OLTL Discussion for the week of August 15th

[TeamEric]

The fact are:

OLTL ratings were UP in April before this story took off as the bullying story was garnering some real critical praise and buzz.

May AND June viewership and demos were BELOW April.

Only when RH started to interact with characters in July did the ratings go UP with all the debate who is really Todd. Last week I have little doubt were sky high ratings again as read a lot of praise for the many confrontation scenes.

This is all too familiar terrirority IF you are an OLTL ratings watcher.

RC builds to these BIG reveal scenes and ratings are UP. Same thing happened with the double wedding when OLTL was hitting 3 and 2.9 million viewers for the church confrontation scenes... then RC drops the ball and pens absurd FALLOUT like Tess/Ford/Cutter and Kelly/John. All those fans tuned out in disgust or boredom.

Same thing happened in Sept/Oct 2009. Ratings were UP then RC turned his 3 promising stories into CAMPY FARCES, especially the mayoral campaign and it was an EPIC FAIL. Ratings crashed back down.

RC has his moments and does far better BUILDs then reveals and forget fallout, he skips over it and it's absurd ISH.

As for PP, for the vets who have no other options I hope it succeeds. But you failed to point out AMC is total DRECK and it's moving to a new platform, too.

[SFK]

These Irene scenes have been the talkiest scenes I have seen in ages. If the show was gone for good I could at least be oddly satisifed that this is the story that'll stick. As folks have said above, all of these retcons leave you with the impression that nothing is ever permanent on soaps anymore. With TSJ gone, I wouldn't be at all surprised if Victor has surgery to get his old face back and they have Roger Howarth doing his best Tomax and Xamot:

[TeamEric]

Constantly? Spare me the made up events.

And spare me the moralizing on TnT when Todd and Blair are equally abusive.

[Vee]

Oh, honey. Rex and Gigi had been backburnered for the most part since early 2010 due to severe viewer fatigue. They along with Todd/Tea, Stacy, the Danielle story, Matthew's paralysis, KAD, Mitch, Starr and Cole, and later Kish had dominated in 2009. 2010 belonged to Jolie, Todd, Tea, Eli, Clint, Kelly and the Fords - I'm sure I'm missing someone in there, but that's the basic layout. Rex's story only really picked up again when Echo arrived last fall. Pretending TSJ's Todd/Victor and Tea were not a major frontburner couple since FL signed a long-term contract, and a major point of the foundation of the show since then until now is just folly. Kelly had a couple chemistry tests - she didn't "trash" anything with Todd/Tea.

And none of this speaks to the initial point I made, which is that RC has not been biding his time for years waiting to destroy Victor and Tea because he secretly hates TNT. He clearly enjoyed writing for the couple and making them central. He was just looking at the bigger picture, and that bigger picture would have ultimately meant Todd/Blair vs. Victor/Tea.

[TeamEric]

I can't bear to rewatch but didn't Irene say she hid the truth about the twins FROM Victor. She sacrificed Todd to Peter so she could keep Victor for herself?

[Vee]

Ah, yes, perhaps he didn't know Victor existed. She said Victor Sr. had no interest in her second pregnancy and cut her off without a dime, only for her to discover she'd had twins. Victor Sr. later left behind an inheritance to the only infant son living an open life - Todd. Perhaps he would have left provisions for Victor Jr. had he known of him, but as it is, there is nothing left to his name. Which would be very interesting going forward.

[Antoyne]

Uh when has TSJTodd hit Tea?

[SFK]

Watching these David/Rex scenes and pinching myself that these are Bo and Clint's boys.

[TeamEric]

Oh honey, get thee to a fact checker.

http://boards.soapop...episode-counts/

2010 EPISODE count:

3) Trevor St. John (Todd Manning)-----168-----67%---61%

5) John-Paul Lavoisier (Rex Balsom)-----145-----58%

14) Farah Fath (Gigi Morasco)-----114-----46%

15) Florencia Lozano (Téa Delgado)-------113-----45%

FF had 1 episode than FL. I repeat 1 MORE in 2010.

You clearly MISSED FL was was backburned for 2 months while GT was having a LONG chem test with TSJ. RC broke up TnT fast to accommodate Todd/Kelly which was promoted. It wasn't a few scenes of chem testing but 6 weeks. It flopped and RC raced back to TnT.

FL was also offscreen for part of last summer.

FL/TSJ topped the airtime in 2009, no debate there.

But FL had two big airtime breaks last year which you clearly missed and her airtime fell to 45%. I repeat 45% so it's absurd to claim TnT were front burner all 2010. That's as silly as RC's Irene rewrite.

FL's airtime for 2011 is at 46%, again not even in the top 10 of airhogs.

And hey, I don't blame you for FFing thru Rex and Gigi's New Mexico adventures but that stinking story ate up half of MAY 2010 sweeps. That is actually the story that earned Rex/Gigi the mocking sacred cows writeup with the contrived letter flashbacks and FF's weird black wig. Gigi was only backburned AFTER Bo and Nora's JUNE wedding. And that wedding Bo and Nora were cooing more over Rex/Gigi and John/Natalie than each other.

*I* never said RC was waiting all that time just to trash TnT.

Téa and TnT were trashed in 2002 and for same reason now. See, there is NO "big picture" reason to trash your ONLY Latina star actress as getting the "special needs" twin. The whole "special" stuff is RC's FU. Even TSJ haters are wincing and calling it a trashing. Unfortunately for your spin, even the ACTORS see their character and story as getting DELIBERATELY TRASHED.

As for bigger picture, RC has his moments of good writing, and I really enjoyed some parts of the last few years under his helm but he's never written for the BIGGER picture. He's a plot driven writer.

[TeamEric]

Actually if RC isn't a horrible writer, he'd remember the past story points:

-Victor's will read Lords cannot be denied a home at Llanfair. This was a plot point in Natalie's introduction.

-I'd have to doubecheck my old tapes but I remember something about the trust reading for the Lord MALE heir vs for Todd Manning. That's why David could fake being the heir and why Tina couldn't challenge the will. It was clearly for his SON. Surviving son since Tony was dead. Victor Lord Jr just proved he is the TWIN male heir.

Since they share the same DNA and only lying, kidnapping rogue Irene's word established TSJ as Victor, that's one heck of a court case.

I loved Todd being Viki's brother twist but hated he was handed riches on a silver platter like that. Todd LORD is not my fave story so I'd actually like to see RH's Todd lose it ALL and rebuild. He was robbed of that ex-con rebuilds his life by his own sweat and brains with the fairy tale crap in 1995, after all.

[DRW50]

I think the show stopped caring about Todd/Blair long before FL returned. The show began phasing Blair out of the lives of most of her loved ones in 2008. She had less and less to do even in Starr's pregnancy story - they just stuck her with John. My guess is that the show planned to have Tarty in a big, complex relationship, with John and Blair outside looking in. When this caused audience backlash, someone got nervous and they instead went back to John/Marty and pushed Todd/Tea. It wouldn't have taken much effort to convince RC because he seems to adore Tea, to the point of damaging her character through too much worship.

The writing backed up Todd/Tea with no attempt at any other possibilities. RC gave them a nice wedding, with idiotic Blair on a boat honking a horn. RC rewrote the scene of Blair pushing Tea out a window just to make sure Tea "won" this time. RC changed the story from Todd using Tea for sex to Todd loving Tea. RC went back and addressed scenes many considered a low point in Todd/Tea history (the punch) to reassure us that it was no big deal. He gave them a child just to make sure Blair had no hold over Todd that Tea wouldn't. If anything tanked this, beyond the horrid Ross psycho saga, it was TSJ, who played what should have been loving moments (like the wedding) in a way which humiliated Tea.

It's similar to their writing the first time around. Blair was never a threat. Blair was written as a golddigger who did not deserve to have custody of her child, made quasi-racist comments and brawled with her cousin, while Claire Labine wrote big complex moments for Todd/Tea.

The main problem with any Todd relationship is that the show does a little dance around depravity and abuse yet still wants us to see this as twu wuv. It is exhausting and degrading and ultimately hollow.

[Cheap21]

FL was most definetly backburnered in 2010. Dropping Todd/Tea was one of ther easons I dropped OLTL last year and didnt come back till I read she was being killed off and they briefly reunited. I was all set to drop it again till plans changed and she and they remaiend

[DRW50]

I thought that was a stunt. The Danielle story was a disaster and I think it was, along with the Stacey crap, a big reason why ratings fell (the Dorian gay marriage story as well). It seemed to me that they just backburnered her because they had to try to retool the story. That led to the fakeout about Tea's illness, which was part of the Evil Eli crap.

[Cheap21]

A stunt that worked bc it made me a viewer again and I HATED OLTL prior to Todd/Tea's wedding and her return from the "dead"

[DRW50]

Didn't the ratings keep dropping at this time? The problem with the story for me was they just had random nonsense happen and they would make sure it was all blamed on Eli. None of it had any follow through. I still don't know what the point was in killing Melinda Cramer.