Characters who have too many children

[DRW50]

Whether we see these children born during the show's lifespan, or they pop up out of nowhere via rewrite, are there any soap characters whose endless amount of offspring seems excessive to you? Or soap characters who only have one or two children, but have them for no apparent reason other than bad writing?

My picks:

Ridge, Taylor, and Brooke, B&B. Of their combined eight or nine children, only two have ever been involved in decent stories (Rick, Bridget) and that ended sometime before Friends went off the air. The Ridge/Taylor kids have been particular failures, to the point where even killing one of them off fizzled out after a few months.

Tad, AMC. Why does he have a child with Krystal? And why did they spend an eternity on his miracle child with Dixie, complete with two women being murdered (Dixie, Julia) to try to generate some sort of emotional resonance for this story, when Tad barely ever spends time with her? I guess he did such a great job with Jamie and JR (one of whom apparently no longer exists and the other only exists when Tad needs to score points against Adam) that the show just couldn't resist tossing a few more traumatized tots into the Martin moat.

Harley, GL. I still, almost a decade later, have no idea why she had a child with Rick Bauer. At one time she and Cassie seemed to be in endless cycles of pregnancy (or in Cassie's case, miscarriage and adoption and the occasional childbirth), and in the end, it all added up to nothing.

[Bright Eyes]

SAMI BRADY! She should be number one on EVERYONE'S list.

Carly Tenney

Lily Snyder

Kate Roberts - Making Cassie and Rex her kids was an extremely stupid move and this ruined any chance of these once great characters having a future

[Cyberologist]

Lots of them on GH....

Elizabeth Webber has a child with Jason Morgan for no apparent reason other than to show him putting every other kid's welfare as a priority and keep his kid in a box on the top shelf of his closet

fans of his waited over a decade for him to have his own kid instead of salivating over the needs of Carly and her spawn....now he's godfather to her newborn but because of danger he can't be around his own kid somehow every kid in Port Charles is bullet proof except Jake.

Elizabeth Webber son with Zander served no purpose IMO except to muddy her up although he's adorable and have the real makings of a child star...

Sonny and his brood has become All Sonny's Children and he has a secret adult child waiting in the wings to be revealed currently. He doesn't need another kid...

Why did Nikolas need Spencer?

The birth of Micheal ate (and continues to eat the show) for well over a decade.

Alexis became Sam's mother which ruined her character storyline wise...

There are a whole lot more but my point is my favs who have kids (women) get rotten storylines, except for maybe for Carly. Kids are just plot points on this show...usually "bad writing"

eg Victor Newman on Y/R is also a culprit of too many kids... while Jack Abbott's are MIA

[P.J.]

^^^Carly, or Maura? Carly's got three kids--one that's adopted and she never sees. Maura's maternity leaves, otoh, are a source of great consternation in my life. LOL.

Holden, ATWT. He's got six kids with three different mothers. And other than Luke, he barely acknowledges the other five.

Hal, ATWT. At one time he had father/stepfather ties to half the characters under 25. But boy, how I miss him. Honorable mention to John Dixon, who seemed to get a "kid he never knew about" every couple of years on the show.

[Jonathan]

When I saw the title of this thread I immediately thought of Kendall from All My Children. She only has 2 kids, but that's 2 kids too many for this woman.

[Cheap21]

Taylor and Tad have too many kids? Taylor only has 3 and Tad has 2, 3 if you count JR. 3 is hardly too much. The storylines which Taylor got hers were good as. Jamie's was a good one as well. Kathy was created bc her birth was anticipated for well over a decade.

IA on Brooke. 5 children was too much for her and in recent years its been a joke

[DRW50]

I count Taylor with Brooke and Ridge. Three was too many for her because in the end nothing of value was done with any of them.

I would put the same for Tad. Four children, and in the long run, not worth it. I could understand Jamie and JR but I don't understand Kathy or Jenny. It's not like they had any interest in doing anything with Kathy after Tad was reunited with her. They should have just had Julia leave town and Tad allowed Kathy to be raised by her.

[quartermainefan]

I have to go with Kate Roberts from DOOL. For as long as I have been watching, someone shows up and it is her kid. She must have six.

Sami Brady is another, she has something like four now, and is she even supposed to be 30?

[DRW50]

I forgot about Holden. Yes, Abigail who, Aaron who...

I didn't count Hal or John because generally the kids added to their stories and had interesting relationships with them, although I don't know exactly why they gave John and Iva a child. Perhaps because they knew she was going to lose custody of Aaron and this was supposed to be some sort of compensation.

[lovely_m]

Ryan Lavery. I know most of those children were miscarriages, but still.

[DRW50]

He should never have been allowed to breed in the first place.

I see what people are saying about Sami (I still don't really know why she needed twins -- in the long run the "two different dads" story fizzled out).

I don't notice about Kate because most of her kids, aside from Lucas and Phillip, are gone and rarely mentioned, but then that probably just shows the flaws in giving her so many.

[classicmoment]

Stefano Dimera- The guy has tons

Kate Roberts - Though I think we were just suppose to forget the two added alien babies

Marlena Evans- II don't know somehow someway, they have found ways to have this woman be impregnated. Intercourse- cross breeding, invitro etcetcetc

Sammy Brady- It's not a lot realistically but no way do I believe Sami Brady needed to have all those kiids

Never been an All My Children viewer but I always assumed Main Stayers on that show would somehow be blessed with abundant youth through reproduction

[lovely_m]

I could add Victor Newman to this. The only children that really matter are Nick and Victoria. We see how they are. Abby is a twit and they ruined Adam to prop Victor and his choosen brats. There was no need for him to get Ashley pregnant.

[Vee]

I defy anyone to name all the children (and parents) of Harley, Cassie and Beth on GL. Paul Rauch turned that show into a blonde bombshell baby factory, some sort of gynecological fetish run amok onscreen. Laura Wright appears to be keeping the flame burning on GH, where she has settled Carly into a rote, Cassie Layne-esque yuppie routine with equally whitebread Jax, doing nothing but bitching about her kids, worrying about having a baby, having more babies, and then bitching about them. Carly is now Kate Gosselin by way of The Godfather.

Emily, Holden and Hal are ridiculous on ATWT. I've lost all track of their children, and judging by Emily, it's getting worse all the time. How many children can she pump out like a chimney bellows? Hasn't some twenty year old popped up now, too?

BTW, until this thread, I'd forgotten Jenny Martin existed. Case in point.

[DRW50]

I can't remember if Hunter is Emily's or if he's with Larry and another woman after Larry dumped Susan.

Beth also became ridiculous with the babies, mainly because they had no purpose. I guess James had a purpose because he saved Lizzie's life through bone marrow, but then he would vanish for long stretches of time. And then there was Peyton, Beth's daughter with Alan, who was rarely seen after birth, then popped back up in the last week of the show suddenly five or six years old.

As for Victor, I don't think he has too many kids as much as the writers have failed. Adam/Victor Jr. SHOULD have been so much more than what he has become. The same goes for Abby, although I hated the entire storyline surrounding her conception.