AMC: Monday, August 4, 2008

[R Sinclair]

In my opinion, there should be no heroes or heroines. There should be humans who go through ups and downs. Good times and bad times. Joy and heartache. That's what soap opera is. The drama of life. In our own personal lives, we're not heroes or heroines. We're just people who try to do the best we can, for the most part. Some times we succeed, sometimes we fail, sometimes we fall flat on our face and wonder how the hell we're going to get up. But making characters do unlikeable things and still placing halos around them is ridiculous and insulting.

JR, for instance... he was made into an alcoholic just to sanctify Babe. Babe's a woman who came to town knowing she was married to two men and still chose to sleep with another man who wasn't either of her husbands. She and her mother tampered with paternity tests. Subsequently stole a baby... but she's good. She's just flawed. JR, on the other hand, reacts to Babe's countless acts of betrayal, and he's turned into the most evil villain to hit Pine Valley because he had the NERVE to not take Babe's countless betrayals lying down. How dare he! And there wasn't any consequence to JR's sudden alcoholism. It was just used to make him evil so Babe could play victim. If the writers were honestly invested in making JR -- a core character on the AMC canvas -- an alcoholic, there would've been a story... a journey... an arrival to the realization that he was suffering from alcoholism. But, no. He just gets labeled an alcoholic, no real struggle, gets plastered and does HORRIBLE things to poor Babe. So, in my opinion, JR's alcholism was a device just to make him as unlikeable as possible so they can trot him out to prop up other characters we're TOLD to like. And this isn't coming from a Jacob Young fan -- because I'm far from that. They could recast JR tomorrow and I won't lose any sleep. This is coming from an AMC fan who watched Adam Chandler, Jr. grow up.

Like I said, the writers aren't trying to make characters likeable by telling emotionally investing stories and writing the characters in a comely light. No. They're writing whatever stories they want and just basically tell us we're supposed to like them.

Tad's unlikeable.

Kendall's unlikeable.

Zach's unlikeable.

Ryan's unlikeable.

Annie's unlikeable.

Greenlee's unlikeable.

They're all unlikeable, in my opinion, because they're not being written as characters. They're being written as props and pawns -- moved around to create story and conflict and stamped with labels of "good character" and "bad character" and we're just expected to buy it -- no matter what horrid crap they do.

You're so yummy!

[R Sinclair]

Well, you know Carly Kendall has to police the lives of Sonny and Jason Zach and Ryan. Toddlers be damned.

[AMCGio83]

Well, I think there have always been characters one would deem heroes though I think that's a more old fashioned soap convention. You had good characters and bad characters. Characters that are like that now tend to be rather tedious: AIDAN I agree with Sinclair in that soap characters should be written as characters and I don't know what it is with AMC but I think it and GH and the most notorious offenders, they don't write for characters. They want the viewers to believe something so they force it down our throats. Example: Does anyone REALLY believe that Ryan and Greenlee were a great love story? NO. Does anyone really believe that Greenlee and Aidan are oh so in love? NO. Especially if you are a longtime fan of AMC and watched her with Leo. THAT was the love of her life and even if she does love Ryan it was NEVER to that degree. In comes Kendall to REMIND us that Ryan and Greenlee IS the stuff of GREAT love stories. Just like Zarf and Amanda were there to remind us how wonderful their BFF Babe was when she died despite the limited amount of time we actually saw them together and Adam is there to tell us about how Krystal is the great love of his life when us longtime fans know she's third behind Brooke and Erica ANY DAY. It's just not organic.

[EricMontreal22]

I like the Hubbards. And umm... NuJake so far... and umm... Opal and Myrtle and Palmer and Joe

[CassieFan]

The Hubbards

Opal

Jake

[Cheap21]

The Hubbards minus Jessie and Cassandra.

[CassieFan]

I like Jesse and Cassie. I forgot to mention Palmer and Myrtle, but they are on screen 1 episode per month...

[Cheap21]

to each their own, but Im finding Jessie especially incredibly annoying since he became CoP

[CassieFan]

That's true. I forgot to mention that I like bitchy Annie.

[MarkH]

Total AMC outsider here, but I caught a bit of Monday's AMC.

I thought it was pretty good.

This "Crash" story seems to be functioning as a real umbrella. Almost the whole canvas was brought together, around these three kids at the police station. It was intergenerational. The dialogue seemed less "hip and flip" than I'd heard in the past. The show looked pretty good (although that "key lighting" was a bit much for some scenes).

I'm not into it enough to lament the unlikeability of many of the characters and such not...but for a quick tune in, it seemed like a pretty balanced canvas.

My reference point for AMC is really late 70s/early 80s, and nothing will match that. But I'm comparing it to OLTL (which I have been watching more of), and I found AMC much more grounded and relatable.

[Laurie]

Pretty boring show yesterday-really don't care about the teens nor Greenlee and Aidan.

As for likable characters-I like Zach, Kendall, Erica, Carmen and Jake. And I don't hate Ryan like I used to lol

[EricMontreal22]

Not for me--Cassandra I'm a bit more mixed about but I overall like and her actions make sense to me. And I love Jesse--I think he's an example of the writers WRITING FOR his character--good and bad. Like arresting Cassandra--as her step father you could see that as an assholeish thing to do, but Jesse also wants to be the best at his job--anyway it makes sense to me. I like that he actually seems like a real cop in how he treats the law too. (ie not giving into AMC's by now cliched sense of vigilante justice)

I also still think Adam's fairly well written for--but a big part of that is David Canary just manages to make almost anything work. I dunno if likeable is the wright word for him, but he still largely (besides the proppin gup of him and Krystal's romance) feels liek the Adam I've alwasy known.

Mark OLTL is in a very non grounde dplace right now so it's hard to compare, but I think your assessment --of the ONE episode anyway--was pretty fair and owuld really actually agree. The show is still better to me than it was, say, last Fall but that's not sayign a whole lot--but I like how the kids' crash storyline has been written and played out (careful when you call it the "Crash" umbrella storyline though as that will make people think of last year's "umbrella" story...)

[EricMontreal22]

I've never been a huge Zendall fan but I don't mind them--I do like Erica, Carmen and Jake and still really like Jack though I know many seem tired of him. And I grew to really like Josh but who knows where he is...

[CassieFan]

He went to the attic to visit Brooke, Sean and Ava .

[nica1008]

I totally agree!!

I love me some Kendall, and I don't care how damn nosey she is, she is still my girl. I love me some Zach, Erica, Carmen. I also love Josh and Amanda (although we never get to see them anymore ) and I also agree that I am also not hating Ryan as much as I used too. Don't get me wrong I still can't stand him, but I hate Annie more right now and Annie is making Ryan look good by comparison. JMO