All : Storyline risks that didn't pay off.

[Paul Raven]

The flipside to Amy's thread.

What were some chances soaps took that didn't work? 

Now we know there were many so let's try and keep it to those that did go out on a limb a little bit rather than just stories that you didn't like.

To start

Y&R

Paul and Nikki as parents of Dylan.

To accomodate Steve Burton, TPTB decided to tie him to beloved core characters and return to a past storyline. But viewers didn't buy it as they twisted history and Dylan was a pretty dull character. He's hardly been mentioned since he left.

AW

Steve/Rachel/Alice.

AW resurrected it's signature 60's/79's story but the revived triangle had 2 recasts ,neither of whom captured the essence of the original with Rachel a different character to what she had been originally. The end result was killing off Steve again, and dropping Alice.

Days

David/Val. The groundbreaking interracial romance ended with Val being written out. She was never contract anyway. Overall, they decided not to continue as ratings  and response wasn't there.

Looking forward to your responses...

[Frank2803]

Killing off Maureen Bauer.

Storyline did nothing for the overall canvas, as a matter of fact the show fell off in quality without a moral compass type of character.

Ed Bauer grieved for a couple of months, but started to have goo goo eyes for a younger woman was eye rolling material at best.

 

[Maxim]

Bold

 

1. Massimo is Ridge's real father. It just ruined the show in a way. It changed history. Bad.

2. Brooke is alcoholic. It was a what the [!@#$%^&*] moment. So not in Brooke's character. Never went anywhere... just bad and stupid.

3. Taylor back from the dead. It cheapened the show and made it look like over the top trash.

4. Every attempt to bring back Sheila Carter... since 2002. It just doesn't work, because Sheila was a character that stayed in the 90s... Her shooting Stephanie should have been the end. It never pays off, because they imitate the past and Sheila comes off as a cartoon character.

5. Ridge and Bridget. Completely disgusting.

6. Ridge and the new Caroline. Didn't evolve. Didn't stay. Didn't do anything.

7. Thomas is a psycho. Completely ruined the character... 

 

and so much more. 

 

[Frank2803]

Killing off Maureen Bauer.

Storyline did nothing for the overall canvas, as a matter of fact the show fell off in quality without a moral compass type of character.

Ed Bauer grieved for a couple of months, but started to have goo goo eyes for a younger woman was eye rolling material at best.

One Life to Live Eterna 

Guiding Light clone storyline 

When soaps not named Days of Our Lives or Passions start dabbling in the sci-fi/fantasy stuff 

[pdm1974]

Talking about current stories...I would say the re-possession on DAYS. I was kinda excited for it at first, but I think the build-up just wasn't there. I think it may have worked better for ANOTHER character to become long-term possessed...maybe Allie, Belle, or someone else Marlena cared about, and then it was up to her to save them. She would have to come to terms with her own past as a result providing the character an arc. I can think of any character growth or long-term story fallout from the current story.

Edited November 2, 2021 by pdm1974

[Spoon]

The first half of the Clone Saga with Joie Lenz as Cleva were fun but turned into just another evil doppelganger plot. Yawn.

 

Personally I found Maureen bland, they needed an older lady as matriarch like a Meta or Trudy or heck even Grandma Santos. So many times TPTB are afraid to kill important characters so its a rare event when it happens.  

 

Y/R Bringing back Phillip Chancellor III from the dead. Convoluted plot and they did nothing with him.

 

Also making Jill/Katherine mother/daughter had some payoff but was so contrived, the Jill/Lauren retcon was just random with even less payoff. 

Edited November 2, 2021 by Spoon

[FrenchBug82]

I mean, I agree with a lot of the comments so far but I feel most of them were not truly a *risk*.
A gamble is different from a bad decision that didn't pay off. Most of the storylines mentioned above are awful but they were not a risk per se.

A risk would be a headwriter knowing something they write might really piss of the audience but writing it anyway thinking it might be so great as to be worth it.
Ridge/Bridget definitely a good example.
Erica's unabortion too: if Josh had been a great character this might not be remembered as uniformly negatively as it is now (inversely because OLTL's Natalie worked as a character, the retcon of her birth paid off).

[SouthernChick]

Princess Gina. It went on too long and the whole WTD story was ridiculous.

[Bright Eyes]

But did I vote for Stefano on the school library computers when I was in the 8th (I think) grade? Yes, yes I did.

[applcin]

This one may be a mix of taking a risk but not going that far out on a limb: Dawn Rollo on AW as the first HIV+/AIDS character. She was a new character, not related to any major characters (her brother had been MJ's pimp but Chad was also pretty disposable), a straight female. Yes, AW addressed AIDS first and showed that even "nice girls"/straight people could get it. But Dawn was a disposable character that viewers were maybe minimally invested in, if at all. This wasn't Kathleen, MJ or Amanda. This was AW deciding to do an AIDS story and bringing in a new character just for that purpose; she was dead within 6 months of her introduction and even that happened off screen. There really was no long-term impact from her having been on the show.


 

Edited November 2, 2021 by applcin

[Soaplovers]

Port charles becoming more telenovela in format.  

[Franko]

I'll go with revisiting Luke and Laura's rape. Interesting idea, awful execution.

[ReddFoxx]

B&B: Maya being transgender. Now this was probably less of a risk and more of a gimmick to put spotlight on the show, but no matter what it had no payoff long term.

[AMCOLTLLover]

That weird Irina Story on General Hospital in 2011 or 2010. That gave Helena a weird daughter just to kill her off. I don't know why they tried to go all in and gave that evil twisted Helena a daughter just to kill her off?

Tinas return story in 2008 on OLTL. Great idea to tie Tina into the 40th anniversary but it just didn't worked out the way they hoped for tbh.

[kalbir]

Y&R hasn't been the same since they killed off John Abbott. It felt like the end of an era.