11 hours ago, skylark said:

I've been meaning to blab the many thoughts I've had on the '82-'83 Rusty Sentell Sr. arc somewhere for a while, so I hope it isn't disruptive if I lay them down here! (God this turned into an essay!)

I've taken the most interest in Rusty Sr., so it's interesting to see all the changes and rewrites they've made to the character as the show changed writers. First, with the reveal that he was still alive in Italy with Gina and Renata here (after apparently faking his death in a "B-47 crash in WWII", which wouldn't have been possible as that jet was introduced in 1951 🤔).

Then, the whole Alex/Rusty doppelganger thing in the Summer of '82...  That one's a doozy. I haven't seen those episodes myself, but going off the summaries, Alex was a “clone” of Rusty Sr. who altered his appearance via plastic surgery in an attempt to manipulate Travis (?) and take over Sunburst. I find this so fascinating because after Rusty kills off Alex, they reintroduce Rusty as "a good guy now" only to reveal that he has the same exact intentions as his evil doppelganger? Did the wrong clone get shot or something? It seems like there were some really conflicting ideas as to where to take Rusty's character.

From what I've seen, they also paint Rusty as having an irrational disdain for Martin, bullying and jeering him at every opportunity, being responsible for his sister’s decline and death, hitting on his soon-to-be-ex-wife before they’ve even finalized their divorce papers, flirting a bit with his current fling, Stephanie, and scamming him out of every dollar and share he owns. He’s a total bully and it’s so unnecessarily cruel that it’s kind of funny. Not to validate Rusty’s crazy behavior, but wasn’t Martin responsible for the death of Rusty’s daughter, Renata, after falling asleep with a lit cigarette that caused the building to burn down? If Rusty has it out for Martin that much, I feel like maybe they should have circled back to that stuff and even Mignon, because although it’s funny that Rusty wants to torment Martin seemingly because he gets a kick out of it, they could have actually had them talk about their lingering history which would have been super interesting. They only ever had Martin yell at Rusty while he stayed quiet and avoided every topic, which makes sense, because Rusty was trying to make Martin look irrational and crazy, but still, it would have been so satisfying to see them actually go back and forth about the real stuff.

Another thing I’ve thought about is how "Rusty was saved by Aja’s father during some sort of 'underground spy escape attempt' in which he sacrificed himself to rescue him". That’s why Rusty raised Aja and supported her family: to repay his sacrifice (well, after subsequently romancing with Aja’s mother, Sophia, too).  Maybe this is a little far-fetched, but since the show has already established that Rusty is a total liar and fraud, the writers could have revealed that Rusty actually killed Aja’s Father or was otherwise responsible for his death in a way that wasn't so valiant, instead of the glorious tale of spying and selflessness and sacrifice, because after seeing how shady Rusty is, I don't buy his story.

I've also done some brainstorming about where they could have taken things if Rusty didn't get killed off, but I'll keep it short as I've already written a novel:

If Rusty tried to repair his relationship with Liza before her and Dane figured him out, he would have been able to slip under the radar and continue meddling with the relationship. That, or he'd give that up considering Liza was pregnant, and just focus on maintaining a good image while racketeering under everyone's nose. I would have liked to see them bring Rusty's brother, Edward (Lee's Father), into the picture and see those two interact. Who knows, maybe Edward's shady too. (I know they had Edward appear briefly before Rusty joined the cast, but I could see them recasting and rewriting Edward to fit this new plot). I see a lot of people compare the actor Fritz Weaver to David Gale, so maybe he could have come in to play him. 

Alright! I better shut up now!

Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I have not watched a great deal of this period so always appreciate the extra insights.

TIL, Rusty was their given name and Travis was his nickname?  That's nutty

4 hours ago, j swift said:

TIL, Rusty was their given name and Travis was his nickname?  That's nutty

Hmmm, I thought Travis' mother Mignon started calling Travis "Rusty" (originally his Father's nickname) after his Father passed away since they both shared the same red hair. I'd have to check and see if that's correct or not.

"Rusty" isn't Rusty Sr.'s real name, either. His is William Barrett Travis Sentell (according to the episode where Mignon reads a letter of his). Lol!

Edited September 21, 20232 yr by skylark

1 hour ago, skylark said:

Hmmm, I thought Travis' mother Mignon started calling Travis "Rusty" (originally his Father's nickname) after his Father passed away since they both shared the same red hair. I'd have to check and see if that's correct or not.

"Rusty" isn't Rusty Sr.'s real name, either. His is William Barrett Travis Sentell (according to the episode where Mignon reads a letter of his). Lol!

Thank goodness,  that makes more sense because no one on earth has been named Rusty Jr.

@skylark Thanks for sharing your thoughts on Rusty Sentell. I watched a bunch of 1982-1983 episodes a couple of years ago and found Rusty (not David Gale) such a fascinating mess. It just seemed like they were going to throw him all over the canvas and see what would happen. By the end of Ralph Ellis and Eugenie Hunt's run, I felt that they were just leaning into making him a more grounded Stefano Dimera/Mikkos Cassadine type.

Tonally, the Operation Sunburst story seemed to be an odd story space to explore the kind of "General Hospital" inspired adventure tales that were becoming more and more prominent. It's an odd story in that it starts in 1981 under Don Chastain and just continues with ninjas, dopplegangers, and other over the top elements when Hunt and Ellis are writing. Then, it just sort of stops being a thing when David Cherrill takes over, but I haven't seen every episode so its possible there is some conclusion to the story. Using this story as a vehicle for bringing Rusty back isn't a choice I would have made, but so be it.

Bringing in Rusty, Sr., as an obstacle to Travis and Liza made sense given their history with Travis' mother, Mignon. I thought the psychological games that Rusty and Liza engaged in were the strongest element of Rusty's storyline even though I don't think Ellis and Hunt did Travis any favors in the process. I could have watched the one-upmanship between Rusty and Liza all day. 

Rusty's motivation was something that I struggled with. The whole concept of the codicile was just odd. Why would the General want Rusty in charge of his own grandchild's inheritance rather than Travis himself? Why not just reopen the will claiming there was a sizeable inheritance left to Rusty that went to Travis because of Rusty's "death"? Granted, this would have made the Travis-Rusty relationship more antagonistic, but it may have made Travis less like an idiot. If Travis was trying to cozy up to Aja, who would play on her connection to both men, you could still have Aja in the role of the third party obstacle without forcing the baby angle. 

Rusty's quest for power seemed to dominate a lot of his actions. I thought Rusty's relationship with Martin was driven by the need on Rusty's part to gain control of Tourneur Instruments and Martin was a two-level obstacle: he had shares in the company and he had a close relationship with Travis. Rusty needed Martin out of the way in order to accomplish this. Also, Martin was definitely a Liza sympathizer. I thought the idea of Rusty as the General's son of choice over drunken rogue Martin was a logical stance. 

The Aja stuff was definitely odd. The spy angle was weird. I wasn't sure if they were trying to generate a level of romantic tension between Rusty and Aja or simply developing a fatherly rapport between the two that would potentially incite jealousy from Travis on the basis that Aja had the parent-child bond with Rusty that should be Travis'. I don't have much use for Aja, if I'm honest. Having her kill Rusty was a two for one special in my book. 

The gun running angle was bizarre. There just seemed to be too many deals going on in Rusty's world. He is trying to secure the rights to Operation Sunburst as well as TI and he is also running weapons through South America with Warren and Ringo as couriers. 

The other thread that was odd was Rusty's friendship with Jenny Deacon. I don't know if they were looking to cause Rusty-Stu tension which would have extended to an eventual Rusty-Jo relationship, but it was just very annoying as both characters seemed to be all over the place even if played by decent actors. 

I felt another angle to approach with Rusty, had he stayed, would have been to have him become involved with Janet Collins, Liza's mother, and having Rusty take control of Colins Corporation (which I think was still around but may have been absorbed into one of Ted Adamson's companies) to use it to fight TI. Or instead of pursuing Liza and Dane, which seemed to be the direction that Hunt and Ellis were suggesting in their final weeks, I would have pursued Liza and Lee by having Cissie leave Roger Lee with Lee in Henderson and having Liza start to spend time with Lee and the child she had once raised as her own. To me, the Aja-Rusty stuff would have been better suited to Lee-Rusty and would have lacked the sexual tension (or maybe not, but that could be a conversation for another day). 

I liked that Rusty's return utilized the history of the Tourneur clan, but I'd be lying if I didn't say that Rusty's loss didn't feel as significant because by June Peter Haskell arrived as Lloyd Kendall and ultimately played a very similar role to Rusty and he felt less forced onto the canvas. 

Long time lurker, first time poster here! It seems like Scott breezed through quite a few wives in the early to mid 70s. Lauri and Jennifer were a little before my time, but i definitely remember Kathy. Could someone please tell me more about Lauri and why Scott ended up raising her son? I remember someone in this thread said that the boy's natural father was a louse and that Scott wanted to protect the child from knowing the truth. Thank you!

@dc11786 Thank you for the reply! I love analyzing these characters lol. Rusty is definitely kind of a mess; David Gale himself was also a bit disappointed with how the character strayed from the original pitch. (Here's a snippet where he responds to the question: "What would you like to see your character do?")

I missed the intro episodes to Sunburst, so I haven't seen a whole lot from the era when things were loaded with ninjas, spies, etc. I've seen a couple of episodes where Aja and Dane go up against a lady in Hong Kong (? I think?) as well as one ninja, but that's it. I wish I could take a look at more from then, particularly the Alex doppelganger thing, who I only have one very short clip of. I really want to see the climax to that where the two look-alikes are on screen together! 

I totally agree that Rusty and Liza's passive-aggressive back-and-forths are pretty good. In those scenes, they do a really great job at making Rusty's dialogue so painful and uncomfortable that I always cringe. Especially during that dinner scene kind of early on where Rusty invades her date with Travis at the Riverboat and goes on and on about Aja's success. I love Rusty because he's crazy, but that makes me cringe every time.

I agree also that Rusty's whole motive with the General's will and the Torneur stock is convoluted. I've tried to explain to friends what he's up to and it's a mouthful. I guess they made Rusty in charge of the inheritance because the General must have really liked him (lol) and they needed some angle for him to try to take TI. Though you make a good point about Rusty having been "dead" up until this point.. I hadn't thought about how that might change the course of the inheritance. Yeah, Rusty really shouldn't be in charge of this will. *edit: also, the fact that Rusty ended up having the same goals as his evil doppelganger still bugs me! 

Oh, that also just reminded me. After Rusty Sr. dies, Dane reveals that he learned Rusty Sr. never had any money to his name at all and this whole time he was just using his crime syndicate's checkbook. I thought that was interesting. It shows how much of a fraud Rusty really was, but at the same time, almost left me feeling disappointed because it took away some "authority" from Rusty's image.

You make a good point about Martin, too. All the scenes of Rusty constantly sassing him felt like insult to injury, but you're right, Martin is in the way, so a guy like Rusty wouldn't care to be decent to him lol. However, I think Rusty was a bit careless with being rude to people. If he put a little more effort into being pleasant to people he didn't like he would have made himself a lot less suspicious. I feel like he was smart enough to know that, but still mouthed off anyways. I guess it's more entertaining this way.

I feel multiple ways about Rusty and Aja's relationship, but I agree that it can be strange. At times I find their relationship pretty endearing (picturing Rusty helping to raise a young Aja, showing her how to operate planes, etc., does make me grin) but other times they seem a bit too cozy with each other, at least to me. I can't tell how much of that is due to the writing and how much of it is just the actors having good chemistry together. Aja could have used some friends to make her appear less dependent on her father figure for companionship. I suppose that is part of the toxic relationship they were supposed to have, but alas. Other than Rusty, she only had Dane. Sometimes I wonder if Dane and Aja would have been decent romantically instead of Dane x Sunny (Not that I have strong feelings about Dane x Sunny one way or the other, but just a passing thought). Either way, I like Aja. The matchup of a gun racketeer father and a rocket scientist daughter I find kind of fun because of how outlandish it is.

Ah, yes, and the gunrunning. Rusty is busy lol. I like the gunrunning because David Gale works well as that kind of over-the-top-mafia-boss type, but it certainly isn't realistic by any means and makes Rusty's character even more all over the place. Although it is kind of funny to see him rent Janet's place and fill it floor to ceiling with guns. He's a piece of work. That scene where Jo walks in his doorway and stops dead in her tracks while the camera pans silently to Rusty's living room covered in an assortment of loaded guns strewn across all the furniture is pretty comedic.

Rusty and Jenny was an interesting side plot. I think someone mentioned it in this thread a while back, and it may have even been you, but I agree with the sentiment that it was likely an attempt to humanize/soften Rusty's character that didn't really work. He was pretty creepy to her and crossed a lot of boundaries. And when he goes on long shpeals about how love is just a tool for manipulation, all the while confessing to Jenny that he has deep feelings for her, it all just really confuses me. I can't tell what Rusty believes.

Oh, I wasn't aware of the Collins Corporation. I need to go back and watch some episodes before '82. Also, super interesting suggestion to switch Aja with Lee. The tension issue would be solved if that were the case. 

Edited September 21, 20232 yr by skylark

OK, I need a refresher because I'm getting my Sentells and Kendalls mixed up.

So, with the Sentells - the General is Gen 1, then Rusty Sr is Gen 2, and Travis aka Rusty Jr is Gen 3, although Travis was really Martin's son - correct

Then, I think I've confused bitchy ex-wives.  Mignon is Rusty Sr.'s ex-wife, so who was Lloyd Kendall's ex-wife?  And wasn't one of his sons actually fathered by another man?

Edited September 21, 20232 yr by j swift

1 hour ago, j swift said:

OK, I need a refresher because I'm getting my Sentells and Kendalls mixed up.

So, with the Sentells - the General is Gen 1, then Rusty Sr is Gen 2, and Travis aka Rusty Jr is Gen 3, although Travis was really Martin's son - correct

Then, I think I've confused bitchy ex-wives.  Mignon is Rusty Sr.'s ex-wife, so who was Lloyd Kendall's ex-wife?  And wasn't one of his sons actually fathered by another man?

I thought Mignon and Martin were brother and sister.  Is that incorrect?  And was the General Mignon's father or Rusty Sr's father?  Did any of the Sentells or Tourners ever meet the Kendalls?  Other than Jo and Liza, I mean.   

 

General Roger Tourneur was Martin and Mignon's father   (William Robertson)

5 hours ago, Neil Johnson said:

I thought Mignon and Martin were brother and sister.  Is that incorrect?  And was the General Mignon's father or Rusty Sr's father?  Did any of the Sentells or Tourners ever meet the Kendalls?  Other than Jo and Liza, I mean.   

 

OK, I went back and solved my confusion.

Estelle was Lloyd's ex-wife and her son Steven was fathered by Martin Tourneur.

I think it is Steve Kendall and Steve Kaslow that threw me for a loop.

Edited September 22, 20232 yr by j swift

Travis and the Kendalls overlapped for about a year. Michael, Steve, and Lloyd were introduced in April, May, and June, 1983. There was definintely an intent to develop the Kendalls as rivals to the Sentell/Tourneur crew, not to eliminate them from the canvas. Besides Martin's affair with Estelle, the General had left Lloyd's father high and dry during a business deal years earlier involving a government contract and faulty parts. The General was able to save his own hide, but Lloyd's father went bankrupt. The failure led to Lloyd's father taking his own life. Lloyd actively hated the Tourneurs and had kept the paternity secret partially out of spite it seemed. 

In 1984, there was some build up about having Liza and Travis raising one of the Kendalls, in what was meant to be karmic retribution for Steve being raised a Kendall. T.R. was revealled to be the missing Rebecca, but, at one point, the baby Elan was going to be Adair's child by one of the Kendall brothers. 

Even with Travis "dead," I think the value in the Lloyd / Liza romance was Travis' inevitable return that simply got lost in the shuffle of writers and producers much in the same way I expected Roger Forbes would have been revived on "Loving" had they not seen writing staff turnover. 

What year was Harding Lemay head-writer at SFT?  Wasn't it around 1981?  So I assume Travis was still alive, and the Kendalls had not yet arrived in Henderson.  Is that correct?  I've read one of Lemay's plans was to bring Mignon back to the canvas. That makes sense, because she was the type of neurotic controlling character that Lemay loved to write.  It would be interesting to know what other plans Lemay had for SFT.  He liked to write for troubled characters who, to a large degree, created their own problems. He also enjoyed writing for characters who had historical conflicts that he could exploit for future plots/scenes (Jo and Stephanie, for example) For those of you who were watching, did you see any sense of Lemay taking the show in that direction?  

Does anyone remember if SFT's original opening theme was ever orchestrated?  All the YouTube videos I have seen have the organ version.  It's possible, I suppose, that SFT's second theme (When Tomorrow Comes) was the first to be orchestrated.  Does anyone know for sure?

16 hours ago, Neil Johnson said:

Does anyone remember if SFT's original opening theme was ever orchestrated?  All the YouTube videos I have seen have the organ version.  It's possible, I suppose, that SFT's second theme (When Tomorrow Comes) was the first to be orchestrated.  Does anyone know for sure?

Neil I posed this to a friend who is very knowledgeable about SFT & about organ music & composers, etc. and he said that to his knowledge the original SFT theme by Chet Kingsbury was never orchestrated. Hope it helps.