Top 10 Over the Top Plots of 1996

[Gray Bunny]

Buwahahah! That would've been hilarious and awesome!! But about 10 years too soon in the glacial-paced soap opera world of including gay characters. I mean that would've been *before* Ellen Degeneres' coming out! What would the bible beaters say?!

[DRW50]

In some ways I think the segregation of GL's black characters had already started a bit in early 1995, with Gilly being taken away from the story with Alan-Michael to be paired with boring Sid and the anguished backstory which fell flat because it took place entirely offcamera. David and the Gabriella story, which I enjoyed because of the performances from Monti and Petronia Paley's Vivian (and I actually liked Gabriella -- I know a lot of people didn't...SOD named her worst new character of 1994), but which was obvious filler to keep him out of other stories.

It did get more blatant with McTavish. At first I was just happy to see Gilly and Vivian finally in a story but quickly the story revealed itself as very lurid and trashy, and frankly, I couldn't help wondering if they did this story precisely because they thought it would be lurid if black characters were involved.

As for Marcus -- I see what Mitch is saying. I didn't think he was that bad, and I didn't really mind him with Dahlia (I thought Sharon Leal had a good presence), but they didn't really do enough with him beyond cliches of the angry young black man. I wonder what their future plans would have been. When Rauch arrived he sat around for about a year or a year and a half until he finally left with barely a whimper. His best chemistry was with Dinah. I wish the show had put them together, as she had none with any Hart.

[Gray Bunny]

Agreed, regarding Marcus' chemistry with Dinah. Great friendship there. And once Marcus shaved his head... yummy fella!

Wendy Moniz's Dinah and Frank Grillo's Hart had GREAT chemistry though... not surprised it spilled over into real life and they're still together today. It would've been nice if they hadn't turned Dinah into a mega schemer once Cassie arrived. Cattiness is fun, but psychotic tendencies is just weak storytelling, especially when you already had psycho Annie and off-kilter Beth at the same time.

[J.W.S]

The Janet/Brooke Plot was written Cause AMC was Not Gonna Renew Mattson at the end of her current 13 week cycle but fans got pissed wrote in and AMC changed their minds and RM signed a new 2 year deal as Janet. So The Plot was found out before it happened. I think Pierce found out the truth if I remember correctly

[DRW50]

I guess the stories were so bad I might not have noticed the chemistry.

I thought Wendy worked better as a headcase. She shouldn't have gone psycho, but then that didn't really happen until close to the end. The scheming and desperation, and the campy moments like holding a napkin to her face to hide her scar, I think that suited her more than the endless whining about her being given up for adoption, or the very poor choice of making her GL's main heroine in 1996.

[Mitch]

I am in the minority as I LURVED Moniz Dinah. She absolutely made a terrible heroine...but as a smart, funny, snarky, neurotic chick, she was very, very good. The whining got annoying but it made sense for Dinah to do that (and I think people hated her Dinah as she had the NERVE to complain about Van, who was the newly minted saint of SF) and after a while it became a bore for Van to put up with it ("Look Dinah, I am sorry, I was young, and yes I was selfish back the, and I did the best I could. But I am NOT going to listen to that one more time!") Van turning on the ice was second only to Bev's Alex (instead of recasting Alex with Marj, they should have just had Van get all Alex's stock and kick Alan around...I HATED St. Van the sighing love sick matron with her hot ass boyfriend.) The main problem with her heroine days is that she was like E & B were with Cassie, no one was ever allowed to give her [!@#$%^&*] or to come out on top of her...fiesty Bridget was supposed to sit there and take her crap about her looks, but then we were supposed to see Bridget as the bad girl in that triangle.

I thought she and Grillo had chemistry, but he was miscast as Hart. He would have made a great Santos brother, one you could actually believe was dangerous, instead of the underwear model (Tony) and they kinda femme one (Danny.) A midwestern farm boy, uh, no, not what anyone else would have cast Grillo as.

[DRW50]

Oh I think the Dinah/Vanessa story could have had potential but to me it quickly became about the show scoring points against Vanessa and degrading her to further Dinah as a character. I have often wondered if that's one of the reasons Maeve quit, that and the incredibly stupid story of Amanda as Malibu Madam and Matt as one of her escorts, and Amanda saying about 500 times, "Oh, those middle-aged rich bored housewives loved you by their poolside, didn't they," which was a codeword for, "It doesn't matter how cute he is and how many middle-aged bored rich guys in Malibu would have wanted a piece of that, he never touched dick! Never never never!" The whole thing of moving towards Matt/Dinah, which they seemed to do several times, also bothered me, not because I liked Matt and Vanessa together (I always hoped for Billy to come back), but because I feared this would be used to further humiliate Vanessa.

You're right about Grillo. I think he was on The Shield 3-4 years ago as some sort of a violent, bigoted cop -- a tough guy role might have suited him at GL. Probably the most glaring to me was I didn't really buy him as Roger's son. But then, sadly, that became moot.

[Gray Bunny]

Oh yes, I totally agree. Wendy's Dinah was best as a snarky, smart-mouthed sassypants. She and Toby Poser's Amanda delivered some classic lines. But like you mentioned, it's too bad they went too far with going off the deep end. But I suppose by the time she set fire to herself, Wendy and Frank had already given GL their notices they'd be leaving in a few months.

I'd still like to know when Dinah got plastic surgery to remove all that scarring. Gina Tognoni never got to experience the joy of sporting a napkin across half her face

[DRW50]

Even that was an accident -- the setting fire to herself. At the time I felt like they did an OK job of showing Dinah's gradual descent into madness. I'm not sure how I'd feel now.

I think Ben Warren got her a clinic or something on the plastic surgery. I can't remember. I have some of that on tape. I also had that hilarious scene where she hit on him until he told her he was her uncle.

Or perhaps Annie, post facechange, got her some plastic surgery. I don't know. Teri/Annie and Dinah had a few scenes together didn't they?

[Gray Bunny]

Oh yes, Dinah was one of the few who knew before everyone else did that Teri was really Annie. Teri made some off-hand commment ("Oh Dinah, you were always so..." whatever) and that lit a match (no pun intended) in Dinah's mind.

Yes, you're right the fire was an accident. But she just got more desperate and desperate. I do agree that her descent into madness was a well-played natural progression, but it just seemed they made her way too wicked too quickly so there'd be a distinct line drawn of: Cassie = Good Girl, Dinah = Bad Girl; Root for Cassie, Don't root for Dinah!

[DRW50]

Oh you're right. It was too one-sided. I could see why some fans were ticked off. I think if I'd been more of a Dinah fan I would have been too.

[Cheap21]

I loved Wendy's Dinah. I REALLY hated how Cassie swooped and pretty much pushed her aside

[Gray Bunny]

Count me as another huge Wendy Moniz fan. I know this is not the majority opinion, but I really wish I had seen more of 1995-1996 GL to see more of her in action. That and Reva married to Buzz. So much about GL at that time sounds wrong, but at least you had all the good players on-screen... they were just doing stupid things.

[Mitch]

Terri/Annie was instigating Dinah to do some evil deed, just like she was doing with Beth, but dimbulb Beth was so pliable she would always fall for it. Anyway, Dinah was saying she wouldn't do such and such a thing and an exasperated Terri/Faux Annie said, "Oh Dinah, that was always your problem you were always too soft," and Dinah caught on.

I liked Moniz as she was one of the few people on soaps that were supposed to be "smart," and savy, and you believed it, but she also made the unbelievably dumb things that Dinah did beleievable, which is hard to do. Contrary to others, I also thought she always gave Dinah a soft side, like when she used Henry's watch for some evil deed and she said, "Grandfather, I am so sorry, I know you woudlnt approve." (I am embarrased I remember this stuff.)

On the contrary I thought that the new actress playing Dinah, while a better actress, while tougher, was colder and I think less sympathetic.

[Gray Bunny]

Nothing wrong with remembering random soap stuff... I remember way too well some of the stuff from the mid-90's, yet am clueless as to stuff that happpened in the past 5 or so years.

Total agreement with your Dinah/WM assessment. I love those kinda characters that totally call other people out on their $hit and casual soap viewers can tune in and think, "okay, at least *this* character seems realistic!"

And yes, I did love me Gina Tognoni, but I also didn't like where she would sometimes play the role too rugged. Like she was some butch biker dyke swashbucklin' around with a bad posture.