I’m up to February 24, 1998.

Dinah finds Rob Layne at a halfway house. Rob is a very handsome man! He flirts with Dinah and they discuss his past with Cassie/Tammy. Dinah’s goal is to get him out of the halfway house and in front of Cassie before Valentine’s Day hits. Meanwhile, Cassie/Hart are in Puerto Rico on vacation, but Cassie gets a bad sunburn and they’re not able to have sex (which strangely they haven’t done yet as a couple). Reva calls them about Vanessa and they come back home early to be with everyone at the hospital. Later, Tammy disappears when Rusty is babysitting. Cassie rushes home and finds her with Rob, who has now shown up in Springfield. She tries to give him money to leave town, but he refuses and Hart shows up and they get into a fight.

Michelle comes back to Springfield with her male doctor to visit Vanessa in her coma and meet baby Maureen. Drew is at the hospital trying to give blood for money because she’s still broke and cut off from her dad. Jesse arrives and Michelle hears Jesse and Drew together and assumes they’re a couple now, but Abby tries to convince her they’re not together. Later, Jesse walks by and sees Michelle and her doctor hugging and assumes this is the guy she’s now seeing. As they’re driving back to the facility, Michelle starts to realize she should be happy she’s alive and celebrate that, not hide from it, so she asks the doctor to take her back to Springfield. She’s now convinced Jesse still loves her and couldn’t have moved on with Drew. Meanwhile, Jesse and Drew are commiserating over their lost loves with beer (Drew talking about Sugar Hill, who was a creep and would rather be with Dahlia than her). Drew loosely says since they’re both single now and attractive, maybe they should get together, which Jesse laughs at, but they start dancing and then eventually make out. Sadly, Michelle and her doctor walk up to Jesse’s place and the doctor sees Drew/Jesse making out. He tries to take her away, but Michelle hears Jesse telling Drew that he really wants her and they continue kissing. Michelle is sad and rushes away with the doctor, but she drops her facility name bracelet on her way out. Jesse/Drew stop before fully having sex because Drew wanted him to make love to her like Michelle, and he stopped and wasn’t able to. He then find’s Michelle’s bracelet.

Maureen tries to convince Vanessa to fight and go back to life, but Vanessa seems set on dying and letting her loved ones move on (which is a common theme with Vanessa, it’s so weird to me). Maureen shows Vanessa a grim future without her, starting at Matt’s wedding to Dinah, who happens to be in a wheelchair. Later, a moment with Matt/Dinah in a car talking about Dinah trying to kill herself, and they get into an accident which caused her to be in a wheelchair. Another scene in Cassie’s bar and Dinah being an alcoholic and smoking, which was just before the car accident. In this vision, Josh also shows up and berates Matt for losing his job and being an awful friend. Then, the final vision, Vanessa sees Matt at baby Maureen’s grave, which confirms that baby Maureen died the same day Vanessa did. Heaven Maureen tells Vanessa that her decision to die will be for not and Vanessa then realizes she can’t allow herself to die. In the hospital, all her friends/family have gathered with a priest, assuming she’s about to die. At the same time, Rick sadly tells Matt that baby Maureen’s organs are shutting down too and she likely won’t survive. What a gut punch!  Vanessa jumps back into life, wakes up out of her coma and is alive - yay! She immediately is concerned about Maureen and wants to see her.

Phillip and Harley move into their new home, which is a nice new set on the show!  But, their time is ruined because Phillip tells Harley that Lizzie cried and pleaded with him to stay at the Spaulding Mansion with her, and so he will have to perhaps split time between both places. Harley of course goes crazy over it, tears up the lease to their new home and they fight. I’ve gotta say, Harley makes it hard to like her sometimes. She’s like a neurotic chihuahua and it drives me crazy, but then sometimes she’s likable and funny. Meanwhile, Lillian continues to worry about Beth’s mental health and tries to get her to see a therapist.

Abby is offered a new plea deal with a lesser crime (involuntary manslaughter), which likely means 18 months in jail. She decides she wants to take it, even though everyone is telling her not to. She’s resolved in her decision and wants to make love to Rick before she goes off to jail. He decides instead to take her to a priest so they can get married. Abby looks beautiful in her dress. They say their vows and get married, which was such a sweet moment with just the two of them and their priest and his wife. I love this couple, always have, so it was nice to finally see their wedding. They later get home and she asks Rick to show her how to make love to her. I guess I just assumed they already have had sex since they’ve been together now for so long and stopped talking about it, but I guess not since she was always going to wait until they were married.

Harley takes Reva to the gun range so she can practice shooting targets. Josh gets upset with her for having a gun and tries to persuade her to get rid of it.

Michael visits with Josh at Lewis Oil and tells him about his research. He says what he’s working on is very serious and could have bad consequences if left in the wrong hands. Therefore, he wants to move away from Alan Spaulding and get Josh’s backing instead. Later, Reva is alone at Lewis Oil and Annie sneaks in, uses a syringe to drug Reva, and straps her up in a stretcher! Josh returns to the office and can’t find Reva and starts to get worried. We then see Annie and a tied up Reva in a prop plane. Annie has a camcorder LOL, and she’s giving updates on her feelings and plans. Reva tells Annie she’s crazy for drugging and tying her up, but Annie was quick to remind her that Reva did the same thing to her at Cross Creek months ago (good point!). Annie said Reva never should have come back from the dead, and this time, she won’t be able to because she’ll see to it that she’s dead. Apparently the pilot is working/being paid by Annie, and she reveals that she played the part of a nurse (with her unconscious patient) to get onto the plane. Annie then calls Josh to gloat, but Reva knocks the phone out of her hands, they struggle a bit, and Annie punches Reva out cold. Josh is yelling for Reva over the phone and the drama is building! Reva wakes up and Annie is still talking to Josh. He tells her he’ll do anything he wants to get her to stop, so Annie asks if he’ll marry him, to which he says yes. She then makes him say he loves her, so he says it. She then tells him to memorize an address and go there alone, and the address happens to be in the Florida Keys where Reva originally ‘died’ when she drove her car off the pier. OMG - Annie then gets out her gun and forces the pilot to parachute out of the plane, leaving the plane on auto-pilot. Annie then taunts Reva a little more, telling her that she’ll be seeing Josh soon after she parachutes out. Annie tells her ‘Sayonara’, jumps out of the plane and leaves a tied up Reva all alone in a prop plane!  Wow, what a great Friday cliffhanger, and how in the world can Reva survive this?!?

Meanwhile, Josh uses his Lewis Oil plane to fly to the Florida Keys. Reva works hard to get her hands free and make it to the pilot’s seat. Both engines go out and she’s out of fuel, so she calls Josh and leaves a tearful goodbye voicemail on Josh’s cell phone. Josh makes it to the Keys/location where Annie told him to go. There’s a tape that says ‘Play Me’, so he does and sees the camcorder footage of Reva/Annie from the plane. We then see Annie talking directly to the camera for Josh, telling him the Josh/Reva love story is over and dead (once Reva crashes in the ocean), she’ll be back when he least expects it, and she’s signing off…for now. She blows a kiss to the camera as Josh screams out for Reva. We then see Reva finish her voicemail by saying “Always, Bud. Always” and the plane seems to crash!  That video of Annie is the last time we see Watros in the role of Annie Dutton, wow!  What an iconic actress and character. ♥️

7 minutes ago, Mitch64 said:

Dinah should have ALWAYS been angry and "bad" I would have originally written her as this carny girl who finds herself in a load of cash and then tries to emulate young Van..lording it over "River Rat" Harley,etc...to Van's chagrin.

They seemed to forget that BOTH her parents started out as very ambitious and angry at the way the world had effed them over and willing to do almost anything to get what they wanted. It would have made total sense for their daughter to be like that. I think they were trying to re-capture the magic of the Four Musketeers, so Dinah got stuck with the "good girl" role. When that flopped, they hustled her off the canvas. 

It would have been SO much more interesting if Dinah had been the schemer, maybe with a "good girl" mask, who made Harley's life miserable. Then later on, "Mean Dinah" would have been consistent.

14 minutes ago, Mitch64 said:

I know people are used to Cullens' drab version, but she was always chasing after men and having a mean girl background..she slept with her Mom's gross hubby so yea, she was no saint. Malibu Madame...no...but a mean girl who was not going to let ANYONE take her on, who had found her sensuality while away, yea, I can believe it. 

Right, she didn't have to be nice, she just had to be Amanda. Amanda was smart, ambitious, yes, but she was also pretty selfish when it came to wanting the men she wanted. (She went to a lot of trouble to corral Ben, for instance, even though he really wanted to go back to Eve).

I mean, she's Alan's daughter. (Well, she was). Even though Lucille had beaten her down when she was growing up, from the beginning she showed a very selfish, ruthless side. 

But it was done in a way that was way more subtle than just saying nasty things about Cassie and laughing about it with Dinah.

I'm usually against giving characters total personality transplants when you bring them back with new actors, but with Dinah I'll make an exception. She hadn't been seen on the show since she was a teenager, she'd been away for 6 whole years, Moniz's Dinah was much closer to what the character should have been in the first place (given her traumatic backstory), and the original conception of the character was extremely boring and bland. There's basically no way you could have driven years of story with Original Recipe Dinah like they did with Self-Pitying Bad Girl Dinah. 

46 minutes ago, alwaysAMC said:

We then see Annie talking directly to the camera for Josh, telling him the Josh/Reva love story is over and dead (once Reva crashes in the ocean), she’ll be back when he least expects it, and she’s signing off…for now. She blows a kiss to the camera as Josh screams out for Reva. We then see Reva finish her voicemail by saying “Always, Bud. Always” and the plane seems to crash!  That video of Annie is the last time we see Watros in the role of Annie Dutton, wow!  What an iconic actress and character. ♥️

You have reached the point when GL officially goes off the rails never to return. It now become GL Reva/Zimmer Power Hour and we get Reva shoved into stupid storylines just to keep up with that huge guarantee she has...with everyone else getting leftovers. 

6 minutes ago, Mitch64 said:

You have reached the point when GL officially goes off the rails never to return. It now become GL Reva/Zimmer Power Hour and we get Reva shoved into stupid storylines just to keep up with that huge guarantee she has...with everyone else getting leftovers. 

I think there's still plenty of good stuff on the show in 1998, but I'd totally agree that Reva's storylines for the next few years are the pits. After Annie pushes her out of the plane, I can't think of a single Reva storyline I liked until the Time Travel by Walking Through Paintings storyline, which is not a popular choice among fans, mainly because it involved time travel by walking through paintings. 

I should add that I found Cassie pretty annoying even back in 1997, but Cassie and Reva as a sisterly duo just grew insufferable as the decade continued. Cassie was truly the Scrappy Doo of Guiding Light. 

Edited September 26Sep 26 by prefab1

1 hour ago, DeeVee said:

But it was done in a way that was way more subtle than just saying nasty things about Cassie and laughing about it with Dinah.

I think you mean Blake, not Cassie  I need to go back and watch the first Dinah from the 80s so I can put a face to these stories!

45 minutes ago, Mitch64 said:

You have reached the point when GL officially goes off the rails never to return. It now become GL Reva/Zimmer Power Hour and we get Reva shoved into stupid storylines just to keep up with that huge guarantee she has...with everyone else getting leftovers. 

That's what I've heard... we'll see what happens, if it gets insufferable, then I may go back to early 90s at that point.

41 minutes ago, prefab1 said:

I think there's still plenty of good stuff on the show in 1998, but I'd totally agree that Reva's storylines for the next few years are the pits. After Annie pushes her out of the plane, I can't think of a single Reva storyline I liked until the Time Travel by Walking Through Paintings storyline, which is not a popular choice among fans, mainly because it involved time travel by walking through paintings. 

I should add that I found Cassie pretty annoying even back in 1997, but Cassie and Reva as a sisterly duo just grew insufferable as the decade continued. Cassie was truly the Scrappy Doo of Guiding Light. 

Oh I've heard about the Time Travel storyline too. I actually watched some YouTube videos that highlight some of the craziest soap stories from the past and the clone and time travel stories were always featured from GL haha.

I find myself agreeing with you on Cassie/Reva as an annoying duo. It's too sugary sweet so I'm ready for some conflict with those two.

27 minutes ago, alwaysAMC said:

I find myself agreeing with you on Cassie/Reva as an annoying duo. It's too sugary sweet so I'm ready for some conflict with those two.

Unfortunately, you've got a long time to wait. I know they have some major conflict in 2002, but I can't recall much conflict between Reva and Cassie before this. Before that, I recall a few "Reva and Cassie Team Up" storylines that I found nearly unwatchable. 

26 minutes ago, prefab1 said:

Unfortunately, you've got a long time to wait. I know they have some major conflict in 2002, but I can't recall much conflict between Reva and Cassie before this. Before that, I recall a few "Reva and Cassie Team Up" storylines that I found nearly unwatchable. 

I remember back in the day,  a poster on the old MD board called them the "Blister Sisters" but they meant it as a compliment, and I saw it for what it was...too drunk traitor trash mean girls teaming up and backing each other up...which would have been fine if people  called them out on it, but they were always right. They had a chance when REva pulled the plug on Stiff Dickie but they glossed over that!

For GL historians: 

This question was asked on here a long time ago and I can't remember by whom so I don't know if anybody still on here will care. Also, this post might just get lost in the shuffle, but...just in case anybody reading this had the question of when the setting for GL became Springfield, it happened in July, 1968. Right before the show moved from 15 to 30 minutes. Also at the time Irna Phillips stopped writing it for the last time. Although name of Selby Flats hadn't been used in a very long time. Selby Flats was just a suburb of Los Angeles and the name Selby Flats stopped being used and the setting just became Los Angeles in general sometime in the 50s. Then, the show was "without a setting" for a while in the 60s when Los Angeles quit being named specifically. It just became a generic city that nobody named. They would just say "the city" and things like that. The actual name of Springfield was not spoken until July, 1968. It was first uttered by Sarah McIntyre who was living in Chicago at the time and placed a call to "Paul Fletcher at Cedars Hospital in Springfield". So, there was no fanfare about the change in setting. The setting of Los Angeles just gradually faded away and the city just suddenly began being called Springfield with no explanation. By that time, Los Angeles hadn't been named in such a long time (years) that it wouldn't have been all that jarring for viewers. Also, to answer the question I remember someone asked about whether or not the characters all moved at the same time, the answer is no. Nobody moved to Springfield. Los Angeles just became Springfield. No mention of the change and no characters had to move. 

I hope that answers some questions any of you might have had. 

9 hours ago, Mitch64 said:

This is a good scene...as dumb as Dinah obsessing over DuhHart and Cassie..characters that had NO chemistry...(you could always almost scene LW rolling her eyes at that greaseball) at least this was old fashioned soap, no clones, no time travel and no Reva. But it really makes you see how shallow the writing was and how much the talent was wasted...Moniz is looking GREAT here and they have reduced Dinah to an Annielike psycho....Dinah is always best when she shows that she actually does care about someone other then herself,, and not in a love triangle...GT showed affection to Bill and her dad and when they showed them her younger siblings...in a still broken way. Cynical conniving Dinah going after something she thinks she deserves is interesting...an unlikeable nut case is not. If only they had Matt and her screw so Van could toss them both out on their asses.

And yes, having an amnesiac Van confronted with her spoiled whiney daughter would have been worth it...."Well, I always questioned if it was the right move to give you up, but I can see it is...tell me dear, did they keep you in the Freak Show section...as the Incredible Annoying Whining Girl?"

PattiD was fired after trying as hard as she could to create a fan base for Buzz and Selena...(yes,there was a Suzz fanzine..made up of about 5 women who were really so pathetic it was sad...they would send Christmas Presents to Patti's kids ..one of her kids made a hilariously snide post something like "My Mom told me to thank the person who sent me that gift..so ...thanks..." ) By that time Zimmer had taken totally over as the queen of the show and Patti, desperately trying to appeal to the power structure jumped on a message board, where people were complaining about Jevas total domination of the show and Reva's stupid storyline and Patti told them to "BITE me!" so it was bye-bye Patti!)

I remember when Cynthia Watros was leaving, the magazines were raving about how GL was preparing for the next generation of female Annie types and named Dinah and Beth as the next heirs.

I knew when I read that.. it confirmed that the magazines were sucking up to the soaps and not calling them out for BS such as the character assignations of Dinah and Beth all so Saint Harley and Cassie could be loved and adored.

6 hours ago, alwaysAMC said:

That video of Annie is the last time we see Watros in the role of Annie Dutton, wow!  What an iconic actress and character. ♥️

Annie big moments in her last year were breakdown on the witness stand, overdose, and the exit story from the wedding arrest to her jumping off the plane.

5 hours ago, Mitch64 said:

You have reached the point when GL officially goes off the rails never to return. It now become GL Reva/Zimmer Power Hour and we get Reva shoved into stupid storylines just to keep up with that huge guarantee she has...with everyone else getting leftovers. 

Good thing I didn't watch any episodes/clips after Annie exit.

5 minutes ago, kalbir said:

Annie big moments in her last year were breakdown on the witness stand, overdose, and the exit story from the wedding arrest to her jumping off the plane.

Spot on - those were all big moments and Watros was excellent!  While not in her last year, I thought her dry-out scenes at the Bauer cabin with Phillip in 1996 were superb too. 

9 hours ago, DeeVee said:

No way. I refuse to believe this. 😂

I don't get why they thought so many women would be into this guy. 

Some, sure. Because everyone has their own personal taste. But how he ended up the GL Lothario, I'll never understand.

There was no consistency to that character. For me, that was the biggest problem. They changed her to suit whatever plot. And for those of us who remember the introduction of the character back in the 80s, it's even more baffling. Even though the two iterations of the character back then were different (she started off as a spunky girl who had had a rough childhood and then evolved into a sweet ingenue) she always was nice, even though she had problems with Vanessa giving her away.

I had the same problem with 1990s Amanda. She was not Amanda.

Just create new characters if you want a young adult mean girl duo in SF.

Tell me about it! I'd forgotten all about it.Then I hit early '92, Van's nearly raped, and Fletch starts making the googly eyes at her. I'm like no bleepin' way---it's going to be one-sided. And sure enough, Billy gets jealous, and Fletch is semi-friend-zoned by Van. THEN, Ross gives Fletch the side eye when he's glued to Van's side when she's pressing charges. And Mo is like "what's going on?" And Alex gets a little green eyed. And THEN Fletch is forced to admit on the stand that he loves her. UGH.  But then they kiss...and (ewwww...more) I'm like RUN VANESSA RUN!  NNNoooooooo!

Fletch is fine as a B/C story character. He's not a leading man, he's comic relief. Worse, he's "the safe choice". Whether it's Maureen's crush that ends up stressing her marriage or the hapless affair with Holly, he's the medicine for the dissatisfied woman. If you've got a bruised heart, he's there to pick up the pieces. Objectively, I get why they needed someone harmless and "good guy" for Vanessa when Billy's dragging her through the emotional wringer. But it does seem really random, like the writers realized they had to meet Jay's guarantees somehow. They had even flirted with Fletch and Chelsea for crying out loud, before Kassie dePaiva left. 

The thing about Dinah was always that a little of her went a long way. Yes, there were other loud or obnoxious characters. (Nola, Vanessa, Harley) but they were never bitches 24/7. Nola had her family to soften her, Van had Henry and Harley/Frank. But nothing toned Dinah down, not really. From the  minute Wendy stepped into the role, Dinah was a selfish bitch. She's still a selfish bitch towards the end when Dinah's faking needing rehab to spy on Billy for Bill or then turning on Bill and being responsible for Lizzie's kidnapping. Having the occasional moment of conscience isn't any kind of redemption. 

9 hours ago, alwaysAMC said:

Maureen tries to convince Vanessa to fight and go back to life,Vanessa jumps back into life, wakes up out of her coma and is alive - yay! She immediately is concerned about Maureen and wants to see her.

I watched this a while ago. I remember that Billy was the only one really saying "Vanessa can still turn this around", while everyone else is waiting for her to die. I wanted Billy to go into her room and start arguing with her, instead of what everyone else was doing, which was basically crying over her and saying their goodbyes.

9 hours ago, DeeVee said:

 

Right, she didn't have to be nice, she just had to be Amanda. Amanda was smart, ambitious, yes, but she was also pretty selfish when it came to wanting the men she wanted. (She went to a lot of trouble to corral Ben, for instance, even though he really wanted to go back to Eve).

Wait, what did Amanda do to snare Ben? 

@Reverend Ruthledge  thanks! It's always interesting to get the background. I just find it odd they did it. Do you know of any other soaps that switched settings? I mean, I assume ATWT always took place in Oakdale, but now I wonder.

Edited September 27Sep 27 by P.J.