KNOTS LANDING

[SoapDope]

I think they should have not had Gary cheat with Judy. That story was a nothing burger anyway . They should have had him be faithful to Val till Season 3 when he finally succumbed to Abby. It would have had a lot more of an impact, but since he had already cheated with Judy it came across as "Oops I did it again, sorry Val". 

Also, since Val's cancer story was done in the self contained years, it did not have much of an impact. It was over with after 1 episode and the next she was fully recovered and being terrorized at a baby shower. If they had done that story a bit later, they could have taken that story further with Val having to do chemo etc...

[Soaplovers]

Maybe her season 12 story should have been Val's cancer reoccurring...and she becomes withdrawn and shuts out everyone including Gary.

Would have been more organic and in keeping with history if that had happened.

[All My Shadows]

Pardon me for knowing nothing, but what is "interlacing" and how is it presenting a problem with streaming the show? I'm still on DVD with season 2, but I'll be done by the end of this week.

I'm currently watching "Scapegoats," which is an unexpected but very good (for its time) look at ADHD in kids. Good on them for giving Michael a chance in the spotlight after we got several Eric and Diana plots. You can definitely tell they're pulling more and more toward fully serializing the show. The self-contained episodes are building off of and referring back to previous events.

I don't think I ever made a final decision on my top episodes from season 1, but I'm gonna go with a Top 5 that includes the pilot, Will the Circle Be Unbroken, Small Surprises, Courageous Convictions, and Bottom of the Bottle Part 2. The first part of Bottle annoys me because how quickly Gary relapsed in one night (and I know nothing about alcoholism, so if that's realistic, then my bad), but the second part was perfect as a season finale for what the show was in its first season.

I'll have season 2 observations when I'm finished, but so far, I much prefer season 2 Gary and season 2 Richard. Abby's introduction is perfect because at the time, did anyone really foresee who she would become? She really just felt like a sophisticated tart with brains. Kenny and Ginger's story isn't bad, and Karen/Sid really do work as the solid couple.

Sylvie's singing sounds like ass.

Edited September 3, 2024 by All My Shadows

[SoapDope]

That's an excellent idea. It would have given Joan a lot of meaty material to play and maybe a Emmy nomination. By the end they were making a clown out of Val and giving her stupid stuff like the brain virus etc...or have her being terrorized for the 20th time. 

[titan1978]

JE has said Judy was meant to be more of a character, but the show went in another direction. They also toyed with Abby/Gary and decided against it. Joan, Ted, and Donna went to the showrunners and begged them to go through with it.

I think his affair with Judy helps cement how pissed Valene is, as opposed to just broken hearted. One affair they could come back from, and did. Another affair, with Abby especially, so soon after Judy? Val can’t stay anymore after that.

[Vee]

This is news to me. Do tell.

[SoapDope]

I never knew that Judy was supposed to be more of a character. I found her quite boring. Gary was of all over the place in Season 2. He seemed so angry and was clearly not happy being married to Val. He barely tolerates her and gets angry when she gets sick because he will have to to deal with it. Even when she tries to support him or be optimistic he acts like it makes him sick. He also starts doing that smarmy "Smug Shrug". 

[Vee]

I think Jane did very well with Judy Trent. Her last scene where Gary explains the dysfunctional way his marriage to Val works and something like how he can only see himself as a decent man through her eyes and Judy says "Gary, that's pitiful!" totally aghast is amazing.

[titan1978]

When the marathon was first airing on PLEX a bunch of old interviews were popping up everywhere, and it was Joan from sometime in the last 15 years based on her facial work talking about it. I can’t find the clip on Twitter, but I did find an interview where she talks about it, although she only mentions Ted. It must be an anecdote she shares somewhat often because the one I saw also ended with her saying the part about it being the longest running story on the show.

From the interview with Joan-

KL4me from Montreal asks
Could you give us an idea of a story for Val that you or someone else had pitched to the producers that never made it on air?

JVA: There wasn’t really anything I could think of, but I will mention that Ted and I went in way early, whenever Donna Mills came on the show, and told David Jacobs that it made total sense that Gary would fall for Abby. I can’t believe I did that but it really provided me with some great stories.

AS: Why can’t you believe that?

JVA: Because they were celebrating Donna Mills and she became the center but Gary and Val were supposed to be this enduring couple. Ted and I were saying Gary and Val should break up and Gary should go with Abby. It was a pretty big deal to break up the couple that the show began with.

So (the producers) were going toward this, then they pulled away but eventually returned to it. David Jacobs was against it but we convinced him. And it was the longest running story on the show. It took a long time for them to get back together.

[kalbir]

Would we consider Abby the breakout character in the vein of JR and Alexis? I don't think Abby became a pop culture phenomenon like JR and Alexis though.

[titan1978]

Talk about playing Judy Trent on Knots Landing.
Being on that show was fabulous! I auditioned for Abby, which eventually went to Donna Mills, and they cast me as Judy, who had an affair with Gary. The job was supposed to go longer but the actors strike stopped production and shortened the length of the season, so my part got truncated. I’d already known those girls for years—Donna, Joan Van Ark, Michelle Lee—but had never worked with them, so it was great fun.

I think the show was such an ensemble that nobody really fills the same role Hagman did as JR or Joan. Both of them have an immediate impact and outsized public reception. Both Abby and Greg are dynamic and become focal points, but the show is so strongly written and much more grounded so it feels to me like they just fit in rather than stand above.

[Vee]

Oh, I knew they all encouraged the affair but I didn't know the writers had almost pulled away from it at one point. Thanks.

[Soaplovers]

She may not have been the breakout character...but anyone that I know that watched Alexis and Abby said that Alexis was fun to watch..but Abby was aspirational since she used all her resources to get power...and her speech to Paige about her trust fund is epic.

[kalbir]

Abby was all about the come up. Even though Abby was considered the villainess, I believe she loved her children and wanted what was best for them.

[All My Shadows]

I think the fundamental difference is that JR and Alexis both arrived on our screens as powerful, manipulative a-holes who were playing games from day one. They had opps from day one, and so their entire stories began with them against their enemies. Abby, meanwhile, rolls up in her station wagon with two bratty kids screaming in the backseat, and her only real opp is the ex-husband whom we don't even see right away. Karen comes running out of the house to hug her, she and Val become good friends, and the cul-de-sac loves her. She has no powerful over anyone, and she has to work as the bookkeeper at her brother's car dealership. Her first indiscretions are sitting on her butt while the other ladies help to move her furniture in and then keeping poor Eric up all night babysitting the kids while she's out on the town, but that's just crazy Abby being a wild and crazy gal.

Compare that to Alexis, who is whisked away from her glamorous jet-setting life to testify at her millionaire ex-husband's murder trial, showing up dressed to the nines and immediately turning heads in the courtroom, getting everyone who knows her in a tizzy because, "Oh fck, here SHE is..."

JR - introduced already as the millionaire president of Ewing Oil, wheeled and dealed to get his way up there, already drove his wife to alcoholism, ready to drive his brother's wife out of the family fold, we soon learn that he destroyed his other brother's family, it's clear Momma and Daddy love him but also realize he's bad to the bone

Angela Channing - from day one, she's the queen of the valley, running Falcon Crest and feeding off the blood of her enemies, tampering with her brother's dead body to make his death look like an unfortunate accident, quickly ready to send her nephew and his family packing so that she can add to the power she already has

Even going further, Constance Weldon - not at all very powerful but super spoiled rotten rich btch who is manipulative from day one, cares not at all about her husband's feelings but he better not dare put his own wants and needs above of her own because she'll withhold a divorce and use her daddy's influence to make things tough for him