I don't think Malone had disdain for Karen Witter's Tina at all - I think he actually really enjoyed writing for her, even if his concept of Tina was different from the '80s version and more limited in scope. But I think Tina was an afterthought without Karen in that era, and it showed with Krista.
I don't think it was all KT's fault, as I've watched some of that stuff again recently and she actually is working hard (she mostly drove me nuts as a kid, but that was down to the obvious disinterest in the character by then). She was there to play a role according to the type she'd played in the past. I think also the audience was unprepared for a Tina who was now in opposition to Viki again, in on a con against her, a role that Tina had not filled on the show in almost a decade. She was supposed to have grown out of that. But to me that was one of the few elements that worked, the idea that Tina could betray her family again after all these years and what that would mean.
Part of the issue was that they played up Tina's worst aspects rearing their head with Krista, especially her becoming openly money-hungry re: Todd again. (Possibly a reaction to being heartbroken again by Cain, but still.) Andrea Evans could play that stuff with a wink and a smile and some heart, and Karen's Tina really was only in on her schemes with Cain for the love of the game at that point while devoted to her kids and family. But when Krista's Tina did it she was shrill, whiny and treated as a joke by the other characters, which she was, really. The nuance and heart had left with Karen Witter. I think they were just over Tina by then, and should've retired the character for awhile when Karen and Christopher Cousins left. But I don't blame Krista for a bad situation.
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Vee ·
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