Fear has made daytime stale

[titan1978]

The thread about rumored/potential queer characters has me thinking about the stories soaps do not even attempt anymore due to fear.  The amount of storytelling opportunities that would be presented by investing in diversity would have helped all these shows, which are stuck in ruts because they try for the most generic product possible.
 

It is remarkable to think that on every other platform to consume media we have now- broadcast, streaming, web based, etc- a story as nuanced as Karen Wolek’s foray into sex work would never be told on daytime today.  Her self esteem issues, the blackmail, the desire for money and to feel important, the shame and guilt, her friendship with Viki, the strength of not being broken by her exposure in such a public way, the unsuitability of suburban life.  Every body else would die to tell stories like that with that talent.  But not daytime anymore.

 

How many times have tptb backed off of an interracial relationship?  When instead, they could have written deep storylines where these characters face the same issues they face in real life!

[AbcNbc247]

I've asked this before, but did something happen, in like the last 8 years or so that made soaps stop pushing the limits? 

[BetterForgotten]

More like the past 25 years...

 

When your audience is dwindling rapidly, I guess you're less likely to take risks in an effort to appease what's left of it. No one considers that pushing the envelope again might actually attract some viewers again (but to producers, writers, and network execs, they don't probably think it will do anything or worth the investment). 

[All My Shadows]

The rest of the movie/TV/theatre scene is filled to the brim with stories that the daily soap format would knock out of the park. Even if the ratings are low and continue to sink, they could still go out telling stories that are beyond the same old crap. What distinguishes soap opera from everything else is that they have the time to hit every single beat of every single emotion of every single story. It's time these people owned that and took it to real stories about real people again.

 

Budget concerns shouldn't even be an issue - they could tell great stories on the shtty sets they have. Soaps in the 50s and 60s made it work on even smaller budgets.

Edited July 13, 2020 by All My Shadows

[Skin]

I feel like there are some sparks here and there in the late 90's and early 00's of soaps trying to tell ground-breaking storylines.

 

You had a lot of landmark firsts with Bianca (AMC) and Luke (ATWT) as long-running LGBTQ+ characters on their soaps. I also think Guiding Light also tried to tell a story about incest with Tammy and Jonathan. I'm also thinking of eventually AMC and B&B's eventual Transgender storylines which weren't executed properly but still at least happened, and then Will's eventual coming out story on Days. 

 

After that though, it's hard to really remember a time when shows truly pushed their boundaries. I think after those landmark experiences in the mid oughts, and early tens you end up seeing less progressive story elements and social concepts being weaved as stories and brought into soaps for more traditional and route stakes for television. You see a lot of business take-over stories, love-triangles, cheating stories, who is the father, pregnancy stories and wash-rinse-repeat staples. I think in this way similar to BetterForgotten's post you just tend to look at what characters/stories seem to have a positive reaction, generate interest and just create storylines that "work" for those segments and portions of audiences. In this way I actually do think shipping is very important to soaps. It tells them they are doing "something" right and as such soaps just chase "super couples" as much as they can. 

 

As a result head writers stop trying to tell stories and you end up just hitting the same plot points again, and again. I think soaps also fall into the trap of trying to integrate plot points with character driven stories. Everyone needs to be related or connected to the show, or else it doesn't have the meaning or impact that it needs to have on the canvas and thus with the characters in the story. However if you try to push the story to hard without the character connections and character elements then you wind up shoe-horning reactions in order to fit the "plot-based" story you need to tell which doesn't feel true or authentic.

 

Somewhere down the line I do think soaps just stopped trying, but I also think they feel there's too much character background and history to try to tell a meaningfully well thought out story and loop everyone in based on the heavily episodic/serialized nature of story-telling on soaps. The continuity as such just makes them stop trying. 

Edited July 13, 2020 by Skin

[Faulkner]

I think that was the last time soaps felt there was a possibility of a future, that they could capture new audiences who might be interested in exciting, progressive things. That’s all been put to bed now. The notes on “don’t be too specific” cited by Patrick Mulcahey are soooo telling.

[titan1978]

Exactly.

 

I just think it is sad that all of other media, including other things in daytime (talk shows both classy and trashy), have prepared these same viewers for all types of storytelling.  And these soaps/networks are so afraid to go there.  People that watch TV that airs in the day also watch TV that airs at night, no matter when/how they choose to watch.

 

I absolutely know people that watched How to Get Away With Murder, featuring an incredible Black lead and many diverse stories, was also truly over the top and soapy, also used to watch Y&R when the Winters family was treated as important.  But daytime cannot have the same type of Black woman at the center of a show?  Grey’s Anatomy and ER before it were incredibly diverse, and Grey’s is a show steeped in romance.  These are our people!

[Vee]

AMC 2.0 got a lot of stick from some folks for "no Erica, no Kendall" and a smaller role for Bianca, at least initially per Eden Riegel's availability, but it had Angie and the Hubbards at its center alongside the Chandlers and Miranda/recurring Bianca. I thought that worked perfectly. You can't tell me Debbi Morgan is an unacceptable central hub for any show. She anchored Loving and she was only there two years!

Edited July 13, 2020 by Vee

[titan1978]

I really wish they had been able to sustain those shows.  When they brought Angie and Jesse back it really felt like the show had a new lease on life for me, and I did not start watching AMC until both were gone/my ABC affiliate never carried Loving/The City.  They just fit and belonged as a focus immediately.

[GLATWT88]

I think the early 90s may be the last time soaps really pushed the envelope in storytelling. The Billy Douglas story on OLTL in 1992 really explored the challenges of coming out and coming to terms with sexuality for a teen at that time. While I do think Bianca's coming out on AMC was a great story, by the time AMC did the story a few primetime shows had already introduced main characters identifying as gay or queer. This is not to say that the Bianca story wasn't important for visibility and didn't have its impact and it definitely deserved to be told- it just didn't explore anything that hadn't been done already a few times over. In fact, I think Bianca's sexuality was played down too much at first. I may be wrong as I didn't watch AMC extensively, but when I did I felt that Bianca's sexuality was never front and center. I don't recall many sex scenes in the style of straight characters in the early 2000s when it probably would have been more groundbreaking for tv. Once it become more safe, I feel we saw a bit more.

 

I think there were some attempts at boundary pushing storytelling in the late 90s and early 2000s but those stories tended to get very safe after their initial impact. Queer characters were made to become as generic and appealing to "mainstream" audiences as possible. 

 

Now, don't get me wrong I believe the Stone and Robin story was important for daytime, but a virus that deeply impacted queer, in particular black queer people, was made acceptable to audiences because of the portrayal by two white cis characters. To tell a story of AIDS and completely neglect queer identities was already a misstep. I'm not neglecting the fact that society's perceptions and views didn't factor into what stories were told and how stories were told. You can't jump from 1950s Leave it to Beaver to today's almost everything goes on streaming platforms in the blink of an eye...gradually society has evolved and so has what we deem acceptable and what is seen as acceptable for tv audiences, but soaps have lagged tremendously and now more than ever. With the amount of scripted tv on cable, streaming, web platforms, viewers can get incredible stories that touch upon relevant and contemporary issues as well as content rich in identities, culture and perspectives that do no exist in daytime. 

[Toups]

I was really interested in GH's gay Aiden storyline last year.  I don't think I've seen a show deal with someone being gay at such a young age (7-8-ish?) and I really liked how they were slowly doing it and how it was affecting him and his family.  It could've been really good to see that story develop for years.  Another good aspect was that we watched the young actor grow up on the show - according to soapcentral, Jason David has been playing Aiden since 2012. So viewers are more emotionally connected to him than they would be with a new actor playing him.  Too bad somewhere along the way, the higher ups got scared. 

[titan1978]

There was absolutely something good brewing with that Aiden storyline.  Actual modern family drama with lots of potential.  I liked the angle of Lulu also having to come to terms with her child participating in the bullying.  Again, an attempt at current, modern storytelling.
 

And it also seemed like Dev had a crush on Cameron.  Both dropped.

 

Just go for it soaps!  You have nothing left to loose now.  If it is the end, at least you tried to make compelling television before they pulled the plug!

Edited July 13, 2020 by titan1978

[Vee]

I think the Robin and Bianca stories were incredibly impactful because of who they were. We discussed this here not long ago, but I remember it flooring me as a kid a bit younger than Robin when Alan said flat-out she had HIV. I knew how important she was to GH. I watched Pedro on The Real World, and I knew AIDS predominantly struck gay men. But giving it to Robin made the problem real for millions of viewers who weren't little gay kids like me, and realer still for young people too. Bianca, same principle. We'd grown up with her or watched her grow up. She was the daughter of the Erica Kane, a household name. She was played by an exceptionally powerful actress. They broke through to middle America and housewives with Bianca; they leaned on her for years after frontburner to push bad stories, bc they knew a more cloistered audience would watch her despite her being gay. That is power. Do I wish we'd seen more of her sexuality, or a gay-themed AIDS story central on GH? Maybe, but it was 20-25 years ago. They did a lot.

 

I don't know the status of the Aiden thing on GH now, but it is not the same thing as Robin or Bianca. That little boy had been playing him with next to zero lines and personality til the last year or two, so the connection with the audience is mild at best. It's not like Robin or Lucky/Emily, or Jessica on OLTL or Tim on AMC, or even the dreaded Spencer, where the child versions were fully formed characters with personalities; he was just another soap kid in the background for years. I also don't love that they were telling a story which seemed predicated on 'Aiden likes feminine things - let's all worry he's gay.' Is that supposed to be bold?

Edited July 13, 2020 by Vee

[All My Shadows]

One big slight I’d give AMC in regards to Bianca’s storyline (and there are several slights to be given post-coming out) is that I always got the feeling that the show considered themselves “done” with LGBTQ+ themes or that the LGBTQ+ box was always checked as long as Bianca was on the canvas. They did the poorly written transgender story later, but it was through Bianca. Every gay character on the show was there through Bianca. I remember watching as a teen and feeling low-key defeated when I realized that my favorite soap would probably never have a long-term gay male character. That was remedied a bit for me when ATWT had Luke’s initial story, but that went wrong in its own way.

 

I guess what I wanted was to see, for instance, Bianca have a gay male friend that she could share experiences with, someone who also had his own story and relationships and could become an established character and represent a different side of what it means to be gay in our country. It could have been a new character who came to town already out of the closet and 100% comfortable with  his sexuality but still fighting barriers. Remember Fusion’s hot lawyer, Kenny? He would have been perfect for the part.

 

Has a soap ever had multiple LGBTQ+ characters on at the same time who weren’t romantically involved or in competition with each other? I know Passions had some crazy sht going on at one point, but what about the others.

Edited July 13, 2020 by All My Shadows

[Faulkner]

I know GH has had a few in recent years, including Kristina (fluid), Lucas/Brad (gay), and Terry (trans), but I don’t think any of them, aside from maybe Kristina, drive consistent story. I hadn’t seen Terry a while in my casual viewing.

 

I’m not sure about Lexi’s status, but most of them are recurring, which doesn’t say a lot about GH’s commitment. 
 

In the UK, Hollyoaks seemed almost half LGBTQ, but I don’t really check in much on it anymore.

Edited July 13, 2020 by Faulkner