P.J.

Well, since I had completely forgotten there were lyrics, no. But even after hearing them, all I can remember is "hold on to love".. JFC...is Maureen's death is like two solid weeks of misery. I mean, it's great misery. But I can't recall any soap ever wallowing like that before or after. And they damn sure never ran pictures of the character during the entire credits crawl. I don't know if that's respect for the actress or making sure all the doors are locked and bolted.

LOL...the '83 intro reminds me that the Lewises' showed up and existed before REVA.

I like the melody. I must have forgotten there were lyrics to it. It's not very deep, that's for sure.

Thanks!

While I agree the vets could have been better used (lol, it warms my heart to think Wagner didn't want to be in scenes dispensing advice to that lame brain Katie...) I don't think they were misused as badly as some do.

Exactly. That narrative exists well into the 70's as well. One of the stressors in Bob and Jennifer's marriage is the fact she *gasp!* wanted to continue her nursing career.

lol...the episode is 5/14/91. Although I guess i oversold it a bit, it's one soap opera day that she puts it all together, starting 5/10.

Granted, it's not a calendar year. I was a little iffy on when Johnny departed, because what I'm catching some eppys aren't around (sigh--huge bummer when you're into a story). Watching May '91, and in literally ONE episode, Alex is hit with three revelations--that Mindy miscarried Roger's child, that Alan-Michael and Henry have uncovered Roger's embezzling, and that Roger has another son. People rave about her blitzkrieg at the Country Club, but hearing Bev McKinsey growl "I want to rip out his lungs..." is FABULOUS.

Wow...I'd forgotten GL had such a mass exodus. In a little less than a year, they lost Reva, Josh, Philip, Beth, Rick, Johnny, Chelsea, and recast Alan-Michael with Rick Hearst. While Johnny and Chelsea are negligible, there's a lot of history tied up in the other characters. Major upheavals like that usually leave shows floundering.

Like all shows, it had highs and lows. I think it was better than some would give it credit for.

I'm sure I enjoyed it the first time around, but the last 5-6 years of GL just killed a lot of feeling that I had for the show. But be still my heart---Rick Hearst. And this is the Harley I really liked.

LOL...she plays someone called Mrs. Beasley? The Family Affair kid in me giggles. '94 is spotty. I fell down a rabbit hole trying to find out Carly's original origin story. Rosanna and Mike are annoying, and of course, just as we got to the point where Ro was going to find out Carly was her sister....there's a two/three week gap, and presto, Ro and Mike are back in Oakdale. And I admit to using google. LOL.

Man, 89-90 Guiding Light is kicking ass! I'm actually a little more than skeeved out by Roger/Mindy, but I'd forgotten how likeable Kimberly Simms is in the role. At least before this war with Alex starts.

The NY shows definitely had better access to talent, and they would pop up in different roles. Phyllis Somerville (who played Annabelle Fettle, the baby broker) was also in episodes in '94 when Mike and Ro went to Montana, and GL in '90 as a mouthy attendant at a Spa Blake went to. Who knows how many the shows hired over the years. But I'll always know Sara Ramirez as Hannah, who married Jack and Carly in Montana.

I'm sorry---I didn't mean to single you out. It just happened that I quoted your post. It's an open question for the board. I'm not sure what gets Hogan credit as doing anything different in terms of story. He egregiously retooled beloved characters to fit his stories, and after the first year, he pretty much recycled his own scripts. I will say, that ATWT under Goutman did some nice stand alone episodes (which at the time I hated, but have grown to appreciate, especially after watching GH's trainwrecks). But that's Goutman, not Sheffer. I guess I just credit Carolyn Culliton with Hogan's first year that felt fresh and revitalizing (although I now wonder how much of that was just spin from the soap press) and see the flaws in years 2-5 that signalled epic burnout.

Am I just dense? What kinds of story points did Sheffer do that "no one else would have"? Deal with two actresses pregnant at the same time? Puhleeze? (I wish people would remember, Sheffer didn't send Byrne to the Spa story because she was pregnant. She ended up getting pregnant and gave birth in September of 2002. In fairness, even Byrne seems to have forgotten this. Unless Sheffer had ESP, he sure as hell didn't know when he planned The Spa out Byrne was gonna get knocked up.) Otherwise, he ripped off movie plots (as soaps had done before; sigh, I didn't know until much later that GL ripped off major points of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof in the '80s with Reva/Lewises) and recycled himself. His writers seemed to like him. But reinvent soap opera he didn't.

Scott really should've had staying power, but after Joe Breen was fired, the writers seemed to regard the character as nuclear. It is an odd episode, having so much focus on the hokey wedding.

"biological twitchings".... :DEAD: I'd like to find more early Vanessa/Reva. Later, Vanessa slips into the "too much of a lady" to truly rip Reva a new piehole when she deserved it. Early Vanessa does seem like a bitch in search of a purpose. It isn't until much later that her old feelings for Ross even seemed sincere.

That's probably fair. Long wrote for her creations.

From what I've been able to revisit, I think Vanessa did need to be anchored to another family. I love Henry and Vanessa's relationship, but a grown woman can't run around town being besties with her "Daddy" indefinitely They kind of threw her at everyone when she started. If it was in pants and moved, Vanessa batted her eyes at it. Good grief, she even dated ED. (and not one of the cute Eds, Mart Hulswit's Ed, bless him.) Which they seem to have forgotten by the end of the 80's. I don't blame Billy for the shift in Vanessa, I blame Reva. Reva took over the "outrageous vixen" role the minute she stepped into town. And then I blame Matt. Vanessa caught "brain MIA disease" from him.

I'm sure part of it is that there are huge gaps in what I can find online (and both Clarke and Kincaid took breaks from the show more than I remembered), but DAMN. Vanessa tells him she's pregnant, and Billy's barely listening to her because he's suddenly obsessed with getting Reva out of the family (she's just married HB.) DAMN DAMN DAMN Pam Long and her obsession with Reva's magic vajayjay. Now I'm watching 89-90, and Billy's convinced he was still in love with Reva. JFC. And no one except Josh ever gets to read Reva for filth. SMH. Man, I thought ATWT's Jack and Carly had it rough. Vanessa put up with a lot of BS from Billy, that's for sure.

Nope. And I remember really liking VW in the role. I remember she got some sitcom that tanked, and had a couple of appearances on HIMYM.

Brandy was first brought on in 2001. She was paid by Nick Scudder to sleep with Adam and break up Adam and Abigail. She then just kind of hung around town. In April 2002, Craig pays her to start a diversion to let James escape the hospital, in exchange for information on Carly's whereabouts (while she was kidnapped in the Spa story). Paul and Bonnie were trying to get dirt on Marshall to get him to back out of the DA race against Jessica. Spoiler:

I love Billy and Vanessa, but they are always miserable. Or at least the clips I manage to catch.