ALL: Saddest Soap Moments

[quartermainefan]

I don't know who these characters are but this was one clip I found very sad. I can only imagine how sad this was to the audience that was watching at the time

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Fs_L7zalQ4

[soapfan770]

Wow that's a pretty powerful clip from the underrated Gloria Loring. I forgot that Liz lasted so long, the only character from the whole 1980 mess to actually be viable and last more than a year. I'm surprised she hasn't been back on Days at all given all the 80s returns in recent years.

While I never could quite follow this whole storyline, I do remember Blade's death on Y&R. It was rather stark, gut wreching and I remember the somber mood and sense of dread as well. I was actually for sure Rick would remain pretending to be Blade and say it was Rick who had died:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LlU_QLUr8-0&feature=related

[DRW50]

I think there's always a choice when characters leave. I don't see why Maggie couldn't have just left town. Certainly Maggie's death was a way to get attention and a big shocking moment, but did it help with the ratings or help the show creatively? I thought it was almost mocking the character, for her to go in the water with this ridiculously big ring on that killed her.

The worst part of Linda's death - besides, as with all badly written soap deaths, her being forgotten almost immediately - was when they showed the blood splattering down onto her pumps as she was lifted off the ground. It just made my skin crawl, and not at the killer (who was a pointless character anyway) but at what KL had become. It's the type of ridiculousness which Serial Mom parodied.

[DRW50]

That was very good, to go from her singing to Tod and then you have her singing over the action, as she says goodbye and the various other characters (many of whom would not be around past 1988 or so, I believe) get the news.

It's too bad she hasn't done more soap work, she had such a natural presence which is missing from soaps now. Oddly enough not all that long after she stopped playing Liz, she appeared on AW as herself, singing a song which had been written for Dawn Rollo, I think? It was a good song, I can't remember it though, I want to say Crackerbox Palace, but that was a George Harrison song. Anyway, considering DAYS and AW were on the same network, I thought it was odd that they so casually had her go from Liz to Gloria.

[Khan]

Word. Now, I'm not saying KNOTS LANDING wasn't above sending chills down viewers' spines whenever it had to, but I think there was a difference in how they handled Ciji Dunne's murder (largely off-screen, exacts details left to the viewers' imaginations) and in how they handled Linda Fairgate's (pretty much 'out there,' w/ no room for one's own interpretation).

If John Romano, who was the Co-EP for the disastrous S13, had been around when Alec Baldwin's Joshua died, chances are, we would've seen the blood splatter all over the pavement when his head made contact with the concrete after falling from the rooftop.

[DRW50]

And it was all so sudden. That guy was just a slightly weird character, but I don't remember him being a psycho. In one episode he was slaughtering her and in the next few he was holding the Fairgates hostage. Rarely have I seen any show just throw any story plans up in the air, if they had any, the way KL did at that time. I'm not saying they were left with great stuff (I almost wonder if LML and husband were trying to sabotage the show with some of what they had in that season 12 finale, between the destruction of Claudia's character and the paintball vigilantism), but those early season 13 episodes, even though I knew in advance what a rough season that was going to be, really shocked me. I also felt like there was an undertone in there which wanted us to enjoy Linda's murder or feel she had gotten what she deserved. It bothered me because I thought Linda was a great character, and was the only time KL got close to having a rival for Paige.

[Mr. Vixen]

I Can't BELIEVE no one posted this. It breaks my heart every time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PoHPfnb75Lg

Jane Elliott deseved an EMMY just for this scene right here.

When she says "I want my mommy"? Oh do the tears flow

[Khan]

Blame that on a new Co-EP/showrunner and writing staff who clearly hadn't been watching the show. At the end of S12, Johnston, played by Philip Brown (who, I'll confess, I've long had a "crush" on), was just some sleazebag businessman who had a "thing" for videotaping his sexual escapades. He wanted to tape him and Paige doing the nasty before Paige gave him the what-for and left; and, we found out later, he'd already done the same with him and Linda. Smarmy, yes, but basically harmless. Then, for reasons which we're sure will be explained next season, he disappears. Um, okay. Seems a bit out of left field, but this is KNOTS LANDING. Wherever they're going with this, it'll be surprising and shocking and good.

Unfortunately, when the next season does arrive, and Linda suddenly knows where Johnston is, and he's hiding out and she mustn't let anyone know or else bad things'll happen...well, we never really learn what those bad things are and why they will happen, do we?

Why has Brian Johnston disappeared? What does he know that, if he is found, will get him into a big heap of trouble? What does it have to do with the videotape that Linda (I think) eventually gets her hands on (along with the money...wait, cash is involved? Huh?...that she sends to her mother and that will, in the next instant, get her killed)?

And for God's sake, what does any of this have to do with Greg Sumner, whom Brian is so desperate to see that he winds up holding the MacKenzies hostage when he learns Meg is Greg's bio daughter (in the episode "House of Cards," a bright spot in an otherwise dismal season)?

Nineteen years later, and I still have no clue. All I know is, you can turn tidal energy into electricity, and Pierce Lawton is effing crazy (although, not as crazy as turning tidal energy into electricity).

I don't think so. The Lechowicks were too busy getting HOMEFRONT on its' feet to really do much w/ S12. Whatever deficiencies occurred during that season, I blame on the Stanleys, Jim and Dianne, who were their second-in-commands.

[DRW50]

I've had a crush on Philip Brown too...he's aged pretty well, I was surprised to see him on a commercial not long ago.

I'd forgotten most of the stuff you mentioned, but yes, it never made any sense.

I keep forgetting the Stanleys were the ones who were involved in season 12. I actually enjoyed most of that season, even if Joan Van Ark would not agree with me, but it just went to hell in the last episode or two.

And poor Bruce Greenwood. Can you imagine going on what had been one of the best written shows on TV and realizing you had a better written role in WILD ORCHID?

[ian]

One scene that is incredibly powerful is when Miss Ellie (Barbara Bel Geddes) breaks down after her mastectomy on Dallas. She conveys so much without saying a word.

[Ann]

My all-time favorite tear-jerker story was BJ's heart transplant story. It was brilliant in all respects. Every day I would watch

it and bawl my eyes out. To me that's a barometer of a really superb story. It affected me so much that I really cared about

the story. It had brilliant character studies. The scene of Tony listening to BJ's heart beating inside Maxie was magnificently

portrayed by Brad Maule. I think we could hear a pin drop during that scene. There was a scene where Felicia is so emotionally

broken up that she sinks down to her knees. Kristina Wagner and Jackie Zeman (who was also in the scene) didn't have to utter a word,

their body language said it all. That story is what the essence of soaps should still be about today. Unfortunately, today's soaps

fall pretty much short of that lofty example.

[quartermainefan]

I think most GH fans have to begrudgingly admit that Kristina Wagner of all people was the one to deliver the most memorable scene maybe in all GH history. You can say this one is a better actress, that one can act rings around her, but nobody has any scene to put up against that scene she did with with Jackie Zeman. The only one is a man, Tony Geary, when he was reunited with Laura after she being dead for two years.

[Gray Bunny]

I thought the exact opposite when I originally saw this. Granted, I'm not a GH viewer nor have I seen Elliot's long line of work, but I remember watching GH that summer and couldn't help but think what a miserable c*nt Tracy Quartermaine is and that stilted performance made me cringe.

As for tearjerking scenes, I can only think of 5 times, 2 of which surprisingly happened in the past year...

---1998, GL: Jenna Bradshaw's death scene

---1998, GL: The Reva Clone's death (only Zimmer could sell a story of a dying clone!)

---2002, DAYS: Bo & Hope give JT to Glen & Barb

---2009, GL: Josh & Reva reunite on GL's final episode (I lost it when they started playing the Jeva background music for that one moment, it was like "This is it! This show I once loved so much is ending forever!")

---2010, DAYS: Alice's funeral. Hope's tearful goodbye. Kristian Alfonso sold it flawlessly! You could tell those were real emotions flowing out.

[Mitch]

I know it touched you, but Zimmer's death scenes with the old age make up and the split screen had the emmy judges (who were outside of daytime and didnt know Zimmer from cheese) laughing hysterically! I had to agree with them.

Josh and Reva last scene was great...finally Zimmer calmed down and didnt try to eat the lighthouse with the rest of the scenery. But why did it take that idiot Wheeler that long to reunite them?

[DRW50]

There were rumors that Zimmer didn't want Josh and Reva back together.

I thought she did a pretty good job in the Dolly death scenes, but I can see why the judges might have been put off.