SPOILER- Melody Thomas Scott (Nikki)

[Soapsuds]

If William J. Bell were writing the show but he is not. The show may still have strong nielsen numbers but that soon will change once all the stars start leaving the show. This won't be a Days of Our Lives clone. Y&R is in s h i t trouble.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

Exactly, people like to underestimate Bill Bell and his writing style to push their agendas about Y&R in its current state. No way in hell does Y&R have anyone like that steering the ship anymore.

[Soapsuds]

I am sorry but Victor Newman IS Y&R. No Victor or Nikki on the show plus add to that maybe no more Jill??? Three BIG stars of the show!! I dont care to see a awful recast psycho being lead of a show with an equally awful Joshua Morrow as his co-star.

Yes, the big heavy weights are still on but I have lost most if not all interest in Y&R. I catch maybe 15 to 30 minutes of the show WHEN I am at home. I could care less what is going on SINCE those featured will be goon soon.

[DRW50]

The joke of all this is that MAB, Sheffer, and Rauch made Victor the big focal point of Y&R again, after some time had been spent cutting Victor off from most of the people around him. They could not resist the easy way out in having the big man with the iron fist. And now that fist is going to clobber their show.

They have done a terrible job of bringing new characters in, and botched every major return. They have set themselves up to have nowhere to go but down. If they think the likes of Billy, or the Newman brats, is going to be a big ratings point, good luck.

[sheilaforever]

I could do without Victor & Nikki.

The show has wisely established Kay as the new pillar of the show this past year which I find way more compelling than the non-stop Victor hour. As a result the Chancellors have really grwon as family and Jess Walton and Jeanne Cooper could easily stear that ship with the right stories even unrelated to one another...

What sickens me is the manner how SONY is hellbent on shipping Braeden and Scott out, just like Hogestyn and Hall last year. Those idiots should have actually watched their respective shows to realize that unlike John & Marlena the characters of Victor and Nikki are STILL vital and an important mix of Y&R's fabric. Moreso since the Newman legacy has now 2 out of 3 sh*tty "actors" with both Victoria and Adam played by paperclippers. Ugh!

[DRW50]

The Chancellors should have grown as a family, but most of them barely interact. Billy isn't really a part of the family, Mackenzie only exists for Billy, Chance for Chloe. Phillip's return was a nonevent.

The show 10 years ago had set up such a bright future of the core families. Most of that is gone now.

[DeeeDee]

Pretty much!

[alphanguy74]

Amen. Jeanne has been driving this bus for quite some time now, and if they need to get rid of Braeden, the time is NOW, while Jeanne is still here to take up the slack. Just because Braeden is going, doesn't mean that Jess is. That's just wanton speculation because she hasn't been on alot since July. It's obvious to me that this show is shifting from the Newmans to the Chancellors, which is ok by me. And they DO interact with each other... and once Braeden leaves, there's gonna be a hell of alot more, mark my words.

[alphanguy74]

And this is coming from someone who wasn't even ALIVE when he steered the ship by himself, let alone watched it. Especially by the 90's, Bill was involved less and less, he basically went into semi-retirement around 92, and most of what you saw after that was Alden. I'm the last person to not acknowldege Bill Bell's genius. He WAS wonderful in so many ways. But he was NOT without his problems. His "Shock and Awe" card was always incest, something most consider to be distasteful. Women always defined themselves in relation to a man. But when it came to rivalry.... his stories were LIKE NO OTHER. The best that daytime ever churned out. That is where his true genius lies, and it's been Y&R's best asset since 1975. And his other BEST quality is the masterful slow reveal and the knowledge of the importance of THE PAYOFF. The payoff is where Maria is really falling down on the job. It's her achilles heel. So in the end... is Bill Bell better than Maria? by a MILE. But his writing wasn't some kind of camelot like you try to portray. You just hate Maria now, and any thing to bring her down, no matter what, is what you want. If she DOES get fired by Sony, I'm sure you'll puff yourself up and tell people you were personally responsible.... it will make you feel really big won't it?

[Vee]

Y&R without Victor and Nikki has not been done since...what...the '70s? Um, that was a long fuckin' time ago and a very, very different world for daytime. This show doesn't even have Rowell or Shemar Moore to pick up the slack.

Oh, and I have my doubts about this "Chancellor resurgence." From what I've heard (and seen) Jill and Kay are not exactly burning up the airwaves. Don't you mean Chloe, Chance and Billy? Yeah, nice actors but that's not gonna cut it.

[bellcurve]

I need an interview or quotes or something to validate this statement. How do you know this?

Also, how condescending and arrogant are you to assume that Y&RWorldTurner hasn't done his homework and doesn't know Y&R pre-and-post Victor Newman?

Again, no one is saying Bill Bell wasn't without his faults. Every writer has a crutch or a motif. But Bill Bell knew how to build characters and knew how to build scenes and knew how to build moments where, no matter how campy or outrageous the story, we were never looked up and said, "(Insert Character Name) would never act this way."

No one ever expected Bill Bell's Y&R to be some sort of high brow art. His Y&R was indeed pretentious, but Bell was able to back it up with riveting stories, characters that had meaning and purpose, and most importantly, he never outright insulted his audience.

And say what you will about Bill Bell's female characters always being dependent on a man, but I've never seen it as bad as it is with Maria.

HA! Just the payoff? How about the actual assembly of her writing staff, the actual ideas themsevles(bedhopping, art, dead fetuses, premonitions, etc), and the execution of those ideas. Who gives a damn about "the payoff" is the journey to get there sucked to begin with?

I think he'd "hate" her a lot less if she admitted defeat and immediately fixed what was wrong. But she's too rich, too lazy, and too egotistical to care.

Y&RWorldTurner doesn't want to feel more "big." He wants Y&R to go back to rich, beautiful storytelling. And if Maria has to get fired for that to happen, then bring it on.

[Vee]

Oh, Christ, don't bring this [!@#$%^&*] in here too.

[bellcurve]

Exactly. This is pretty much like a whole revamp of the show. And it's so clear that Maria doesn't have a backup plan and this will blow up in her face.

Exactly. And if everyone is being re-negotiated, Jeanne Cooper may be next. She's even more useless than Melody and Eric.

[bellcurve]

Can you chill the f*ck out with your moral superiority?

No one asked you.

[alphanguy74]

It's impossible to truly KNOW IT unless you were there to SEE IT. Anything less is utter bullsh!t Youtube videos are cherry picked, the boring and stupid parts were generally never kept by fans in the first place. And you can only get so much from articles and books.