ATWT: April discussion

[All My Shadows]

For the win...

Please don't hate me? :unsure:

[P.J.]

^^^^I'm just funnin'....maybe not too successfully, but funnin' all the same.

Opinions make the world go round. I bitch and moan, but it's hard to work up a good, healthy hate on Janet....not when Craig's in my face every. friggin'. day. I can only truly hate one Carjack SPD at a time.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

I must say, Marie Master has aged gracefully, and dare I say, she looks much better than Ellen Dolan.

[All My Shadows]

LOL!

I didn't want you to be all "Janet for the WIN!? WTFWTFWTFWTFWTFWTF are you TALKING about!?!??!"

I thought she had a point today, despite that she's never been an A+ mother herself. Carly needed to hear what she said, no matter who it came from, and I hope she takes it to heart. And plus, Pinson and West have amazing enemy-chemistry together. AMAZING. They work very well off of each other, and I want to see more! I'd love for them to sorta become civil to one another, while at the same time not fully embracing a friendship.

Craig...I don't think I've paid any attention at all since he came back. I am so beyond tired of that whole clique, the Craig/Meg/Paul/

clique. Even though Craig isn't heavily involved with them this go-round, I'm still sick of him. They need to restructure the characters' bubbles, or better yet, do away with bubbles and have everybody interact with everybody. That's a wild idea, I know.

ETA: Marie Masters has indeed aged gracefully. She's what...I think 67-68ish? Very pretty.

[P.J.]

^^^^^LOL....Ellen should definitely get the name of Marie's colorist. I think a stronger, more vibrant color would keep her from looking so washed out.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

Word. Ellen's hair is a one hot mess.

[P.J.]

LOL...if Janet had just kept on point, I probably wouldn't have said [!@#$%^&*] about it. But Carly isn't "in the dark" about Parker's problems. That's what annoyed me. If there's anyone truly blind to what's going on with their kid, IMO, it's Janet. I can't forget that last summer, Janet was all "oh, Libby, let's go shoppin' so I can nail my baby-daddy away from his wife..." or "forget about your problems Libby, I just nailed Parker's dad".

And I hate how Janet feels entitled enough to go to Carly's home and lecture her about this, that or the other. Good grief...just listening to her, Carly's not entitled to talk to Jack, share in the equity of her house, or watch out for her own child's best interest---not if it gets in the way of anything Janet wants.

I think Parker's problems are just more open for everyone to see. Everyone seems to be ignoring the fact Libby always agrees to do these hairbrained things with Parker. I hate how Janet flip-flops...one minute she's "Craig, separate these kids at all costs", and the next, she's whining that no one consulted her before offering Libby a summer away that would accomplish her goal.

I just wish Janet and Carly were more enemies and less friends...I hate that Carly's kids tolerate Janet, and I hate everytime someone says something like "Carly and Janet are so similiar". They're not. Janet is a loud-mouthed, crass, childish hypocrite.

Whoops...I think I'm working up my Janet hate. LOL...

I will say this----they are showing the growing distance between Jack and Janet, and the similar outlook Janet and Craig share. Way, WAY too slowly...but they're showing it just the same.

On some level, I weep for how Sheffer and Pissy have destroyed the character of Craig. I FLOVED Craig, back in the day.

I hate Craig...but if they need a pot-stirrer, I can understand. But these story bubbles are suffocating....and knowing pretty much every day Carly's on, Craig will worm his way inside her house irritates the living crap out of me. And what's worse??? Thinking I'll have to endure it for years to come, simply because Pissy can't write a new story to save her life.

[UKBoi]

For a minute there I thought you'd written Marnie's colorist...I was thinking the only colorist that girl has is Nice'n'Easy...

[P.J.]

LOL...don't blame Nice'n'Easy.....that has to be some off-brand clearance bin color. It is just horribly, horribly wrong. Maybe it looks better IRL...but I doubt it.

Ellen's color...oy. It's almost as bad as Margo's wardrobe.

[jfung79]

I agree with Amity about Luke's insecure reaction to Noah not calling him. I never thought we had missed anything. The point was that Luke and Noah had ended on good terms, and we as viewers knew that, so we would know something was fishy about Noah suddenly being gone. But Luke wouldn't know that because he is always insecure when it comes to Noah, like when Noah went off with Maddie to console her at New Year's and Luke automatically assumed they were getting back together so he kissed Brian.

Things I liked last week:

- Bob having a real conversation with Margo about Casey and Jade, where he talks about his own home life.

- Nancy -- I love that she was involved in the Casey/Jade story, and in a way that makes sense too with the senior van thing -- multigenerational storytelling! This is different from the Katie thing because Casey is actually related.

- Susan and Allison's talks.

- Allison again sabotaging herself when she sees Casey and Jade after the van breaks down -- the show is rushing a lot of stories, but they're doing it right with the slow build and both internal and external sabotaging for Casey and Allison. Where is Matt though? Is he gone for good?

- Jade not trying to get in between Casey and Allison.

- Damian/Lisa. Lisa talking about her life, and about how she knows Damian still wants to be with Lily.

- Damian pointing out with good examples how Luke is not as sweet and innocent as Lily wants to think (again, more evidence the show is deliberately portraying Luke as overly self-righteous and stubborn, as an "ends justify the means and to hell with anybody else", hypocritical, gray character), Luke's breakdown where we clearly see how irrational he is about Damian, yet Damian also being wrong too in thinking Luke plotted it all to incriminate Damian, and then the sweetness of Lily convincing Damian Luke would not be behind it, and then Damian going to Malta to investigate about the ring, and saying he will go to Lisbon to bring back Noah.

- Surprisingly, Meg's new "manipulate Paul" story. Meg has a purpose and a goal again -- get back in Eliza's life.

- Zac and Zoe possibly being Grimaldis.

- Liberty standing up for herself and leaving Parker.

- Carly resolving not to drink, and being able to keep it up for awhile, before breaking down.

Didn't like (most of this from Friday's episode, which was almost unwatchable):

- Janet suddenly hating Carly after they had become friends and using the drinking against Carly when she had disagreed before when Jack thought Carly had a drinking problem.

- Carly not getting that her son was a possessive jerk, and blaming it all on Liberty.

- Jack not calling Parker out on being possessive when Parker went to visit the farm after the breakup.

- Parker bicycling to the docks for seemingly no reason (we had been told before the docks are in Bay City, not Oakdale, so they're not all that close!), then just happening to stumble across the Midnight Sun shipment

- Dusty and the thugs in a scene that felt like it belonged in a Hong Kong gangster movie, not a soap. Lucy's "Fellowship" ridiculousness in general.

- The lack of natural family and friend conversations connecting different stories. For example, why have Luke and Jade not had a scene about Damian yet? Why have Luke and Lucy, or Casey and Lucy, still not had a single scene since she came back? Why is Brad barely involved in the Parker/Liberty story?

Neutral:

- The Vienna baby story - it was just sort of there.

About scriptwriters, I agree with whoever thinks Susan Dansby is actually one of the weaker ones. She knows her history, but her dialogue can be corny/ cheesy, or too clever by half. My favorite writers on the staff are probably David Levinson and Peter Brash. All the scriptwriters are at least okay though.

[JellicleCat]

This is one of my main issues with the storytelling on ATWT too. It makes absolutely no sense that Brad is so absent from the whole Parker/Liberty debacle, and it makes equally no sense that Holden is nowhere to be seen around Lily and Luke with Damian in town.

And don't even get me started on the travesty that Lucy hasn't been in contact with her grandmother yet despite being in town off and on since December!

[P.J.]

Setting aside the fact the docks are supposedly in BayCity (! which was kind of arbitrary in the first place), I think Parker went to the docks looking for Craig.

As for scriptwriters...eh....I've always been so friggin' grateful they canned Lynn Martin and Royal Miller's asses, other than Susan Dansby and Liz Page (who last I heard was at OLTL...) the rest blend together.

It always seems like no matter how many parents children have, someone's got to be left out. Last summer, Carly was the absent parent, now it's Brad. I remember back in the day, teenAdam spent much more time with Jake, Molly and Abby than he ever did with either Margo, Tom or Hal.

[Amity]

That was me. Levinson and Brash are good.

[Amity]

*thought today was awesome*

[All My Shadows]

Argh!!! It drives me up the wall!

They're trying to tell a hundred storylines, and that basically leaves them no room at all to have scenes set aside for character/relationship-development. It's all about plot, plot, plot, storyline, storyline, storyline. It sucks.