All: Characters you thought would come back but never did

[NothinButAttitude]

Russ, Pat, or Alice Matthews on AW. Even though they were before my time, AW should've brought them back in the early 90s to reestablish Matthews clan on the show. That would've given Josie more family on the show and possibly convinced the show to keep Olivia around longer. 

 

Teddy Hughes, Don Hughes, Joyce Colman, or Grant Colman on ATWT. I feel like the return of these four would've given Lisa much needed story in the last decade of the show given the history around them. 

 

Honestly, GL might own this thread more than anyone.

 

Hope should've been brought back after Mary Stuart (Meta) passed. Hope should've been centered as the show's new heart/central matriarch.  

 

J and Stacey Chamberlain should've been brought back with their cousin Tom Reardon and took back the Boarding House/Company from the Coopers. 

 

So many countless characters should've been brought back that last decade of GL to somewhat attempt to bring audiences back. 

[AMCOLTLLover]

One character from The Bold and the beautiful:

Marcus Forrester/Logan/Barber whatever. His father Justin and his mother Donna are still there. Why didn’t they brought Marcus back one in a while?

[Forever8]

I don't need him back. 

[amybrickwallace]

I'm still surprised that The Doctors never brought Toni Ferra Powers back from the dead, whether she was still played by Anna Stuart or not.

[Khan]

For sure, if THE DOCTORS had survived past 1982, I could see Toni returning and throwing a wrench into Mike and Kit's relationship...thanks to the now-grown child she had by him while everyone believed she was dead.

[amybrickwallace]

Michael Paul would have definitely been superaged had the show gone into 1983.

[DemetriKane]

OLTL 

Billy Douglas 

Anybody from the Gray family 

 

Y&R

Amy Lewis

David Kimble

 

 

[Dr Neil Curtis]

Neil Curtis, especially when Sarah was brought back, but they seem to leaned toward him being dead and established a relationship with Sarah off screen. 

[carolineg]

It's probably already been mentioned, but I can't believe they didn't bring back Noelle especially after we found out she slept with Rex too.  Knowing she slept with her sister's man makes me want to meet her more now.

[MichaelGL]

Michael-Paul, Erich, maybe even Stephanie would have been an entertaining group of teens to compete with other shows such as GH and GL. 

Edited December 21, 2021 by MichaelGL

[amybrickwallace]

What could have been!!

[DramatistDreamer]

Before this, I really never spent any time considering what characters that I thought would return, as it seemed like so many returns on my favorite soaps had been a bust, I didn't want to think too much about it, but a post in the Cancelled Soaps thread, triggered a thought.

With all the multiple returns of James Stenbeck on ATWT, I wondered why Ariel Aldrin (Judy Blazer) never made her way back to Oakdale. As long as you had Barbara, Paul and even John Dixon, there would have been plenty of characters that she could have mixed it up with. The character was off the canvas by the time Lucinda Walsh entered (I think), so given the fact that both were married to John, I think it would have been fun to see them interact. Both could be on the troublesome side at times.

[Paul Raven]

That got me thinking about ATWT under Marland, and that he always made a thing of respecting history he never actually brought back characters from the past.

Yes, Penny, Don and others made guest appearances but I think James and Susan Srewart were the only characters that came back for long term stints.

 

[DramatistDreamer]

The actress who played Penny, Rosemary Prinz has stated that she didn't want to be locked into long-term stays on the soaps, as she loved being on stage. Not sure about the actor who played Don, but Prinz preferred shorter stints, as she wanted to spend more time in theater. As a theater person, I can't really blame her.

The show in the late 90s was languishing and could have really used some long remembered characters doing meaningful, if brief story arcs. The show attempted some form of this, bringing back Duncan McKechnie briefly when an adult Bonnie, his daughter, was on the canvas, but the story and its execution was laughable. 

If the writers aren't knowledgeable enough about the show's story DNA, trying to bring longtime favorite characters wouldn't matter anyway.

After Marland's passing, the show should have made an offer to Susan Bedsow-Horgan to be the headwriter--an offer she couldn't refuse. She knew the show's storyline DNA, as she was there before and during aspects of Marland's tenure as HW. She would have had a better sense of continuity, while adding her own stamp on the storytelling. And she might have been more successful at bringing back some of the show's longtime favorites, who were more likely to trust her skill for storytelling. An actor who was nominated for an Emmy award during her time as a writer, would more likely return with her as HW as they would be more likely to trust her. Actors don't like the possibility of seeing their characters undone by poor storytelling any more than longtime fans do, and we know this happened a lot to characters who were brought back in the late 90s/early-mid 00s on ATWT.

We all heard the stories of P&G wanting to exit the business of producing soaps, but ATWT could have at least made a case for their survival by writing consistently better stories, or at least end with a higher degree of dignity.

[spike99]