GH February 2021 Discussion

[titan1978]

I agree with this.  At first, some of the tragedy played into her self destructive nature.  But at this point, they want her to be quirky, bitchy, and also mascara stained and holding babies at the hospital bed of her latest man.

[carolineg]

So many kids....For a character that I don't think even needed kids, she now has 3 by 3 different dads and she's like 35 at most.  She could have been like a Brenda with no kids for years and didn't really want any.  Maxie was career driven and then they saddled her with a herd of kids (much like Sami on Days), one of which she doesn't even raise.  

[coffee drinker]

Was the Georgie pregnancy written in due to KS's real life pregnancy?  

[Forever8]

If the show didn't want to write for Georgie they could've had her just go off to somewhere like Johns Hopkins for medical school. 

Edited February 26, 2021 by Forever8

[carolineg]

 

No  Baby Georgie was born before KS was pregnant in real life.

[FrenchBug82]

One of the most infuriatingly bone-headed and short-sighted choices by a HW of the past twenty years. And quite the mystery *why*

[titan1978]

The why is pretty easy.  The show wanted a spike in ratings for the short term, which was the ABC pattern by that point.  Their bonus was to kill off characters that either Guza had run out of story for, JFP was over, Frons, or all of the above.  Never forget JFP killed Maureen by the results of a focus group, which the data can be manipulated to get the result you want.

 

They stopped thinking long term.  I would say if there was a bible by that point, it was the length of two sweeps periods-max.  I also think for all his faults, Pratt usually writes a young heroine type on all his shows.  On GH both Georgie and Courtney screamed Pratt to me, and Maxie aligns with Guza’s more self destructive characterizations.  Because she wasn’t just a snarky bitch, Maxie does have layers even if the show doesn’t use them very often.  Pratt was gone by then.

[Vee]

I don't think Georgie was ever Pratt's type, lol. Or anyone else's in power at GH back then. They lucked into that pairing and took advantage of it til they could move Scott Clifton on. Georgie was incidental to Dillon for that entire run. He got the lion's share of stories and paraded around to new toy Lulu, etc. Lindze was seen as the 'homely' girl fans liked but couldn't carry her own A-story and got backburnered. Which is exactly what JFP essentially told her in a meeting, allegedly - that GH would never be the place for her to break out.

 

The problem with Maxie is as others have said; their stories should have split between the Jones sisters. Georgie modulates Maxie, and Maxie is the wild contrast to her more conventional heroine sister. This is a family structure in daytime as old as the hills, going back to Y&R's Brooks sisters, back to the various Hortons or Snyders on ATWT or DOOL, you name it. That is what these contrasting family members are for.

 

Pratt's types were Courtney, Faith, etc. I can't remember him ever writing a young woman like Georgie while in the driver's seat at any show he worked on. Alison Parker and Jo on Melrose Place or the heroines of 90210 don't count; those shows were the product of many writers and they'd been there long before he took direct control.

 

It would be easy to resurrect Georgie, Emily, etc. with the stroke of a pen and a couple days of airtime, blaming GH's large and historical cast of supervillains. The background is all there for it with both families. You don't need to keep them on contract and around long term without story until you find one for one of them sometime. Just bring them back in an anniversary or sweeps period, send them off happy. Done.

Edited February 26, 2021 by Vee

[titan1978]

Well maybe Georgie was a stretch for Pratt, but she never felt like Guza either to me.

 

And if JFP did say that to her- I’m not surprised.  And just another example of Jill speaking about her bias, not necessarily the audience of the show.

Edited February 26, 2021 by titan1978

[FrenchBug82]

Emily is another character I agree shouldnt have been killed, rationally speaking, but I hated everything they had written for her so much that it is not as triggering for me.
I suppose reworking Georgie in would be easier for GH that resurrects characters often more than for others but the longer we go on... How few of current GH viewers would even relate to Georgie being alive.

And not to be cynical but "that GH would never be the place for her to break out.". Shouldn't that be what producers want for a younger actress? One how is talented enough - and she was doing fine - but probably not someone with a brilliant primetime/movie career waiting outside which means she will be around for decades if you keep her happy and write compelling stories for her?
I always say the fact producers can't keep their younger actor/legacy characters in the USA the way British soaps do hurt the soaps. There is so much more invested when one has seen someone grow up on-screen and follow into adulthood like we did with Robin

[victoria foxton]

Georgie's murder during Christmas time was revolting. GH could've easily had written her out. By going to med school. But Guza loved killing people off. His GH had to be as depressing and dark as possible.

Edited February 27, 2021 by victoria foxton

[titan1978]

It was rough.  I’ve said it here many times- I thought Georgie, Maxie, Lulu, Dillon, Cooper, Logan, and Spinelli were a compelling set of younger characters (although severely lacking in diversity) with good ties to the other characters and a real shot at giving the show an entire generation of stories.  Much like Brenda, Karen, Jason, AJ, Stone, and Robin did before.

 

And after two years they had killed off half of them, Dillon was gone, and within a few months at the end of the Text Message Killer I pretty much quit the show.  Even Brenda wasn’t enough to lure me back for longer than a few months.

[carolineg]

The fact they did not tie Cooper Barrett to Brenda and Julia is practically criminal.   I still don't understand why he had the same last name and no one noticed. 

[KMan101]

Phelps and Guza/Pratt really tore the heart out of GH. It was like watching a nightmare for over a decade. Sure a lot of it was flashy, even at times dramatic, entertaining and produced well, but the show stopped plotting long-term (like all the soaps, really; Y&R is at that point and you can see them struggling). If they cared about the show at all so many characters wouldn't have been offed in a sweeps/ratings stunt. I mean, even Sussman and Alden recognized the massive error in Y&R killing John Abbott when they did and wished they could have resurrected him (though like I say below, I do think there's a 'time limit' so to speak)

 

Georgie, Emily and Alan's deaths remain massive mistakes. I wish they could have fixed them; I think the time has passed, maybe (well; it has on Alan I believe; but I would have accepted Tony Jones instead)

 

They COULD get away with Georgie and Emily. Emily would work better if they brought back Helena and had it revealed Rebecca was a brainwashed Emily. Boom there you go. Done. I'm guessing Ron never got the time because it's something he would have done LOL. With AJ back from the dead they should have just said to hell with it and had all the Q's alive with him.

 

I'd have to think about Georgie. But I don't want to distract with too much fan fiction LOL

 

I also wouldn't have thrown Logan under the crazy bus and killed him off (Josh Duhon was the hot new thing and then Brandon Barash was the hot new thing). What a waste. I'll even toss out Karen's death on PC. I threw it out before but Megan Ward could have made an interesting Karen. Shame.

 

Oh, and Willow should have been Lucy's daughter Christina. Lured into a cult by her mother Julie who now goes by Harmony. It writes itself. But nope.

 

Since I lied and AM doing fan fiction, LOL ... I'll dig deeper and say they should have moved Eve to GH and had her be Alan's daughter, not Skye (and Skye would have been on AMC or OLTL). I don't know why but I've always thought that.

 

Anywho ... sorry all LOL

Edited February 27, 2021 by KMan101

[FrenchBug82]

Yeah. Bringing back Emily would be pretty easy considering the Nikolas connection and with Helena and all.
But NL was so loathed by fans by the end of her stint that I don't think anyone really misses Emily. And based on what happened at Days, I think there must be more to her story.

Georgie is more of a sore point but there are also way fewer ways to bring her back without really testing our ability to suspend disbelief.
For the record, I didn't like Kiki in either of her versions but killing her off was also stupid for the long term, despite the material it gave Maura W.
Don't kill characters in their 10s/20s with a lot of family on the canvas. Just don't