Passions: Hank shooting and "killing" Sheridan.

Sunset Beach: The earthquake, Mark telling Meg that Ben killed him, Olivia & Caitlen driving off the cliff.

DAYS: Too much to mention. One of my favorites was Hope getting buried by an avalanche.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fbZo3odGw3Y

You're right. The actor, Frank Beaty, had a breakdown. The temp recast, who had to return for several stays I think, was Marc Wolf. He did a good job, considering. At the time I actually wondered if they were planning to have Brent stay on, remember towards the end they suddenly started showing flashes of his mother or father and how he was abused as a child, and they brought in his sister. Looking back I wonder if they may have been planning a "they cut out the bad" tumor type of story like McTavish did with Jonathan Lavery on AMC. Anyway, if they were, Beaty's breakdown probably stopped that once and for all.

I can see why people thought the story was offensive, but like you said, it was a very entertaining story, strong performances, and lots of twists and turns.

For years we have been having baby switching storylines, I never understood why an HIV twist was so offensive. I thought it was a good updated twist on an old cliche. I actually loved a lot of McTavish's tounge in cheekness with the story, she played with the conventions of soaps, without it becoming campy..(i.e. Marion is a plain frousy woman, who, in real life no one would notice, but in soapland immediatley set out warning signals that something aint right. The scene when Brett reveals himself to the cops over the internet, "The part of Marion Crane is now being played by....Brett Lawrence," a riff on both the old announcements they used to make for a new actor, and the morphing witch face in the crystal ball in the Wizard of Oz!" I thought McTavish was great at that, she just want good at "Guiding Light," (weird stuff, like Michelle calling Vanessa "Mrs. Reardon," and Nola, her aunt, "Mrs. Chamberlin," how the characters were ground down to their most cartoonish essentials, etc.) She also burned out after Brent, and the show lost all energy.

And yes, he was going to be "redeemed," and Abby was going to befriend him and be a Maureen to his Roger..but his breakdown closed that door.

So that was confirmed, he was going to be redeemed? The Abby/Brent scenes would have been compelling but it was probably for the best that the character left (not for the best that the actor had a breakdown, I mean).

Remember when Vanessa and Lillian sat around with Annie talking about Reva being an adulteress? That was the biggest WTF moment on soaps at that time for me, and still stands out as one 15 years later. Of all people to cast aspersions regarding adultery, Lillian was not one (especially not only a few years after Maureen's death), and Vanessa may not have been a Reva booster, but she liked her a lot more than she liked Lillian.

I think one of the reasons some were upset is because AIDS was more of a sensitive subject then, there were fewer of the medications that prolong the life of someone with HIV, and this was coming right on the heels of the very serious Stone story on GH. I wasn't sure about the story, but generally I thought they handled it OK and I thought they did a wonderful job with the Susan character and showing her as having a full life with HIV.

I was more upset with the way Nadine was murdered, although the rest of the story I thought was very good, overall. There was, as you mentioned, a lot of humor, which was something good GL psychos in that era had (Cynthia Watros's Annie also had a lot of humor).

Best Friday cliffhangers:

Y&R-

David Kimble revealing his bandaged face (after getting plastic surgery to look like David Hassellfoff!)

The plastic surgeon etched the word KILLER in his forehead. AMAZING. I remember that my grandparents were watching me for a week, I was 14 or 15, and I called my grandmother in to watch it over and over! (I taped every episode of Y&R and OLTL back then).

OLTL:

After the Patrick London storyline ended Tina follows Ursulla to the lighthouse to look through Patrick's journals to try to understand him better.The tide comes in and Tina is trapped. Ursulla tells her there is no escape.

After he rapes Sarah and is then shot by Sarah, Asa and Cord bury the dead Austin Buchanan on Llantano Mountain. The episode ends with his hand coming up out of the ground. He was alive.

I had just been writing about this very topic in my notebook the other day planning to start a thread, and a great mind beat me to it!

The Friday cliffhanger is one of my most favorite aspects of the classic daytime soap. Back in the good old days, the Friday cliffhanger was a signature event not to be missed...the better writers of daytime knew how to bring things to a fever pitch on a Friday, making the viewer think that all hell was about to break loose...Friday's final moments were like a hit of a powerful and addictive drug, and the viewers were hooked fiends..and there was no doubt whatsoever that you would tune in on Monday (for the obliglatory replay of the final five minutes or so of Friday's show) to get that next fix!

In my twenty-five plus years of viewing I have witnessed some spectacular Fridays cliffhangers, so I'll have to post seperately for the different shows. I'll start with the show that during the 1980's was truly the master at the Friday close...ONE LIFE TO LIVE...

*I still remember to this day the tension-filled courtroom drama in either 1985 when Tina Lord was put on trial for the murder of Harry O'Neill. Tina was of course innocent, as Mitch Laurence had shot Harry dead intending to frame Viki/Niki Smith for the crime...but the only eyewitness to the shooting who could clear Tina was Niki, who had since retreated back into the depths of Viki's psyche with no intentions of coming out again. However, on a Friday, poor Viki took the stand, and Tina's attorney, Pete O'Neill (Harry's brother) grilled her so hard that Viki couldn't take it anymore. Suddenly, Viki's head began to slowly turn round and round as it always did when Niki was about to emerge. Clint jumped out of his seat in fury as he watched his wife slip away and Niki Smith take control. "WHAT HAVE YOU DONE!!!! NOW WE MAY NEVER GET HER BACK!!!" Clint roared at Pete as the background music swelled before the show faded to black...

*A year later, Mitch was again wreaking havoc as he set up his cult of iced tea drugged female disciples in the Waterside Inn. He was fleecing the mostly wealthy young girls of their money, and journalist Cassie Callison went undercover to expose him. Unfortunately, Mitch was on to her, and on a Friday afternoon poor Cassie found herself drugged out of her mind in Mitch's Waterside Inn suite. As Cassie lay on the sofa, dastardly Mitch leered over her, preparing to rape the poor girl. Then suddenly just as Mitch had jumped on top of Cassie, there was a loud crash and thud, and the evil con man fell off Cassie, landing dead on the hardwood floor...he had been murdered, but just who had delivered the fatal blow to his head?

*Tina going over the falls in 1987. Enough said.

*1987, Tina and Max at the the altar getting married when OOPS!!! Tina blurts out "I take thee Cord"!

*Although technically I don't think it was a Friday (more likely a Thursday, but the show didn't air that Friday), the 1987 Thanksgiving show, when Delilah left the holiday celebrations at Llanfair in a limo on her way to the airport to go to either NYC or Hollywood to realize her dream of becoming a star. However, one of those infamous Llantano blizzards set in and the limo got stuck. Delilah would not be stopped though! She jumped out of the limo and declared that she would walk to the airport if she had to! She promptly disappeared for over a year and was presumed dead until...

*In 1988, the faux-Bo storyline, which seemed to last FOREVER (but in a good, suspenseful way), got the final scenes EVERY Friday, and the tension kept building and building every week! The two Fridays cliffhangers I remember best were when Didi marched into the party the Leightons were throwing at Stonecrest, and then the one in which Delilah and Lord Henry were in the park and she was almost spotted. Then of course the tragic Friday when faux-Bo/Patrick London pulled sweet Didi onto the electrified fence with him, killing them both...

MORE MEMORIES TO COME!!!

Sedrick- You summed up OLTL in the 80's perfectly. No one did Friday cliffhangers better than OLTL in the 80's. They were generally life or death cliffhangers. I never tired of it.

The faux Bo story does seem very suspenseful in the clips I've watched of it. I think a lot is also down to the work from the actors -- I didn't know that Shelley Burch and the woman who played Didi were that good at dramatic stuff. Was it a cliffhanger when they briefly escaped from the guards and Didi tried to make a phone call, or was that just a regular part of the episode? That really got me, even though I knew she wasn't going to get through.

The faux Bo story does seem very suspenseful in the clips I've watched of it. I think a lot is also down to the work from the actors -- I didn't know that Shelley Burch and the woman who played Didi were that good at dramatic stuff. Was it a cliffhanger when they briefly escaped from the guards and Didi tried to make a phone call, or was that just a regular part of the episode? That really got me, even though I knew she wasn't going to get through.

God I loved that storyline. It was so suspenseful. I do not remember if that was the cliffhanger or not..That was the summer that OLTL hit #1 for a week.

Y&R Jack walked away from Victor's heart attack at Newman.

Jill running through cornfields to prevent Billy and Mac from consumating their marriage.

GL Tammy finding out Johnathan was her cousin

Alex finding out Mick was her missing twin

B&B

Brooke finding out Thorne married Macy after Venice

Ridge proposing to Taylor instead of Brooke

Brooke racing to the church to tell Ridge she was pregnant with Bridget

OLTL

Nash's crash.

Adriana punching Gigi.

Nora finding out Daniel Coulson was gay

Todd trapping Nora at the beach house