GH: Discussion for the Month of April

[DRW50]

I guess it depends on the point of this story. We have been expected to do nothing - for months now - but point and laugh at a mentally ill woman. That's the entire story. This is after years of RC/FV coming up with any reason possible to have Bree Willamson playing the same character on OLTL. No matter what - even when she was almost raped by her own father - we were supposed to point and laugh at Jessica. Why is this a story? Nothing will change with Sonny, so it's just Ron writing bad parodies of soaps yet again.

It's like cheap cotton candy.

[DRW50]

And I keep hearing about this great mentor relationship with John/Starr, and so on. John doesn't give a [!@#$%^&*] about anyone but himself. He never has. It's kind of hilarious how the show didn't bother for even a month to pretend that he ever gave a [!@#$%^&*] about Cole. Now he has this dead sister he can pretend to care about.

[Khan]

See, this is why I'm not fond of DID/split personality stories on daytime. Because they don't have the budgets of movies or even most prime-time shows, they have to resort to the one-alter-talking-to-the-other-in-the-mirror trick, which is cheesy and tired, IMO. Especially as one alter urges the other not to do something and the other says, "Tough! I'm doin' it and YOU CAN'T STOP ME!".

[Cheap21]

What does budget have to do with anything? How else would it be done? Ive seen DID stories be done like this on primetime as well. I have no issue with the mirror trick. The camp factor came in Connie trapping her in a mirror with Kate banging to get out. Just Kate looking at a mirror and interacting with her is fine enough

[Khan]

I will admit it looked as if poor Kate's laxative had started working at the most inopportune moment.

[Cheap21]

OMG Check out Kate running to the bathroom

[DRW50]

If you have a good enough actor then you can see them transition all on their own. You don't need gimmicks. Kelli, like Bad Acting Bree, just can't make it work.

I think they also assume viewers won't get it so they need some chuckles. The last years of Viki/Niki were terrible for that reason. If you watch the 1995 DID story, none of the alters talked to each other in mirrors or cages. At most they spoke to each other in Viki's mind. I think there was a mirror scene once.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djIRhlfASO4

[Cheap21]

This DID story has been going on for weeks now and this was the first time the mirror trick was used. Its been mainly in Kate's head till now and I think it was purely to have a visual representation of Connie "locking" her away.

IA that KS is a weak actress and the way she symbolizes Connie coming to the surface is the "epileptic seizures" (as R Sinclair calls them) and her stupid facial expressions. I said before that GH would be best to just tell her to stand still in place for like 2 seconds and have sound edit in a musical cue to denote to the audience that she has changed bc she's god awful at doing that on her own

[DRW50]

You're right. I think all their stories tend to start off with just voices and then go to this. Beyond some visual need, I wonder if it's also someone on the show realizing how talentless some of these actors are. It's so similar to OLTL's last years - RC/FV zero in on bad actors and bad writing and directing make them even worse.

[JaneAusten]

I think Kelly Sullivan gets a bad wrap. Not that I like her as Kate or think shes great but is she really any worse than the rest of the mediocrity on this show. And I do believe a lot of its directing and FV. It's too similar to how Bree acted on OLTL with her DiD stories.

And I like Robin Mattson but I always thought Kate Collins Natalie was played less cartoonish and more well rounded. Maybe it was the writing KC got vs RM but then I have a very low tolerance for extended runs of OTT crazy characters. Particularly when they start off cartoonish at the onset.

[Cheap21]

Really? Do you mean Janet instead? KC’s Natalie wasn’t cartoonish but her Janet most certainly was. She was the epitome of cartoon soap villain and a complete joke. RM played the role a lot more subtle, and cunning. KC was just so over the top with the theatrics and she was written more comedicly whereas RM’s Janet was portrayed more sadistic. RM got to play the more well rounded redeemed Janet. KC's Janet was almost cuckoo crazy her entire stint

[JaneAusten]

No I meant Janet

And it's just personal preference. I never cared for Robin Mattson in that role and I liked her as Heather. But I'm already tiring of her on GH for exactly the same reasons I tired of her in 2004.

[SweetPea36]

True enough. Neither Three Faces of Eve nor Sybil resorted to cheese to get their point across. Neither did OLTL in its earlier years. It's the writing, the directing or the acting that's to blame for this mess, probably all three.

[JaneAusten]

I think its writing and directing. Rc plays all his story points as parodies. If you enjoy that type of writing it's no issue. DH is a show that's sort of thrived on that type of writing for years. Me I just think there's a line where parodies should not cross rape being one.But that's me.

[SweetPea36]

Certain topics are not funny and should not be attempted. I could see this DID thing being somewhat humorous if it were done well. This is being played way too broadly, as if the Three Stooges are going to show up any minute.