ALL: Grade the soaps

[King]

Haha. Right here, right now!

I was going to give straight D's and F's across the board, but then everyone would have whined and complained and said I was being too negative and blah blah and report me to mommy and daddy.

[R!ck]

Your being negative Mike! Now bend over and receive your caning

[billyjill]

I think the dialog is okay when it's trying to be fun and snappy. I think it underdelivers when it aims to be very emotional, it still lacks a little subtext IMO.

I do think the stories are that bad though. Steve/Kayla were horribly integrated and new viewers were asked to care about the couple before they bonded with the characters and chemistry. That is so the antithesis of supercouple writing. Plus they are totally missing how awesomely awesome the whole mystery about the thirteen missing years (which nobody cared about for months after Steve came back!) could be as a storyline. The Johnsons, the Bradys, the Alamains, and yes eventually the Dimeras ... it could've involved a lot of characters who would each maintain their own stakes in the storyline instead of forcing them to be secondary characters. Lumi reunited way too easily after the A/C/S/L quad fiasco last year ... yes it was time to move on from that storyline but I absolutely hate how this show has gotten into the habit of ripping couples apart with far more time and effort than the effort used to put them back together. Then they were stuck in this awful redundant storyline that kept both characters un-enjoyable for months (I was about to put out APB's for Sami's sass, Lucas' brain, and Lumi's scheme team dynamics) and put the character of EJ in such a terrible spot with the rape rap, considering that James Scott was the first new addition to the show in ages who was actually old enough to tie his shoes.

As for Bope and J/M, we've all talked at lengths about them ... I am fairly convinced that Sheffer does not like the supercouples, and he has no intention of giving those characters much depth and certainly no character growth or arcs of their own. Bo has fared best, but to Sheffer he's still largely just an action hero (he even had him say "Beating up bad guys is what I do best" or somesuch ... it's obvious IMO) ... I think he might get more moments than the others (like that scene with Maggie at Chez Rouge with the cupcake for Ciara's birthday), because he has a dick and Sheffer likes it if you have a dick, and because he's in enough plots to at least get characterization by plot involvement (as much as I hate that as a default technique). John has been even more of an action hero, less character moments than Bo (the only thing I can recall was when he sprung Sami from the slammer last summer and I believe that was Beth Milstein) and while I grant you that Sheffer was certainly not the one to start this practice with John, he was sure content to continue it. Marlena is probably a bit better than her better half but not by much. She's a prop. Hope is Sheffer's absolute least favorite, all her angst from last year has been all swept under the rug. Our chance to see her LEARN from her mistakes has been evaporated, and her moment to explain her side of things from last year has been stolen from her. Her reconciliation with Chelsea OUGHT to be a deep story given a lot of thought and effort instead of something clearly pushed through and taken for granted to validate Chelsea, who could've been just as compelling without being insta-good (I know Sheffer is trying to take his time with her, but something about his logic with her is very cart-before-horse IMO). Hope as a character commits three unforgivable crimes: 1) she has no dick, 2) she is a "good girl", and 3) she is part of a supercouple. Sheffer will never write character for her. All she got after a year of being broken apart and transformed by her sons' death is "I've learned my lesson not to be judgmental" -- that's it??! Blah.

Kate and Billie, Sheffer likes them and you can tell, and yet they're going nowhere. Sheffer's best storyline is Chick, which makes sense, he loves Chelsea (she's a "bad girl") and Nick is his own creation. They're going well because the writer likes them, and the actors have chemistry. The writer's favorites will generally be written better, you just produce better quality when you like something. I'm thankful they have good young actors in the roles, I like them and I enjoy them. They are too cute for words. But the fact remains that he gave the best material to characters who in all honestly aren't high up on the totem pole.

Romance on the show SUCKS. Romance needs build-up. Romance needs follow-through. Romance on this show has none of that right now. It's like Sheffer goes "Ohhh I have to get in that damn romance quota for the month ... let's see, we can pencil it in on the 5th, 17th, and 28th", etc etc. It ties in to the larger pacing issues of the show. The pacing is HORRIBLE. The pacing is killing everything. It's hard for me to explain, but nothing is gradual, there is no build-up and no payoff, there is no ebb and flow. Sheffer just tosses in element A, B, C, etc, when he remembers about them. "Oh yeah, people want history ... let's see I'll mention random tidbit X from year 19YZ and people will see that I know the show! I so know the show!"

Bo/Chelsea such a great example. "Chelsea you're family! You're out of the family! You're family! You're out of the family!" Literally at that level of nuance. There is no over-arcing momentum, no long-term direction, except on a very rudimentarily delineated level.

And that leads me to another problem, rushed redemptions. It's a product of the awful pacing and the lack of emotional nuance. Bo/Hope insta-reunion. Billie/Hope insta-friends. Chelsea/Hope insta-trust. (Wow Hope had a lot of grudges last year huh ... and now they're all gone! Poof, like magic!) Lumi insta-forgiveness (and I'm talking pre-EJ, again). Blah! Lumi should've had a few good months of awesome back-and-forth scheming chemistry before they got back into being serious. That chemistry phase is when people fall back in love with a couple. Chelsea/Hope, again, should've been a protracted deep story about grief, family, growth, and forgiveness. Billie and Hope honestly should not be best friends. No way. It'd have been better if in today's episode they formed a tenuous alliance to help those they care about, without the pretense of chumminess. That way you can see that they're mature enough to put top priorities first, but still human enough to have their own self-centered point of views. And the Bope reunion should've been a treat for romance fans, complete with build-up and awesome pay-off. Heck you can put S/K here too, how much happier would fans and non-fans alike be if they had gotten everyone on the same page and allowed the entire audience to fall for them and want them to be together and root for them? Days isn't supposed to be "decent" at romance, it's supposed to kick ass at it. It's a bad bad thing when "the romance soap" does romance this bad (excluding Chick).

And the show is just plain dumb. You can feel the times when it tries to be clever ... Look at me, I know what a PDA is! Look at me, I know who Gwen Stefani is!

And while I was heartened by the creation of Nick, and how he managed to be much less awful than teens on this show of late, along comes the abominable nuStephanie ... what IS that thing?!? And there are more tools on the way.

I'm getting incoherent and repetitive and babbling now, sorry if this comes off unorganized. All I know is by now, 8 months into Sheffer's tenure, there should be some momentum. There should be some character arcs. There is really nothing. There are decent things, yes, but nothing is ever decent enough for a long enough amount of time. Hence, no momentum. Hence, no emotional stakes. Hence the viewer doesn't know what the hell to care about. They are screwing over their potential storylines that really have the potential to return Days to form (classic supercouple arc with S/K reunion, deeper dramatic exploration of Bope's dynamics -- which after a decade of superficial split-em-up/put-em-together/repeat, they deserve --, classic soap triangle with EJ/Lumi, new growth for secondary characters, etc). They miss so many opportunities it makes me tear my hair out. I think Sheffer tries too hard to be "Days", which itself is a very fractured concept at this point, and in the process the quality suffers. He has to try hard because, really, he isn't very "Days" at all.

LATE EDIT: Kenny I will definitely give it to you on scenes, the actual scenes are better, the dialog (though again I think it's still got a ways to improve) is better and the structuring is better, the camera's getting more creative and so are the cuts between scenes, etc etc. I can actually go "I like the way this was shot" or "I like the way this scene was blocked" or "I like how the dialog was structured within the scene" now. That is an improvement.

[darraholic]

DAYS: C+

PSSN: C-

ATWT: C

Y&R: B

OLTL: F

[King]

[DevotedToAMC]

AMC: B

[sheilaforever]

B&B

A-

Great stories, somehow a balance (character & generation-wise), fantastic dialogue, good actors - still several character are seriously backburned. Fix this and it is a straight A.

Y&R

D-

Good storyline ideas, awful execution, horrendous pacing, inconsistent dialogue, disrespectful to show's history, often boring - only saved by some remaining very good actors from a big fat F.

[Steve]

AMC: B

This show is transitioning from plot-driven cartoonish storylines to character-driven stories and it takes time for that transition to affect the entire show. As a result, some characters (Jonathan, Ryan) are still annoying and ill defined. If the improvements continue at this rate, though, by August AMC could rate an A.

[alwaysAMC]

AMC: A

GH: B-

OLTL: F

DAYS: D

ATWT: D

[Mitchapalooza]

ATWT = C- (on a fast track to the bottom of the list...ATWT is becoming unrecognizable to me)

AMC = C (still not seeing this great improvement everyone here is talking about..the show is better, but not by leaps and bounds, not even CLOSE)

B&B = C+ (meh, boring/bland...maybe im just bitter about ED still...the show is actually one of the better ones on at the moment)

DAYS = B- (Last three weeks warrant this grade, otherwise a solid C+...balance is improving but still a MAJOR sore spot for this show)

GH = C+ (no where near as good as it was a few weeks AND months ago)

GL = C+ (again, its just ok for me...daytime is stuck in a mediocre trend at the moment...no shows are really firing on all cylanders)

OLTL = D- (Easily the worst show right now)

PSNS = D (...does it really need any explanation)

Y&R = B (some horrible casting choices have been made, but Y&R still rules over all)

As my ratings suggest, daytime is extremely bland and mediocre for me at the moment.

IMPROVING:

-AMC

-DAYS

DETERIORATING:

-OLTL

-GH

-ATWT

-PSNS (perhaps someone at DirectTV has a brain and will actually choose to step up and find a competent writer for this show)

The rest are just sitting idle imo!

[arcibaldo]

The bold and Beautiful C.....

the young and restless B+... i don't like more story political

guiding light C

bye

Andrea

[Evan]

B&B: B (It could be better, and I hate Phoebe, but the core actors keep me tuning in).

Y&R: A-(Still the best soap on air, and brilliant actors too)

DAYS: D(Awful, crap, and the DiMera stuff won't be an improvement)

[kentville]

B&B-D

Days-C

[DeeeDee]

Y&R: F -

[Ponz]

DAYS: C- currently. (would have been D- prior to last week).

Hogan delivers pockets of excellent content but has yet to prove that he can write a consistently compelling long-term story. There have been great individual scenes, great episodes & occasionally great weeks but the momentum is never sustained. Though his characterisation is generally solid, he's been too quick to sprinkle stories with campy gimmicks. I'm not sure whether this is just his style or he's trying to *fit in* with some perceived notion of DAYS' identity. But it means that stories that could be heavy on emotion and/or character-insight (eg. Sami's rape, Steve's mental problems, John's coma) too easily descend into farce.

I won't discuss the balance issue because its been talked to death. That also factors into the rating.