AMC: The Pratt Post-Mortem

[R Sinclair]

Yeah, I spent the summer outside and at the beach mostly, so I didn't watch as much. I checked in via YouTube clips every few days, but, for instance, when I saw the clips of RyICKa talking about going "sailing" during the Anniversary special, I was like "WTF?! When was thi-- ohhhh!"

[EricMontreal22]

I agree that Pratt seemed to lose steam around then-- That said even the last few months of McTavish seemed like she had lost interest even from the crazy. But I think I may agree with the people here who said that overall, while not wishing to sound like I'm overpraising if Vee thinks that's what some of us are doing , AMC under Pratt was more watchable than it had been for years--for me perhaps since the first two years of McTavish's last run.

[EricMontreal22]

I actually disagree with what yous ay abotu Adam--I don't find he's being written out of character (and it's not like when fans were up in arms in 1990 whe the started making Palmer less menacing--with the Cluck Cluck Chicken Shack, etc). I do agree that, as much as I've enjoyed Annie, he wrote her non committal--not deciding exactly if she was crazy or not, if she liked Adam or not, etc, etc. I'm all for ambiguous characterization but Pratt does not do it well.

Jamie Luner seems to be doing fine now though--I dunno if that's all her doing but more fans definitely have warmed to her than not, despite the awful Melrose Place opening scene for her character. You're right he did deserve csome criticism for his stupid comments--I just thought it was overstated. He said a few stupid, clueless things, and made it clear he should never be allowed to talk to the press, but they weren't on the level (IMHO) of Frons quotes, and I didn't think they were worth making a webvideo series around...

[All My Shadows]

That's basically it. When you miss the show and don't feel compelled to catch up, it's bad. When you are perfectly capable of watching the show but you choose not to, that's when it's just a complete mess. Once upon a time, I'd have killed someone if they caused me to miss the show. Now? Not so much.

[Adam]

While it was a bit disrespectful, I applauded him for coming down on Eden Riegel. Directly or indirectly her constant back and forth with this show post Feb. 2005 has caused more problems than its worth. I was happy to see someone finally publicly call her out on it.

[Adam]

Haha! Yes, so true. I remember there was a day my dad was home sick from work and was watching a movie or something and the VCR failed to tape AMC. This was just after Maria had given birth and Erica got into the accident on the way to the hospital with Maddie. I believe it was the day after the accident. I can remember being SO pissed off

[EricMontreal22]

I've never fully felt that with AMC though there have been times I watch it, out of habit, while completely absorbed in doing work or something else. Granted, I did spend nearly a year in Europe and then had no tv my frist little while in Montreal and missed a lot then--would cacth up on bits, and read the online recaps (this was before online video)--but didn't miss it too much. Conveniently that mainly happened during Passanante's time...

On the other hand One Life to Live, a soap I love but have never felt is "my" show the way I do with AMC has had huge chunks in the nearly 15 years I've been watching where Ive not managed to find the energy to bother with the show--much of the late 90s, much of Higley's era, etc...

[R Sinclair]

When I was in high school, which was coincidentally around the last Broderick era, I would be in class, looking up at the clock during the 1:00 hour anticipating what was recording on my VCR-- and the first thing I'd do after I get home is rewind the tape. The last time Ibarely felt that way was during the 2004 climax of the Baby Switch.

[bbmm]

I'm one of those people who stopped watching because of Pratt. I thought he was doing a bad job and I just didn't care enough to watch AMC. A lot of his stories started with good promise and ended up failing, like the Stuart murder storyline. I think when Pratt started that storyline he didn't know who killed Stuart and that's why it failed.

What I hated most was bringing back Alexander Cambias Sr. What was the point of bringing him back? The Satin Slayer s/l was among the worst in AMC history. There was no need to bring that story back!

Pratt wrote AMC like a prime time soap. In Daytime you have a lot of time to tell a story. Things would be talked about,that we never saw!

A lot of characters weren't doing things their character would do. Jessie would never hide a daughter from Angie! Pratt also had a weird, random obsession with the moon.

I hated what he did with Zach. Pratt made the character misogynist, entitled, and psycho.

I will give him that he made Annie a great character.

I'm glad to see him gone and so far this week I've been enjoying AMC.

[Adam]

But, but.... Megan McTavish was writing then... MCTAVISH... this development surprises me

[EricMontreal22]

I think even R has said that at least the first year or so of McT's return was fairly compelling... (Not to put words in his mouth).

bbmm we don't fully agree but I do agree that Pratt wrote AMC like a primetime soap--I think this is what many on here have talked about when they say his lack of fall out on stories. EVen his classic years at Melrose--arguably the highest rated--and putting aside the fact that Melrose and AMC are polar opposites in terms of soap opera styles--the fallout forhis stories often sucked. But they were told at such a pace with one shocking plot turn happening over another, you often didn't have time to notice the dropped or unfinished stories, etc. That is a lot harder to hide on a daytime soap (and I do believe in hsi way he tried--for all his talk about writing characters out of character, in many ways I think he did get the basic characterizations for a number of them spot on, and he DID make some attempt to have a sense of community etc...)

[AllMyDaysatGH]

ITA with you on this. You hit it right on the nail. A lot of his story's were quick and started off promising, but he ended them so abruptly, just like on a prime time show. I think his attempt at trying a more long-term storyline was with the Who Shot Stuart storyline, and well, we all know how that ended up. He dragged it out to long, and you could tell that he made up everything as he went, had no clue how it would end, did absolutely no research, never tied up loose ends, sloppy. Also, when Adam was M.I.A for a while, and came back in April I think it was and was obsessed with Erica (remember when he drew that picture?), what ever happened to that?? That was totally dropped I think, I thought he had something going with Adam and Erica. He started so many things off great, but totally bombed on them shortly after.

[EricMontreal22]

I agree, except that I think he did know Adam would turn out to be the killer from the beginning--it seemed obvious to me. But what his mystery lacked, and even McTavish's mysteries had (of course she did the classic Who Shot Will one) was development while it ran--he set up all these possible killers, etc, and then didn't develop ANY of the scenarios, etc... (I totally forgot about Adam drawing Erica's pic--for some reason I had that mixed up with his stint in OakHaven with ghost Dixie--that was B/E writing I think LOL)

[LeClerc]

This especially bugged me with Tad and JR. The only reason for dredging up Dixie's death again was to give Tad and JR motives to kill Adam...but neither of them was ever even a suspect in the story, so what was the point?

[EricMontreal22]

I know many didn't like the murder episode--but I enjoyed how it was ridiculously crammed with Agatha Christie style scenes--everyone ending up at the mansion, the images of the lady's shoes, etc. I think it's really disappointing essentially all of that was abandoned--they may as well have just had Kendall and Zack and Adam and Annie there, really.