As The World Turns Discussion Thread

[j swift]

That's amazing!  Soap writing can be so sexist, the men never age and their women keep getting younger and younger.

[DramatistDreamer]

What is says is that writers loved to use Craig to service damn near every woman in his age group, whether the pairing worked or not.

 

After Ellie, it began to get ridiculous, although he had some chemistry with Sam.  

 

Writers completely ruined that character after the mid 1990s and I don't even acknowledge the years that came after.

[P.J.]

There was a point during Bryce's run where his story consisted of making the rounds, checking on the women in his life, from Lyla on down 

 

Oh, and at the end, Craig was also trying to get Lily into bed, as I recall.

[DramatistDreamer]

 

Probably during the Writer's Strike.

 

Still better than the horrendous stuff that was written for the character in the '00s. 

 

About a month ago, I struggled to get through a chunk of 2007 episodes and saw Bryce and Elizabeth Hubbard try to get some terribly written dialogue to work.  I repeat, Scott Bryce and Elizabeth Hubbard couldn't get the dialogue to work!! 

That's when you know a script is a genuine flop, but that was characteristic of the show's final decade, in particular.

Edited August 29, 2018 by DramatistDreamer

[P.J.]

 

Sigh...I'll never stop hating how Goutman just never understood who Craig was.

[j swift]

Craig is one of those characters, (like Tad AMC or Jamie AW) who was beloved in their first run so they weren't killed off when they left the story.  Then, years later, there's a hew and cry to bring Craig back, but everyone else has been SORASed or evolved and for viewers to recognize Craig he had to stay the same. 

 

Then, we get dumb things like Craig being in a love triangle with Dusty.  I remembered Dusty as the teen who lead Paul into shoplifting while Craig was having "intimacy issues" with Betsy; it would seem absurd that one day they would be competing for the affection of Barbara's daughter. 

 

So, we're stuck between a rock and hard place because you want characters to return, but they're doomed to return to a town that has gone on without them; as if they were returning from a time wrap in outer space.   It seems a herculean task to successfully write someone  back in after 3-5 years off the canvas, and I can only think of two cases were it worked successfully, Roger Thorpe on TGL and Iris Wheeler on AW; and neither had a satisfying ending.

Edited August 30, 2018 by j swift

[DramatistDreamer]

There was a hew and cry? Wow, really?? 

Perhaps the writers should've resisted the hew and cry and simply wrote better stories for the characters they actually had.

 

Personally, I would've left Craig in Montega with Sierra and the kids and had him make occasional appearances the way ATWT used to have Don and Penny and even David Stewart visit Oakdale.  Bonus points if they could get Finn Carter's Sierra to make an occasional visit with him.  In the last decade of the show, Carter was doing more TV and some of the shows were on CBS.  It wouldn't have taken that much effort.  

What they wrote for Craig could've been accomplished by any ole garden variety villain. That would've been a good instance where a brand new character would've made sense.

 

The ages were all messed up.  Paul looked damn near older than Barbara toward the end of the series.  Meg, Emily and Paul were written as if they were all in the same age group.  I found Emily and Paul written as the same age group to be particularly incongruous considering their history.

 

The other thing that seemed ridiculous was the multiple recasts.  I thought it was ridiculous how many recasts ATWT had for Adam, Craig, Paul and Casey's trip to the attic to SORAS was utterly ridiculous.

Edited August 30, 2018 by DramatistDreamer

[P.J.]

Yeah, Craig was probably always near the top of most requested returns, but Oakdale hadn't "moved on" and made Craig obsolete. He'd only been gone 5 or 6 years. His contemporaries were still on the canvas, his family was still there. 

 

I wouldn't have objected to an edgier version of Craig, had he been written with any complexity. Not the misogynistic, lazy, consciousless [!@#$%^&*] Goutman and Block conspired to put onscreen.

 

If that's what Goutman, et al wanted---they might as well have brought back Tonio Reyes and Peter Boynton. Boynton wouldn't have broken the bank and Tonio was a using douchebag asshat. 

 

 

[Mitch]

I never understood why GL killed off Ben Warren to move the actor over to ATWT to play the same character with an established character's name. I never thought of him as Craig..though to tell the truth, I never liked Craig to begin with, he was always a "weak" character, first as a villain...(how hard was it to trick Ryan's brain dead Betsy and dimbulb Steve??) and then as a romantic lead...his puckering of his lips and his eyes welling with tears every damn time he was in love with a woman, which was every three months..got on my nerves.  Craig and Carter's Sierra were like watching paint dry..

 

But Craig screwing Dani is beyond horrible.

[vetsoapfan]

 

It was repugnant, even worse than Frederick Bauer sleeping with Christina/Blake on TGL, whom he had known as his sister when she was born.

[DramatistDreamer]

No offense @Mitch but I don't think you were the intended audience where Craig was concerned.  The soap writers and execs likely paid attention the fact that the majority of their audiences were women and Scott Bryce, would have appealed to a good number of that audience.  His Craig was by most definitions "80s hot". 

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  I'm actually serious.

The idea of the sensitive, romantic guy was very popular back then, which is probably why Bryce's sensitive guy got nominated for an Emmy over his anti-hero from years before. 

And on his worst days, Bryce's Craig couldn't ever  have as grating as Nicholas Cage's character from Valley Girl and that movie is a cult classic.

 

I actually do believe it when @P.J. says that Craig consistently ranked at the top of the lists of characters most desired for a return. 

I actually loved Craig and Sierra and I would've relished Craig returning had I trusted the writers and ATWT/PGP execs. But I didn't.  I thought the writers were pretty lousy in the last decade and I thought the decisions the execs made were pretty poor choices.

 

 

 

So glad I had taken a hiatus from watching the show at that time.

[Mitch]

No offense taken..I  just don't remember the ladies being that turned on by Craig..but I am sure you are right. I just remember him bouncing from his mom, to his sister, to whomever he was involved with , and he was chief supporter of annoying Lily. You would see him walking around that damn farm..checking on Lily...looking off into a window dreaming of Sierra...talking about Sierra...checking up on Lily..telling Margo some wussy ass thing like..."You have to follow your heart but be honest," before puddling up his eyes and quivering those lips of his thinking of Sierra, Iva, whoeverhewasinlovewithitatthetime. You wanted to scream.. "Craig..just go to F*CKING work!"

 

A middle aged man crying day in and day out would have gotten almost as old as Hunt Block chewing with his mouth open : )

[DramatistDreamer]

 

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 Staaaaph! 

When Bryce returned, the character was much changed.  Craig was written horrendously in '07 when Bryce had briefly returned to the role but hey, no more tears, lol.

[YRBB]

Bryce was husband material. The end! 

[Khan]

 

It just irks me how Goutman REFUSED to alter his ridiculous vision for Craig to fit the actor who freaking originated the role.