OLTL: Discussion for the week of September 26

[Llantano Incorporated]

Thank you for posting those tape dates- THAT IS INSANE! I had no idea how far apart scenes could be taped for ONE episode. All scenes are taped by set to save on that end. WOW. It explains OLTL's continuity issues here and there...

Frankly, just hearing Tina once again say "THE CROWN JEWELS OF MENDORRA" made my day. If you would have told me when I was 11 years old that I would hear these words on OLTL 20 years later I wouldn't believe you. I adore Andrea.

[AlexElizabeth]

Well the stuff taped on 5/3 was for RH's return, where they just dropped his 10 second scenes into the episode lol.

[MontyB]

What do you mean? This seems like the same Tina (as portrayed by AE) since she turned vixenish in the early 80's.

[CouchTomato]

David and Tina passed each other at the airport but they didn't see each other. Typical RC bait and switch.

[DRW50]

Thanks.

I think RC likes the idea of a joke Tina but there isn't a lot of depth in most of her scenes. Hopefully this will change.

[CouchTomato]

ITA. Clint's attitude toward Rex came out of nowhere! Most of what Clint's doing comes out of nowhere these days IMO. He's suddenly acting like everyone's boss in someone else's home, not a convicted felon w/an ankle monitor. He's strutting around, blowing up at people like he's perfectly healthy. And he's drinking booze like he always has, just a few weeks after a heart transplant (Viki still can't drink nearly a decade after hers). That was a WTF? moment on Friday. RC's constant rewrites and SPD's to push a specific plot point make it hard for me to know who these characters are from week to week.

[MontyB]

...but when was the last time Tina had any real depth? Maybe way back when she was under Marco Dane's spell. Besides the early days of Tina, AE had never played the role as a super serious character. Tina comes across very differently when other actress "fill in" for AE.

[MontyB]

I don't think Clint's reactions are really out of nowhere. I think about people in general. They can be extremely wishy washy. Take this board for instance, people say things one day and totally do the opposite the next. My point is, I don't see where characters need to be so black and white, they HAVE to do the expected. We all knew that one day Clint and Rex's relationship would change. Why can't Clint bend a little and start thinking about Rex as his son?

[Antoyne]

So you're saying it's normal for Tina to take several verbal beatdowns without mentioning just once that her actions were to protect her daughter?

[DRW50]

Andrea played the character with a lot of vulnerability and heart. Even when Tina was doing selfish things, it was there - such as when she didn't want to testify in Gabrielle's baby switch trial because it would possibly incriminate Cord and Asa. Now Tina is just very shallow, and history is rewritten to go along with that, such as the show not mentioning that Tess threatened to kill Sarah.

[DRW50]

The problem with Clint is that he did MONSTROUS things to keep Rex out of his life. Even when he bought Gigi's corpse from Rex, there was nothing about father/son bonding. Yes they had a toast a few months later but that's it. So for Clint to now be perfectly fine with Rex destroying his company and shaming Cord for even daring to question Rex, it makes Clint look ridiculous. Clint is just such a plot device, and this might work when Clint is being "fun", like last year, but now it just makes the character seem unhinged.

I think the show just sees Rex as a great guy and therefore assumes it's fine if Clint suddenly does too, now that the story of Clint causing problems for Rex is over.

What made Clint work as a character was his love for his family, and his actions, along with the show's unwillingness to address those actions, have shot that to hell.

I also don't understand why Jessica has been so infantalized that Clint is practically wiping her behind. What are they trying to say about her? Every other time she's been this way they've added some weird campy "sexy" twist. I don't know what they're doing now.

[Cheap21]

No IA with Antoyne. Theres such a thing as growth and Tina did that under Karen Witter's run. She shouldnt be acting exactly the same way she was in the 80s. I love her but he writes her too one note with not much to balance that. It seems his inspiration is the ditz that KT portrayed the character as, not the cunning, intelligent vixen. This Tina seems rather clueless and dumb about things like she couldnt put a sceheme together if her life depended on her. And we have Blair, Irene, Todd and Viki talking down to her like she's some stupid child, makes it worse. RC's Tina is a joke and not someone to be taken seriously.

Exactly. She'd at least defend herself but she lets people clown her and beat her down with their words. She used to have more backbone

[CouchTomato]

Viki's penultimate visit to the Lord mausoleum was to "chat" with Ben on a Valentine's Day show and flash back to their romance. I remember seeing his plaque near her mother's. Years later after she and Charlie fell in love, Charlie found her there. She was railing at her father and the Lord legacy as she was wont to do on occasion. They had some very powerful scenes when he found out about what Victor Lord did to his daughter and consoling Viki. When he saw how upset that place made her, he got her permission to inter the bodies elsewhere and dismantle the mausoleum. She was extremely grateful and that was the end of the Lord mausoleum. Frankly, I think the crew got tired of arguing over which sarcophagus top to use - 1976 (Dorian killed him) or 2003 (he died of natural causes). I swear, if they bring him back again . . . . .

[MontyB]

When Tina originally confessed to Viki that she knew Tess locked Natalie in the basement, she told Viki she kept quiet because Tess threatened to hurt Sarah by letting Carlo Hesser know where she was. Viki told her afterwards that she should have went to Bo.

My point was, it's not just RC who wrote Tina as is.

Alright. Anyway, Tina did tell Viki about Tess threatening Sarah.

[DRW50]

Yes, but the show isn't mentioning it now. It's part of a pattern recently where they just rewrite or ignore story beats they don't like.