Characters you think writers struggled to write for

[titan1978]

It’s pretty incredible how many years Tad was just there.  Nobody seemed to know what to do with him or how to write for him for a really long time.  I’m surprised Frons didn’t tell them to kill him off like all the GH vets.

 

 

Edited March 29, 2021 by titan1978

[Skin]

 

It's the Luke Supercouple syndrome. He was the male equivalent to a super couple, who the producers felt held most of the audiences interest more than the female equivalent (Dixie).

 

Outside of that, I think there were several things that kept him on the canvas one of which were the number of relationships, (however questionable) that Tad was involved in. This likely fueled interest in him as a character. He was sort of a male Erica, just played for laughs. His relationships made him important to the canvas (Brooke, Liza, Krystal, Jenny, Kate, Jaime, JR, Dixie, etc.). 

 

He also served at the functional patriarch of the Martin's so I can see why he stayed. Add in his rivalries with David, Adam, and friendship with most of the cast and I think it all makes sense. As a character he was directionless, but he could be used to loop into stories when needed as a vet to add connection to the larger series. He was a bit of a legacy character and a major player in 80's and 90's storylines, and that payed dividends even if he had dead story in the 00's. Outside of Erica and Adam, he was a particular cornerstone of the soap.

 

He also didn't really have a successor, extending his self life. Jaime as a character just sort of flopped after Justin Bruening left, which made Tad viable in stories thereafter. 

Edited March 29, 2021 by Skin

[titan1978]

To me, what happened to him was closer what happened to Hope on DAYS.  Just there and in bad stories and pairings for a long time, playing in name and audience history of better days.

 

GH never stopped investing in Luke.  He had a storyline or was in a major story for most of the time he was on the show.  I may not have liked what they did with him, but he was considered a lead the entire time and was a major character right up until he retired.  I don’t think AMC treated Tad quite as well.

[Skin]

I think Tad was somewhere within the middle. I don't feel like they completely gave up on him, but I don't think he led story in his last days either. The show definitely tried to give him love interest, after love interest and see what worked. He was definitely seen as more independent from Dixie than she was to him. Honestly it felt like Dixie was completely defined by Tad, where as Tad felt like he could be paired by numerous female characters pretty easily. Ultimately I think they positioned Tad to be numerous things to numerous people and that's why he got on as much as he did. He was everyone's friend, he was a father figure to many characters, he had his rivalries, and he had multiple love interests. He could skate by on meager amounts of story because they could connect him to whatever they wanted to. 

[DemetriKane]

Yea, he was in the middle. I just don’t understand how I just came up with five storylines for him, and the people who get paid to do it can’t? It’s very telling when you’re the good guy and I don’t root for you in your feuds. Tad also had the wrong profession imo.

[Soaplovers]

 

I think the show had trouble writing Dixie after the mid 1990s.  

 

When the Prospect Park revival came out...MarDar wrote Dixie quite well on her own ironically.  She actually had more to offer at that point than Tad did.

[titan1978]

The Liza affair was a great story for all three, but soon after the show was so destabilized after Broderick left that even if the show was still good compared to what it became, characters like Brooke, Erica, Tad, and Dixie really suffered.

 

I mean Erica stole a child!  And so many relationships that went nowhere!

[amybrickwallace]

 

You had to remind us of that travesty.

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[SteelCity]

I liked Maxie a lot under him. He also was obsessed with Lulu.

[Chris B]

More generally, I think most of the Y&R head writers of the past 10 years struggle with letting go more than any particular character. You have people like Chloe, Kevin, Chelsea, Lauren and Michael (among others) who remain on the show but the writers either don’t use them or don’t have anything compelling to write for them. Still, they remain. The best thing SSM did was writing out Kevin, Chloe and Chelsea because there simply wasn’t a story for them. Now they’re back and they’re still useless. 
 

B&B also has the problem of letting go. Their contract and recurring cast the past five years has been one of the strongest of any soap, but the vast majority it seems like Brad isn’t inspired to write for them. It’s odd because he could easily still keep Hope/Steffy/Liam on the front burner nonstop, but they can’t seem to tell more than one story at once so everybody else languishes and is lucky to get a C tier short term story in the background. 

[Forever8]

It's sad but I wouldn't be upset if Kevin gets a job in Silicon Valley, and he, Chloe, and the kids move to California. SSM had the right idea to write them out. I mean what is the point of bringing them back if you're not going to use them consistently? 

[Soaplovers]

What was ironic about the Tad and Dixie story was that he was back for months beforehand without a strong story.  Other than the Barbara/Tad situation..he was basically not used.

 

Dixie had the benefit of a strong story with Adam/Brooke..plus had a strong connection to Palmer/Nina/Will to play opposite of.

 

No wonder Cady kept leaving...because the show seemed unwilling to write Dixie as anything except Tad's plus 1.  It's why it was nice not having Tad on the Hulu show because it gave the writers a chance to rediscover Dixie as a character.

[titan1978]

My nightmares are your nightmares!

 

Another character nobody can seem to get- Carrie Brady.  The original Sami stories need her to work, it’s that balance between Sami’s trauma and selfishness with Carrie’s stability and family ties that helped get Sami to the place she was at.  With Roman as her dad, I could see Carrie as a lawyer or a cop easily, and she and Sami could have had issues for decades.  She could also have worked in business stories, and really should have had a place on the show and a family of her own.

[amybrickwallace]

Carrie DID come back as a lawyer at one point, right?

[SteelCity]

True.