te.

I've been watching "Homefront" lately and despite all the critical acclaim hiding the fact, it is a soap. Part of me wonder if they had gone harder in the promo for the soapy angle rather than trying to be a critical darling it would've been more successful.

For now, no. It honestly wouldn't surprise me if it gets ready for the fall, but I also wouldn't be surprised if it's next year or fall. If it's replacing The Talk, well, that's a show they can literally end or extend as long as they need it.

This is what people easily forget. Prime time is diminishing at a faster rate than daytime; in fact, if Y&R rated as it does in daytime in prime time, it would be on the level of getting renewed these days. Soaps also frequently appear in the top ten lists on streamers - and as you say, they produce 260 episodes a year for a fraction of the costs of a similar 8-10 episode high-budget series. I mean, FreeVee taking a chance of Neighbours shows that they don't view it as a dead genre, but a lot will be about making the economics work out and getting as much as possible out of it (hence people talking about it re-airing in a late night slot).

This should've been done with some of the soaps that launched in the 90s - ie The City and Sunset Beach, since those were directed at the 18-34 demographic that had gotten a sudden interest in soaps due to the success of Beverly Hills, 90210 and Melrose Place, yet were airing in time slots (noon) that none of that audience were at home. Unfortunately, I think late airings wouldn't be as effective today, so I'd hope they would go all out on streaming too.

Well, The Talk at the very least. It's worth remembering that they brought Jerry O'Connell on as an attempt to differentiate it from other women talk shows and to boost ratings and it's still at the bottom. I don't see it surviving before B&B (plus, as others pointed out if The Gates does bomb it leaves them in a worse position without B&B to fall back on).

Another thought re: profitability and this being a majority black cast. In prime time we've seen a lot of shows break out that's either been majority black or black led like Empire or Abbott Elementary. However, the issue with these shows that attract a large African-American audience is that despite rating well, they don't attract premium advertisers because they're usually from low-income households. Star was essentially cancelled due to this. It was rating well in the 18-49 demographic, just not in high-income households making it unprofitable for prime time. Daytime doesn't have this issue; there's no pressure to attract higher income audiences because well, everybody needs and buys soap and that's the advertisers that it's supposed to sell to. So it makes sense to develop this from that perspective.

I think it's worth remembering that even if shows like The Talk is cheap, it literally has zero value beyond it's initial airing especially on streaming. Surely, that must be something CBS have taken into consideration with developing a new soap, particularly one they have a stake in.

I've had my IMDB account since 1999, so... Wiki didn't come until the mid-00s.

That was for prime time and they still have budget there to order scripts only to have them gathering dust. Ordering for daytime hasn't happened since... uh, when was the last time it was seriously even talked about to launch a new daytime soap?

I'm stunned that not only a new soap is being developed, but that it's being developed for broadcast. I assumed the next time we'd see a new soap would be for an online streamer! On one hand, it hasn't been ordered yet, but on the other hand would they bother putting it into development if they weren't viewing this as a sure thing to go to broadcast?

IIRC, it was because DvD's character has been in the same war as Tommy. Plus, they had already shown some rare flashbacks in relation with Mikey's amnesia on Suzanne's 50th anniversary.

I think it expands when the apartment complex explodes at least I think several people sleep there in the immediate aftermath (though maybe they got mattresses all over the floor I guess). The real beach house was bigger (it's torn down now since a few years back RIP), so I assume they just reverted it to the actual floor plan of that house. I'm guessing they wanted to downplay the size when Michael and Kimberly moved in to make it seem a bit more modest for their financial standing (but no one really cared lol).

A quick look at his Wiki and apparently he went to Betty Ford in the 90s. So he was an addict and probably affected his behavior off set. Hollywood might not care if you're an addict (a lot of actors have substance abuse issues), but once it impacts the production, you're toast. He mostly seemed to do guest spots, so I guess he could pull it together short term, but probably was a mess for longer productions. Aaron Spelling was loyal to actors, but after the Mod Squad movie he only threw him a bone for Vega$ and Fantasy Island and then didn't work with him again for 15 years until a guest spot on 7th Heaven.

Well, I randomly came across this today: Seemingly it's a short-lived attempt at a syndicated soap opera from 1995 starring Maree Cheatham, Raquel Gardner and Ash Adams. It's an adaptation of Mexican telenovelas Tu o nadie and Acapulco, Cuerpo y Alma and was presumably sold as either a package of 60 or 120 episodes. It wasn't successful, but I guess someone found the time to upload the series to YouTube in the 60 episodes format; I guess it's a bit of a curiosity as an attempt to break daytime soaps into the syndicated market.

Yup. They were so-called "satellite" hits. Shows that were in proximity of an actual huge hit and they fed off it - I think comedies also had an easier time to retain viewers because at worst they're mildly amusing to spend an half hour (while maybe doing something else), especially if you're not going to switch the channel anyway. NBC's Thursday murder night of Friends / Satellite Comedy / Seinfeld / Satellite Comedy / ER was a factory plant for these sort of "false" hits. What's funny about Coach is that they were going to reboot it a decade or so ago, but realised once giving it a direct-to-series order that it wasn't going to work. Allegedly the stars got paid for the entire episode order (I believe it was ten episodes), but I think only a pilot was filmed, if that.

I guess this falls under "Counterprogramming to try and sabotage another network, shows survival be damned", but scheduling Freshman Dorm / 2000 Malibu Road against Beverly Hills 90210 / Melrose Place during the late summer of '92. While 2000 Malibu Road outrated Melrose Place because that was getting weaker post-premiere, Freshman Dorm just bombed against The Summer of Deception (aka Douchebag Dylan and That Snake Kelly Gets It On), because how couldn't it? It just seemed like ruthless counterprogramming where they almost weren't that concerned with the success of their own shows as much as trying to damage the Fox line-up. It was summer, so it wasn't like there weren't other timeslots available... Okay, Freshman Dorm was maybe too young to last on CBS (though I could see it being a cute show to on early Sunday evening), but 2000 Malibu Road clearly had potential to replace the aging Knots Landing. Either way, both shows probably could've rated better away from the Fox line-up.

Interesting since in recent years the syndication number has been lowered to more like 80-90-ish episodes (ie three months of daily M-F stripped syndication), so there's a lot of examples in recent years of shows lasting four seasons.

Honestly, finding a new villain for a soap is not exactly a problem as long as they get the casting right. Sheila's just done way too much over the decades to be able to work as a character interacting with other characters on this show. Just start writing new villains with blank slates that can actually convincingly manipulate people without them looking dumb as hell as a result. With that said, Sheila will be back when Bradley needs a ratings boost.

I agree with you - once you start getting into the later part of the season when Amanda enters you there's a strong focus on the triangle (Alison / Billy / Amanda) and Jake and Jo. Other than that most of the cast starts going AWOL or just briefly appears. I think before they decided to go ahead with the Kimberly affair, Michael and Jane were also on consideration for the chopping block along with Rhonda and Matt. Matt probably won out because he's Darren Star's self-insert character, plus Rhonda started drifting from the show once she got with Terrance. TBH, they probably could've done something with her considering her professional dancer background (I guess they could've forced her into some sort of talent coach/agent role).

To be honest, I think Melrose would've been renewed for season 2 even without the Heather boost. It wasn't doing great, but looking at the other three dramas they launched that year - The Heights, Class of 96 and Key West, all bombed far worse than Melrose and networks rarely like to cancel all their new dramas (it's like admitting complete defeat). With that said, it probably would've had more of a The Colby's run of two-seasons-and-done as I'm sure they might've moved it from the safe space of the post-90210 halo. On a related note I've been watching failed soapy dramas this year and am on The Heights and Class of 96. I don't think either is too bad if you like these sort of early 90s shows. The Heights is probably trying to be a bit too heavy on the social issues of the day and in all honesty, I'm preferring Class of 96 as it feels a lot lighter (for now - I'm only two episodes in). Which is funny since "heavy" isn't a thing you'd normally associate with Aaron Spelling shows. You kind of have to wonder how something like The Heights would've turned out if Fox had more patience with it and it lasted into Melrose Place going full-on barmy soap. Even the mothership didn't escape Melrose's influence.

Sheila is just a well that's dry, yet they keep going back for no good reason. Soap psychos / short-term villains are probably the easiest characters to write for (if not cast). And in all honesty, a new character would probably make as much sense as Sheila doing these things.

The early episodes are a bit... earnest and most doesn't work due to them being in their 20s... learning lessons that you'd expect the kids on 90210 to learn, and as a result it sort of become cringe-worthy. 90210 suffered from this in their later seasons when they'd occasionally tried to do "Issue of the Week" storylines and all characters ended up looking dumb as hell (like when Kelly had to explain to Donna about street prostutition in season 8).

I don't think it actually looked *too* horrible until the last episode: 8.3 - 7.2 - 7.2 - 7.5 - 5.9. I guess because they had the Perry Mason and Saved by the Bell tv movies scheduled to air in the slot, they might've thought The Round Table couldn't sustain those breaks and the last airing didn't inspire them much hope? It didn't rate that differently from I'll Fly Away bar that last performance and considering the trajectory of prime time soaps in general I'd at least given them 13 episodes to prove themselves. But maybe this is also why NBC just couldn't catch a break with prime time soaps - a lack of patience.

Have fun! Even if people keeps dragging up Amanda as the moment the show changed, I'd argue they started having their first serialized moments (beyond the lame 90210 cross-over) earlier than that - around episode 11 if I remember correctly.