TV Guide's SOAPnet Rant

November 19, 200817 yr

Member

The Hills are Alive

When did Soapnet become the Beverly Hills 90210 Channel? The ABC/Disney-owned outlet currently runs repeats of the old Aaron Spelling series a whopping 28 times per week. It's also devoting November 28-the day after Thanksgiving-to a 12-hour marathon called "Kelly's Leftovers" about Kelly Taylor and all the men she loved and left behind. The day is valuable real estate. Wouldn't ABC be better off re-airing its daytime soaps-especially the much improved All My Children-to lure lapsed viewers who happen to be home over the holiday? Apparantly not. "We think our audience will want to curl up with something old, familiar and nostalgic," says ABC ratings publicity director Catherine Lord, adding that "our 90210 marathon last Labor Day was SOAPnet's second-highest-rated acquired-series marathon ever. No. 1 was a 90210 marathon in 2006. The show brings us 50 percent more viewers than our daytime soaps." In other words, get used to it

Edited November 19, 200817 yr by Zendall Fan

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Created 17 yr17 yr
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November 19, 200817 yr

Member

In other words.....I hope SN goes under soon.

They f'ing suck. IMO. <_<

November 20, 200817 yr

Member

I love 90210, but there is such a thing as overkill. OTH and OC should only be on once a day, and 90210 (and MP!!) should be on twice a day. Case closed.

I don't get the "old, familiar, and nostalgic" comment. Aren't they trying to appeal to unborn fetuses at this point?

November 20, 200817 yr

Member

Those ratings tell the tale. They cannot afford to do anything else. SN is a business, and 90210 is a business decision: More viewers, in a more desirable demographic.

Seriously, we don't have to watch it (I seldom do, anyway)...but we do have to get over it, I'm afraid.

November 20, 200817 yr

Member

You can't fight the numbers. Soaps don't bring in viewers anymore. At least not the way they are. They've naturally selected themselves out of existence.

November 20, 200817 yr

Member

I love 90210, but there is such a thing as overkill. OTH and OC should only be on once a day, and 90210 (and MP!!) should be on twice a day. Case closed.

Amen.

November 20, 200817 yr

Member

Know what, I prefer 90210, OTH and The O.C. over daytime soaps anyway so I am looking forward to the 90210 marathon.

Edited November 20, 200817 yr by jcar03

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Guiding Light Discussion Thread

Agreed, I think Blake became a woman who learned from her mistakes and grew up. I too wanted them to be the core couple after the Tori thing, as a matter of fact, around Wheeler after Simon left I wanted them to move into the Bauer house..( I would have Blake say that this is the closet thing she knew as a home )SORAS the kids, and bring Sam back..Dinah would have a very contentious relationship with her, as she would be jealous of Ross and Sam's relationship, and Blake and Dinah would have that tension (ya, know cause she killed his brother) it would be a core family that had some fissures leading to good drama. But now, Wheeler and company though the Coopers should be the core.

By Mitch64 · 51 minutes ago51 min
BTG: December 2025 Discussion Thread

Agree that great minds can think alike :)
In terms of Derek, I see the show doing one of two things based on the most recent episodes that featured him.
1) They do the gradual fade-out of the character until he stops appearing and is occasionally mentioned by Jacob (i.e. still living and existing in town, just not being seen). We saw some evidence with him having a group of co workers he's friends with, plus a female co worker interested in him... so possibly we see him regain his walking and go back to his life with the Fire crew and eventually we stop seeing them on air.
2) His mentioning to Jacob that he hopes to win Ashley back signals that perhaps the dark side we saw glimpses of has been hidden and will rear itself if she appears to be moving on with a new guy.
In terms of Ashley, the show seems committed to keeping her character on the show especially since she was shown in the Thanksgiving episode having a quiet day with Jan and Mona as they discuss Black Friday shopping, food, and other day to day matters... so I think delving into her backstory in terms of who her father is would be a good place for the show to go while keeping her as a good friend to Naomi, Shanice, and a good nurse during medical stories.
Perhaps one of the children of the handsome new doctor could be her love interest down the line.

By Soaplovers · 1 hour ago1 hr
As The World Turns Discussion Thread

Re: 1978. I'm glad the unedited version of the episode complete with commercials is available. The one that has been posted several years ago had several segments missing. I like Barbara's long hair here. Dr. Steven Farrell didn't last very long I take it since she is re-connecting with Tom (Tom Tammi) by 1979. The actor playing Steven (Phil Peters) was the real-life husband of Lenore Kasdorf (Rita GL).

By SoapDope78 · 1 hour ago1 hr
Guiding Light Discussion Thread

Oh, how I wish we'd gotten to see Ross deal with his teenage sons. I loved his relationships with Phillip and Sam, but he really deserved to be seen with his own kids (other than the horror that became Dinah). The boys simply disappeared off canvas after either the Nursery Stalker or the affair with Tori.

By P.J. · 1 hour ago1 hr
Guiding Light Discussion Thread

What I liked about Bloss is that I liked how they grew to be the stable couple- the closest to an Ed and Mo in their prime. Especially after the Tori story when their extra-marital exploits were in the past. I wanted them to SORAS the three kids, along with Dinah and with Phillip's family as Ross's extended family would really be solid core family material.
With that said, I was rooting against Bloss in 1999 as I really liked the Ross/India pairing-- but that just turned out to be a waste of MKA.

By Spoon · 1 hour ago1 hr
GH: December 2025 Discussion Thread

They did reveal Austin's shooter...about a year and a half later.

By DRW50 · 2 hours ago2 hr
Your daily (or nightly) thought

My Queen Kylie is always trying to get a Christmas hit, so spin it:

By te. · 2 hours ago2 hr
GH: December 2025 Discussion Thread

They did actually resolve who shot Austin over a year later (it was Cyrus, as part of his hasty exit story). That was a last minute save though clearly when they forgot lol.

By Vee · 2 hours ago2 hr
Talkin' 'Bout TV Movies

I love those old TV movies, especially the ones from the 70's and 80's. The ABC movie of the week had a ton of them. Like
Satan's School for Girls (1973)
All My Darling Daughter's (1972)
Gidget Gets Married (1972)
The Girl Who Came Gift Wrapped (1974)
The Two Worlds of Jenny Logan (1979)
The Boy in the Plastic Bubble (1976)
Death Cruise (1974)
Here is the 70's ABC opening. The theme music "Nikki" was composed by Burt Bacharach and named for his daughter with Angie Dickinson.

By SoapDope78 · 2 hours ago2 hr
Looking back...Primetime Ratings from the 80's

The return of sitcoms' popularity in the mid-'80s was a real thing, but the crash of the wealth-based nighttime soap genre was resonate and self-induced.

There was an effectively grim finality to the mood of the cliffhangers in the Spring of 1985: Bobby's death, the Moldavian massacre, the return of Val's babies... and they felt as if they could have ended right there (and perhaps they should have, although I would have sorely missed S10 of Dallas, S6 of FC, and Season 9 of Dynasty , and the next five years of KNOTS as they singularly maintained quality).

But, wow, these shows just fell apart post-Spring 1985. They stopped being character dramas after a while, and just started trying to "impress" viewers in some superficial way and to "fake it" somehow.

What a painful, unnecessary slide it was. But once these shows seemed to lose their identities, their sense of self, their momentum into the dung heap couldn't be slowed.

By soapfan770 · 2 hours ago2 hr

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Looking back...Primetime Ratings from the 80's

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