1 hour ago, DRW50 said:

@Lujack4Ever I appreciate hearing your thoughts. You're right, killing Lujack was very short-sighted, likely a spite move, and produced little story value unless you are a big fan of Alex's decimation with Nick. I hadn't even thought of the lost story potential in Nick not meeting Philip.

Do you think Lujack would have worked with another actress playing Beth?

Thanks. Well unfortunately we wouldn't get the flashbacks but Beth Chamberlain worked well with others like Grant and Tina so I think it could have been convincing having her play off Vincent's returned Lujack. (the closest we ever got was Beth Chamberlain's Beth telling Reva Johnathan reminded her of Lujack-to which I say NO WAY!)

20 hours ago, Paul Raven said:

When Meta married Joe Roberts he had 2 children. Kathy who was Robin's mother and Joey who was written out in the mid 50's.

So Meta could have had 'grand children' through Joey.

Or they could have done rewrite whereby Bruce Banning found out he had a child and there were grandchildren through that.

I can see Meta adopting the Faux Bauers like Johnny, as she would desperately want a family like her brother did, (and he threw it away.) That would have made a better connection then bringing in this Lainie and Jack that no one knew (though I liked the Lainie actress as Meta, and I would have made the new Bauers...more interesting then Johnny.) Meta's cousins died in one of those car crashes that were always so plot expedient in soaps, so motherless she adopted them herself and took back the Bauer name.

7 hours ago, DRW50 said:

I hadn't even thought of the lost story potential in Nick not meeting Philip.

I never followed Irizarry's career, was he on AMC when they were doing the Beth/Phillip/Harley thing? If not that would have been an interesting development and much more interesting then Phillip, in love with good old gal Harley, but chased after by a newly psycho Beth.

1 minute ago, Mitch64 said:

I never followed Irizarry's career, was he on AMC when they were doing the Beth/Phillip/Harley thing? If not that would have been an interesting development and much more interesting then Phillip, in love with good old gal Harley, but chased after by a newly psycho Beth.

IIRC, he began appearing on AMC in late 1997 for a guest run, then was popular so returned full time later on that year until the mid '00s.

On 11/30/2025 at 2:06 PM, Reverend Ruthledge said:

Oh. Good question. So many, it's hard to choose. But I can probably pull out my top five:

1. 1938. Reverend Ruthledge talks about the trouble growing in Europe during his Thanksgiving Day sermon. Ned asks Torchy to marry him. Abe dies. So much foreshadowing of the drama to unfold for both the world and for the story.

2. 1945. Reverend Tuttle is worried that he's about to be put out to pasture and his assistant Bill Brown surprises him with a full congregation for his Thanksgiving Day sermon.

3. 1948. The first Bauer Thanksgiving and Mama Bauer is still alive.

4. 1955. Meta is missing Chuckie at the Bauer Thanksgiving dinner and Mike asks, "Who's Chuckie?". I just found that a poignant moment.

5. 1968. When Ed comes to the Bauer Thanksgiving drunk, starts a fight with Mike and passes out before dinner is served. Not a heart-warming moment but good drama.

I know you know ball, I can't wait to go back through this thread and learn more.

@DRW50 @Lujack4Ever Thanks both I actually came here immediately after seeing someone’s post ranting about Lujack’s death on Facebook in the GL history group I’m in.

I think this was probably the most obvious sign for sure the Kobe/Long was going off the rails, and also Jeff Ryder wasn’t up to HW of GL. Many, many years ago there was a member who was a online friend of mine named Angel here at SON and WOST who was taken back by seeing similar criticism of Ryder because while she was at the now defunct University of the Arts she took a class by Ryder and according to her he actually spoke openly and warmly about his writing stint at GL.

Obviously Lujack’s death was short sighted by all parties involved when perhaps a simple recast was in order. Instead the show had Simon Hall hoisted on it, Beth died herself while Judi found even more super stardom on Days, and eventually of course GL ended up with Nick.

@Khan @DRW50 I still always wonder how Gail Kobe always felt about ending up at B&B being forced to do her job without drama/question after all was said and done with her time at GL and Texas. Actually I wonder why Bell even hired her. No one ever talks about her tenure at B&B lol.

BTW regarding Meta @Mitch64 guess I have always thought that Joey was Meta’s legit son with Joe and never understood why he was ignored; similarly I vividly remember seeing a Bauer Family tree in I think either SOU or SOD around the 60th anniversary that not only indicated Joey was Meta’s son, but also Paul Kincaid was Bill’s son along with the existence of some other Bauer sibling (Douglas Bauer I think?).