Have soaps that are left run out of ideas/stories??

[juppiter]

Without a doubt. Primetime has gotten more raunchy/daring over time (yes partly due to HBO and Showtime, but even network TV) whereas daytime seems less raunchy and more risk averse. I think there is plenty of new ground for soaps to cover but that would involve leaving the 20th century and entering the 21st... actually even leaving the 1950s and entering the 1960s would be nice.

[gtru1981]

Agreed. Hbo, Showtime, and even AMC and USA has people talking. They showcase fresh shows. Yes Primetime has gotten more daring, have u seen some of the words they are saying now. I was watching Melissa and Joey on ABC Family and they said "pissing off". I was kind of shocked by that. BR yea, these soaps need to leave the 50's and 60's.

[frequentsoapfan]

This right hereThe only soap that took raunchy risks was that parody called Passions. I feel like every year there is less and less romance and sex scenes on soaps. There are stories that can be told if they were willing to take risks and move into this century.

[Khan]

This reminds me of when KNOTS LANDING's Greg Sumner (William Devane) was stopping by Linda Fairgate's (Lar Park Lincoln) apartment for an unexpected visit and she had to figure out a way to get rid of Brian Johnston (Philip Brown).

Brian: "This isn't the 1950's. Just tell him we're sleeping together."

Linda: "This isn't the 1960's either!"

[Susan Hunter]

Beautifully put.

A literary critic named Christopher Booker has said that there are only seven basic plots. The youngest soap currently on air is over 25 years old. If it wasn't for repetition this genre would have fallen apart decades ago.

The seven basic plots are:

[ChitHappens]

Absolutely! This question would have been met with a resounding yes about 5-7 years ago. But the repetition is not necessarily the problem because after so much time on the air, where else is there to go? You are going to have new characters selling a slightly different version of something from the past. The problem lies with the recycling of the same hacks TODAY who are not willing to tell stories. Nothing on now can even compare to some of the worst of yesteryear. The slugs left 1/2 writing these shows each have their own theme. YR? We need to add a baby to the mix and create angst so let's have one of the men raped. OLTL/Cartooni/ OLTL 2.0, rapists are misunderstood and the mentally ill are to be mocked once they are sexually assaulted. BB, too incestuous for far too many years. DOOL? We need a big story so let's kill everyone and bring them back to life.

The hacks are the biggest problem! Yesteryear is gone in regards to soaps, and the time has come!

ANDREA

[beebs]

The thing that I should point out here: I've been watching DAYS a lot in the apartment lately, and my roommates have barely kept their eyes on the screen more than five minutes at a time. Until last night, when I uncovered the Stella Lombard/Marlena-in-a-pit storyline, and within a half hour, I had my roommate (who'd sworn off soaps years ago), and his boyfriend who'd never once bothered to watch any soap, fixated on the screen waiting to find out how Marlena would get out.

These are 20 year old episodes, and they still hook people. The storyline wasn't even that popular when it aired! There's something important to be said about the differences in the stories, I just can't figure out what it is.

[ReddFoxx]

Having to sustain 52 weeks a year and 250+ episodes a year, most soaps started recycling a long time ago. And writers being less creative every year only compounds that.

[Skin]

That's a big part of the problem. Daytime hasn't created any long lasting characters in such a long time and they end up running into the ground the relative gold they once had. AMC had this problem at the end with meaningless characters like Randi and Madison and GH is suffering from it now with the throngs of meaningless characters on the show now. There are tons of characters that are done and past their expiration date but are being held onto simply because there is nothing else left.

I agree. The turn over rate is just too quick and I don't think anyone could keep up with it these days. I think even primetime writers would become burned out rather quickly if they had to write 250 episodes a year with virtually no vacation time and no break. I doubt the job is easy, especially when trying or at least attempting to write for a cast of around 30 or 50 characters. Trying to keep things consistent without making these characters over exposed is probably a huge problem. Shows in general are also an hour of 40 minutes long. It's probably hard to seem fresh a lot of the time. That being said I do believe you can inject new stories every once and a while. Soaps have had success with this at times, the gay coming out stories I think for the most part are well done.

[Khan]

And ironically enough, that storyline was derivative of "Natalie in the Well" on ALL MY CHILDREN.

[DRW50]

I don't think it's that huge a problem. Writers like Henry Slesar, Agnes Nixon, and Doug Marland knew how to write for characters in a format that covers hundreds of episodes a year. So did the Dobsons. So did many others. No one knows now. They can't even write for a character who has only been on a show for a year.

[BoldBeauty]

For B&B I would say yes. But I bet Bradley Bell would say no. Ha!

[Gray Bunny]

Is that a name or a location?

[NothinButAttitude]

I don't think soaps have ran out of stories it's more of how they are executed. WTD, whodunnit, affairs, etc are apart of soaps and apart of life. I think they're not built up well enough and hitting all the beats like a Bill Bell, Agnes Nixon, Douglass Marland, Nancy Curlee, or Harding Lemay would hit them. Instead, they either drag it out too long without hitting beats or move too fast missing all the beats. I also think that shock value plays a part as well as writers nowadays write to shock the audience or get a story in some smut magazine instead of telling a great story from start to end.