Paul Raven

Thanks @DRW50 'There's nothing really wrong with Kathy except for mental and physical exhaustion'. Meta, that's a lot actually. The Roberts need to invest in a 3 seater sofa -it was kinda squashy. Not sure what was going on in the Grant's living room set. Were those curtains and a bamboo blind, or some sort of wall feature? @Reverend Ruthledge Would love to read the 50's stuff. Enjoyed your summaries of TGL in the radio thread.

Well, the Hastings brothers had been in the business since the radio days. I wonder how close Bob and Don were as they were on opposite coasts for decades.

They could have done the 'Penny's mother befriends Afton with the intent of stealing the baby, seeing it as the grandchild she never had. Losing your daughter due to an illegal abortion might be enough to tip her over the edge. JR double crossed so many people that there was a huge pool of victims wanting revenge. Imagine if 3 or 4 of them hooked up and devised an elaborate scheme to divest JR of all his assets. And of course because JR has to ultimately win, they could turn against each other.

Looking back at the one and done episodes in the early days, Garrison (Ellie's brother) came to my attention. He was killed off. But later I think it would have been interesting for a son/daughter to appear. Better than Jack/Jamie Ewing? Any other early plots that could have been utilised later on?

There is so much rubbish on Facebook about all the soaps eg 'Peter Bergman's heartbreaking decision to leave Y&R' etc so I'm inclined not to believe it.

Well they didn't explain back from the dead or why Matt now had a different face again so that would not be an issue. Did they approach Rick Hearst? Again, I'll state there was zero reason for Matt to be in this story especially if Hearst was not available. At least then they could have used flashbacks to bolster the story. Otherwise forget it. Roger should have played a new character.

Miss Ellie did have a brother Garrison who came and went in one episode early on.

The ratings are not high. The show is #1 by default. I wish they took more care in recasting Billy than just grabbing JT because he was popular on GH and the previous Billy was a bust. Actually I think Micheal Roark who played Travis and is now Jeremy on Days would have been a better choice. Jason Thompson is too old and dour for Billy who was always more light hearted when Billy Miller played him.

10 years! What did we do to deserve that? The writing and Thompson's take on Billy make the character insufferable. Today we have Tessa announcing she's divorcing Mariah. WTH is that storyline? Camryn is hardly ever on and we still don't know what happened after months. Awful. I know it's budget but the show's treatment of children is terrible. They're never seen apart from Harrison. If we saw Tessa as a mother to a young child, Sharon as a grandmother we might feel the emotion of the 'story' than just having the kids referred to (or not). So much wrong with Y&R.

They are almost a year ahead of what is playing so those two couples will probably get a lot of story in that time. Maybe by then it will feel right to let them go. The reverse of this is when young couples are front burnered and go through so much story in a few years that they are prematurely played out but stay onscreen for more marriages/divorces and affairs .

One thing is that Ashley is the only young white female on the show and I think they are conscious of having that onscreen.

The 1981/82 season was a struggle for NBC. It was the end of the Fred Silverman era that had produced more misses than hits. Apart from Hill St Blues, NBC's only hits Real People, Different Strokes, Facts of Life debuted several seasons before so Silverman hadn't replenished the schedule. Apparently the pilot line-up for Fall 81 was so uninspired that NBC announced Rock Hudson, James Arness, Angie Dickinson in shows they had no title or clear concepts for. There seemed to be a budget freeze as NBC had no big theatrical releases, splashy mini series, TV movies and specials. And only a few back up shows. They also had bad luck with Powers of Matthew Star and Devlin Connection delayed to the following season which left gaps to fill. Those shows bombed any way. Compared to the following season's schedule with Family Ties, Cheers, St Elsewhere, Knight Rider, Remington Steele all debuting. None of them were huge hits but building blocks in NBC's ultimate success.

I dislike characters 'fading away'. If Derek is a goner, and I'm not sure he is, a couple of farewell scenes should be written where he decides to leave town for a better job, or be closer to sick parent etc. It seldom makes sense when character just disappear.

#67 Palms Precinct. This was a failed pilot that NBC programmed Fri @10 against Falcon Crest and Strike Force. It starred Sharon Gless and Steve Ryan as police inspectors in mythical Palms City CA. #52 Mork & Mindy. After a ratings bump early in the season with a marriage and birth viewers tuned out and ABC later tried Police Squad and No Soap, Radio in that timeslot, bumping M&M off the schedule. #47 Fame, Debut episode. Despite good reviews that show never took off, coming distant second to Magnum.

That was a pretty standard week with no special programming of note. As for Dynasty, at that point it was winning it's timeslot but usually finishing somewhere between 20th and 30th-it hadn't broken through yet. One explanation for the lower rating was that it hadn't aired the week before so maybe a bit of momentum was lost? Anyway it continued to slowly grow throughout the season moving into the Top 20 on occasion but it wasn't till the May finale episodes that it exploded, finishing at #2 for the final two episodes. NBC was having trouble on Friday and Saturday nights but what possessed them to program the movie The Late Show Sat @9?It was a repeat of a box office flop that had rated poorly the first time around. Surely they could have found something with a bit more ratings potential? Barbara Mandrell had won it's timeslot and they squandered that. CBS programmed a repeat of Foul Play and ABC Love Boat.