3 hours ago, Vee said:

Brown and Esensten did an all-time great arc with the Loving Murders which was (IMO, I know others disagree) uniquely rooted in that show's strange, sad family history and gothic sensibility (dating back to its dark pilot episode murder mystery with Lloyd Bridges and a chilling Geraldine Page) and situated as well at a moment where a handful of key young and/or Black characters could take off on ABC. Watching it all again for the first time since childhood during the housebound horrors of 2020 was one of the highlights of my soap viewer experience.

They spent the rest of their career chasing that high, and never really could replicate it. Not on The City (though my ex adored The Masquerade), not at PC where they went hogwild with horror, and definitely not on Paul Rauch's GL. But I do credit them for being key to re-populating AMC with a ton of Black characters, including past LOV/TC leads Debbi Morgan and Darnell Williams again, in the late 2000s, even if only a couple lasted beyond their merely so-so writing regime.

I wonder if due to the popularity of the Loving Murders if it would have been a better bet for ABC to keep the show branded as Loving and then just introduced new characters with the handful they were planning to keep in Corinth and just do a huge reboot of the show. It could have possibly prevented some of the loss of viewers that happened when the show was redone as The City.

3 hours ago, pdm1974 said:

For me, it's OLTL and the Billy Douglas/homophobia takes over Llanview story in the summer of 1992. It was so well-plotted out with a distinct arc for all the characters. Marty told the citizens of Llanview that Andrew was sexually involved with Billy (a nod to the movie "The Children's Hour") when he was just providing counsel to Billy who was struggling with revealing his sexuality. Andrew turned down Marty's advances and her revenge against him kickstarted a HUGE umbrella story where homophobia touched almost every character's life on the show. It's particularly amazing when you think this story was done 30 years ago, and I'm still surprised ABC approved it. The scenes where Billy comes out to everyone in Llanview while the AIDS memorial quilt comes to town were so moving. Since I was coming out at the same time, the story really impacted me more than any other TV storyline had before or has since.

And one of the fallouts with Marty's role in the Billy story was that when she was gang raped by the frat brothers...her credibility was questioned due to her past history of lying...and it led to a 'wait until dark ' cat and mouse story between Todd and his attorney Nora (who got him off partly due to using Marty's past history against her in the trial).

4 hours ago, pdm1974 said:

I wonder if due to the popularity of the Loving Murders if it would have been a better bet for ABC to keep the show branded as Loving and then just introduced new characters with the handful they were planning to keep in Corinth and just do a huge reboot of the show. It could have possibly prevented some of the loss of viewers that happened when the show was redone as The City.

I think it is one of the best denouement of a show, but in the end it was the timeslot, changing tastes, not the creative choices that killed The City

1 hour ago, j swift said:

I think it is one of the best denouement of a show, but in the end it was the timeslot, changing tastes, not the creative choices that killed The City

So many affiliates have a local news show or a local lifestyle show that they want to air at lunchtime because they get all the ad revenue. And, half hour shows apparently need to have a sheltering effect from a big show that they can follow, not lead off the block. Clearances was a problem for GEN, CIT, PC (all new & lunch) and Sunset Beach & Santa Barbara (new and NBC affiliates are arseholes)

DAYS- John & Marlena 1991-1991. Years of solid story beginning with Marlena's return from the dead, OG Roman's return, the quadrangle between Roman/Marlena/John/Isabella and the eventual affair. The payoff being the creation of evil Sami. Several plots like Mason Blanche were contained within the story, and seeds for the posession were being planted by about late '94. A geat example of a story leading to another without hitting a dead end.

Y&R- Marge Cotrooke 1.0 , 1989-90. In 1989 the audience was given so much detail. Marge was shown changing her hair style, having apendix surgery to mimic Kay's pain,  Clint taping Kay & Rex in the bedroom to help Marge match Katherine's sexual demeanor, testing a forged signature at the bank while impersonating Katherine. Soaps wouldn't go this far into deatil with a silly doppleganger plot these days. Despite the possible arguement that the plot was silly and may have dragged too long, great attention to detail was made in the beginning. 

Edited May 13, 20223 yr by ironlion

4 hours ago, j swift said:

I think it is one of the best denouement of a show, but in the end it was the timeslot, changing tastes, not the creative choices that killed The City

It is kind of miraculous that ABC ran LOVING for as many years as they did. I wonder how much of it was "what else are we going to run against Y&R anyway?" and Agnes Nixon's pull (assuming she still had it at that point). I read her autobiography, and I thought it was strange that she NEVER mentioned Loving at all. Of course, she wrote tons about creating AMC and OLTL and her start in soaps, but not one word about Loving. It would have been interesting to get her viewpoint on why it never took off like her other creations. You can't say the show was a total flop. It ran for over a decade, and I'm sure money was made.

7 hours ago, Soaplovers said:

And one of the fallouts with Marty's role in the Billy story was that when she was gang raped by the frat brothers...her credibility was questioned due to her past history of lying...and it led to a 'wait until dark ' cat and mouse story between Todd and his attorney Nora (who got him off partly due to using Marty's past history against her in the trial).

The plotting for Marty's rape was very well-conceived, too. I found the graphicness of the plot hard to stomach at times, but in terms of plotting an arc for multiple characters, it was genius. I remember reading an interview with Michael Malone where he said he took the approach that the town of Llanview was actually the main character of the show. I think his experience as a novelist helped in terms of creating these large umbrella stories.

1 hour ago, pdm1974 said:

It is kind of miraculous that ABC ran LOVING for as many years as they did. I wonder how much of it was "what else are we going to run against Y&R anyway?" and Agnes Nixon's pull (assuming she still had it at that point). I read her autobiography, and I thought it was strange that she NEVER mentioned Loving at all. Of course, she wrote tons about creating AMC and OLTL and her start in soaps, but not one word about Loving. It would have been interesting to get her viewpoint on why it never took off like her other creations. You can't say the show was a total flop. It ran for over a decade, and I'm sure money was made....

I read it & I loved it but I kept waiting for her to talk about Rachel & Ada as parallels to Erica & Mona. Disappointed. And, of course she saved AW and she could have had bragging rights to that. About shows that made money, it's not about that, it's about *enough* money.

4 minutes ago, Tonksadora said:

I read it & I loved it but I kept waiting for her to talk about Rachel & Ada as parallels to Erica & Mona. Disappointed. 

And, of course, we got the parallel with Rachel & Ada/ Erica & Mona/ and Ava & Kate on Loving. Agnes really enjoyed the rebel daughter and her long-suffering mother.