General Hospital: May 2023 Discussion Thread

[Darn]

Brenda is on the un-recastable list with Erica Kane, Victor Newman, Marlena Evans, Robin Scorpio, etc. You just don't even consider it. 

And as many ties as Brenda has to the canvas she's never a glaring omission in most stories because her familial ties aren't strong. You don't have her kids suffering in Port Charles while she's "finding herself" in Europe. So leave her be until you have the story and commit to Vanessa for a good long while.

[Faulkner]

I’m glad she’s been off canvas. They would have absolutely destroyed Brenda by now.

[carolineg]

Exactly.  There are a million places I could put Vanessa's Brenda in and it would work, but she isn't necessary for most stories the show is telling.  She would make them better, but she's not MIA like someone like Robin tends to be at times. 

I do think there were a few instances you could have tried a recast and it would have been right around the first time Brenda left.  After 2002, it was clear Vanessa was the draw and not just the character of Brenda although I would personally argue that was always the case.  

I just don't see any value in recasting a role that has been off canvas for 10 years and is rarely spoken about, especially without Jax and Jason around because there is a very high chance another actor will tank with MB.

[AbcNbc247]

That was a great cliffhanger. I actually didn't expect it. 

Makes me excited for Monday 

[Dion]

I liked that Laura remembered that she had memorised the formula back in 1981 and was able to use that to switch off the machine. I thought that minor plot point would never be brought up again.

[John]

Sarah Brown could have been a good Marty Sayebrooke But That will always be Susan's role and then FV had to ruin it when writing her out in 2011.

 

When PP brought back the soaps and TK was promoting AMC he said he feels Susan would go back to OLTL now  alluding because FV was no longer there.

Edited May 6, 2023 by John

[AMCHistory]

Can we give GH kudos for making the ladies the heroes for the Cassadine caper? Laura is leading the rescue charge. Holly and Anna are the calvary. Jordan and Felicia are the home team. I don’t want GH to be all spy adventures all the time, but the weeks of girl power and suspense since the awful Nurses Ball has been must-see tv for me. 

The only weak part to this story is that we’re supposed to hoping for Obrecht’s rescue in time to save Willow. Only, none of us care if Willie lives or dies. 

[BrendaB]

After having seen the beautifully written long death arc for Dominique in 1993 and how wonderfully the entire cast acted, it's just pitiful how badly this Willow story is being written and acted.  Every single character (except maybe Leisl) is so vapid in that never-ending non-story.  Since they're clipping old scenes from 1981, they should go watch and re-learn some of the lessons from 30 years ago, too!

After all these years, I still cannot stand Snarly and her perfectly cast mini-me daughter.  Carly's smug, arrogant bitchiness being portrayed as if she's a sympathetic heroine grates my nerves.  I also can't stand sappy, indecisive Nina and her even worse daughter Wallow.  I wish Nina would go full on crazy and unintentionally kill her own daughter and intentionally kill Carly, Joss (and maybe even Sonny) in the tradition of some grand Greek tragedy and then be carted off to a psych ward permanently.

The only good acting being done in every episode is by our Gerber baby, Ace.  Yesterday, he was clearly traumatized by Trina knocking out his nanny!  It was lovely seeing Constance Tower's Helena.  Holly & Laura are doing great, too.  I wish Felicia was there-- I liked the comment earlier in this thread about doing a Charlie's Angel thing with the GH gals (but I wouldn't include Anna until Valentin was permanently out of the picture).

[Darn]

I think this week on the whole was great! With today a highlight.

Even the utter ridiculousness of James Patrick Stuart's acting made me laugh my åss off. I don't know what that man is doing but he's definitely doing something!

[Liberty City]

Genie Francis is eating, and I love to see it.

[Darn]

The fact that the show went so long without her presence feels unimaginable to me right now.

She carried her expository heavy scenes so well today, it's like I could feel Laura mentally transporting herself back to 1981. And her reaction to the Haunted Star exploded was everything if you consider how many times Laura has had to react to something awful happening to a member of her family. It's like it's impossible for her to give a false note.

If the show is in danger of cancellation any time soon they're at least putting in the work to rectify sidelining and disrespecting Genie the way they did on and off for 40 years. Laura's face should be the one you think of when thinking of GH, she deserves the same level of association to it (without the Luke&Laura albatross) as Viki to OLTL, Victor to Y&R, Stephanie to B&B, etc.

Tabyana's reaction was excellent as well. All these Sprina moments have made the exceedingly long burn almost worth the wait. I'm hoping the show can keep up the momentum with them. And that it's a long time before they breakup for some dumb plot driven reason. I want them to continue facing adversity together for minute.

[AMCHistory]

Laura is the symbol of this era of GH. This is the post-mob only era of JFP. Port Charles is a community again, it has a heart again. That heart is Genie.

[Liberty City]

Misogyny. Like Francis has said in the past, she was told it didn't matter if she lived or died, because Tony Geary was the whole show. And I think a lot of people, until Frank Valentini came along, saw that as fact. Making Laura the heart of the show, like @AMCHistory said above, has brought some heart back into the soap. She's comfort. She's home. And now she's kicking ass and taking names without Luke, and it's amazing to see her in that element.

[titan1978]

And yet, Frank or someone at ABC or both tried to make her recurring (with no major story in mind) a few years ago.  And she rightly said no.  It’s only because the fans of the show/Genie fans tore FV and ABC apart for months online that they brought her back and use her like they have since.

I still say it was JFP more than Guza that kept her away during the 2000’s.  Because Guza used to love to write for her.  As awful as the Rick Webber story was, it was one of the first ones introduced when Guza/Pratt came back.  And it centered on her more than Luke, just like the Nikolas story.

[Vee]

Yeah, Frank got bullied into keeping Genie, at least twice. The first time she walked out was in 2013, when he supposedly wanted her and Stephen Nichols to hang around as part of the recurring veteran corps Frank and Ron preferred to feature at that time and they both passed, hence Laura's abrupt exit in the middle of the anniversary year. He tried it again the late 2010s. Both times Genie said she wouldn't stay without a contract (and in her first return, without a new love interest which she got, Kevin). AFAIC FV half-lucked into making Laura the centerpiece of the show, and that's only because they lost several people he would've rather leaned on more IMO (Geary, etc).

I couldn't say who soured on Laura the most in the 2000s because the fact is the writing was heavily skewed against her after a certain point. Guza's team in those years made much of how Laura and their family was just a fantasy for Luke, how Tracy was his much more 'honest' partner in life, how she truly understood him and on and on. It came out of the mouth of virtually every character in that era and it was clearly coming from the top, which was Guza and then Tony Geary; JFP was not in the driver's seat in those days. And it's complicated, because as I've said before a lot of Guza's team had been there since the glory years and while the overall storylines degraded a lot of the day to day work could still be good, even when in service of bad ideas (Guza himself had been there in the Monty/Pat Falken Smith/Racina heyday in the early '80s of LNL IIRC, though I may be wrong).

The best moment of all for me, though, was in Genie's underrated '08 return, where she listens to Tracy spout all that new gospel, doesn't really react and politely tells Tracy 'don't kid yourself' - Luke loves her. She doesn't bitch at her or scream or trade shots, she just graciously walks out, and the instant Laura's left the room Tracy's armor drops and she bursts into convulsive sobs. God bless Jane Elliot.

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That was the most honest moment of that whole era. Whoever wrote that from the old crew, it was very good. And it's not that I didn't like Luke and Tracy together, because I did at least early on. The problem I had with it that developed over time was the relentless need to demean, rewrite and unmake Luke and Laura to try to service and validate Luke and Tracy, which was not necessary. They were two very different relationships and that's fine. But someone wasn't secure enough in that. Also, Luke's constant scamming of Tracy and the Qs, stealing from her and leaving her, screwing her over got very very old as well. Tracy had at least 3-4 "I'm done with you, Luke Spencer" speeches early in the Carlivati regime and the first one was the only good one. They kept repeating it because Geary refused to end the pairing or go back to LNL (just like he refused to play Carlivati's alcoholism story for him by taking drinks onscreen), so Tracy just kept taking Luke back.

Edited May 6, 2023 by Vee