Members WorldTurner Posted July 14, 2008 Members Share Posted July 14, 2008 If ATWT isn't falling faster than other soaps then how did they go from 3rd place earlier this year to just .1 ahead of GL? Simple math says they are falling faster than the other soaps despite them all falling. The ratings DO support that conclusion! Writing absolutely is a factor! I know quite a few people who have turned it off because they think the stories have become garbage! That is the writing. It's not the only factor but it most certainly is part of it. And a lot of these people tuning out have watched for years. They just won't waste their time any more on stories that they don't find interesting and just bore them or frustrate them. Writing isn't the only issue but it certainly is a part of it and can't be ignored! I find myself watching less and less because the stories simply don't make sense. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members GHJunkie4Life Posted July 14, 2008 Members Share Posted July 14, 2008 Wasn't it just a few weeks ago that people were saying GH has dropped the "most" out of all the soaps... It seems like that title gets passed around week to week. Writing isn't as a big a factor as people would like it to be. And Zendell in regards to Y&R I might be wrong but last I heard people are claiming that Y&R's writing is getting "better". While it may not be fantastic people are saying the show is slowly getting there... Well if the show is getting better quality wise in terms of writing then why aren't the ratings rising as well? Anyways this really amounts to nothing. I'm happy for the most part with ATWT. The stories make perfect sense to me as a viewer and I enjoy most of the characters. So I'll continue to watch. And if gets bad then I'll stop watching. Personally I think if you don't like a show then do not watch it. Spare yourself the misery and depression. I don't like B&B or AMC AT ALL right now but I don't wish for it to be canceled. I think as long as a show has fans and has some credibility to it then it should remain on air for the fans who are enjoying the show. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Ann_SS Posted July 14, 2008 Members Share Posted July 14, 2008 No soap is falling faster Y&R over the last few weeks. None. Your interpretation of the ratings decline is erroneous. I'm sure that Mark H who tracks the ratings will explain this more clearly Juliajms, truer words never spoken. There is reluctance to admit it, but Y&R is worse under MAB. Gloria who makes me crazy is getting even more screen time. She and Victor Newman have sucked the life out of the show. Overall, Y&R isn't bad, it simply is not interesting. At least under LML, the show was never boring. I'm not sure what is the cause of Y&R's tumble in the ratings, but the audience has drifted away are not likely to return even if Hogan Sheffer works magic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members MarkH Posted July 14, 2008 Members Share Posted July 14, 2008 You folks have written some seriously excellent analysis here. I'm thinking that the term "habit" is accurate for a SUBSET of us viewers. (It sure is for me...or I would not be DVRing B&B anymore). Those of us who have watched for years...maybe started with our moms and grandmoms...soaps are a whole "experience" of being connected. I have lived SO many places...but Genoa City has always come with me. THAT is why I tune in. I mean, I generally enjoy it, but it is also my "home" or "my familiar place". It is the think I watch, usually with people I love, in the early evening. THAT is habit. We would do that until we were embarrassed to keep watching. I was LML's biggest supporter, and until AFTER John died (i.e., the Senate race and Pheila were when I noticed the change...about the time Kay Alden left...the last woman standing...) I thought everything she brought to the show was an improvement. I still enjoyed that period of Victor's epilepsy and Brad's hidden past (before it turned into the silly Reliquary story) more than anything in years on that show. When MAB came, the show instantly returned to something closer to classic style and pacing...but then it dragged. March-July on this show were often painful. It IS now getting better. People are mostly acting like themselves again, AND the interest-value is ramping up. I am hopeful. But the viewers lost (that 0.5 ratings loss this Spring)...they are NEVER coming back. (Jack Peyton axiom). Y&R is as doomed as all the others. But if it can slow its' rate of decline (back to industry-standard) at least it will be a few years before it dies. [i listened to Mimi Torchin's interview with the gang at a major soap blog today...yeah, I'm slow...and I was struck by how much she talked about the genre as something that was past.] Nobody--nobody--wishes more than me that the writing would bring the shows back. Even during Gloria Monty's days, the gap between when she joined the almost-cancelled GH and when it became #1 was YEARS. That is how long it will take for writing to have an effect. Moreover, in this time of diminished audience, the size of the 'writing effect' will be small...maybe 0.5 rating AT best. And we still have to contend with the industry-wide decline. That isn't going to stop. So, if writing boosts the ratings, it will only be for a few years anyway. Even GH...they got their Luke and Laura bump...but then they fell again. That is what happens. Finally, I really do think Ron Carlivati is writing one of the best soaps out there. SURE, it is event driven and over the top...but that was the OLTL classic formula from the Rauch 1980s. They're not going to go back to the late 60s/early 70s, when Agnes wrote a reality based soaps with Polish and Black and WASP families, where Jim Craig's daughter went to Odyssey House (an actual NY drug rehab place). OLTL changed permanently with the introduction of the Buchanans...and bless him...Carlivati is AT LEAST honoring that last 25 years of history. That is more than most soaps!! More importantly, his canvas is exciting and compelling, and it is multi-generational. I wish ABC would LEAVE HIM ALONE for five years...and then we'll have our experiment. But ABC won't. Because they think that viewership patterns can still change quickly. They can't. Because writing doesn't matter...not in a serious, short term way...not anymore. I wish it did, but it just DOESN'T. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members UKBoi Posted July 14, 2008 Members Share Posted July 14, 2008 I think both P&G soaps are in the crapper, creatively. At least GL is trying to make changes, and while they may not always be for the best, at least they're TRYING. It seems that nobody at ATWT sees anything wrong with the crap they're putting out on the air and are content with mediocrity. They need someone fresh to come into the show and put some fire into the current writers, but since we know soaps just like to recycle each other's writers (instead of promoting from within...HELLO RON CARLIVATI!), I actually wouldn't mind Brown and Estensen, they did a great job of installing a feeling of community on AMC and that's something that's sorely lacking on ATWT. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Sylph Posted July 30, 2008 Members Share Posted July 30, 2008 Besides Goutman and Passanante, Leah Laiman needs to go, too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members MarkH Posted July 30, 2008 Members Share Posted July 30, 2008 Why does she get called "Lethal Laiman"? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cat Posted July 30, 2008 Members Share Posted July 30, 2008 Didn't she destroy Another World? Maybe that's why. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members David V Posted July 30, 2008 Members Share Posted July 30, 2008 Maybe the term "snowball" accurately describes the ratings decline. For years the decline had been gentle and an accepted reality, and people still felt soaps had a future. This decade has seen the snowball effect take place, as the ratings decline gathered momentum every year. The difference between then and now is that the higher-ups are nowhere near as quick to get rid of bad writers and producers as they were in the past. It took P&G less than a year (1996) to see how bad things were getting on all three of their soaps, and Daytime was nowhere near as bad then as it is now. Passanante has been HW for all of three years now even though she is long proven to be utter garbage. I disagree with those who said Another World was the "weakest" of the P&G shows in a creative sense, although its biggest problems were the constant turnover of writers and producers. It was nowhere near the worst in either ratings or quality, even in its twilight years- and certainly was nowhere near the state SFT and EON were in their final years. Sometimes I wonder if SFT would have survived a lot longer if CBS had kept it on, instead of shafting it like it did in 1982. After all, they were still one of the top 8 rating soaps at the time, and except for Ryan's Hope all the shows that rated above it are still on air today. EON on the other hand would probably have gone earlier than it did, were it not for the rise of ABC Daytime prolonging its life. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Y&RWorldTurner Posted July 30, 2008 Members Share Posted July 30, 2008 Because she sucks and her writing tends to be completely plot-driven. She's butchered quite a few popular characters in her prime as well... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Sylph Posted July 30, 2008 Members Share Posted July 30, 2008 It's Lethal Leah. Much more effective. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Khan Posted July 30, 2008 Members Share Posted July 30, 2008 Leah is "lethal," IMO, because her stories are all Idiot Plots -- those where, in order to advance, the characters involved have to be completely stupid, or else, the story's over. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Y&RWorldTurner Posted July 30, 2008 Members Share Posted July 30, 2008 I agree, this was so obvious during her last real HW-ing tenure which was at ATWT. Say what you want about Lorraine Broderick's tenure, but she understood the characters and their histories, and she was a character-driven writer. However, the Broderick to Leiman transition was anything but smooth. Almost overnight the characters seemed to change, got stupider, and the plots were horribly conceived and everything was beyond inconsistent. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Khan Posted July 30, 2008 Members Share Posted July 30, 2008 And if anyone needs an example? Look no further than the Andy/Denise story. I still have anxiety attacks from that one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.