Well, I see CBS tried luring Larkin Malloy fans. 

1 hour ago, DRW50 said:

When the show briefly tried to bring that back in 2002, it mostly made me feel sad. I'd say Michelle was like their mother, but even Maeve six feet under probably had more presence than NSA did.

Ugh...I really intensely disliked St Alban.  I remember when they gave her amnesia and tried dirtying her up to give her personality.  Cringe.

27 minutes ago, P.J. said:

Well, I see CBS tried luring Larkin Malloy fans. 

It's a very odd way of doing so - "your old love has become a threat" is unnerving.

On 11/6/2025 at 10:48 PM, DeeVee said:

That's true...but. Whatever the Dobsons had planned for 1980, there were two big monkey wrenches thrown into the works: Lenore having to take maternity leave and Cindy taking time away to film a movie. 

Like Marland did, they would have likely used the first months of 1980 to wrap up the Roger story. Unlike Marland, they weren't going to start introducing a bunch of new characters who were being set up for big stories later on, but also filled in the holes left by Lenore and Cindy's absence.

I also don't see Lainie and Floyd becoming a couple (more likely, Floyd would have been friendzoned but still care about Lainie and her ill-advised crush on Ed), but maybe they would have had to become more prominent early in 1980 for this reason. 

It's interesting to contemplate what might have happened if the Dobsons had stayed on the show. They seemed to love Lezlie Dalton and Elizabeth, so I doubt she would have been written out. I wonder if the ultimate plan was to have Mike and Elizabeth get married at some point.

Or maybe not. Maybe Justin wouldn't have taken Elizabeth's infidelity so well. We might have gotten Dark Justin, mad that Elizabeth betrayed him and Jackie lied to him all those years. Possibly it would have been Mike and Jackie who got together in the end. (Assuming they did a better recast for Jackie).

As far as Alan and Hope, they were also headed for marriage under the Dobsons, but I believe it would have deteriorated MUCH faster. Again, Lenore's absence would have delayed that somewhat, because it's clear they had an Alan/Rita affair planned for a long time. I can see Alan becoming very controling over Hope and immediately being unfaithful to her (kind of like what happened to Barbara when she married James on ATWT), and her becoming disillusioned. Maybe they would have had her become pregnant, too, and feel trapped. (I'm certain they would have also killed off Rita's baby so she would have been unencumbered for this storyline). Either they would have introduced a new man for her, or possibly involved her again with Ben. MAYBE she would have been the one to find out about his involvement with Roger. Maybe they would have let her become a more interesting character than Marland's version, the endlessly loyal girl with little identity outside of being Alan's wife.

It's hard to say much beyond this. They likely had new characters and storylines planned that never came to be. But the show would have been quite different if they had stayed. OTOH, we would have missed out on some beloved characters, like the Chamberlains and the Reardons. 

Let's face it, the only reason Marland was good at Guiding Light was because he had a strong foundation to work from... but his weaknesses became apparent eventually on the show.  Not to say he wasn't talented, but there was a noticeable difference between how the Dobson's wrote vs the Marland's that became apparent once the Roger story was wrapped up.

1) The Dobson's had a diverse mix of female characters that weren't interchangeable.  Elizabeth, Holly, Rita, Jackie, Diane, and Amanda were so uniquely different from one another... and they have positive and not so positive traits.  Even the newer characters that debuted/returned in 1979 like Hope and Lanie seemed to have distinct personality traits (Hope in 1979 had confidence and drive while Lanie was warm and optimistic).    

     Marland had trouble with most of those characters rendering Holly a zombie, not understanding what made Rita tick, turning Amanda & Hope into weaker characters, and Diane into a one note villainess.   Even his female creations didn't seem any better (Nola, Vanessa, and Morgan weren't written very well... but thanks to Lisa Brown, Vigard, and Maeve Kinkaid.. they became interesting characters).

2) When watching a 1979 episode, there are long scenes of conversations that were realistic and allowed the actor to shine.

     When watching a 1980 episode, the conversations were mostly exposition with too much detail and unrealistic.

3) The Dobson's Guiding Light seemed to have story bubbles where certain character groups hardly interacted.  It seemed more like Bill Bell's Y & R where characters existed in their own orbits.  I didn't see a lot of overlap between the Jackie/Alan/Elizabeth/Justin crew or the Ed/Holly/Rita crew in the 1979 episodes unless it was a social gathering.. and even then it was more of a passing hello and not long drawn out conversations.

    Marland's Guiding Light.. he seemed intent on everyone interacting and knowing one another's business (he did this less so on GL than on ATWT where it was basically a gossip session most of the time.. unrealistic in real life).

 

With that said, I would have been interested to see how the Dobson's would have resolved the Roger story since I don't think it would have involved falling off the cliff.  If anything.. they probably would have either killed him on screen or carted him off to jail.

The other story I wondered about would have been the Amanda story.. since Lucille was scarier in the 1979 episodes than she was in the 1980 episodes.  I suspect how that story would have ended would have been more sinister/darker than how Marland resolved the Lucille aspect of the story.

I’m up to July 10, 1998.

Ben’s hearing starts, because he wouldn’t take Ross’ deal to drop the charges in exchange for leaving town. Beth takes the stand in support of Ben, and even says she would re-do the night they had sex if given the chance. Previously, Beth and Blake fight over Ben a bit, with Beth pushing her to tell the truth and support Ben. Blake doesn’t, of course, and Griffin rules in Ross’ favor, meaning Ben can’t practice law again. Afterwards, Beth invites Ben as her date to the Bauer July 4th BBQ.

Jesse draws a nude Michelle (taking inspiration from the recent Titanic movie at the time, it seems), and Drew/Bill show up. Drew finds the drawings and takes them.

Reva gets to reunite with Marah/Shane when Rusty brings them home, which was sweet.

Meta, Abby, and Selena get things ready for the annual Bauer 4th of July party. Buzz shows up with food and runs into Selena. He tells her she reminds him of his ex-wife, Nadine, and could be a sister of hers. Hmm. After a while, everyone shows up, including a rarely seen Vivian and Charles Grant. Everyone is upset that Beth brought Ben, and when Blake/Beth are alone, Beth accuses her of being jealous that she had sex with Ben. Vanessa/Dinah get into it and Vanessa tells her she wouldn’t be surprised if Hart isn’t the father of her baby. The new Bill seems to all of a sudden be interested in being Dinah’s brother now, and he vows to not let Hart screw her over. Reva and family show up and it was nice to see Abby/Reva finally reconnect. Jason goes missing for a bit and everyone starts to panic, but Ben realizes he fell into the hot tub and saves him. Blake thanks him and hugs him. This scene was pretty silly because Ben pulls the boy out of the hot tub and the little actor isn’t screaming, scared or anything, he just looks happy and smiling LOL.

In Cassie’s dumbest decision to-date, she decides to trust the clone to stay put in the pool house while she goes to the BBQ. Of course the clone disobeys her and wants to be part of all the fun, so she heads to the BBQ too. She watches the egg toss, where Reva and Marah are having a blast and she gets jealous. When Reva goes inside, where she thanks Matt for helping Josh find her, the clone decides to step in and do the egg toss again with Marah in front of everyone. Marah asks how she changed her clothes so quickly, because of course she’s wearing pink while Reva is wearing white. They end up winning the contest and are awarded prizes, just as the real Reva sees them from the house. Reva pulls her off to the side and asks her what she’s doing and the clone says she’s being a better Reva than she is. Marah tells Josh about how Reva quickly changed clothes and seemed to have a different personality throughout the day, so he rushes off to find Reva. The clone/Reva argue about her life and Reva starts feeling sorry for how the clone’s life is meaningless and she has nothing to live for. The clone leaves, Josh finds Reva and finally Reva lashes out at Josh for putting them all in this situation. This makes sense to me for Reva to be angry at Josh for playing God and putting their family through this mess. They work through it and eventually kiss and embrace each other.

Later, there is an auction to raise money for the Second Chances club, and Abby bids on Rick and they go upstairs immediately to have sex, which was odd but nice to see them have some physical scenes haha. Then, Buzz presents a wrapped painting, which he unwraps in front of everyone and shocker, it’s Jesse’s nude drawings of Michelle. Ed and Michelle are horrified, and Meta tries to calm Michelle down by saying they’re tasteful and she even posed nude back in her day for art classes. Jesse suspects Drew did this, which she did, and Michelle goes off on her. The next item is a pin that Blake told Ross she really loves, so Ben of course bids on it and won’t let Ross win. Ben ends up winning and gives it to Blake, but Blake gives it back to the charity as a donation. Later, Holly receives a telegram from her brother Ken wishing her and Fletcher a happy wedding anniversary, which stings, as Holly tells Ed and Ross that she still has no idea where Fletcher and Meg are. She mentions her brother is in the hospital, she hasn’t heard from him in years and was sent away for shooting Ed in the past. Hmm.

Charles doesn’t feel well and Rick takes him to the hospital, thinking maybe he’s having a heart attack. Come to find out, it was a stroke and he’ll need to be taken care of for a while. Vivian mentions that Gilly is on assignment in London, but that David will be coming home soon. Ohh, if true, interesting!

Dinah faints so Hart/Cassie take her home and then later to the hospital. The three of them argue about Dinah not taking her pregnancy serious enough, which Dinah is very upset about. Dinah gives Hart an ultimatum, either his baby and her or Cassie, but Cassie gets her to agree to let them both take care of her while she’s pregnant. They continue to fight over the week and Dinah threatens Hart that she’ll terminate the pregnancy so he can’t have the baby, which is just really gross but par for the course with Dinah. She later apologizes and says she could never get rid of her baby, she was just lashing out, which tracks. Later, Rob calls Dinah’s house and leaves a voicemail saying he’s back in town for a night and wants to recreate that night they had. Later, she plays the message with Hart in the room but stops it quickly and Hart grills her on why she’s still talking to Rob.

I am curious why Buzz and Jenna are at the BBQ, but no mention of Frank, Eleni and their kids. We haven’t seen Eleni in forever it feels like, and I really want to know why. Also, O’Leary does SUCH a great impression of Grant Aleksander. He did it again in front of Harley and Beth, and Ehlers even cracked, because he clinches the jaws and extends his bottom teeth like Phillip, it’s so funny. Phillip wasn’t at the BBQ, he’s at camp with Lizzie, but contemplating his relationships between Harley and Beth. He calls Rick and tells him he’s made a decision and wants to get married. Rick later tells Jenna and she asks which girl he chose, just as Harley/Beth walk in. The call dropped so Rick didn’t know who he picked, leaving everyone speculating and Beth assuming it’s her. Later, Phillip shows up and Harley sees Phillip/Beth talking so assumes he picked her. She and Jenna prepare themselves that she needs to move on, but Phillip surprises her by saying he chose her and wants to get married. A sad Beth breaks down at the Bauer house with Meta.

After the BBQ, Drew tries to convince Bill that she didn’t expose Jesse’s drawings of Michelle. She tells Bill that Jesse is jealous of him and rich people and that he did it to show the town and her family that he ‘has’ their little girl. Jesse/Michelle show up and Bill stands up to Jesse and they fight before Selena (who is randomly working at the diner now), breaks them up and realizes Drew is causing trouble yet again. Later, Jenna shows up and Buzz introduces her to Selena. Selena tells Jenna she has nothing to worry about, she’s not interested in Buzz and Jenna agrees, she wouldn’t be worried about her. Hmm. This reminds me, we haven’t seen Nola in forever which is sad.

Griffin and Vicky go on a date and he tells her to be careful with Alan Spaulding, but she assures him she can handle him. They head to the hospital so she can meet with a doctor, and Vicky says her full name is Vicky Brandon (hmm, Brandon Spaulding?). Griffin runs into a distraught Vivian and they hug. She asks about living wills just as David Grant arrives!  A new actor is playing him, gosh we haven’t seen David since early 1996. He berates Griffin and says he knows what he did to both Gilly and Vivian, which is why he quit working for his company back then. Vicky introduces herself and David is frosty towards her too, and she thinks he’s a jerk. David then sees an unconscious Charles and starts crying, asking him to wake up and be ok. Later, David stops by the diner and reunites with Buzz and Frank (guess I missed their relationship prior to 1995, because I don’t remember them having much of one before David left). He asks about Lucy (you’d think they would have stayed in touch), and then mentioned Mallet when Buzz says Harley is back in town. Vicky shows up and she and David continue to spar.

Sean and Reva have a reunion and Josh shows up and thanks him again. Reva and Josh try to convince Sean to stay so they can help exonerate him, but he refuses. Cassie arrives and alludes to the clone being in the pool house. I really think Cassie/Sean have good chemistry, they should put them together. Alone, Sean voices his frustrations to Cassie about Josh wanting to keep the clone around, thinking he should send her packing immediately. She then lets it slip that the clone and Josh had sex once, and that pushes him over the edge with anger.

Ben makes a cryptic comment to Ross and Blake about Kevin’s parentage, which confuses them. Ross thinks there’s something he’s holding over them now, and it upsets him that Blake put them in this position. Ross throws flowers at Blake and walks out, and Blake decides to watch the tape of her and Ben. Meanwhile, a distraught Beth seeks out Ben for comfort after Phillip decided to marry Harley. Ben tries to console her, but she wants sex and he refuses because he wants to keep trying with Blake. Beth gets upset and tells him she hopes he loses Blake like she lost Phillip and storms out. Later we see a crying Beth on the Towers rooftop, teetering over the edge - oh no! Thankfully Ben finds her and saves her before she jumps.

10 hours ago, DRW50 said:

Haha...that was Malloy's"acting" as Kyle...flaired nostrils and all. Wow, they were really trying to turn GL into Dynasty/Dallas werent they? I dont get the old love thing?

 

13 hours ago, P.J. said:

Bill, Michelle and Ben should've been the Musketeers of their era. They could've written age-appropriate stories of substance. No need to rush them into mob or psycho stories.

As long as they recast Ben...I couldn't stand that kid with the New Jersey accent...

18 minutes ago, alwaysAMC said:

I’m up to July 10, 1998.

Later, David stops by the diner and reunites with Buzz and Frank (guess I missed their relationship prior to 1995, because I don’t remember them having much of one before David left). He asks about Lucy (you’d think they would have stayed in touch), and then mentioned Mallet when Buzz says Harley is back in town. Vicky shows up and she and David continue to spar.

 

When David first came to town in '92, he worked at the Diner.

1 hour ago, Soaplovers said:

Let's face it, the only reason Marland was good at Guiding Light was because he had a strong foundation to work from

As far as ratings go, it also helped that February 1980-May 1982 Y&R was in their post-expansion slump, otherwise GL might not have been CBS's highest-rated daytime drama during the Marland years. Notice that Y&R rebound in the second half of 1982 overlaps w/ GL post-Marland fall.

22 minutes ago, Mitch64 said:

Wow, they were really trying to turn GL into Dynasty/Dallas werent they? 

In the 1980s practically every daytime drama jumped on the Dallas/Dynasty bandwagon. It worked for some but not for others.

10 hours ago, P.J. said:

Well, I see CBS tried luring Larkin Malloy fans. 

Given the timing of Larkin Malloy run, he was pretty much brought on to fill the void from the departures of Chris Bernau and Robert Newman.

Edited November 8Nov 8 by kalbir

14 minutes ago, Mitch64 said:

Haha...that was Malloy's"acting" as Kyle...flaired nostrils and all. Wow, they were really trying to turn GL into Dynasty/Dallas werent they? I dont get the old love thing?

 

As long as they recast Ben...I couldn't stand that kid with the New Jersey accent...

LOL...they were speaking to EON fans. I guess I'd forgotten EON was a P&G production too. Now I wonder if Malloy had some kind of play or pay contract, and that's why he wound up on GL.

Greg Burke never made much of an impression on me, he's mostly just the dorky friend who pops up occasionally. So I probably wouldn't have noticed if they did recast. 

24 minutes ago, P.J. said:

When David first came to town in '92, he worked at the Diner.

Ahhh ok - that makes more sense, thank you  

1 hour ago, Soaplovers said:

1) The Dobson's had a diverse mix of female characters that weren't interchangeable.  Elizabeth, Holly, Rita, Jackie, Diane, and Amanda were so uniquely different from one another... and they have positive and not so positive traits.  Even the newer characters that debuted/returned in 1979 like Hope and Lanie seemed to have distinct personality traits (Hope in 1979 had confidence and drive while Lanie was warm and optimistic).    

     Marland had trouble with most of those characters rendering Holly a zombie, not understanding what made Rita tick, turning Amanda & Hope into weaker characters, and Diane into a one note villainess.   Even his female creations didn't seem any better (Nola, Vanessa, and Morgan weren't written very well... but thanks to Lisa Brown, Vigard, and Maeve Kinkaid.. they became interesting characters).

Totally agree with all of this. Marland did not write women well. They were all neurotic and on the verge of becoming hysterics, even the characters he favored, like Nola and Carrie. Almost every female character was Sarah's patient at one time or another. (The men never sought therapy, though some of them needed it, LOL).

1 hour ago, Soaplovers said:

2) When watching a 1979 episode, there are long scenes of conversations that were realistic and allowed the actor to shine.

     When watching a 1980 episode, the conversations were mostly exposition with too much detail and unrealistic.

Yes, I commented recently that the 1982 episode that was posted here had several scenes of characters doing nothing but expostion dumps just in the cold opening. 

A lot of soap writers were like that back in the day, but the Dobsons and their writing team were much better at using exposition in a way that didn't feel so clunky.

1 hour ago, Soaplovers said:

3) The Dobson's Guiding Light seemed to have story bubbles where certain character groups hardly interacted.  It seemed more like Bill Bell's Y & R where characters existed in their own orbits.  I didn't see a lot of overlap between the Jackie/Alan/Elizabeth/Justin crew or the Ed/Holly/Rita crew in the 1979 episodes unless it was a social gathering.. and even then it was more of a passing hello and not long drawn out conversations.

    Marland's Guiding Light.. he seemed intent on everyone interacting and knowing one another's business (he did this less so on GL than on ATWT where it was basically a gossip session most of the time.. unrealistic in real life).

This reminds of a scene that totally made me LOL: After Alan got out of jail the first time, for some reason he steps off the elevator at Cedars, walks up to Hillary, gives her a BIG hello and asks her how she is...and I'm thinking to myself, does he even really know her?

I think that's true about characters being in their own orbits under the Dobsons, but still things that happened in one would reverberate in others. This was definitely true about the Roger story. 

1 hour ago, Soaplovers said:

With that said, I would have been interested to see how the Dobson's would have resolved the Roger story since I don't think it would have involved falling off the cliff.  If anything.. they probably would have either killed him on screen or carted him off to jail.

I would have preferred that. If Roger had at least gone to jail, then the partial redemption they did for his character later would have gone down a little better for me. It totally grinds my gears that Roger NEVER went to jail for anything he did, while two of his victims, Holly and Alan, served time because of him. 

1 hour ago, Soaplovers said:

The other story I wondered about would have been the Amanda story.. since Lucille was scarier in the 1979 episodes than she was in the 1980 episodes.  I suspect how that story would have ended would have been more sinister/darker than how Marland resolved the Lucille aspect of the story.

I think Amanda was slated to become more of a villainess under the Dobsons. They were showing her as very manipulative (gee, I wonder who she inherited that from) in getting Ben. After Marland came on, she was putting on sackcloth and begging forgiveness for her machinations. Marland turned her into more of a victim. 

11 hours ago, DeeVee said:

 

This reminds of a scene that totally made me LOL: After Alan got out of jail the first time, for some reason he steps off the elevator at Cedars, walks up to Hillary, gives her a BIG hello and asks her how she is...and I'm thinking to myself, does he even really know her?

I think that's true about characters being in their own orbits under the Dobsons, but still things that happened in one would reverberate in others. This was definitely true about the Roger story. 

I think Amanda was slated to become more of a villainess under the Dobsons. They were showing her as very manipulative (gee, I wonder who she inherited that from) in getting Ben. After Marland came on, she was putting on sackcloth and begging forgiveness for her machinations. Marland turned her into more of a victim. 

Was Alan  married to Hope at the time?  If so, it's possible that he and Hilary had interacted off screen.

The Roger story was sort of a connector during the Dobson era, but the interactions/mentions were more realistic like how it would be in real life where you might know of someone and offer them good luck and/or pulling for you before returning back to whatever you were doing in your day to day life.

Yeah.. I did remember thinking how Amanda was nice.. but also had a devious side she kept hidden/repressed.   

However, the whole Lucille element was creepy in 1979 especially when she was trying to kill Ben.  I always wonder how the Dobson's would have resolved the Lucille element and how they would have revealed that Amanda was really a Spaulding.

When Lucille was murdered Doug Marland stated that Lucille was always intended to die. Whether he meant in his projections or that the Dobsons had mentioned this in long term story projection, I'm not sure.

But it  seems likely. The soaps always liked a murder story from time to time. If that was the Dobsons I wonder who they intended to be the killer? Ben ? Amanda? Eve?

Also wonder what plans they had about Amanda's real parentage. As soon as Marland arrived, Jane Marie Stafford(Jennifer) was mentioned.

 

25 minutes ago, Paul Raven said:

 

Also wonder what plans they had about Amanda's real parentage. As soon as Marland arrived, Jane Marie Stafford(Jennifer) was mentioned.

 

Does someone remember...what was the deal? Wasn't Alan dating a sister of Jane Marie's who drowned? Or was there just one Stafford girl who Alan (or Brandon) got pregnant?

1 hour ago, Paul Raven said:

Also wonder what plans they had about Amanda's real parentage. As soon as Marland arrived, Jane Marie Stafford(Jennifer) was mentioned. 

At Brandon's funeral, which the Dobsons wrote, a woman in a big black hat and heavy veil showed up. Everyone wondered who she was. The obvious assumption is she was Amanda’s mother.

Later, Marland wrote a flashback scene showing Jennifer in the black hat arguing with her husband about going to the funeral. 

But the thing is, they were financially not doing great, and it seems unlikely that she would even have had the money to do that.

(Honestly, I still don't get why she went to work for Lucille in the first place. Sure, she would want to be close to Amanda, but she wanted to keep her identity a secret. I don't know how she thought she could avoid Alan forever. Suspension of disbelief was very much needed here.)

So it's likely Amanda’s mother was going to be someone else, that Jane Marie and her backstory were invented entirely by Marland. Possibly Alan mentioned an old girlfriend during the Dobson period, but I don't recall it. It wasn't until Marland came on that he started talking about Jane Marie.

Edited November 9Nov 9 by DeeVee