DAYS: One year later...

[DrewH]

Do you remember Hogan's SOAPnet interview, this time, last year? He said such great things and gave us such hope of what's to come. I remember being so excited after watching this.

Take a look at it. You have to scroll down and click on the Days of our Lives links. They go in an order, so you should start with the frist one, with the caption, "Kat and DAYS head writer Hogan Sheffer talk fall storylines."

http://soapnet.go.com/specials/fallpreview06/videos.html

Now, here we are one year later. Lets take a look at what Hogan's done, shall we?

First of all, I'm going to point out that he didn't even know when DAYS premiered. He said 1966. No, Hogan. DAYS premiered in 1965. Small mistake, I know, but just something that bothered me after watching this again.

Hogan loves John and Marlena. They were going to be central to the storylines that were going to be told. Hogan planned to make Marlena the heroine she once was. And he said that John and Marelna had a lot to do (along with Steve and Kayla). John and Marlena were never central to the storylines being told. They supported Steve and Kayla's storyline when they went to find the cure for Kayla. Sure, we got some great scenes between the couple in the cabin, but I wouldn't say they were central. They did have the whole search for Stefano, but that only lasted a few days, and this included their wedding in Italy. That brings us to the end of December when John was shot and the couple disappeared from our screens. They were no longer central to nothing. They appeared about 15 times from January until May. Even now, John and Marelna are still not central to any story on this show.

Next thing discussed was the supercouples and how DAYS basically coined the term. Hogan said that he planned on taking the show back to having supercouples being what they were about, and that was romance and adventure. I won't deny that Hogan has given us loads and loads of adventure storylines, but where is the romance that was promised? Sure, the couples are together, but they're not romantic in the very least. The part that made fans fall for the supercouples of the 80s was the beautifully done love scenes that made viewers drool. They wanted to see beautiful people making love with the one they loved. Aside from Santo and Colleen, we haven't gotten one love scene since Hogan took over the show. I know there are some that feel that love scenes are not essential to the show, but I'm going to disagree. I want to see my favorite couple expressed their love to each other in the sheets. Sex sells! Isn't that the number one rule in entertainment?

the young demos and how the younger audience doesn't want to see people their own age, but family scenes with problems and resolutions that come along.

Next, Hogan talks about the BS that is the show catering to the younger demos by having younger characters shoved down our throats. He makes mention that we won't be seeing 15 year olds hiding condoms in their lockers, but what do we have? We have a group of people in their early 20s, acting just like a group of high school kids. Maybe not so much anymore, but when Stephanie (Shelley Henning), Jeremy and Jett came on board, the kids were acting like horny high schoolers. And the worst part about them? They were islanded. We never got scenes with Jeremy and the Hortons, aside from that one 4th of July episode.

That brings us to the next video when Hogan says the biggest problem with introducing new character is that you can't shove them down the audience's throat. He says that the biggest example of this was Stephanie's introducition last July. She came onto the show and immediately started clinging to Max, and he thoguht that viewers didn't care about that. He's right about that. Hogan says that he wants to establish the younger set so that the audience can get to know them before giving them their own story. Has that been done? No! The only characters that the audience have had at least 2 years of knowing them were Chelsea and Max. Nick, Stephanie, Jeremy and Jett, we really know nothing about. And who's on our screens almost everyday? Nick, Stephaine, Jeremy and Jett. Hogan basically lied about that. And he was right. We don't care about these characters, and we do want to know why the hell they are on our screens in their own stories. Throwing them into an already established family doesn't make things okay, Hogan.

And the sad part is that Hogan did a fantastic job with this in the beginning of his run. None of the younger set was really in a real romance for a while. You had Abby harboring her crush on Max. It took a while before Chelsea and Nick even became an item. We saw these characters develop in the romance department, and it was done slowly and realistically, and that is the reason why these romances were a hit rather than Jeremy and Stephanie or Jett and Chelsea.

And don't get me started on his comment about Max and Stephanie. He said that they were related and he wanted to get away from the incest angle. What's going on right now? I believe that Stephanie and Max are discussing their relationship status, and not just their family relationship status, but a romantic relationship status. Way to go, Hogan. You're really staying true to your words, my friend.

And I have to LOL at his comment that we are going to end up loving Stephanie. Sorry, Hogan, but there was a point when I loved Stephanie, and that was when Shayna Rose played the part. This Stephanie that you have on right now, there are feelings for her, but it surely ain't love.

I remember hearing about Shawn and Belle's on the run storyline and how excited I was for it. And when Hogan said that Belle would be taking a walk on the wild side, I was estatic. But now, here we are, one year later, and where was that wild side that Belle was supposedly going to walk on? She hasn't really changed her personality at all from the way she was. She never really did any wild walking either. She went on the run with Shawn. Unless that was the wild side that Hogan was referring to, I saw nothing. And I wouldn't necessarily consider that a wild side, but that's me.

I do like the way he talked about the transitioning from the older characters to the younger characters, and it is something that I do agree with. Hogan said that Philip will be the new Victor, while Shawn and Belle are the new Bo and Hope. He doesn't mean they are going to be literrally like their predecessors, but in a figurative way, they are.

Now this was not supposed to be an attack on Hogan, although it may turn into one, but I'm personally not attacking the man. I think he is a great writer, but I think he put his foot in his mouth a lot during this interview and said some things that he couldn't back up with his writing. Most of the things he said came true in that first 3 months of writing the show. And then, something drastically changed.

That brings me to the budget issue. Now I know that head writers usually plan a bible, of sorts, for the next 6 months to one year away. And I know that the head writer has to pass through the executive producer before things can be given the greenlight to tell the story. If Corday saw that Hogan had plans to keep John and Marlena frontburner, and he saw that he had plans to really keep the vets on to establish the young cast, why would he not tell Hogan that his writing could not be told because of the budget from the beginning? Corday is a rich man, and I'm sure that he doesn't handle the budget problems personally. I would think that the show would have several accountants that handle the money issues. Shouldn't Corday have checked with the accountants to make sure that the stories that Hogan wanted to tell would merit the budget? It just seems that if the budget was the problem, that Corday Productions is a very unorganized and unresponsible company if they couldn't even tell that their money couldn't handle the writer's demands.

That theory right there kind of trashes the budget excuse, and I'm not buying the budget excuse anymore. I did defend the show because of that reason for a while, but after thinking about it, it doesn't make much sense.

I don't know much about contracts, but doesn't an actor's contract entitle payment whether or not the actor is being shown or not? I thought that is why actors were placed on contract, so they would have a steady pay. If not, they should be on recurring with the other recurring cast that only gets paid when they make an appearance.

Putting those two things togehter juts totally blows the budget excuse out of the water for me.

There was something else going on, and I don't know if we'll ever get Hogan, or Corday, or whoever to fully admit what the real plan was. Was the show trying to phase out the vets to see if the show could survive with out them in order to save more money? Something was going on, and I'm not buying the budget excuse anymore.

[heatherwebber]

I can't figure out why fake Stephanie is on such front-burner shoved in your face all the time mode. She drives me crazy. I loved Shayna Rose. This one is quite another story.

The entire show either obsessed on a bunch of young bland characters or throws a tiny bit of the far more exciting Stefano feud story then yanks it away for more silly stuff.

Now, I do have to admit that even the worst silly stuff seems to move faster and be less repetitive than the Reilly 2nd run. But is it worth it if the characters are so bland and at time incredibly annoying? I'm not sure I can say it's really better....

Now if the Stefano story had a great deal more airtime that would be different. If Anna Dimera were on a lot more, more Lexie, more Marlena, etc., I would be saying very different things.

But this crowd of silly kids & Valley Girls bores me to no end. I've more than had enough of it.

[IMissAremid]

Drew, I never bought the budget excuse in the first place. I personally thought Hogan just made it up to cover his butt when fans were outraged that the Big Four weren't used at all. I'm not saying that I think Hogan made the decision to backburner the big 4 in a vacuum and that Corday wasn't possibly on board for the Big 4 backburnering experiment too, but I just really don't think Hogan ever had any interest in writing for the Big 4 and especially not John and Marlena after January.

[tylerbo20]

He even mentioned bringing back Louise Sorel for the show...and they even interviewed her...I HATE CORDAY

[DaytimeFan]

I too never bought the budget story for the very reason that the OP pointed out. Soap contracts have guarantees so regardless of whether or not the actor actually appears on the show he or she gets paid. And there is simply no way in hell that Diedre Hall would skip one paycheque. Ditto Alfonso, Reckell and Hogestyn. And they shouldn't have to! They're worth every penny.

In all honesty I'm finding DAYS very boring and I'm a longtime fan who has seen it up and down many times. This is one of the worst times for DAYS. Ratings have hit an all time low, the show is the lowest rated soap on the air and they've only got a contract till 2009. Although it may not be completely fair I blame Hogan for a lot of this. Corday, repeatedly, has exhibited that he does not really put much into the show creatively. Furthermore, Corday knows that DAYS is his big meal ticket (aside from a minority stake in Y&R) and without it his bank accounts will no longer grow at an exponential rate. Hogan, quite simply, lied to the viewers of DAYS.

He said that he planned a new, exciting story for the fabulous Lauren Koslow which would be different from what we'd previously seen her do (the Sami vs Kate merry go round...and yet nothing. Not a damn new thing for Ms Koslow who has always made the very best of some truly laughable material which she continues to do with complete professionalism. Hogan fired and then rehired Renee Jones to waste her. Ditto Tanya Boyd, Suzanne Rogers, Susan Seaforth Hayes, Joe Mascolo, Thaao Penghilis and so many others like the Core 4 Kristian Alfonso & Peter Reckell and Drake Hogestyn & Diedre Hall.

I'm sorry but Hogan had a year to mend the show and he failed. It's time that Ed Scott let the axe fall and hire someone from the Bill Bell Family (Trent Jones perhaps? Even Jack Smith would be a good fit for DAYS. Sally Sussman Morina's reign in the late 1990s was very underrated, I'd like to see her back) Hogan's time on this show is up. It goes to show that lightning doesn't strike twice and that his reign on ATWT was a one shot deal.