Most pointless soap returns

[aMLCproduction]

How could I forget Frankie

[MichaelGL]

Lisa R's Billie under Brash and Cwikly in 2002.

[SFK]

As I've said before, a Debbi Morgan and a Darnell Williams do not a Jason Olive make. He might as well have been another character. Who really cares about Frankie (at that point at least) without Angie and Jesse around? Kind of like when they brought on Carla and Ed's grandson over at OLTL. But at least Ed came to visit, and the casting didn't seem as random. Then again Frankie had a little storyline with Mia while Josh's son (notice how I can't remember this guy's name?) was blink and you missed him.

[SouthOfSoap]

I thought the point was to showcase Lisa Rinna in a police uniform lol? I remember her complaining about her police hat every chance she got.

[Cheap21]

OLTL: Victor Lord. Does anyone know why the hell they brought him back from the dead after over 25 years only to kill him off 2 weeks later? Beyond pointless return

Y&R: Phillip. Another one who should have stayed dead

[SFK]

Wow, how did we forget that one (Victor)!? Not only pointless, but anger inducing... made me so mad. We got a perfect ending back in '95. Who knows, maybe there's STILL more to the story (i.e., Dorian's comment at Asa's funeral).

Re: Phillip, wouldn't it be something if he has yet another secret... he's been living in Australia with his father, Phillip II, who ALSO faked his death to escape Kay and Jill's drameuh?? Welcome back Donnelly Rhodes!

[Gray Bunny]

I think most have already been mentioned, but I'll have a go at it...

DAYS:

--Billie (2002, Lisa Rinna)

--Frankie Brady (2005)

--Carrie & Austin (2005, loved having them back, but Reilly made them both stupid in order to make this story work, and it took away from the progress of the Sami/Lucas relationship... at least the endgame was now Carrie/Austin instead of Carrie/Mike)

--Kayla & Steve (2006, Or was it '05?) Either way, their return was too little, too late. And now we're still stuck with their daughter.

--Dr. Rolf (2007, or '06? The history in recent years doesn't stick as well in my head cuz I don't care so much) His sudden return to life made no sense... and it was never explained how other people knew it was Mimi and Rex and their Weekend-At-Bernies antics that had originally offed him. Is he still alive somewhere? Hopefully not.

--Wayne Northrop's 2005 return as Alex North... if they were going to bring him back with great fanfare, they should've just made him Roman and reignite the John/Marlena/Roman triangle. The Dr. North storyline and Marlena's history rewrite was a total bomb.

--Justin Kiriakis, 2009. He's so far removed from his original history it might as well be a stranger being a soundoff board for Hope. And p.s.: Hope and Justin have zero chemistry.

--Tony & Anna, 2007... after all the rewriting of Tony/Andre, it was smart of them to just kill him off this past year. But it was obvious there was no invested interest in writing for this couple once the Andre saga was over.

[EricMontreal22]

Josh had a son? When was Carla and Ed's grandson brought back?

But I agree--I think it's done sometimes as a small concession by new soap writers--say they want a new characteron the show so they agree to make him the son of some beloved long gone couple just so they can claim they're being true to history when really it means next to nothing (I'm glad Frankie seems to have forgotten he exploited Simone's brother's near drug death for his own gain ).

"Wow, how did we forget that one (Victor)!? Not only pointless, but anger inducing... made me so mad. We got a perfect ending back in '95. Who knows, maybe there's STILL more to the story (i.e., Dorian's comment at Asa's funeral)."

As messy as Malone/Griffith's return to OLTL was I can't believe they brought him back without a longer term story... I still wish they'd tell us what Dorian's comment to Vicki meant.

[DRW50]

Their grandson was brought on briefly in 1999. He was around for a few months or less and then vanished. I think he was supposed to be the new DA.

[EricMontreal22]

I admit to not even remotely remembering that lol

[Vee]

Yeah, Josh had an improbably adult son, Jared Hall, played by the dreadful Herve Clermont. He was originally introduced to take part in Tea's planned exit story, and spent much of his early weeks fighting with her - Tea knew some "dark secret" about him and was going to bust him. Then they scrapped that and wrote her out with Roger Howarth. Turns out Jared Hall had been some sort of fucked-up drug addict in his college years or something and was pending review by the bar. So Sam and Nora called in old Ed Hall to speak on his grandson's behalf.

Jared then lingered on for the summer and, IIRC, tried to romance the recurring Ellen Bethea as Rachel during Nora's "death." Then disappeared.

[DRW50]

I'd forgotten most of that!

Too bad they couldn't tie the Evans in with the Hall family by recasting Jared and having him as the one with the dark secret over Tea, instead of having this Elijah guy.

I didn't even remember that they'd tried to give Ellen Bethea any story on her brief returns. I still miss seeing her on daytime, she's such an understated, intelligent actress.

[SFK]

And there's something about Ellen Bethea that reminds me of Ellen Holly (no, not her name ). And not even just her complexion, it's the shape of her face/eyes or something...

It's really, REALLY a shame that Carla and Ed didn't become a Clint and Viki in their own right. I'm not confident that they'd handle it right, but with Phlyicia Rashad in New York doing Broadway show after show, I would love to see her back on OLTL if only for a short stint, someone's laywyer the next time we have a big (not boring!) trial. Maybe her Courtney should have been Evangeline and Layla's lawyer mom, plus she could have had professional/personal ties to Nora and the Gannons.

[Mitch]

Yea,agree that the Nola return on GL was stupid. She is an iconic character, right up there with Reva and Alex, and they treated her like a walk on. I do know that she was brought on to pair with Ed, which I think would have been good, but PS had a problem with that so BOTH of them had no storyline...(if I was the producer I would have indeed told PS to shut his mouth and act the story out.) She also was a good foil for Vanessa..and they actually had some good scenes. Would have been nice to see Nola at the Boardinghouse taking over for Bea (which was young Nola's nightmare.) So instead they write her off and again we are stuck with those freakin Coopers until the very end.

The return of Dylan was goofy..but that actor was good old Babs pet so we got him.

The return of Alex and India was probably the biggest wasted opportunity, the two of them didnt even have a "bitch fight," scene. Alex had one good scene where she tore into Faux Annie and then that was it. I know that Marj said that after that attic scene they told her they didnt have her scheduled for another 8 weeks, so she took the AMC job. Which was odd,as you would think they would follow up Annie vs. Alex..(oh that is right,we need to get back to KZ and Reva.)

[SFK]

Yes, I was kinda happy that Dusay stuck it to Rauch and took care of #1 with the AMC gig. Hey, they came calling (Conboy this time) for her yet again when Joan Collins ducked out. But I remember a great press photo of Alex and India, I'll see if I can find it. It looked like there would be some exciting faceoffs ahead.

There's a pic from this photo shoot with just India and Alex that I really liked.