P.J.

True enough...loved Hal! It's one of those weird coincidences. It's a good thing Phillip's "friendship" with Reva remained platonic---imagine the product of the father of Springfield with the mother of it. RME.

I just realized that had Mindy, Maureen and Reva not had miscarriages circa '84-'85 , Bill could've had a completely different set of friends. Granted, he'd have been uncle to Mindy's baby and nephew to Reva's, but still.

Honestly, Dinah ran rings around both Ross and Vanessa, which was ridiculous, given their own devious pasts. Not to mention Ross being a pseudo father to both Phillip and Sam, and Vanessa being stepmother to Mindy for years.

Yeah, OGVanessa ('80-mid'83) is a 180 degree turn from post-Billy Vanessa. She's basically Dinah, only with one parent. And more business sense.

Historically, Vanessa and Amanda don't like each other. When Van first came to town, she was conniving and set every woman's teeth on edge as she flirted with the men. Van's first target in town happened to be Ben McFerrin, who was married to Amanda at the time. Van doesn't break them up outright, but she strains the marriage. Then Van and Amanda butted heads at Spaulding. They never fought outright over a man, but they had lovers Ross and Mark Evans in common. OG Vanessa found Amanda boring (as she did anyone who Ross was interested in like Evie Stapleton or Carrie). Plus, Vanessa's a little more territorial about being Ross #1 ex...which sounds a little weird I know.

If you want to see Roger/Holly/Blake, I'd start at the beginning of '89 (or maybe even December '88, when I believe Holly returns. I just caught like Xmas '88 and Holly/Blake (Liz Dennehy) are getting along...) You'd definitely need to see Roger's return to Springfield, which I believe is May.

I don't understand why they didn't lean into the Nick/Eve story and play that out longer. I understand Hilary Edson isn't the most dynamic actress, but they could've still made her crazy over living in Mindy's (off-screen) shadow. Then bring Alex back, and have her see that Eve is off her spool, but Nick just think that Alex is that jealous and controlling that she no longer likes the woman she purposely brought back into her son's life.

I don't even blame her for trying to continue that story...but you can't just hand the part to an actress without screen testing her with VI. That's unforgivably stupid. How many times have the same co-stars not recreated the chemistry they had on show #1? No matter how well-regarded Crampton was, to my recollection, she'd never had romantic chem with anyone on Y&R.

No problem! SOD recaps always leave a lot to be desired. The early ones read like a cheap novel, and the later ones will ignore stories points deemed "unimportant". I only know this so well because it's also around the time Billy proposes to Vanessa. In fact, Dylan has taken Bill for the night so Billy can have some "alone time" with Van. Dylan and Bill don't exactly interrupt---but Billy and Van's night is cut a little short when they bring news of Reva's medical crisis.

Well...that piece on Crampton sure doesn't age well. For a minute I thought they got Crampton confused with Eileen Davidson. I mean...c'mon. Crampton was okay on Y&R, but "most respected"? I knew I hated Peter Barton for a reason. (God, he ruined Lauren...RUINED.)

Just to clarify---Harley didn't lure Dylan down to the Keys. He went after Reva suffered some kind of medical issue due to the medication for her post-partum depression. Dylan was on parole, and couldn't go until Billy persuaded his parole officer to let him. Reva (back to suffering PPD unnoticed) then arranged for Sam to come down as a surprise for Dylan.

Yes, Evie fell and knocked herself unconscious after seeing Ben and Hope saying goodbye (Hope returned to CA to college, which I assume was Robin Mattson's exit). But per the SOD recaps, her deteriorating eyesight (and loss of some motor skills) was "due to a fungus related to meningitis" and had an 80 percent chance of going blind ...which sounds... strange. She was Ed's patient, a Dr. Lathrop diagnosed her. Justin was a cardiologist (among his patients are Jackie's father Emmett and Henry Chamberlain), at least until his '90 return when they turned him into an infectious disease specialist.

Thanks!! You really are amazing!!

I think she overexposed Reva practically from minute one. And then the Lewises really literally revolved around Reva. The Kyle Sampson story. He literally arrived with a built in entourage that no one GAFF about. Then he ate the town. I hate that they rewrote Billy's parentage to shoe horn Kyle into a family. Couldn't he have been just a businessman looking to takeover Lewis Oil, who used Reva but then they fell in love? Killing Lujack. Look, I get VI was a hit with the audience. But honestly, enough so that the role was unrecastable? Permanently? Puh-leeze. Greg was the doctor Rita had a fling with, correct? Which Mark was this?

It is. I like Rebecca and Trish. I think I know what you're referring to--after the oil rig disaster, Vanessa is left to deal with the press, and while she gives a strong, prepared statement, when one of the reporters asks how she identifies with the women who lost their husbands, it kind of rattles her. After, Ross asks her how it went and she cracks a little bit about how she is human. Which is really kind of sweet, as Vanessa had been a bitch on wheels for a lot of the year.

While there's not enough of Vanessa/Ed (and I mean Maeve and Mart) for me to judge---I think it would've been fascinating to see Vanessa and Rita go at each other. I have never found a scene of Maeve and Lenore interacting, even though they were on for maybe a year together, and Rita realized that Vanessa was snooping into who Alan slept with in Jamaica(?).

Warren got enough, at least in the beginning. He stole Lesley Ann away from Floyd and married her, and he was sleeping with Alex when she first came to town. I'm not sure how long it went on, but he was not a eunuch.

In 1982, Vanessa is very much used to advance other plots. While it's not exactly out-of-character, she's markedly colder and more controlling. She does thaw a bit towards the end of the year. By the end of the year, she has mended some fences with Ross, which is nice to see. I do wonder where Marland would've taken Vanessa had he stayed. He'd reset both Nola and Ross...so he did like to give his gray characters a redemption. I've caught some more of Trish and early Trish/Ross, and can't help but think they mishandled them. It seems like Chris Bernau's exit kind of stymied the progression of their romance, as they now don't really have an outside enemy to fight against. Warren started out as a slimy user, and somehow got involved with Alan, who used him to set up Ross on drug charges. He's then involved in trying to use the Dreaming Death research as a bio-weapon, (or something, I'm not revisiting that RME story to get deets...lol) and then he's Alex's henchman who comes up with a way to force the Chamberlains out of Spaulding (or at least selling their controlling interest) by making Quint and Henry think Vanessa could still face charges over the Josslyn Electronics kickbacks. He was always trying to curry Alex's favor, hoping to become a kept man.

Who asked about the character of Gina? This is from 1984 (in spite of what the title says)

Am I wrong in remembering that Sofia Landon-Geier wanted to leave, but was surprised that Diane was killed? It might've made more sense in the end to kill off Andy for the murder mystery, which could've involved nearly all the same characters. Then again, Andy was connected to Holly and Barbara. At some point, they could've been reintroduced. And recasting Landon was bound to be difficult.

Vanessa knew Andy was married to and had abused Trish (which made her sleeping with him squeamish), but we didn't find that out until just before Trish came to town. I'm not sure when exactly Andy blew into town, but Trish doesn't show up until June/July of '81. Critiques are always of their time, but I side-eye this one more than a little. You can't let the fans dictate story. And the irony of complaining about the "younger set" when that must include Nola, who ends up being one of GL's most beloved heroine kind of proves Marland's point from that interview. I do agree with one point, which IMO really plagued GL until it's finale---the inability to create new villains with legs. In the '80's with Roger gone and Alan's running in and out---Warren Andrews is not the answer. Maybe Ted LePlat wasn't either, but at least bringing him back (and I just saw an episode where Josh mentions that Andy is up for parole) would've played on established history. And it might've given Trish and Katie something to do, and kept them in town longer. I will say, the one thing that might've given Andy a path to be redeemed somewhat, was his friendship with Hope.

Well, Carrie was a 180 degree turn from Vanessa (ambitious, calculating, controlling) and Amanda (pretty neurotic and someone he had personally wronged). I do wonder why Ross ended up believing Carrie over Justin, but I guess that's how drama works.... Yeah, thinking about it, it's a little weird that they're friends, as Josh had been holding Leslie Ann's past over her head, and intent on screwing over Floyd in the process. Not to mention him trying to bust up her friend Kelly's marriage. They had been around each other since the days of Wired for Sound, if not exactly "friends". I think Hillary was just one of those characters (like Maureen later) who is a friend to all, and accepts you if you're making the effort to be better than you were in the past. Josh took Hillary to Quint and Nola's engagement ball. That shot in the opening credits has Billy kissing her hand (in case you can't tell who it is.)

I don't think Kelly and Hillary slept together. He friend-zoned her. I think the only other woman he ever slept with on the show was Claire. '87-'88...I guess Sonni/Solita was having plenty of sex, but yeah, I think the AIDS epidemic kind of cooled things off, characters no longer just slinging it around. Harley came on pregnant, Dinah wasn't having sex, and I wouldn't have called Elizabeth Dennehy's Blake a vixen. Meredith had slept with Phillip once, but otherwise the show was filled (or filling) with good girls like Jessie, Dinah and Chelsea. I'm not sure I'd call '82 anti-sex...but other than Quint/Nola, it seemed anti-romance. Ed/Mo are together, but I wouldn't call them chemistry magnets. Ross' wife is murderous one-third of the time, Vanessa is either pathetically needy or a stalker, Amanda does the dirty in her mother's bed, but *yawn*, and Evie simply thinks about Ben and makes moon eyes.

Thanks! Maybe I'll try and pay more attention to the Martin the German teacher storyline when I go through early '83-ish. It's just a bit bizarre that what I read was so damn specific. Someone got their wires crossed somewhere.

According to an SOD recap, Josh made a pass at Vanessa when he first moseyed to town. But I've never seen it personally, and it would've been when Anna Stuart was in the role, so I'm not sure it counts. But yeah, neither Josh or Tony was letting the grass grow beneath their feet, so to speak, from '81-'83.