5 minutes ago, P.J. said:

Um...I will say I am surprised that the Vanessa/Nadine rivalry just pretty much stopped dead in it's tracks after the Peter reveal. Of course, I don't watch past mid-'93, so maybe there's moments that I don't know about. But per Jean Carol's perspective, she stopped working with people she'd worked with for years, so I guess they booted her to the Cooper storyline.

However, I don't think there was a way they could've ever gone back to Billy/Nadine. Nadine had committed two unpardonable sins---she'd hurt Vanessa and then she was complicit in hurting HB. He wouldn't have gone back to her after hurting Van except for the baby. He may not have hated her, but there was no way he was ever going to trust her again. 

That's true. They sort of painted themselves in a corner for that stupid storyline.

Hart being killed, Bridget leaving with Peter.  It all seems so pointless now. 

In 97 there are so many characters gone and so many new ones.  

You stopped at the right time.  1994 was not good and it got worse, IMO.

7 hours ago, MLH said:

Speaking of Vanessa, this was earlier in August of 89. This episode is so good! Makes me nostalgic. 

LOL...that's a good one too! It's so refreshing to have characters talking to each other like they remember more than the last five minutes of their history. The only thing missing in that Vanessa/Phillp conversation is Van dropping India's name to remind him how bad it can get trying to get out of a marriage.

23 minutes ago, MLH said:

That's true. They sort of painted themselves in a corner for that stupid storyline.

Hart being killed, Bridget leaving with Peter.  It all seems so pointless now. 

In 97 there are so many characters gone and so many new ones.  

You stopped at the right time.  1994 was not good and it got worse, IMO.

Honestly, had Jordan Clarke still been with the show, I'd screw up my courage and rewatch. To clarify, I did watch it originally. I'm just not interested in rewatching it now. Too many changes, too much the wrong focus, characters eating airtime that I dislike (and I do mean more that Matt, there's a host of them, Buzz, Jenna, Reva's eventual return, Eve, Nick and fauxMindy...*sigh*)

On 8/6/2025 at 8:32 PM, MLH said:

I can't even handle watching anything beyond 1994. 

 

On 8/7/2025 at 6:27 PM, MLH said:

You stopped at the right time.  1994 was not good and it got worse, IMO.

Real time I watched Spring 1989 to Summer 1992. Online I rewatched that same era, plus continued from Fall 1992 to Spring 1994. Once Nancy Curlee left the writing team, I was done with full episodes.

Of the final 15 years, I saw online MZ last episode and clip sets of Annie Dutton psycho turn (witness stand breakdown, overdose, exit storyline). I didn't watch anything past Annie Dutton parachuting off the plane.

Edited August 9Aug 9 by kalbir

14 hours ago, MLH said:

Billy had to make a fool of himself going after Cassie.  Did they even try to have Billy go after Vanessa? 

 

No, Billy never tried to get back with Vanessa after he returned in '97. Part of it is timing, Maeve is in and out for the next 2-3 years, and I don't think TPTB really trusted Jordan enough to give him a major storyline. Billy kind of flits in and out of Springfield the way HB had. For instance, Billy seems to be out of town for most of the CloneReva story.

They did occasionally interact. Billy tells Vanessa that HB had died. Billy comes to Van's rescue when she's arrested for helping Dinah escape, but he pushes her back in Matt's direction. Billy shows up when Van's dying (he seemed to be the only one who hasn't given up hope that she'll pull through). And then after Matt squirrels Van away (after he realizes that Van shot Ben and Michelle has gone to jail) it's Billy who helps convince him that Van needs to tell what happened and free Michelle.

Personallly, I don't think TIIC were interested in revisiting Billy/Vanessa in any way, shape or form. Mattressa fans were not to be angered. 

One of the few right things Wheeler/Kriezman did was reconnect Billy and Vanessa. And honestly, had Jerry ver Dorn stayed, that probably wouldn't have happened. Dinah needed a parent in town. Matt was virtual dead weight. Hello divorce, buh-bye parasite.

There's a cute little short GL at the end about Billy and Van's wedding. Maeve is so sweet--she says that Billy and Van have missed each other, and now (with the marriage) they don't have to any more. 

 

1 hour ago, P.J. said:

Honestly, had Jordan Clarke still been with the show, I'd screw up my courage and rewatch. To clarify, I did watch it originally. I'm just not interested in rewatching it now. Too many changes, too much the wrong focus, characters eating airtime that I dislike (and I do mean more that Matt, there's a host of them, Buzz, Jenna, Reva's eventual return, Eve, Nick and fauxMindy...*sigh*)

Aftermath of Maureen death until Nancy Curlee leaves the writing team was a chore to get through. Way too much Buzz. I can only imagine how painful it was to watch in real time.

1 minute ago, kalbir said:

Aftermath of Maureen death until Nancy Curlee leaves the writing team was a chore to get through. Way too much Buzz. I can only imagine how painful it was to watch in real time.

I think the first half of '93 is dang good. But Buzz's hijinks are already wearing thin in the first three months, being shoehorned in on the biggest plot going--the Peter reveal--feels forced. I kinda wish it had simply been Vanessa finally getting the goods on that bleach blonde hussy all by herself.

10 hours ago, P.J. said:

Honestly, had Jordan Clarke still been with the show, I'd screw up my courage and rewatch. To clarify, I did watch it originally. I'm just not interested in rewatching it now. Too many changes, too much the wrong focus, characters eating airtime that I dislike (and I do mean more that Matt, there's a host of them, Buzz, Jenna, Reva's eventual return, Eve Nick and fauxMindy...*sigh*)

You aren't wrong.  It was basically focused on Michelle, Reva and Cassie by 1997/1998.  The whole Jenna/Buzz/Jeffrey (her husband) was so boring. fauxMindy was gone at this point. fauxDavid, fauxEd, fauxRoger...ugh, it was horrible for me. When the one actor I really care about (Michael) is gone, it's just not fun anymore. 

It was good to see Jordan Clarke, but his return was handled so rough to me. 

@kalbir Thank goodness for the FF! LOL I tried the rest of 1997 and hit the FF so much.  

@P.J.  LOL You sure hate Nadine!  I wish she stayed over Buzz. If I had my way, Nadine would have first became a real estate agent then a real estate broker...making mega bucks herself. 

In watching bits and pieces of 1992/1993/1994/1995/1996/1997, I see how good Melissa Hayden was and how the show should have focused more on Bridget.  Bridget should have had a full-blown love triangle going.   She seemed more attractive than annoying Dinah to me. Too bad the actors they picked for Hart after the 1st one, don't have good chemistry with her.  I would have had her have a bit of a closer relationship with Roger, to cause the friction needed with the Chamberlins. 

Edited August 8Aug 8 by MLH

I'm continuing my GL watch journey and getting more detailed in my 'watch journal', because I want my future self to enjoy the details later in life when I want to revisit this era of GL  I'm not sure if y'all read these anymore because I know this era isn't a favorite for most, but I'll keep posting just in case! They are more recap-style with my opinions/reactions sprinkled throughout.

I’m up to June 16, 1997 (and what a month!).

Something I’ve noticed this year is that both Reva/Josh and Vanessa/Matt have distinct music used in their scenes. Whenever there is closeness and love in the scenes, their music starts and it’s definitely part of each couple’s identity now.

The new Roger has really taken me out of it, which isn’t the actor’s fault, but it’s just not Roger and now I don’t really care about him or the Amanda/Roger storyline, sadly. You can tell they’ve put this storyline on the back burner too, for now.

Abby is in Rick’s class now at the hospital, so they’re able to interact. They grow to be friendly again, as Abby excels in her class.

Well, Alan lied on the stand in favor of Annie, so the judge ruled that Reva will stand trial for murder in 10 days. Rusty takes Marah and Shane to Oklahoma so they aren’t around for everything, which leads to a very tearful goodbye with Marah and Shane (although a couple weeks later, Marah yet again runs away and figures out how to take a bus cross state lines all the way back to Springfield LOL). Meanwhile, Alan is falling for Annie and they spend more time together. But impulsively, Annie hits Alan with a vase while panicking at Fran’s office. Reva arrives and they get Alan to the hospital, all while Reva is trying to press Alan into telling the truth, as Annie continues to panic. Alan privately forgives Annie and tells her he will take charge now and she will fall in line with him.

Reva’s trial starts on June 3. The judge is an old grumpy, no-BS man and guess who the actor is - Uncle Frank from Home Alone LOL! Griffin uses some magic trick to make a point about perception in his opening, which was dumb and upset the judge. Rick’s testimony was damning towards Reva, except Annie screwed herself over by getting rid of the fetus, because an autopsy couldn’t be completed and there is no way they can fully blame the fall on the death of the baby. Ross destroys Abby’s testimony, sadly. I felt bad for Abby because she was so nervous and only wanted to help Reva, but Ross really sunk her. Rick comforts her afterwards, which was sweet, and they end up kissing.

Reva starts to believe Annie’s baby was already dead before the fall, so she’s starting to figure out the truth. Josh tells Annie the hospital found the baby’s remains (which we see Annie actually swapped the label on another baby container so they were all mixed up). Annie panics and calls a clinic to ask if an autopsy would reveal whether a baby that’s already dead be shown in the results. Josh overhears, so he’s now figured out the truth and vows to get revenge on Annie.

Blake struggles with whether she tells the truth about her antics with Annie, with Holly pushing her to tell the truth and Roger pushing her not to, which puts Holly and Roger at odds. Blake doesn’t want to upset Ross and ruin his first case as DA, and also doesn’t want the truth to come out that she helped Annie steal files and tap Ross’s phone. So it’ll be up to Blake’s decision this entire trial, I think. Plus she really can’t screw this up again - this is her shot at redemption with Ross. If she doesn’t say anything, she’ll be such a weakling in my eyes after 1) throwing Roger under the bus at the Lonatrat trial and then 2) failing to tell Ross so many times about her hookup with Rick and the twins.  Especially now that Ross and Blake just had sex and he’s asking now to move back in with the family. She’s going to mess this up, I can just feel it haha. Meanwhile, Roger pulls Holly into a kiss, which upsets Fletcher.

Whelp, the next morning after Blake and Ross finally have sex and reunite, Ross is really digging into Reva while she’s on the stand, and in an emotional moment, Blake stands up in front of everyone and screams “No, Reva is not lying, Annie is!”. Great soap opera haha, but Blake really should have told Ross much sooner, as always. Annie looks like she’s going to kill Blake. Blake takes the stand, tells the entire truth and of course Ross questioning her gets really personal and messy.

Ohh, Marah is at the courthouse and Annie freaks out and pressures Marah into telling her what Josh was saying to her. Reva sees it and pushes Annie away and they almost get into a fist fight as Fran walks in ready to take the stand!  Annie has slowly spiraled for months, but she’s peak crazy right now. Fran tells the truth on the stand and Annie continues to call everyone liars. Come to find out, Alan paid Fran to tell the truth, so his scheming continues and I’m assuming this is his way to separate Annie and Josh so he can have her now.

Vanessa, as Tess, tells Matt online about her illness and how she wanted to save her husband from heartache. Matt, as Robert, tells her that’s basically awful and not the right way of going about it. They eventually ‘make up’ and continue talking. Vanessa gets the strength to take a few steps and really gets excited about her progress. She decides to call Matt’s house, he answers and she chickens out and hangs up! Then they have a ‘date’, both are drinking wine and Matt is sitting there shirtless, he takes her virtual dancing, and they start revealing more about each other’s looks. Vanessa starts to freak out because she thinks she’s now cheating on Matt in real life because they’re starting to venture into cyber sex land, and she says Matt’s name, which the computer microphone picks up and allows Matt to see she used the name Matt. He is startled and cries out for Vanessa! He starts putting all the pieces together and thinks it might be Vanessa. He tells Dinah his theory and she thinks he’s crazy, but then starts to believe him, while Hart tries to bring them back to reality. Matt then tells Nola his theory, but Nola tells him Vanessa was really sick and even if she didn’t die in the car wreck, she’d be dead by now, which infuriates him.

Meanwhile, Vanessa is more determined than ever to recover and plans to go back home to her family. These scenes are really good, and it doesn’t hurt that Matt is shirtless throughout haha. Oh no, then Vanessa calls Roger asking about Matt, and he tells her that Matt generally seems to be interested in a lady that he’s fallen for (Tess), which devastates Vanessa. She then tells Michael she has nothing to live for.

Maureen is back!  Michelle shows up at the door of the lady who she thinks has Maureen’s heart, and before she knocks, she has a vision of Maureen hugging her! Come to find out, this lady doesn’t have Maureen’s heart, so Michelle is devastated. She then sees Maureen again comforting and talking to Michelle from a distance.

Harley comes back and surprises everyone at Buzz’s birthday party. Her claws are already out with Jenna. Philip keeps pushing her on where Mallet is, which she seems to evade. As Buzz leaves his party at the diner, he’s run down by Jeffrey. More of the same with this storyline: Jeffrey threatens Jenna, Buzz finds a way to find her, Buzz/Jenna hide and make out, Jeffrey catches Jenna, Jenna tells Buzz she can’t be with him… rinse and repeat.

On 8/6/2025 at 6:30 PM, DeeVee said:

Every single thing here sounds like stuff Nola should have done, not Blake.

Exactley...they had no clue what to do with Blake so they just made her a ditzy..which she never was...remember when Labine wanted to make her a mail order preacher?

Nola just disappeared...they came out with a statement to the mags that Brown was now on recurring, and they looked forward to "many visits from Nola," in the future..but nothing happened (Brown coached the younger actors so with GL, she had her hands full.) Dumb, as she was perfect to be on recurring and managing Company and getting into everyone's business and acting like a greek chorus on what was going on, but you know..we have to focus on Reva and Cassie..so lets make a dumb island!  Matt sold Company to Buzzard (I always wanted Nola to come back and buy it back and kick the Coopers back to 5th street....) 

 

On 8/7/2025 at 6:33 AM, MLH said:

there is a dinner scene that has Amanda speaking and a dude with grey hair beside her saying absolutely nothing!  Is that supposed to be Roger? Roger saying nothing?  Seriously? Horrible writing.

Especially since he was sitting at the table with the woman who blackmailed his daughter and switched her paternity tests! If he wasn't thinking of ways to get back he would be thinking of ways to use Annie to bring Alan down..especially since she had him carrying her purse all the time...(I hate RR's Alan, his "Now Amanda" is so damn wimpy...) I gotta say, the women in this scene gave it their all and looked great. I do like Amanda's snakiness and think Alex needed a rest at this time after Marj and bad writing...but even Poser's Amanda is obscured..she would also be thinking of ways to use both Annie and Beth to manurer the Spaulding men out.

 

14 hours ago, MLH said:

Ok, I don't get it. LOL.  Did Harley leave or why did they go nowhere? 

Because it was stupid...Harley was the only one on contract at that time...and to have them investigate a crime they would need them to have writers who could make a coherent storyline. 

 

13 hours ago, P.J. said:

But per Jean Carol's perspective, she stopped working with people she'd worked with for years, so I guess they booted her to the Cooper storyline.

They relegated her to the Coopers and that damn diner, both of which Nadine wanted to get away from. She always had to moon over Buzz, the midget looser who left her and her kids, so there was not much to do with her. I always though Nadine should run after Ed, wanting to be a doc's wife...Nola, Bridet and Van would be aghast and maybe she could wake up sourpuss Peter Simon.

Popped up on my YouTube timeline this morning. I do not know if this has been posted prior, but I found it a fantastic watch (volume a bit low, FYI).

36 minutes ago, Liberty City said:

Popped up on my YouTube timeline this morning. I do not know if this has been posted prior, but I found it a fantastic watch (volume a bit low, FYI).

What I find most interesting about this is how "on" Jordan is in the scene, as if this is being taped for the show, not an audition.

I would guess one reason KZ got the role was because she was able to keep JC from totally dominating the scene.

The chemistry between her and RN is less obvious. I think she's said it took a little while for them to vibe.

Edited August 8Aug 8 by DeeVee

@alwaysAMC If you think fauxRoger is bad now, it gets worse. Plus, he treats Amanda like a stranger to me. Amanda shined at the dinner party to announce Ross and DA/the stupid Annie/Reva fight; and then they treated her like Nola, provide a comedic line and disappear for weeks. 

I have never been a fan of Blake/Chrissy.  I loved how Sherry Stringfield played her, but how she treated her parents drove me up the wall as she was an adult. Watching Holly and fauxRoger fawn all over her during the stupid Reva trial was eye roll inducing.  Roger suddenly being a Bloss fan was the worst. That guy should have played fauxAlan. Roger should have been getting closer with the Spaulding family as Blake/Holly have betrayed him and Peter is gone. 

Philip became fauxAlan-Michael by hanging at the diner more than at Spaulding Enterprises. 

@alwaysAMC Harely didn't mention Nadine's murder?

@Liberty City Nice find.  Kim and Jordan always had great chemistry together. 

Edited August 8Aug 8 by MLH

7 minutes ago, MLH said:

@alwaysAMC If you think fauxRoger is bad now, it gets worse. Plus, he treats Amanda like a stranger to me. Amanda shined at the dinner party to announce Ross and DA/the stupid Annie/Reva fight; and then they treated her like Nola, provide a comedic line and disappear for weeks. 

I have never been a fan of Blake/Chrissy.  I loved how Sherry Stringfield played her, but how she treated her parents drove me up the wall as she was an adult. Watching Holly and fauxRoger fawn all over her during the stupid Reva trial was eye roll inducing.  Roger suddenly being a Bloss fan was the worst. That guy should have played fauxAlan. Roger should have been getting closer with the Spaulding family as Blake/Holly have betrayed him and Peter is gone. 

Philip became fauxAlan-Michael by hanging at the diner more than at Spaulding Enterprises. 

@alwaysAMC Harely didn't mention Nadine's murder?

@Liberty City Nice find.  Kim and Jordan always had great chemistry together. 

Yeah - I'm wondering if Amanda/nuRoger were sidelined for a bit as they figured out the Zaslow situation, or maybe they just always planned for the Reva trial to take up most of that month.

Harley mentioned Nadine's death briefly when she returned for a week in January 1997 for the 60th anniversary party. She just said she was sad to have missed all these significant moments (Nadine's funeral, A-M/Lucy's wedding)... but then she decides to return to catch Jenna thieving? Dumb.

15 minutes ago, alwaysAMC said:

Harley mentioned Nadine's death briefly when she returned for a week in January 1997 for the 60th anniversary party. She just said she was sad to have missed all these significant moments (Nadine's funeral, A-M/Lucy's wedding)... but then she decides to return to catch Jenna thieving? Dumb.

I think she also said she just couldn't face going to Nadine's funeral.

Thanks for the audition @Liberty City I'd never seen that. The volume is so low it's hard to tell, but is Kim not doing the big Southern accent?