as she is more volatiles then Eve) who didnt need a big storyline but could have been behind the bar making connections and expostion, but Rauch wanted JEVA/JEVA/JEVA and DRAMA (which to him meant a lot of yelling and stupidity.)

This is where McLaibey falls apart. It becomes clear that McTavish had not thought past Brent/Marion...so the energy drops and she starts throwing things at the wall (Blakes twins, Lonatrat.) Fans HATED this funeral. Everyone is mad at everyone else, which is fine, the death of a beloved community figure would give people a reason to come together...(Quint and Nola could come together at least for a bit to support each other, Nola and VAn could finally admit they kinda, sorta like each other) Its just an example of McTavish's mean writing. I have a feeling they were going to make Dahlia Frank's kid but they chickened out. Making Tina a prostitute didn't help, they could have been lovers when they were young but felt society pressure to part. Marcus took over David's role (you can't have two young black men at that time...) Get used to it...this will happen, the same storyline over and over until the end.

Oh Hope..I remember Ben, and well, he has been the pass around boy for 15 months..THAT might be why he is not into you that much.

Thanks, interesting and so believable (no Lonatrat or Clones...)Instead of the Lewis family he should have made the Oil family Granger...even if the audience didn't remember that one off character it would have been interesting to tie it into the fictional GL world.

Oh but those "Pharleys" were very adamant that they stay together and be featured everyday (though I did like their websites and the recaps they gave each day.) I agree, they were interesting at first, but the longer it went on the more Harley became this sad sack jealous wife, the more Phillip became a dumb Josh type character torn between two women and the more Beth became a pathetic looser chasing her ex. I think after Beth came back it would have been an interesting triangle of three "good" people trying to find a way, and I did like the "Who killed Carl" and how Harley and Beth had to work together there, but we all know Phillip would have dumped Harley to get together with Beth, Harley would have been hurt but dusted herself off and moved on, and eventually Beth and Phillip would implode. They didn't bring back one Reardon or Bauer for Mo's funeral...did anyone think they would waste money and energy on poor sad Nadine?

I HATED Infinity (I could care less about Kyle Sampson and his hanger ons and the dumb Lujack video, and Mindy and Kurt were strong armed into being a fave couple and married off way too soon (Jeva didnt get that big of a wedding.) I did like the Fishing Mystery (despite the changing of history..it was murky enough that it could be fudged) and the Cabin mystery started out good ..I thought Tony was hot and I liked Annabelle, it had supernatural elements but they did not overtake the story (i.e. Reva traveling through time..) and I love a gothic mystery.. however, it was bizarre that nosy Nola wasnt in the mix...she barely seemed interested that her sister in law was psychic, there may be ghosts in her brothers house, etc. I don't know if there was a behind the scenes issue with Brown and Kobe, or if Long just wanst interested or felt tied up writing for Quola. I would have had Quint blow up in the cabin instead of Hillary but..The big problem that the end result was...boring. Okay so there are black Spauldings..and they disappeared...so what now? Not only was J gross...(I can't believe the actor IS actually just as obnoxious as J) they made Chelle into an airhead horn dog going after her cousin. Yes, by adoption but still her cousin. I wondered why she was not calling Nola "Aunt" when she first arrived, and they barely acknowledge each other ( I would think Nola would glomb on to mothering her sister's daughter, especially with Stacy not in town, much to Ed's chagrin) but it was in service to...this??? Wait until Chele gets all horny for an angel...oyyyy! No one else in town reacted to Nadine's death,, cause Deas had to have his big dumb over the top reaction scene to Deenie's death. I can't imaging watching that scnene and thinking he was a good actor!

She was the Town Historian, who knew a bit too much about Brandon and the infamous cottage. SF was still a pretty normal place at that time, with Nola and Reva being the most outrageous citizens....seems that Carrie Pipper would have stood out a bit more for people.

ANYTHING to get her off the screen..she COULD have been interesting if she and Van had a few face offs..(there was a mild one of her going back to work...but I wanted something meatier "Bitch, I am Vanessa Chamberlain and I don't take advice from someone who followed the..career path you did!" I did like Alex's outright disdain for her.

That era is so weird...they made a big deal out of all three of those characters and then they just..disappeared! Not that I am complaining. We talk about the bad out of character writing for Alex under JFP..but this was one example that may have led them to write her being so obsessive with Nick. WHY would Alex accept Flock of Seagulls guy as her brother? They had her in one scene (setting up the Alan return) complain that Alan abandoned her...she blackmailed him into leaving town and she had been angry at him for helping Brandon with Lujack and also using Spaulding for that dumb dreaming death thing. Endless scenes of her with Simon, I can't believe Bev wasn't bored to death! I would also add Pam writing the scene where she lets Ms. Sally die in front of her to protect Alan and the writing for Alex could be screwy even before JFP.

This leads to one of my favorite scenes ever...I won't spoil it but it is a very clever meta moment unmasking Brent to the cops...(it may have happened.) Also you already saw one of my favorite lines..."You, you think I'm a LESBIAN???" even crazy Brent is shocked that Lucy is that dumb, and only crazy Brent would be pissed at being mistaken for gay instead of being a psychotic rapist /killer. Hate that scene, made both adult women look like morons. Amanda is way too subtle for that, I could see her egging emotional Blake into doing that and making a fool of herself in front of everyone. The whole story would have been more fun if Amanda was manipulating Blake to look like the Blake of old. One of McLaiby's biggest mistakes is what they do to Bridget, who grew up since having Peter and loosing Maureen and running a business.I remember Liabson saying in the press..."The Bridget we know is back" but that was over, and being more adult does not mean you have to be boring..she was even less feisty here, she just looks pathetic. This story is so gross... and too bad too, cause Griffin is sexy as hell. I can see Viv getting steamed on him but.... There is a spectrum of sexuality that some people can go in and out of, depending on special people they may find attractive...and we can leave it at that. I never trust the long distance girlfriend boyfriend but I hope he is happy and settled. I would have HATED the Abby storyline. He raped and killed too many people to be "reformed," and to have anyone in SF accept him or trust him after that would make them look like morons.

I like Jed Allan, it has to be someone who can play authority but "good" authority to oppose Alan's bad. As mentioned upthread, can you imagine how it would have been with Alan and Mike against each other, with Roger in the mix. But I would have had Roger, ever the opportunist to try to take advantage of their fighting to make his own headway. Maybe that could have been the storyline, Mike involved with Alex, but the constant fighting with Alan causes a rift (she like Mike fighting Alan when it is to her advantage, but he can be a bit self righteous and I can see him demanding her to disavow Alan publicly..) so that is how Roger lands in her bed, much to the consternation of BOTH Alan and Mike. I would like to have a woman of a certain age being fought over by two men (really three if you count Alan.

Actually, the boardinghouse kitchen set was used up to 1985 when the Reardon's were all written out but Maureen. It then came back (different set) when Bea came back when Chelsea was introduced..after Long came back the second time and wrote Bea off, it disapeared (there was brief scene years later of Mo and Chelsea in a portion of the kitchen that looked totally different again..) until right after the custody battle of Peter ended, and Ed gave the deed of Company and the Boardinghouse to Bridget. (How I remember all this but can't remember peoples' birthdays...) Rauch got rid of the kitchen set..(because really, would Cassie or Reva ever use it) but when they saddled poor Nola with the stalking Buzz storyline..and made her a pathetic sad sack...she had a galley kitchen in her sad room in the Boardinghouse..for..whatever reason but obviously to make her look more pathetic.

Your right, as opposed to other matriarchs, even Nancy Hughes, Bert had a vital life outside of her family. She wasn't just sitting in her kitchen waiting for someone to stop by and cry. She volunteered, and later (thanks actually to Pam Long) had a job running the Patient Advocacy program, had friends, it didn't seem weird if she was at a party or an event, (with Nancy even with Marland it was like she was tagging along and every felt responsible for including her) Bert was kind of a role model for aging gracefully and independently. I dont understand why they didnt bring a recast Mike and Hope back when Alan returned. Your right, his animosity towards Ed and his branch, seemed forced....but not as much as the years of Alan hating on the Lewis family, then even worse, the Coopers..(like they would be a match for Alan..they would be totally beneath his notice.) They should have had Mike in constant oppostion to Alan and Roger (Ed was too docile and had his own problems at home) especially if Alan was involved with Alex.

I think they were going with a Hope recast as they mentioned a "change of character" which I can only assume meant stronger. I think ER even by that time had..uh, not the soap look and I think a Hope who went to New York and started her own business needed a recast with a strong actress who could play a character taking on Alan (so weird that Bert's death was the perfect time of Hope to come home, maybe move into "Grandma's" old house.) But GL just made every slip it could during that time. That's why JFP got rid of Maureen with the excuse she was boring, as she was a soap rarity, a stay at home Mom (even Kim Hughes had a glam job) that harkened back to the Bert Bauer/Alice Horton/Nancy Hughes days. The focus group would obvisously find her boring as they weren't aware of the context of her role and just watching her serve coffee and be a should to cry on..well, soap audiences were already dumbed down and wanted clones and possessions. Funny thing is that I only started to like post resurrection Reva when they made her more support..bouncing in between different characters and timing things together without a huge story(I will forget her miracle baby and foisting Brad Cole on her) If GL was around today Kimmer would have been the Bert Bauer of the show (which was also funny as she bitched that they were trying to turn her into that in 97, but it was more soccer mom (which never suited Reva) then earthy woman who had lived a full life they could have made her later.

Actaully...Charita's death came as a BIG suprise...she was only 62 (she was one of those people who looked a certain age when she was young and never got older) and THAT is not old...(at least, not to me now.) Everyone thought she was okay (she died from complications from diabetes) and Charita, like Bert, was counted on to always be the "up person" who everyone counted on so she didn't let on to anyone about how ill she was post surgery. As a matter of face Gail Kobe killed Hillary, wrote off Mike and recast (disasterously) Ed as she thought people would tune in to her new GL as long as Charita/Bert was there (which is why it took them so long to do let Bert die offscreen...they didn't know what the hell to do.)

You mean when they dress her to look like someone's Mom trying to copy the look of a soap opera character (Van is not Nola but she would never dress like a frump) Or when Matt is chasing Hottie Beth and Van instead of kicking him to the curb, ponders if she needs plastic surgery? Or when they put her in a coma with Carmen's bad poison lip balm and she has to just lay there for weeks while people talk over her? Not paranoid at all but why did Rauch bring her back from her leave unless that was in her contract. I heard she left on the leave for a combo of reasons,she felt that Van's story was over once she got with Matt (disagree) she had hip surgery I think (hence the bed) and problems with Moniz...all rumors of course. But not the first time you thought "Annoying" but I 'm good with THAT!!!! : )

Oh Contessa...now you know how the rest of us sometimes feel ...though we may not say it....plus, I prefer to be annoying then boring!! Blame JFP and Buzz...Nadine was connected but once the "Super Duper Cooper" take over of 93 (?) she was stuck in that diner (as we were) pining over Buzz while Deas threw his hands up, Frankie D stood there with a blank look in his face and NuEleni was just wondering when she would get some lines. Did anyone besides the Coopers (and if you havent seen Deas over acting when he finds out that Nadine has been fish food for months you aint seen nothing yet) react to her death? Bridget, Nadine, Ed (who was Billy's counselor during his marriage to Nadine.. Someone set Ed up by hitting him on the noggin and planting an empty booze bottle in his car. This was when they were wasting David on that nobody character I forgot her name. Is that when Nola brought a Hula Hoop to the funeral. Why did anyone in SF or especially Salem ever go to a funeral when a body was not recovered. "Fool me once, shame on you,"

Not an assumption..it was a question or a "supposition," so I should have placed a question mark on that. However, it's not hard to question your likes on Otalia and I have read you credit that to Wheeler and Hurst. It is quasi incestuous, in much the same way Blake and Rick were. The only thing with that is that Blake and Rick were sorased and when playing brother and sister they were kid actors if they had any scenes at all. Alan's antagonism toward Beth and her antipathy towards him lasted years..as adults (or young adults for Beth..which adds to it..Beth was so young when Alan and she met and then he became a middle aged serve for her) the only reason Alan liked Beth slightly is that he hated Harley more and felt Harley was trash. He paid the step father that raped her money, made it look like she was dead so no one looked for her, etc. Not to mention RR looked every year of his age (no insult in that, its natural) and it was...distasteful to see them making out and banging and them "in love.' (it did get better when she started banging Coop and Alan blackmailed her into marriage again...)Reva and H.B. would have been that nasty if we watched 20 years of them. I realize that GL was riddled with bad writing from around 93 onward, and ramped up during the Rauch years, but that doesn't make this any better. Good description...I may not have liked all of Long (obscuring the Bauers, and the Reardon's and Reva Obsession) but you could feel her energy when she was writing...I have read several people say, and I remember it too, they knew when she first came back to the show in 86/87 or her first episode after the strike..it was just that kind of energy.Same with Marland, I remember watching ATWT when he first took over and the characters were smarter and more integrated with each other.