Another World

[Xanthe]

 

I would love to know what they thought they were doing when they decided to let the audience vote on the verdict in Brittany's trial, and then essentially ignored it to have Brittany and Catlin leave the state (!) together while Zach appealed it. Regarding whether Britt was conning Peter, there was no doubt that she deceived him into thinking he was the father of her baby. 

 

I wonder if Nancy would have lasted longer if any of her boyfriends had been tied to other core families. Perry was Donna's stepson and Carl's son but Chris and Greg and Tony were all outsiders. It wasn't long after Nancy left town that they SORASed Amanda to fill that slot.

Edited July 29, 2019 by Xanthe

[watson71]

 

The character of Paulina was another unnecessary illegitimate child of Mac Cory.  When Cali Timmins and Judi Evans were on the show, they should have  been cast as Nancy .McGowan rather than Paulina.   Nancy always had a crush on Jake- Paulina was involved with Jake,  Nancy hated Vicky- Paulina and Vicky fought over Grant, when Joe Carlino was introduced on the show they even stated that he dated Nancy in high school- before he became involved with Paulina, and both Nancy and Paulina became addicted to drugs.   The Paulina storylines in the 90s would have worked if the character was Nancy.

 

Bringing up Carl's son Perry, I always wondered why the writers ignored the fact that Vicky indirectly caused Perry's death when he discovered that Vicky was a twin to Marley and he fell from the hayloft in the Love stable.  Surely a vengeful Carl would not want another son, Ryan, becoming involved with the woman who caused Perry's death.  Ironically, Ryan's death would also be tied to Vicky when he was shot by Grant on the train trestle after Justine kidnaped Kirkland.  So Vicky had ties to the deaths of both of Carl's sons.

[AbcNbc247]

I think the writers just might've forgotten that Vicky unintentionally caused Perry's death. When I was watching the Swajeski era, I noticed there were a lot of mistakes/continuity errors (where Janice was buried, Iris and Cecile's friendship, etc.) And when Carl came back in 1991, they didn't even include Aunt Liz in that story, and he was indirectly responsible for Julia's murder.

[watson71]

 

Julia's death was unnecessary.  Another member of the Matthews family killed.  Within two years, both Julia and Sally would be killed off AW.   If Julia remained on the show, at least her parents Susan and Dan could have returned to Bay City giving Liz some additional airtime.

 

Also, at one point, didn't the writers play around with bringing back Liz's son, Bill, who died in a boating accident in California?

[AbcNbc247]

I have no idea. I never heard that from anyone or anywhere.

 

Killing off Bill was another mistake. Him and Missy and Ricky could've driven story for years. If Joe Gallison was locked into OLTL contract and couldn't get out of it to appear in Somerset, they should've just recasted the role.

[j swift]

As I recall from one of the podcast interviews with the actress, her real-life pregnancy and resulting child with special needs were impetuous for her character's departure, which was sad to hear and made me give AW a pass on their exit, but not on the prior errors in establishing the character.   

[KMan101]

 

And then John and Anna were dumped and written out (or did they leave on their own?)

[John]

Anna Holbrook was fired. Not sure about David Forsyth

[AbcNbc247]

He was probably fired too. The show was really anal about featuring younger characters at that time.

[KMan101]

 

How is it any different really than forcing viewers to care about a new character who has a convoluted backstory no one cares about? It's really the same thing.

[KMan101]

 

Yes!! I've long said Judi should have been playing Nancy, not Paulina. Paulina wasn't needed. I think Cali's Paulina had a lot of potential but I also think Cali could have worked as Vicky over say blah Jensen Buchanan. Watching a lot of Rachel/Paulina scenes, it's clear they should have been sisters, they sure acted liked it (Judi's Paulina was basically Nancy and it all would have worked much better, but they seemed to act as if Nancy didn't exist, I rarely ever remember them talking about her) ...

 

Thanks. I know Forsyth quickly landed on AMC (ugh, just remembering that time period). I imagine he was fired too, but maybe he saw the writing on the wall and left? lol

Edited July 29, 2019 by KMan101

[John]

Anna Holbrook also went to AMC around that time as a Madam named Victoria, I think I am remembering that correctly.

[Efulton]

I read somewhere that Harding Lemay toyed with the idea of bringing Bill back as having lived in Europe as a gigolo.  Not sure how true it was though.

Edited July 30, 2019 by Efulton

[Xanthe]

 

They had plenty of options to accommodate Sharon Gabet without soliciting and then ignoring audience input. If they didn't want Brittany to go to prison, they could have just written her acquittal. Letting the audience find her guilty and then hand-waving the verdict away as irrelevant because it was being appealed (plus layering on top of it a happily-ever-after where she and Catlin and their baby moved to Montana) felt like one of those Choose Your Own Adventure books where option 1 takes you to a dead end where the only option is to go back to the previous choice and choose option 2 anyway.

Who knows what they would have done if Thomas Ian Griffith had not been ready to leave anyway. But Brittany was handled terribly and ruined Catlin -- if I recall correctly he didn't keep Kevin, just handed him off to Aunt Liz.

[watson71]

 

Regarding Aunt Liz, I never understood why TPTB wrote Irene Dailey out of the show from June 1986 to November 1987.  When Dailey returned in November 1987, she was placed on recurring status,  I wonder why they didn't do this in June 1986 to keep the character in Bay City.  Her last airdate was May 4, 1994 on AW's 30th Anniversary episode.   They should have kept her around on a recurring basis until the end of the series.  JFP probably would have gotten rid of Aunt Liz during her tenure in 1995-96.  Given JFP's record at other shows, she probably would have tried to get rid of Mac (Douglass Watson) and Ada (Constance Ford) if they hadn't passed away and were still on the show in 1995-96.