soapfan770

Thanks for sharing those 1984 videos Carl. Always like seeing young Lauren with her bad sexy self and always enjoy seeing Brenda's Jill pre-Alexis Jill phase. I had forgotten about that ladder story, I think there was big ambiguity over whether or not Jill's fall was an accident or not due to the fact the baby was possibly Jack's. I guess Jill did make up for it in the end with Billy a decade later. I'm not sure when the sainthood of Katherine began, growing up she was always a wicked old lady to me. If I had to pick a point in time when it started, my guess is when Katherine went into hiding and wound up in the homeless shelter with Mac.

The weirdest bit came from the Alden/Smith years when I think either Victor or Jack invited a Muslim businessman to a Fourth of July party and discussed with Neil what American life and freedom meant to him in light of the 9/11 attacks.

One more thing I got from this scene about Traci inquiring about Lauren from Ashley was a completely missed opportunity to do a possibly huge story--a Lauren/Brad/Ashley triangle, with Epperson as Ashley of course. IT could have come very easily together, would have been sexy, and would have created a ton of priceless drama.

Haha I loved the scene with Ashley and Traci talking about Sheila. I forget how isolated the story was, it's pretty surprising I guess it didn't all become about a certain sister of Scott......but I guess that would be one too many psychos at once.

From May 1986: http://s685.photobucket.com/user/dustyr87/media/gl860525.jpg.html'>

In addition to it being the 50th anniversary of GH, it's also the 50th anniversary of The Doctors. Too bad the show met an early end because the show always had a truly talented major cast over the years--or would we have Pamela K. Long come write for the show and make Nola the star while Reilly come aboard in 1993 to save the soap. I've always been fascinated by the fact The Doctors won the first Daytime Emmys and also had a major supercouple even prior to Doug and Julie's height.

I can't remember if this has been posted, but I'll repost again but this is from the March 1978 SOD's synopsis of what was going on the show thirty-five years ago this month(give or take):

Can some light be shed on the Vanessa/Alan/Reva triangle from late 1987? I've always been curious about the short-lived storyline cut abruptly by Kinkead's exit. I've seen the Christmas 1987 episode(all about Johnny dying!!) where Alan quietly surprises Reva with gifts but haven't been able to ever get too much information on the actual details of the story.

It was Tom's decision to leave because the show was offering her bad terms during contract negotiations so she jumped ship. One more thing I should mention is I did always like was Nick and Sharon. My biggest problem is Nick and Sharon were married for ten years (1996-2006, they celebrated their tenth I recall) but spent at least eight of them engaged in some sort infidelity story of sorts. Nick and Sharon were at their best during the Cassie story and later on in 2003 when it was Nick&Sharon vs. Victor&Nikki.

Heh I love reading this thread the most, I don't know where to start replying lol. Let me say this about Y&R's redeemed characters is what made them work best was the fact they continued to be gray characters haunted by their pasts. The two most prominent examples of this are Michael and Phyllis. For years Michael spent most over of his time hanging with the other lowlifes (ie Phyllis, Diane, Isabella) and his attempts at being good for Christine were always hampered by his selfishness and poor judgment(becoming Victor's goon in 2003). Phyllis reorganized her life but still had the edge she always carried, and always haunted by her past whether it was having nightmares upon being jail for the pool-house arson in 2002 or breaking down before Danny in 2003 about how much she has improved yet couldn't take back the past. I had enjoyed the creep-fest that was Kevin Fischer as the perp terrorized GC and found the bizarre relationship he had with Lauren quite chilling. I wasn't entirely against a redemption arc of Kevin yet the show went about it wrong on so many levels. The whole fake rescue of Lily, Colleen in 2006 and Gina in 2009 both being belittled for their criticism of Kevin, Kevin never truly owning up or even apologizing etc. Yeah Kevin saved Collen's life when Jana tried to kill the both of them but beyond that Kevin in my eyes never lost it all and his redemption was always on shaky grounds being he was always up to no good, yet somehow under LML and MAB this became comical(falling in love with Jana, gambling, Angelo & Angelina, stealing Katherine's money). Then again after 2005 both Michael and Phyllis were no longer written as tortured characters and until the past year their history was for whatever reason was swept under the rug. Maybe by doing that it made it easier to keep Kevin around for so long. Don't even get me started on the writing for Adam for the last five years. As for Y&R 2004, well what a mess. The show had its moments that year but so many things went so terrible or stupid. The Bobby/Brittney hour was unusual, the Jill/Katherine/Arthur/Harrison story ended in disaster, the less said about Malcolm's return from the dead the better. Maybe Nikki and Sharon digging through the sewers of Genoa City looking for Cameron Kirsten's body was the perfect image of the show that year. The mistakes of 2004 of course lead Smith to panic come up the oh so brilliant ideas of killing off Cassie and writing a return of Sheila, thus leading to the downfall of the show. I refuse to believe Victoria was at the creative dead end at the end of 2003. Sure Victoria hadn't been in a leading story for a good year but letting Tom get away was a big mistake on the show's behalf as Tom continued on a successful career with OLTL and B&B.

Just of out curiosity what did you guys think of Nancy Pinkerton in the role of Dorothy Connors? I know Pinkerton had some popular runs at other soaps her role on ATWT was her last soap role and didn't last a long time either. Most I've really seen is her breakdown at the trial and confession to murdering Whit. Does anyone also think the McColl family could have lasted a lot longer than they did?

Oh its the same one I got the details mixed up while posting about something else lol but it was with the Jack Kiley character who she tried to date and the he repeated tried to harass and attack her and in the middle of all of it Fletcher saved her life. It's been so long but I didn't like the story.

Vanessa and Fletcher are such an odd pairing...I hate when Vanessa is written as weak too. I think Fletcher and Vanessa paired up around the same time Vanessa was sexually assaulted in the park by a mentally ill man and decided to not press charges wanting to keep it secret and avoid attention. Then when it was exposed her assaulter got a lot of sympathy to his past and Vanessa ended up dumping Fletcher on their wedding day. I think the assaulter finally went to jail but it was just a strange story and I enjoy Vanessa more when had to tangle with Billy, Ross, Alan, Roger etc. than stories like this, or her endless comas and dying, Matt/Beth etc. Out of all the women Fletcher romanced(everyone but Reva it seems) I think the only one I liked was his relationship with McKinsey's Alex.

Looking back it seems sadly so many of the Spectra stories have been long forgotten sadly. I enjoyed the Anthony/Ivana debacle as it played out (the strange scary letters) even though it had a traumatizing climax (Sally being shot), and enjoyed it when Grant got his revenge on the Forresters by showing up at Spectra with the entire Forrester collection for sale. Actually, it's sad that so many of B&B's secondary stores have been lost even though I feel a lot them supported the show more than the main Forrester story.

That's because at the time they were still writing for Victoria, not the hot mess shell of a character they write for now. Heinle is a miscast but she has had her moments and I did like her pairing with JT in a way. It was Latham who started around 2007 writing for Heinle's strengths that weakened Victoria a lot and pairing her with Miller has been a disaster for the character. I'm surprised Victor didn't think of bringing back Cole to town to break up Billy and Victoria instead of the mess played out on screen.

According to what I have, Chuck was indeed on the show and was played by three different actors, Don Chastain, Michael Ebert, and Bob Kaliban in the late 1960s all before Jennifer first appeared.

Its been forever since I've posted some of my stuff, so I'll start by sharing these profiles that were shared in Soap News in the late 90s:

Thanks, it was not too long ago I caught her in an early Law and Order rerun as a guest star.

Thanks for sharing those 1994 episodes. The Jessica/Duncan/Shannon stuff always makes me sick and it's interesting that Rosanna had pretty much always known of Carly's existence but had just thought of her as her cousin I hadn't remembered any of that. I seem to recall Finn Carter returned as Sierra to exit Craig out in early '95 anyone else remember?

I thought Lauren was pretty pointless on B&B until they had her working for Spectra and the triangle with Eric and Stephanie. But then the whole Johnny/Rush caper made her pointless again and she vanished for a good year before popping up again on Y&R and wouldn't get an actual storyline again until 2003. James/Sheila/Stephanie was pure gold although I hated they aborted Sheila's redemption tale just to have her go wayyy overboard for her exit. I have to wonder what would have happened though if Sheila had expanded her sights on someone else like Brad or even Paul.

Anyone ever wonder if instead of turning Sheila completely psycho they had a just kept on as a viable villainess instead on the show? I wonder how she could have continued to fit in or if going to B&B was really the best thing for her.

I've found myself looking into OLTL more and more have found it fascinating to watch because my original dismissal was the show didn't seem that serious but looking back some the material has been incredible to watch.. I know Carl had wanted to hear some of my thoughts, so far from the material I've seen in the late 80s and early 90s OLTL's style reminds me of Days and to some extent B&B. I only know of Fiona Hutchinson from GL as I loved Jenna but this scene blew me away in-spite of not even knowing the circumstances of the story of why she was leaving town. I know this has been posted many times in other threads but I'm in love with it, especially Hutchinson and the background music:

Eh, I didn't care much for John and Barbara either I think the pairing grew from their rescue of Lisa from Martin Chedwyn in Hong Kong. I remember feeling sorry for Lisa when she walked in on them sharing an intimate moment. The John Dixon Jr. story was pretty stark I have to wonder if this is why CZP said she felt revitalized when Sheffer took over and later on with her pairing with Henry. In spite of the negative reception and some pretty bad performances, both Bronson Picket and Rosalyn Sanchez both grew after their ATWT roles to have some success in primetime and cable. Mike and Lily was a go until Hensley's return. Funny I've been rewatching Season 1 of Charmed and Shawn Christian played one of Piper's pre-Leo boyfriends for a few episodes and he was horrific, pretty much giving the same performance he did on ATWT and on Days now.

They really did a number on Diego didn't they? From Sam's sexy therapist to Emily's rapist to the international terrorist who "murdered" Damian in a span of a year. I have some Feb 97 eps of the CBS soaps around the time of Diego's murder and during a "Men of CBS Daytime" promo a shirtless Pickett is featured as ATWT's hottie. Ick. This was right before Holden's return which if I recall right was New Year's '97. Paul and Sara don't seem too bad here, and I liked the little bit at the end there with Connor and Kirk. Bianca got a mention later on by way of James Stenbeck when confronting Lucinda upon his return.