Classic AMC/OLTL

[Pine Charles]

Oh, maybe it was Josh and not Zoe.

So, yes - AMC is the first soap to have a golden shower... and a same sex one at that.

[Skin]

I think the sheer shock of it would have been enough just on Erica's side. Unless I have my facts wrong wasn't that a child she actually wanted which was why she went insane when she miscarried? I didn't watch back then it was 1975, but I think just the idea that Erica lost a child she wanted and finding out that child survived years later would have been enough of a shock in terms of story to send her reeling. Josh could still have all the issues he had with Erica (his problems with her were pretty token and bland as they were anyway), he could still be the egomaniac that felt the world should revolve around him and he could still be sorased into being a mid 20's young man who was going to set off to make the world remember him - a lot like Erica was during the early to mid 70's. Jeff himself wasn't really much of a factor and after the reveal neither really was Erica in Josh's life until his swan song.

I think it's obvious that the writers wanted a historic male lead and what spells history on AMC than a child who came from both families that had been there since the very beginning? The Kanes and the Martins.

I think by 2006 though David wasn't really a factor which is why I don't think much drama could have been driven by this. David and Josh's time on the show rarely overlapped with one another Josh 2005-2009, David 1998-2006, 2008-2011. Josh didn't know he was Erica Kane's son until February of 2006, they would have had only a few months to deal with their relationship as David leaves in November of that same year. I don't think 9 months would have been enough time to really create much of any type of relationship for father and son and wouldn't have been enough time to mine much of it. David was pretty much a non-issue at the hospital too. I think if anything Hayward being Josh's father would have put him in a corner.

They tried doing this, which is why we got 1997's baby switch with Maddie/Sonya and Erica's miscarriage on her wedding day I believe. After that happened they were just trying to make Erica young again and lighten her up which is why we got her string of romances after that.

There weren't really a lot of Martins around back then either. You only had Joe, Jaime and Tad mostly. This was before they brought back Jake into the picture.

[EricMontreal22]

The big problem was of course that he was "the unabortion". Jeff's return was a botch as well. I think Josh, played by Coling E anyway (though I didn't think the first Josh was so so bad) had a lot of potential with a lot of characters that was never fulfilled (and his exit sucked--good old Pratt--although it gave *one* decent scene between him and Erica finally), and I kinda like the Kane Dynasty not being ALL female. It bugs me a bit when the Kane Dynasty is endlessly brought up as being completely female and almost like a male member would not be welcome, and adds an interesting dynamic. I'm one of the few that felt they should have just retconned Josh's origins or something and kept him as part of the clan.

Yes I'm now 100% sure it was just Josh's shoes. Still kinda bizarre but not as awful as him finding a beat up Zoe and pissing on her face or something or in her wounds.

[ellabelle]

Yes, that was when Erica suffered from an hysterical pregnancy and had to be committed... because Susan Lucci needed to hide her real pregnancy and go on maternity leave. I do think the shock of it would have been difficult for her, but at the same time, Phil had moved on with his life before he died, and she had a close relatinoship with Phil's father, Nick Davis. Seeing Erica and Nick and a returned Charlie interact over Josh being Phil's son could have been interesting.

I do agree that TPTB didn't do as good a job as they should have in terms of really building the relationship between Erica and Josh. It wasn't bad, but it could have been done a lot better. It seemed like they really just wanted to bring in Josh as a Kane and then have his father break up Erica and Jack, which might have been believeable if John James hadn't been such a cold dead fish of a man.

My point about having David as the father is that then he'd have actually had something to do. VI was written off in 2006 because TPTB didn't really have a storyline for him. If he'd been Josh's father, there'd have been plenty of material there for him to work with, and he could have stayed on.

I HATE that they took Erica's baby away from her on her wedding day. I'm still bitter. She wanted that baby so badly, and I hated that Dimitri was such an ass about it, but God, she was so happy when she found out she was pregnant. Erica kidnapping Maddie does NOT equal Erica having a late in life baby. She make a snap decision to keep someone else's baby and then engaged in an elaborate cover up to stick it to Dimitri and Maria as a form of sick payback. Besides, we're talking about Erica having a son, and Maddie was a girl.

[Angela]

B&E played more Kendall/Josh. Megan spent most of Josh's time worshipping Babe.

Like right before he got pissed on by JR in the following scene from June 22, 2006:

J.R.: Look, I'm supposed to leave a sample.

Josh: Fill her up. What can I say? We're understaffed.

J.R.: Not a chance in hell.

Josh: Well, no sample, no test. Your sobriety is suspect. It's like refusing a Breathalyzer, but worse. I'll have to report you.

J.R.: I'll go to the john.

Josh: No, you're not going to be able to do that, either, because the men's room was flooded this morning. So you're just going to have to think of something else. Like Babe, for instance -- beautiful, amazing Babe, who deserves so much more. I'm just wondering how you got her to step up for you. Blackmail, drugs, hypno?

J.R.: Surf's up.

JR unzips and proceeds to pee on Josh to leave his sample for alcohol testing.

[EricMontreal22]

The irony is Josh had a few good moments (one was in an elevator) with Greenlee of all people. But someone seemed to be scared of taking Greens too far away from Ryan (was that during B/E?) sigh.

[SFK]

And then did Josh punch him in his smug alky face? I hope so.

[EricMontreal22]

I was gonna say I never got why they tried to make Josh seem like a villain for much of the time when he never seemed to act like one... But of course they did start him off (with the other actor) as sleeping with Dannii who was underaged (one of McTavish's classic WTF moments and one that I bet was a favorite of Ron Carlivati's).

[Jonathan]

I now remember the JR golden shower on Josh. The "surf's up" part is what drove it home.

[Angela]

It's never really right to piss on anybody but Josh was refusing to give JR a blood test to test his blood-alcohol to make a fool of him, then he was refusing to let him use the mens room to piss in the cup to make a fool of him.

This was the aftermath...

J.R.: Stupid son of a -- you think you can mess with me?

Josh: You touch me again, I'll snap your neck!

Jeff: Stop it! Son!

Tad: Knock it off, both of you -- J.R., your uncle told you to stop. What's wrong with you? You can't just go pounding on the staff.

J.R.: This arrogant, smug piece of --

Tad: You live with arrogant and smug! You don't go pounding on Adam.

Jeff: Now, what's this all about?

Josh: Your nephew relieved himself on my shoe!

Joe: He did what? Is this true, J.R.? Is this the way you behave yourself in my hospital? You're on the board of directors, damn it! Have you lost your mind?

J.R.: Yeah, I've lost my mind in a big way. Why don't you ask golden boy why.

Josh: I asked the patient for a urine sample, as per his rehab program. He lost it, made it personal! Look what he did!

Tad: If I can't do that to Hayward, you can't do that to Josh.

Jeff: J.R., you'd better have one hell of a reason.

J.R.: Yeah, well, how about he sticks a cup in my face, tells me that the bathroom's closed, and makes me pony up a specimen right there in that cubicle?

Josh: Well, if I had known your aim was so bad --

Then Josh "showers" with Babe later in the episode, lol...

[Thunder]

Josh: Listen, if I see my father again, I'll find out about the little girl. I promise you.

Babe: You mean it, don't you? Everything that's going on with you, you'd do this for me? Thank you. Summer rain feels so good, right?

Josh: Your hand feels even better.

[J.R. sees Babe and Josh standing in the rain holding hands.]

[Skin]

Agreed, but I think by that point nothing could really be done about it. Ironically enough Megan herself kind of sealed Josh's fate. Megan brought on Josh and did the unabortion back in very early 2006 (February though seeds were planted as early as November of the previous year). By the time Megan was out mid 2007 (May-June), such a large amount of time had passed that many writers I think feared to even try and tangle with the mess of Josh's origin. Then once Pratt came around Josh was too vulnerable and too much of a non-entity on AMC and he upped his body count by killing off what he felt was a useless character, which couldn't really be argued Josh didn't do anything for month on top of months. The worst thing that could have been done for his character was putting him at Slater/Cambius industries and isolating him with Zach's side of PV. He never saw the light of day after that.

I doubt that would have happened though David's exit was spelled out nearly two years before it actually happened. I think Megan was just done with the David character by November of 2006. He never really flourished under her tenure. I would say the most he did under Megan's third term was play a supporting role to emotionally weak, victimized ingenue's like Bianca and Babe in 03' and 04'. The highlight of work under McTavish was from those two years, after the custody case in February of 05' David did nothing of notable importance until Dixie's reappearance a year later and even his storyline with Dixie was diminished so they could feature more of the Zach/Dixie connection. The writers (Megan) weren't interesting in giving David story during that time period and even if by some off chance that David had a long lost son it wasn't going to stop him from leaving that same year. Hell that same reason didn't stop Jeff himself from staying on very long either.

Well it's kind of obvious that Babe was Josh's most important love interest but I was talking more along the lines of Josh's family relationship under Megan's pen. Josh was his most defined and most fleshed out during her tenure and once she left Josh ended up floundering by the wayside until Pratt's unceremonious slaughter of him. I would say even during Megan's tenure and the "Babe is Love" years we still saw a lot of relationship establishing with Kendell and Josh. We had tons of scenes with Josh seeking Kendell out for advice to his problems, we had multiple scenes with them squabbling over love interests, they kept secrets for each other, Josh knew that Kendell was lying to Ryan about being Emma's father, Josh went to Kendell's house after JR threw himself out of a window, etc. There was generally a lot of relationship building with Josh/Kendell. I would say even during Megan's years Josh's deepest family relationship out of the Kanes was with Kendell. B&E just extended what Megan had already established during the Satin Slayer storyline, Josh's induction into the Kane family and before.

B&E were generally just inactive to the point of boredom. It made for good introspective moments, even heart warming material and nice character work/building experience but nothing happened under their tenure. Which is why everyone went screaming into the night when Pratt came in and took a hatchet to the cast. Pratt was actually the one killed Greenlee off the first time back in February of 09'. Lorraine brought her back that same year in December. I think B&E were actually the least afraid to pair Greenlee up with other people.

B&E: July 2007- August 2008

Pratt: September 2008-November 2009

Lorraine: December 2009-March 2010, April 2011 - End

Josh was a nicer character when Scott whatever his name was playing him. Colin made him meaner you could say and gave him more of an edge. I would say his "worst" moments were gaslighting Amanda and sabotaging Erica before Pratt completely assassinated his character in 09'. Other then that he was a good guy for the most part. Not a straight arrow at all in terms of the truth, justice and moral right but what character was then?

Don't people who have to take urine tests have to be monitored to make sure they don't fake or manipulate the test by using someone else's urine? He can't really do anything about the bathrooms being closed and it would be wrong to let JR us a public restroom where he could easily pay a guy off to whiz in a cup for him. I also don't believe Josh was obliged to give JR a blood test considering the court order is asking for urine which I believe is the easiest way to detect for alcohol and more importantly other drugs in the system. JR was not allowed to be on any dubious substances not just alcohol.

[EricMontreal22]

OK in that quote from the show who is the girl Babe means? Emma?

Skin I do mainly agree with all of that (B/E were pretty inactive--and really created the extreme focus on Green/Ryan/Kendall Zack--though when they had interesting story ideas--even stuff liek the Richie reveal it would get momentum and then go inactive again, though they did well with much of Jesse/Angie--I know many credit that to Nixon, but B/E also wrote well for the characters on Loving/City).

[Vee]

I CAN'T!

[Skin]

I think B&E only had like three major stories.

Greenlee's return

Jessie/Angie reunion

The terror of the Novak's

A lot of that was very well written to their credit, it's just a lot of it was typical and not very shocking or soapy a lot of the time. Their tenure reminded me a lot of Y&R for what it's worth. Typical everyday drama. As to their pairing preferences I think they were pretty fair about changing the pairings up a little bit unless I am wrong, I think all of the characters within Slavery were paired up with different people at some point. Greenlee had been paired with Josh, Ryan and Aiden at that time. Kendell too was given some breath outside of Zendell with her affair with Aiden and her emotional affairs with Ryan. Zach had dalliances with Hannah and Liza that gave Kendell pause. Ryan was shackled to Annie while also giving time to his other harem women Greenlee and Kendell, etc.

They weren't quite so insular and defined by each other during this period even though they were as deeply entrenched in each other's storylines as ever. There was at least an attempt to broaden their sphere even if it was unsuccessful by and large.

[ellabelle]

Erica: "Bianca, that tramp broke your heart. Josh, that tramp has no brain."

God I love Erica.