2 years ago today was BLACK THURSDAY? Was it the worst day in soap history?

[All My Shadows]

G.Mont becomes EP of General Hospital.

[Khan]

[Max]

I find it hard to single out a specific day that was the worst in soap history. I certainly don't believe it was the date that AMC and OLTL had been cancelled, because both of those soaps were so poor in their quality by then.

I think it was just a string of bad events that led to the genre's near demise, and that no one event can be the culprit.

[juniorz1]

I have to go with January 15, 1993.

[EricMontreal22]

Of course that's just opinion. I felt AW, ATWT and especially poor GL had a lot less going for them when they were canceled, but it's all subjective. (It was upsetting with AMC that Lorraine Broderick had finally agreed to come back full time and--I think a week later, after we all were under the impression that meant it had another year or so, they said it was canceled.)

But yeah, earlier cancelations may have been done to soaps still with more poential--like Santa Barbara? (I don't know enough about 90s SB.) This will prob not be a view shared by others, but I thought The City had finally figured out what was working for it and what wasn't and was on a creative upswing its full final 6 months (in fact, while the climb was not very major, it was the only soap on ABC at the time--this was Spring 1997 when ABC Daytime was having trouble) that would have weekly increases in viewers not decreases.)

Radio soap fans would cite that day in 1960 when I believe the last four remaining radio soaps all went off the air at once (I know the GL spin off, Right to Happiness was one--I always wondered why they never tried that on TV, it often had stronger radio ratings than GL.)

[Gray Bunny]

This may sound cliche, but I think The City was ahead of its time. Had it aired 10 years later or so, I think a soap about a younger generation in a trendy NYC neighborhood without multi-generational family ties would appealed to a larger audience nowadays.

[Khan]

No doubt, PP would have snapped up THE CITY as soon as ABC pushed it off the schedule.

[EricMontreal22]

LOL It certainly didn't help that ABC was stuck with that early timeslot that didn't work for anyone--but especially wasn't really conducive to getting a new, younger-ish soap crowd.