For Y&R I expected to CBSto do a half a job in celebrating the show's history (on the show). For General Hospital however, I had significantly higher expectations given the fantastic events surrounding their 50th anniversary. The 50 hour soap net marathon, the Nurses ball relaunch and the Katie Couric special were all great. At the very least GH could've put out 60 episodes, (10 best episodes per decade) on Hulu. Even easier, ABC could have released all the episodes that were played during the soapnet marathon plus ten more.

Y&R definitely underwhelming.

The only story that peaked was the Phyllis poisoning which was nonsensical.

The returns were nice but basically cameos. The Mamie return should have been longer with maybe Mamie gifting Lily something from her mother-those sort of moments.

Leanna should have turned up to the bash on the arm of say Matt Miller- with him unaware of who she really was -leading to a mini story there

And so on...each return having some sort of impact rather than just a few lines here and there.

And no throwback to the 70's at all-at least have Leslie performing.

Also a collection of clips representing each decade.

And the gala with the GCAC and extras gave us false hope that the production values might be improved, but no- back to empty restaurants used as offices. 

A definite disappointment to me.

 

 

The Young and the Restless did well with their anniversary week(s) of shows, but, in the follow up, it has been disappointing.

General Hospital did not do well with their anniversary week of shows, but, in the follow up, it has been quite well done (aside from anything involving Willow).

I think GH's anniversary celebration was awful!  We didn't even get a montage of clips.  Is it even an anniversary if I don't see Elizabeth Taylor cursing Luke/Laura or Sonny/Brenda making out in the sand in Puerto Rico?  That being said, the celebration of the 60th was awful, but the show is actually pretty decent right now so there is that.    I just don't understand why there wasn't more clips or flashbacks or returns to celebrate.  The 50th had so many returns and weeks of celebration and this was like 3 days of a high school production of the Nurses Ball.

Y&R's 50th anniversary episodes were decent considering the show is in budget mode.

It’s weird. This whole board feels super low-energy to me lately, which could be my biased perception (as these soaps have lost my interest), but it’s weird to feel this slight lull on the board when you have two major milestone anniversary years for iconic soaps.

Y&R had some fun stuff like Nina tearing Abby a new one. In spite of the nods to history, like Phyllis begging Danny to validate how much she’s changed, it did feel like a bit of a letdown as a jumping-off point to new things.

The returns could have been more integrated, not to mention we should have had more flashbacks and the 1970s were completely ignored.

But with today’s soaps, you’re grateful you get anything halfway decent, and Y&R at least rose above that low bar.

We’re so used to Y&R as deathly dull that it sometimes feels improved when they put in the barest effort, and while it was nice to see everyone at a big event, it was mostly in service to this botched story with Phyllis, which, again, at least grabbed some attention and made us engage with it. But ultimately it’s nonsense.

Leanna basically existed for people to sh!t on. Just reminded me of how Sally existed as a punching bag for the town in her early days.