Santa Barbara Discussion Thread

[amybrickwallace]

 

That was one of the final nails in SB's coffin, truly.

[Wendy]

BJ and Warren never made sense. And unlike many, I thought they had zero chemistry. I hated Cassie, but she and Warren (even with the later incestuous angle) had chemistry. Ditto Warren and Angela.

 

So why the hell TIIC put Warren with BJ the drip mystified me. Well, I kind of know. To help Pam Long's pet Kim Zimmer's character's family get a foothold. Alas, the Walkers sucked. Every last one of them.

[amybrickwallace]

The only Walker the viewers wanted was Marcy. I wonder if she was even approached about coming back after Palace Guard tanked.

Edited April 18, 2019 by amybrickwallace

[Franko]

Good question. If A was still determined to leave the show, they could have brought Marcy back to escort him off.

[amybrickwallace]

 

I wish they had. 

[MissPalmer]

Marcy wasn't interested at all....what a pity!

[j swift]

Looking back, SB is not a show that was remembered for its great twists which makes me wonder about the quality of the writing?  It seems well established that the Dobson's quiffed the first mystery - Who shot Channing? - by stringing it out too long with too many red herrings and recastings.  By the time Cruz solved the mystery one year after the start of the show, Joe had been dead for three months, and 18-year-old Channing Jr turned out to be a switched baby, father of a newborn, gay. thief, star student-athlete, who was blackmailing his neighbors. 

 

However, SB was always a show that seemed to clue in the audience rather than traffic in surprises.  For example, viewers knew that Sophia was Dominic, Brick was Channing, and Brandon was Santana's son within the first weeks of the show.  Even Pamela's return was less dramatic because she interacted with a few characters before she appeared in the courtroom for Elena's trial.  I guess Madeline killing her husband was a bit of a surprise, but most murders were solved by the time they went to court.  For every Robert Barr in a cage, we mostly got stories where main characters were falsely accused and their innocence was never in doubt.  I'm not saying that twists indicate good writing, but it is difficult to remember any SB twist as particularly eventful.  

 

Good cliffhangers (the earthquake, Eden's fall, Elena's death, Dylan falling out of the window) but not really great twists.

Edited April 22, 2019 by j swift

[Soaplovers]

I think Mary dying when the C from the sign fell on her was the best twist..and oddly made sense.

 

I'll even say I liked that a middle class family The Walkers were introduced...and even liked all of them...but fo agree BJ and Warren were a bad fit...Warren/Angela were a good couple.

[pdm1974]

I actually loved Cassie. I thought she was a fascinating character and had the potential to keep stirring the pot long-term. I was disappointed when they got rid of her. I saw the actress who played has done some directing for TV since then.

 

I didn't get BJ and Warren either. He seemed way too old for someone who was just a college freshman. I was always just so-so with the Walkers. They tried to start a family around Thaao Penghlis giving him two kids, but that was all at the very end.

 

One thing they never revealed was who Warren's birth father was, and I was glad they didn't. That shouldn't have even been a story point to give him a history with Cassie. At one point, I just knew they were going to have it revealed that CC was his birth father.

I think when she left it was really the beginning of the end.

That was probably the BEST twist they ever did. I remember that episode to this day...first with Flame removing the black wig and we see she's a blond goddess...then she walks into that room...hits a remote and there was Robert Barr...it was like WTF but in a good way.

Poor Mary and that big letter C.

Edited April 23, 2019 by pdm1974

[amybrickwallace]

 

That's a plot point that should never have worked...but it did. The acting was incredible. Harley Jane moved on to film and primetime success before giving up show biz to become a novelist. I have never read any of her books; I probably should.

[j swift]

I recently re-watched the falling C episode and it doesn't hold up.  Contrary to my memory, they never actually showed the C fall on her.  It blows in the wind, and they stay on the roof so long that something was bound to happen.  The twist is that it looked like Mason was going to be the one in danger based on the promo.

 

Mary was the Job of Santa Barbara.  Not only was she from modest means, but her sister was raped, her father died in an earthquake, and both of her brothers were killed in the same year.  She was a nun who was raped, held hostage, accused of tampering with CC's medication, and forced into marriage with her impotent ex-husband.  The man who she truly loved was an alcoholic and he was the only poor Capwell in town.  I think the falling "C" was a fitting ending to such a sad life.

[amybrickwallace]

Well, I thought it was good. Mary was hardly a saint - she could often be very judgmental of others (like Ted) and not seeing that some people were wolves in sheep's clothing...until it was too late (like Mark). She had finally started to pull her life together when she went up to the roof of the Capwell Hotel that fateful night.

 

I did, however, think it was poor taste that the Capwells put that same neon C back on after Mary met her end. They were rich - couldn't they have replaced the C???

Edited April 23, 2019 by amybrickwallace

[j swift]

Eden's Orient Express burned down during her first wedding to Cruz and they never rebuilt it.  Maybe Mary was haunting the hallways?  It took SB a few trys to find a central meeting place for the characters.  The Beach Bar was too youthful and too seasonal.  La Mesa and The State Street bar were very small sets and filled with riff-raff like Gina's drug pusher.  I am always amused that every bar/cafe had to have a pay phone for characters to call each other.  

 

I will give the scab writers credit for revisiting Mark's death later with Mason when they found the remains of Pamela's lover and Scott's father.  That story was poorly finished but an interesting callback all the same. I appreciated that throughline that CC supported the nunnery because they had provided childcare to the Capwell children; presumedly when Rosa was out sewing her wild oats.  

[amybrickwallace]

 

Yup, that was when Dr. Marcello Armonti, who had an ax to grind with CC, flipped out and set fire to the Capwell Hotel. The Orient Express was on the top floor of the hotel.

 

It was really interesting how once the fire reached the top floor and disrupted the wedding, the fire trucks, Medevac helicopters and such started taking everyone out of the burning building one by one. It was like SB does The Towering Inferno. I thought they did rebuild the Orient Express later on, but I could be wrong.

[j swift]

You are correct because Eden's first wedding happened before Mary's death, so they must have rebuilt and then abandoned it once Johnny's opened.