soapfan770

So happy to at least have Nina and Gina back for this, actually really surprised to have Patty Weaver at all. Don’t get me started on this aggravating show lol.

Don’t forgot our favorite Dynasty reject had a recurring role in Season 5! 🤣 There’s so much wrong with Season 5 of the top a lot of it was boring melodrama. So many good ideas went to waste and season fell into stagnancy. The back half after Apollonia, Father Chris (what was the point?!?) and Robin left was a lot better, but by that point I’ll say the show had teetered into the crime/mystery format with the 80’s synth music the show feels like it’s setting up for the Freilich era to start. The high points of the season for me are Emma and Dwayne, Chao-Li’s daughter which was cut too short, and well Peter and Angela. The show still did well with 55+ crowd from the demos I’ve seen, and well it was implied Peter and Angela had sex (more than once). Perhaps Cesar Romero and Jane Wyman together was comfort food instead of what Miami Vice for the older demos.

Something I was wondering about after recently rewatching a few season 2 episodes when they reaired on Plex’s soap channel the other day but what did everything think about Jane Elliot’s Judy Trent character? I kind of wished that Knots had at least gotten some more mileage out of Elliot and I could’ve easily seen Mills and Elliot having a good feud for at least a season, but Judy was just an obstacle really for Abby.

Thanks @kalbir! I knew we had this data already but sometimes it’s hard to find the exact page lol. For the most part definitely lighter fare ruled above the heavier dramas. Obviously NBC sitcoms and MSW, but also Highway to Heaven, the CBS Monday night lineup were favorites here. ABC Tuesdays were slowly taking shape. Knots Landing was the only stable primetime soap I see for these 1st weeks. LOL. I’d also throw in the fact that Falcon Crest wasn’t completely obliterated by the “new hotness” either i.e. Moonlighting killing off Riptide this season or Mangum’s complete collapse. The Retro TV Listings group also posted the start of the 84-85 season as well. It’s probably already posted too but I’ll share it again. I’m actually surprised Paper Dolls started off decently.

Jack and Jennifer was probably the one classic Days super couple that got stifled the most this century. The whole Africa affair thing, Jennifer and Colin, Jack pretending to be gay for Greta, and Jack purchasing a talk show for Jennifer wall over the top and strange as it was, but of course once JER came back Jack was killed off three years in a row. Then later died a 4th time which gave way to Jennifer & Daniel which still makes me 🤢 to this day. I mean I am glad that Jack and Jennifer finally stabilized these days but it took wayyyy too long to recover from the chaos of the mid-00’s. Oh and @carolineg and @dc11786 I agree with both of your assessments about the 2009-11 period of the show. I do think Sweeney, Zucker, Bjorn, Rogers, and Koslow deserve most if not all credit for carrying the show on their backs during that period but they never seem to get recognized for that era.

No kidding. I think some ideas might have been sounded good on paper but none of it was executed well. JR and Cliff fighting over who was going to clean up an oil spill was nonsensical, JR being JR and pointlessly cheating on Cally with that lady from the move Spaceballs was just dumb, Ellie and Clayton going around solving the mystery of the week, wasting Lesley-Anne Down’s talent etc. None of it was good.

I vaguely recall Ron a few years later retconned the story a few years later by having Dorian reveal she killed Victor and that the guy was an imposter, but he didn’t go further than that. What a mess. I blame Josh Griffith as that is totally up his alley.

Le sighed agreed 100% I was at least interested when Casey Denault returned and both Lucy and April were drawn in but the show made them look so foolish once all the schemes went bust. Then later came the ridiculous triangle between Lucy, Cally, and Elizabeth Taylor’s son. I loathe that particular season of Dallas and I think it’s the 2nd worst season after the 87-88 season. I was a bit shocked Knots’ final season actually mention Lucy a couple times though, especially when Mac asked about in the wake of Val being presumed dead.

Here’s an article regarding the Golden Girls debut and surrounding ratings: NBC STARTS FAST IN RATINGS RACE By LEE MARGULIES Sept. 18, 1985 TIMES STAFF WRITER NBC’s bid to unseat CBS as the prime-time ratings champion got off to a zippy preseason start last week as three of its new series placed first, third and 13th in the audience popularity ratings, figures from the A.C. Nielsen Co. showed Tuesday. The premiere of “The Golden Girls,” dubbed by many critics as the best new comedy of the season, was the most watched program of the week, attracting viewers in 21.5 million homes on Saturday night. “The Golden Girls,” which stars Bea Arthur, Betty White, Rue McClanahan and Estelle Getty as single women living together in Miami, scored the highest premiere ratings for any NBC comedy since the 1974 debut of “Chico and the Man,” the network said. The new comedy that followed it on NBC Saturday, “227,” finished third, with a rerun of “The Cosby Show” coming in second. “Hell Town,” the other NBC series that debuted last week, ranked 13th among the week’s 61 prime-time network programs. In all, NBC captured the top four spots and 11 of the top 15 on Nielsen’s weekly ratings list. Its programs were seen in an average of 12.6 million homes, compared to 12 million for ABC and 10.7 million for CBS. CBS’ presentation of “Death of a Salesman” on Sunday night, with Dustin Hoffman recreating his Broadway performance as Willy Loman, ranked 25th for the week, drawing an audience of about 12.1 million homes. CBS has won the prime-time ratings race for six years running but this year expects a strong challenge from NBC, which moved up to second last season after nine years in third. NBC has now captured 16 of the last 17 weeks, including one tie. CBS’ ratings typically dip during the summer, however, in part because its popular soap operas--”Dallas,” “Falcon Crest” and “Knots Landing”--do not perform well in repeats. The 1985-86 TV season doesn’t begin officially until Monday, even though NBC unveiled three of its new series last week and another nine are debuting this week, including four tonight on CBS. So, much of the programming is still reruns, meaning that the preseason ratings for new shows are not necessarily indicative of how well they will do against regular competition. TELEVISION RATINGS Here are the ratings for national prime-time television last week (Sept. 9 through 15), as compiled by the A. C. Nielsen Co. Each rating point is said by Nielsen to represent 859,000 homes, or 1% of the 85.9 million U.S. households that have TV. Network Rating Program 1. The Golden Girls NBC 25.0 2. The Cosby Show NBC 24.6 3. 227 NBC 23.8 4. “Miss America Pageant” NBC 23.7 5. Monday Night Football ABC 20.7 6. “Barbara Walters Special” ABC 20.3 7. 60 Minutes CBS 19.6 8. “Lady Blue” ABC 19.2 9. Cheers NBC 19.1 10. Family Ties NBC 18.8 11. Facts of Life NBC 18.7 12. “Back to Next Saturday” NBC 18.1 13. Hell Town NBC 17.5 14. Highway to Heaven NBC 16.8 15. Gimme a Break NBC 16.7 16. “Gambler--Adventure Continues,” Part II CBS 16.4 17. Who’s the Boss? ABC 15.3 18. “Love Child” NBC 15.1 19. Newhart CBS 15.0 20. Kate & Allie CBS 15.0 21. NFL Football (Thu.) ABC 14.8 22. Hill Street Blues NBC 14.7 23. Moonlighting ABC 14.7 24. NFL Football CBS 14.5 25. “Death of a Salesman” CBS 14.5 26. Three’s a Crowd ABC 14.1 27. Scarecrow & Mrs. King CBS 14.0 28. Remington Steele NBC 13.1 29. Simon & Simon CBS 13.0 30. “Life’s Embarrassing Moments” ABC 12.9 31. Hotel ABC 12.9 32. “Brass” CBS 12.9 33. Miami Vice NBC 12.8 34. OceanQuest NBC 12.8 35. “ABC All-Star Spectacular” ABC 12.7 36. Cagney & Lacey CBS 12.6 37. “The Cannonball Run” CBS 12.5 38. Webster ABC 12.3 39. Knight Rider NBC 12.2 40. A-Team NBC 12.2 41. “American Almanac” NBC 12.0 42. Mr. Belvedere ABC 11.8 43. “Secrets of a Married Man” NBC 11.6 44. TV Bloopers & Practical Jokes NBC 11.6 45. Hometown CBS 11.2 46. Silver Spoons NBC 11.2 47. West 57th CBS 11.1 48. Magnum, P.I. CBS 11.1 49. Riptide NBC 11.1 50. “J.O.E. & the Colonel” ABC 11.0 51. Hardcastle & McCormick ABC 10.6 52. Benson ABC 10.5 53. I Had Three Wives CBS 10.5 54. Airwolf CBS 8.6 55. Punky Brewster NBC 8.5 56. “In Like Flynn” ABC 8.4 57. Love Boat ABC 8.2 58. “Illusions” CBS 7.8 59. Ripley’s Believe It or Not ABC 7.7 60. Motown Revue NBC 7.1 61. “Saturday Morning Preview” CBS 5.1

The deaths of Damian and Chance really left me in the cold. This is the first time I’ve stopped watching Y&R for stretch since the summer of 2012 when the Victor/Sharon/Tucker insanity crap happened. All that needs to be said.

I always still remember the very homoerotic friendship of Vinny and Thomas from a few years ago. Of course they made Vinny so obsessed with Thomas that Vinny sacrificed himself to ensure Liam took the blame for his death. What a mess that story was!

Is this show even worthwhile watching anymore? I read a couple recaps from this past week and it made my stomach churn….

Weird CBS just about eliminated FBI nigbt while the NCIS shows live on although Hawaii was canceled last year for being too expensive. Matlock and Elsbeth are about the only things I watch on CBS primetime anymore though.

Always thought It’s Your Move only ever aired on Saturday nights, didn’t realize it originally started out on Wednesdays. The rest of the schedule is pretty much self explanatory. Had I been in ABC programming Paper Dolls definitely should have definitely aired after Dynasty on Wednesday nights while Hotel could’ve been bumped to Tuesday nights or to Saturday nights with the Love Boat. Obviously a crappy washed up show like Glitter was just destined to be cancelled in that Thursday night timeslot.

I literally spit out my evening beverage here laughing at the idea of Leslie running over Ridge with Thudley using his “empty dark Muholland Drive” cliche he’s used repeatedly before 🤣

On the flip side Reva’s return also gave GL an additional 14 year lifeline. Idk it’s hard to say because by 1995 the show was on the downhill and it needed a jolt to the arm with Reva back from the dead and again in 1996 it was in serious cancellation territory yet got another serious jolt to the whole system with Reva/Josh/Annie. Problem was the show kept going for shock and awe like it was Melrose Place and just ran out of steam. I had wondered if P&G ever asked Judi to stop AW (at that point Paulina being written bad) to rejoin GL, but I can imagine Rauch pushing back especially given Judi’s weight issues at the time. Had Judi rejoined GL in late 1997, I can just imagine Rauch dictating a heyday between Harley, Blake, Amanda, Vanessa and Dinah joking how fat Beth had gotten. Yikes.

August 1997 is also when the show took a break of new episodes and instead for a couple weeks their new episodes consisted of “recap” episodes where characters narrated what was going on their stories were. I was definitely disappointed to see Elaine and Paula written out not long after after but honestly by December’97 the show gained momentum going into Terror island and the Olivia/Caitlin baby swap.

Some great choices here all around. I’ll add a few I didn’t see listed: ATWT: Margaret Reed’s return as Shannon in 1994 was a complete disaster. I mean I suppose it was a good thing that we found out Shannon’s head wasn’t shrunken by Lilith after all, but the whole story was such a disappointment and she was gone within a year. I’ll save the 2000’s character returns for another time, but Scott Bryce was failed by inept writing and management. AW: RKK’s return. Nothing else needs to be said. Also the Anne/Frankie story was….weird… B&B: Too many failed returns to count lol Days: Crystal Chappell’s return as Carly became a rather sloppy disappointing mess. GL: The waste of Robert Gentry’s Ed and Susan Pratt as Claire in their returns. For returning characters, Alan-Michael in 2005 turned into a big WTF. Y&R: Hmm another tough one. Poor David Tom in 2014. Malcolm returns but is now played by Eddie Winslow. Stafford’s return in 2019 is a return no one asked for.

@DRW50 @Vee @BetterForgotten Is Josh Griffith is biggest hack in soap history? For years I remember so many people always sung his praises until his 2012-13 Y&R stint went awry along with his earlier very disappointing 2003 OLTL return with Malone, but now looking back I do believe Josh Griffith has pretty much faked his way over the last 30+ years even going back to his Santa Barbara days and absolutely deserves no credit whatsoever.

That’s what happens when decent actors actually get decent writing compared to what we get from JG anymore.

THIS. For whatever reason Noah is such a failed character just like Abby.

My god. Well at least we have one person (that being Da Stafford ©️) happy on the prospects of a Stafford/Howarth pairing 🤣😂🙃

Going back to @kalbir mentioning about the upcoming 40th anniversary of the 85-86 season, what a difference between December 1984 and December 1985:

I’ve always been interested in how some of these primetime soaps were programmed in the 80’s. The big four were strategically placed and other than The Colby’s and Knots airing against each other in the fall of ‘86 none of the soaps ever really compete against each other. Wednesdays were for a midweek escape from reality with Dynasty. Thursdays were for some wonderful adult drama on Knots Landing. Fridays were for a way to unwind from the week with some wine with the double bill of Dallas and Falcon Crest. Yet the attempts to do a soap on either Monday, Tuesday, and Saturdays are failed. Some of these shows weren’t the best, and obviously Saturday nights weren’t the most ideal. On the flip side the 90’s soaps were all over the place. Melrose found success with its 8PM Monday night slot and “Mondays are a bitch” campaign, 90210 and POF did well enough on Wednesdays, and Sisters managed alright with Saturdays. Later on Providence did will with an 8PM Friday night slot. Wasn’t until 2004 we finally got a Sunday night soap with Desperate Housewives. I wonder if anyone in the 80’s had ever thought of programming a soap on Sun nights.

Pretty much my thought too my friend. I still remember Howarth getting hired at ATWT and Barbara Bloom boasting about how many ABC stars she had hired for all 4 soaps at the time. None of them lasted long except we were stuck with Howarth till the very end. (Don’t get me started on Brian Gaskill lol) Other than PB, MCE at her height of popularity there 2014-2016 when she was paired with Justin Hartley, and I guess B-listers like Thompson and Heinle for better or worse, has any major ABC star ever even made a lasting impression on Y&R? All the ones I can think of outright always flopped.