All: Best and Worst Resurrections

[Cheap21]

In honor of Easter, what you are some of your favorite and least favorite stories involving characters coming back from the dead?

Best

1. Taylor (B&B, 2005) - In the long run, it wasnt a good decision, but short term, I thought her return was great. The scream that Brooke let out when she opened her door and saw Taylor was priceless. The drama her return brought was good and brought about a sense of classic B&B for the remainder of that year

2. Tina (OLTL)- Tina walking in on Cord's wedding to Kate, complete with a baby in her hand was a classic OLTL moment and one of the best back from the dead scenes in soap history.

3. Hope (Days, 1994) - Who watching Days, didnt love this story? It made for one of the soaps' most interestng triangle, with Bo and Billie, both pairings which chemistry and were both viable options

4. Jesse (AMC, 2008) - This was the story to watch at the start of the year on the soap. Debbie Morgan's acting was fierce and the show did good by the couple.

Worst

1. Days Serial Killing Island - This is hands down one of the worst. What a horrible and tacky way to bring all those characters back. It was upsetting to see favorites go but the story was intriguing and intesting. It completely jumped the shark when they had Marlena killed, only to have her coffin mysteriously on some island where all her victims were being held

2. Ryan (AMC, 2006) - The audience knew he was alive, but everyone else thought he was dead. I wish he really was. His return at his memorial service, which for some reason took place 3 months after he "died" seemed like such a ripoff of Edmund's return a decade earlier.

3. Mitch (OLTL, 2009) - His returned marked OLTL's current downfall into pure and utter crap. His presence on the show compromises its integrity and they've rewritten so many things, made so many characters stupid and introduced plot twists that make no sense and it all started by having him resurrected again

4. Victor Lord (OLTL, 2003) - Completely and utterly pointless. They bring him back, only to kill him off 2 weeks later. Never explained why or how he managed to be living in secret all those decades.

5. Anna Devane (AMC/GH) - It sucked that it happeend on AMC, insted of GH, but that wasnt the biggest issue. The story just sucked. Alex disappears mysteriously and she comes back a few months later with her not so dead amnesiac twin. I didnt care for it the first few months and Anna was annoying. At least they brought Mac and Robin over.

6. Maria (AMC, 2002) - People wanted Maria back, not Maureen Gorman. That crap lasted for two long and Maureen worked the nerves big time.

7. Marty (OLTL, 2008) - They brought her back to be kidnapped and raped. I really dont care for amnesia stories and like Maria's, hers lasted too long. In hindsight, they should have left her dead, bc she's been wasted since coming back.

[Faulkner]

Best - Roger Thorpe, GL

Worst - Phillip Chancellor III, Y&R...just bulldozed years of history.

[Cheap21]

Oh yeah, I forgot about Phillip. I was only pretending to be dead bc I was gay but guess what Im back!

[darraholic]

Worst: Steve & Kayla (DAYS) My god that was a awful 2nd stint with the show.

Best: Can't really think of any. But I did like Larry Welch's return after serving prison time. I loved how he was able to kidnap Hope and frame Lexie for it.

[Eric83]

Worst:

1. DAYS: Salem Serial Killer Victims

2. DAYS: Tony DiMera

3. DAYS: Jack Devereaux (Didn't he die like 2 or 3 times in the span of a year? )

4. Y&R: Phillip Chancellor

5. OLTL: Mitch Laurence, 2009

6. DAYS: John Black, 2008 (They finally had a chance to do something REALLY good with Marlena, but managed to [!@#$%^&*] it up, by bringing John back from the dead.)

7. DAYS: Stefano DiMera (He's died so many times, I can't pick a specific one.)

Best:

1. GL: Roger Thorpe

2. GL: Phillip Spaulding (It wasn't that great, but it was the only time I really enjoyed GL, after the production model switch.)

3. GL: Reva Shayne, 1995 (Hate her or love her, but I feel that she carried GL in its last decade, and it wouldn't have been as good without her.)

4. ATWT: James Stenbeck (I love him, so I never minded his constant returns from the dead.)

I will post more later...

[Quent]

Best:

ATWT: James Stenbeck's FIRST return. To this day, I can see him taking off the monk's hood, whispering "Hello, Barbara".

ATWT: Shannon's return. This was the last time a soap completely surprised me. Duncan was called down to the police station to get his wife, who we all assumed was Jessica. Lo and behold, it was his first wife (and without a shrunken head!).

Worst:

Y&R: Phillip's return. Enough said.

B&B: Taylor's return. We saw her die ON-SCREEN in her husband's arms, for crying out loud!

[catsmeouch]

Best:

Stefano, DOOL, 1993 - Brought about Stefano's definitive reign of terror in the 90s.

Hope, DOOL, 1994 - Is she Hope or is she Gina? My favourite Kristian Alfonso story, and my very first Bo and Hope story.

Worst:

Rolf, DOOL, 2007 - No explanation for why he was alive except for the snide "I got better" comment. A stupid character and an unnecessary return.

Roman, DOOL, 1997 - Roman's return from the dead brought Josh Taylor back to the show. They should have kept Roman dead rather than make us suffer through JT.

[All My Shadows]

Most of them suck, IMO. If you're gonna kill a character off, suffer the consequences. If you come into a show and a character you want to write for was killed off by a previous writer, tough luck. I'm not completely sure of it, but in real life, I know I'm not spared death simply because I'm part of a core family or one half of a supercouple*.

* - not that I'm one half of a supercouple or anything....

[applcin]

Best:

GH Laura - when Luke first saw her walking on the grounds of the mayor's mansion after she'd been presumed dead for 2 years

GH Brenda - Not a huge S & B fan but the scene at the church in the rain when Sonny sees Brenda alive for the first time and then he's shot--I thought that was well done.

EON Sky Whitney - presumed dead, his life was taken over by an imposter. After the imposter died, the real Sky was revealed to be alive. For a Larkin Malloy fan, this was heaven.

OLTL - Clint (even though the audience but not the characters knew he was alive) I liked the old West 1888 story, so when Viki travelled back and walked in on Clint marrying her great-grandmother, Virginia, the reunion was great. Weird but still a great Clint & Viki moment.

Worst:

GH - Stavros (they should have let him stay dead after he fell down the stairs)

GH - Duke Lavery - without Ian Buchanan, what was the point?

OLTL - Mitch - perhaps my most hated character in all of daytime. Every time OLTL brings him back, it drives me away from the show.

Both Good and Bad:

DAYS - Steve. I liked that when he "died", they showed a coffin switch, so it was always left open for Steve to be alive. But the way they told the story surrounding his return sucked. They switched the villain from Alamain to DiMera and his torturer (EJ) would have been a child when Steve was kidnapped.

AMC Jesse - yes, we saw him die. But I'm still glad he's alive and the train station scenes with Angie were good. However, the backstory developed involving Rebecca and the fact they felt the need to give him an adult daughter made it play out that he immediately found someone else to love rather than supposedly missing Angie so much.

[Khan]

Best: Roger Thorpe's resurrection (GL, 1989); James Stenbeck's first resurrection, w/ the infamous greeting, "Hello, Barbara" (ATWT, 1987)

Worst: Every. Single. One. of Stefano DiMera's on DAYS. Just die already, you son-of-a-bitch!

[Leia]

Best:

B&B Sheila Carter. It gave B&B a nice tie to Y&R and treated us to some of the best crossover stories when Sheila and Lauren continued their feud. I'll never forget the wedding gown fight.

B&B Taylor's 1st return when she was Princess Laila in the palace with Omar.

Worst

Y&R: Phillip Chancellor 2008. Dumb. Lame. Shark Jumping.

Taylor's return 2005. Ridge went from being married to Brooke one day and screwing Taylor the next. And Stephanie's heart attack brought them back together.

OLTL: Mitch Laurence 2008. 3 weeks in and everything started to fall apart. I suspect the whole show will never recover from the continuity and rewrites.

[quartermainefan]

I loved the return of Frisco on GH. He had been thought dead and Felicia moved on with Colten Shore, and then on her wedding day Frisco returns to town.

Cliff on AMC had a similar story with Nina, but I forget if she thought he was dead or not.

[DRW50]

This goes way beyond Mitch. I thought the screeching child Danielle and the huge rewrites that accompanied her were as bad were almost as ridiculous as Mitch, especially when so many characters were trashed just to make her and her parents look like saints. Not to mention the KAD "hey let's remind people that Todd wasn't the only person who raped Marty, and hell, why not turn Rebecca into a psycho just for a kick" saga.

I think soap resurrections work if there's a good reason for their return and/or if they shouldn't have been killed off in the first place.

Best:

Roger GL

While on paper there may not have been a need for Roger to come back, the way Pam Long and Nancy Curlee handled his return was skillful and Curlee continued to make him a stronger and stronger presence, an antihero, a man who sometimes did awful things but also felt remorse and who rarely crossed the line in the brutal, direct way he did during his first run.

Worst:

ATWT Shannon

I am mentioning this because so many other choices were already mentioned. I liked Shannon but there was no real reason to bring her back. The triangle with Duncan and Jessica made Shannon look like a very sad and desperate woman, which took away from most of what was appealing about Shannon in the first place. Her backstory was depressing. Her exit was flat. They didn't even bother to have her leave happily with Duncan. She just went on a book tour.

[Khan]

I'd definitely pick Shannon's resurrection as my choice in the "Storylines That Need Explanations" thread. I feel as if no one at WT thought beyond the initial shock value of Shannon coming back from the dead to mess up Duncan and Jessica's marriage, and that when it didn't deliver like they thought it would, they just plain gave up on it.

[DRW50]

That's how I felt too. All the characters were damaged and neglected and finally just dumped. It sucks because Jessica and Duncan were a very strong couple on a show which at that time and for a long time after only had one or two strong couples.