Khan

Ceara is probably the best role (on daytime) that GF has ever played that wasn't named "Laura." But I still maintain that one reason why Agnes Nixon wrote the incest storyline for her was because she wasn't working as the gold-digging tramp who was after David Rampal for his money; and once that story concluded, and Ceara had mellowed and wed Jeremy, she just sort of faded away (likely because the network was determined to bring GF back to GH).

If you ask me - and I know you didn't, lol - I think Max is in deeper trouble than even they are letting on and that it's only a matter of time before the whole operation collapses and sold off for parts. Of course, this will mean the end of HBO and all traces of it.

FreeVee re-aired old soaps? I had no idea, lol! Basically, what I'm talking about is SoapNet, but in app form, and not restricted to the ABC shows. Whatever is out there and available, including even old episodes of international soaps! They could call it "Sudz," or "Serial Bowl," or some [!@#$%^&*] like that.

I wonder how successful a FAST service devoted solely to re-airing old soaps would be. (I say FAST, because I, for one, abhor having to subscribe/pay money to watch TV shows, lol.)

I look at it this way: Michele Val Jean must see something in Ron Carlivati's work that most of us don't, or else she wouldn't have hired him. Same goes for Bob Guza and Julie Hanan Carruthers. This show is too important to MVJ to place even portions of it in less-than-worthy hands. That does not mean I've become an RC fan of all sudden. It just means that I'm willing to trust MVJ's judgment, simply because her track record and commitment to BTG tell me that I should.

I agree. IIRC, too, they even discovered (or RE-discovered) taped footage of Super Bowl I, decades after all the footage had been deemed "lost."

I might have said this before, but I thought it was odd how easily they kept going back to "Melissa is unstable," especially when I don't think Ana-Alicia was all that good at playing that kind of story.

Exactly. "Cosby" didn't exactly put an end to the way family sitcoms had been produced before; it just added an upwardly mobile, African-American family to the mix. "Roseanne," on the other hand, was the first sitcom of any era to show what it REALLY meant to be a family in America. That's why I always gravitated toward "Roseanne" more than I did toward "Cosby." Even though I'm African-American, "Roseanne" just did a better job of depicting families like mine and my peers'.

Like so many other sitcoms from that era, "Who's the Boss?" and "Growing Pains" were pretty much shark bait once "Roseanne" took off. Say what you will about HER, but her show was probably the biggest game-changer, sitcom-wise, in the '80's, more so than even "The Cosby Show."

Again, you can't beat the short-and-sweet approach:

Unlike most of Frank's changes, however, ATWT's later openings didn't need trigger warnings for epilepsy sufferers.

If I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times: love can save the world, but it couldn't save GL, lol. Same here! Besides, as fond of GL as I'll always be, that epigram? Not so much.

It's in her book!

Basically, they were people who weren't good enough to be on "The Love Boat" (...and the original Sky Masterson).

I think ATWT's last opening was what all soaps need to be in this day and age: just a simple title card with some dramatic "sting" playing underneath (although, I could have done without the globe rolling across the title like some roll-on deodorant). And I LOVE Kim Zimmer's description of GL's last anniversary opening: a bunch of hairy-ass arms reaching out to other hairy-ass arms, lol.

As they say in France: "un chèque de paie est un chèque de paie".

Fred Silverman arrived at NBC looking for higher tone, and then settled for this:

I wish Cyrus' death had been one of those "City Confidential"-like killings, where the entire town bans together to bump him off; then, when the authorities step in to get to the bottom of things, everyone claims they were hiding under the same pool table when it happened, lol.

ICAM! And even Douglas Marland supposedly was aiming to "keep it simple" with his own soap, "The Soul Survivors," which he was working on at the time of his death; talking with SOD about his plans to focus only a handful of (meaning, 6-8) characters at the start rather than bombard viewers with a whole lot of characters they don't know and don't care about.

Years ago, I read an old article where Douglas Marland discussed GH, which he had just joined after writing THE DOCTORS. Among other things, he complained about the PJ/Steven Lars storyline, saying it was too coincidental that Peter and Diana Taylor would adopt Jeff and Heather Webber's baby, even though the adoption had occurred outside Port Charles. I wonder whether he felt the same about the storyline surrounding Philip's origins. IIRC, the Marlers and Spauldings all were living in Chicago at the time of Philip's birth and "adoption." Yet, it just so happened that Elizabeth and Jackie shared the same obstetrician (Dr. LaCrosse, maybe the best last name I've ever heard on any soap, lol); that Jackie's baby would be available (in Switzerland!) right at the same time that Alan and Elizabeth's own baby was stillborn (also in Switzerland!) and that all four would end up living in the same town again years later.

I agree. Of course, a lot of great moments in soap history have occurred during trials. But - like you said, @Chris B - those moments were outcomes of equally powerful storylines that built up to those moments. It's like with everything else that used to happen with soaps but doesn't anymore: you have to take all the necessary steps to get the audience to the point where they WILL care, or else it won't work.

That goes without saying. Frankly, I'm pissed that Cyrus is dead (for now). He didn't kill off nearly enough people.

An intriguing part of Laura's past that has never been fully exploited, IMO. It would've made so much more sense to tie Cyrus to that part of her life, for example, than to make him and Martin her insta-half-siblings.

I agree that it would have made more sense for Nancy to be opposed to Duncan and Jessica's relationship, but as another poster mentioned upthread, Lisa was more involved with the two - or at least with Duncan - than many others were (which says a lot about how Duncan was integrated with the rest of the ATWT cast, lol).