To defend the scripts though, there has been a mandate for quite some time to dumb it down, keep references to history to a minimum and so forth

This makes no sense And they wonder why AMC is going down the tubes?

ATWT

Letting go Hunt Block

Matie

Paul/Meg/Emily

Lack of Tom and Margo

Lack of good storylines involving the vets

The teen cast

Bringing back great characters such as Simon and Damian and then ruin them

EastEnders

The time scedual during the Soccer WC I had no idea if en when it was on

Dawn Miller pretending to be Ians wife

To much Mitchells

AMC - Making the Carey Whores the show's moral compass. Everything has to be approved by these two sluts, and if not, then we're supposed to think it's baaaaad!

I'm sorry, but JR holding KWAK at gunpoint, and wanting to kill Babe in a pile of cynder blocks... kinda made me giddy!

ROTFL!

Oh man! That was harsh! Funny but harsh! LOL

This makes no sense And they wonder why AMC is going down the tubes?

Its to make the show more easily accessible to new (teen) viewers. References to the past might confuse their small minds and make them change the channel to an simple NBC show. As just one example there was a reference a while back to Billy Clyde Tuggle. It was nothing more than a 'blink and you'll miss it' line thrown in by the script writer as a nod to long-time viewers. Regardless it got that writer a spanking from the higher-ups.

AMC

The problem with this show is writing- plain and simple. There are no fully developed plot-lines or well developed directions for this show. I only see a series of contrived events that are used for “shock value” even if it goes against what was written and aired for the previous day.

I think the actors are great. With the exception of a younger newbie, they are all talented and they are the only reason I have tried to continue to watch the show (although I have to admit I haven’t watched in over a week. I have them recorded but I just dread watching so I haven’t bothered to try). It’s truly sad when the writing is so bad that it takes away your enjoyment of your favorite characters.

I think Colin Egglesfield is doing a fabulous job as Josh. Unfortunately, I cannot seem to get past my absolute disgust of the unabortion storyline to really support his character. I hate what they have done to the history of this show so much that a talented actor (that gets better every day) has to work triple hard to try and gain fans and support to overcome this crass origin of his character.

I hate the missed opportunities that are squandered by this show. For example, in the aftermath of the Janet drama, there was a great opportunity to really develop Amanda. We could really see how her mother’s recent actions affected this young woman. Amanda really grew as a character through this ordeal with her mother and she gained sympathy and fans that she didn’t previously have and then …..NOTHING. We had about 10 minutes of scenes with her and Jamie agreeing to be friends and apologizing to Simone and that’s it. It was a long time later that we see her with Greg Madden and it was obvious that she was being used to show what a demon the Mad Doc was. If we had a little more Amanda between these two events showing her confusion, depression and a search for forgiveness we could have REALLY seen what Madden was doing as an evil taking his prey.

The Mad Doc is another sore spot with me. The sorry plot devices have really made me question how evil he really was. Right now, I am tempted to believe that he just told the people of Pine Valley a lot of truths that they didn’t want to hear. This methodical man with an obsession with Erica did NOT take the opportunity to implant donor #1 sperm in a Kane woman? …that doesn’t make any sense. Maybe he wasn’t as obsessed as I thought? We assume that he was donor #1 but now I don’t know since he didn’t use it. Watching him in that coffin did nothing but garner more sympathy for him and make him less evil for me. Ian Buchanan is that good. I will not watch that much human suffering without it hurting me and making me want to see his side- which I do. I don't agree with his methods but I am sympathetic. If they wanted him to be evil incarnate, they shouldn't have forced me to watch him die. As for what he did for Kate, I think he did the baby girl a favor by keeping her from Dixie. I’m sorry but Madden was right when he said Dixie isn’t fit to be a mother and the way that Dixie has been written since this return is all the evidence I need to prove that fact.

Dixie stood outside that log cabin while JR was on the verge of a complete breakdown. He was about to change his life forever by trying to ease his pain of losing his wife and his kid in a drunken stupor and SHE DOESN’T HELP HIM???? What mother would do that in self preservation? Dixie was written to be so selfish that her concern was how JR would feel about her rather than her doing the right thing by her son. I know that the argument is that she thought coming out would cause more damage but we are talking about a CRISIS moment when JR had his step-mother/mother-in-law at GUNPOINT!! You can’t just sit there and do nothing and still be a good mother. You can’t let your son grieve for you for FOUR YEARS and be a good mother. It doesn’t matter that she was looking for Kate. She hurt her son INTENTIONALLY and not telling him she was alive when she knew how much he needed her was, in my opinion, child abuse. That alone killed Dixie for me and I will never forgive her. The only scene I wanted to see with Dixie was when JR confronted her for the first time. Jacob Young rocked that scene and Dixie’s pathetic excuses left me cold. Other than that, I cannot stand her on my screen and ALL OF THAT IS THE WRITING.

Characters that I have seen and known for so long- Jackson, Opal, Palmer, and Brooke are almost nonexistent. The only time we see Erica’s husband is when he is being the “bad guy” for wanting to keep his autistic daughter safe and away from a killer or at the very least a dangerous situation. As a parent of an autistic child, I back Jack 100% as being a responsible and dedicated parent that is willing to take the heat for an unpopular opinion about his daughter’s welfare for her own good. I don’t understand why this is an unpopular opinion either. This man held Lily, Greenlee and Kendall in a cave with a dead body. This man was drugging Greenlee and she nearly died with her little trapeze incident on the roof of Fusion and had Greenlee convinced she was going crazy. This man beat his girlfriend Maggie and killed his own brother. Erica and the rest of the world think that it’s okay for an underaged autistic girl to be with him? A tumor explains everything? We don’t even want to be cautious and get that guy through some therapy?

The constant erasing of history irks me. The constant inconsistent writing of characters for plot reasons irks me. The forcing of friendships, familial bonds, or romances irks me. I hate to have to endure constant “screen testing” of couples just to see what will stick. Here’s an idea, how about develop a story that may instigate a romance because of the story itself? That’s how your DEVELOP chemistry and secure strong fanbases. They don’t grow overnight and no one should expect it.

And speaking of fanbases, the constant playing of one fanbase against each other is DESTROYING THE SHOW AND THE CHARACTERS INVOLVED!!! If you want to please everyone, develop a full story for couples and let them have their day in the sun. Once you feel the time is right, develop a good story for another pairing and let them have THEIR day in the sun. Right now, NO ONE IS HAPPY with how their couples are being written. Zach and Kendall get a day before she goes into a coma and then Ryan decides that Greenlee wasn’t the real love of his life, Kendall is? Krystal despises Adam and loved Tad but has to let him go so he can be with faux-Dixie, his true love? Then Krystal sleeps with Tad while she’s in love with Adam after Tad breaks up with faux-Dixie/Di? Tad and Di had about two days of fun and being a couple before the real Dixie wastes that relationship? Babe loves JR but kisses Josh more than once and JR runs to Kendall for a roll in the hay every time Babe sneezes when he didn’t want her to sneeze? Everyone involved comes off as a slut or stupid or takes away from the meaning of the “I love you”s and every single fanbase is mad because no one is getting any real satisfaction or fulfillment from what is being written. It isn’t suspending the drama. It’s just ticking people off!!

The balance of the show sucks. Everyone is always miserable. The comedic moments are too few and far between and the ones that are there seem to be ad-libbed by the actors themselves and not in the script.

If I didn’t love the actors and want to support what they do and who they are, there’s no reason to watch the show. A character I love will act like a completely different person depending on the day. A history that I witnessed will be rewritten on the whim of a “shock value” happy head writer that seems to want to write Pine Valley out of existence.

GH is my other show and I don’t have nearly as many complaints about that show as I do AMC. While GH does things that I don’t really like (Lucky and Maxie, Lulu and Dillon, etc) at least there’s a story behind it. With AMC there’s nothing.

AMC:

Brian Frons. Because of this one man pretty much nobody enjoys working on his show anymore, behind or in front of the camera. Once you've created morale that low you can count the number of years a show had left on one hand.

So do they want out of daytime or are they going to get rid of this guy who is destroying three soaps?

Its to make the show more easily accessible to new (teen) viewers. References to the past might confuse their small minds and make them change the channel to an simple NBC show. As just one example there was a reference a while back to Billy Clyde Tuggle. It was nothing more than a 'blink and you'll miss it' line thrown in by the script writer as a nod to long-time viewers. Regardless it got that writer a spanking from the higher-ups.

I had to come out of lurkdome just to respond to this. Wow the higher ups at Disney really do think we are idiots don't they? By we I mean all soap viewers not just teens since they obviously think anyone who watches this type of genre is going to sit by and watch this shoddy crap. As a former teen and a teacher I also have to say they are delusional if they think dumbing down stories and keeping the scripts simple are going to bring in teen viewers. Teenagers may often appear to be a species all their own but they are not stupid. I am sure a teen would love hearing Brian Frons explain to them that they are too dumb to follow big interesting storylines or understand words made up of more than five letters. I have actually seen kids in grade eight put on displays and talk eloquently about human rights abuses around the world! I think they can handle a reference to Billy Clyde without freaking out.

I think the problem is something you said earlier possibly in another thread. These so called 'research experts' don't really seem to know their market. Soaps only attract a certain type of audience, I find them similiar to horror films in that regard. They don't appeal to eveyone. I've been watching since I was a kid but when I was a teen I would tune into the shows that featured a hot hunk. For awhile. But if the stories weren't interesting a hot guy really was'nt enough to keep me around. I am guessing todays teens are the same. I know they hate when people treat and act like they are vapid and dumb. Watching two attractive twits sit around a pool in bikinis dissing people is not going to hold their interest for long. No wonder ABC daytime is plummenting. All they have to do is read Douglas Marlands soap rules and they might have a chance to fix some of this stuff. I think the main problem is the suits are running the shows and don't know who he is. I have no idea why they feel the need to stick their noses into storylines, I don't think it has always been this way has it?

As for specifics what is ruining my shows. GH is simple the Sonny and Carly hour. I watched Wednesday and it was'nt bad. Put those two on the next day and I had to shut it off. On AMC its all the crappy character propping and assisination. This is not Adam Chander or Erica Kane I am seeing!! Tad I don't know anymore and MEK always looks miserable not that I blame him. The babyswitch and its need to fluff Babe have destroyed much of the cast. I could handle Babe as a !@#$%^&*] but Josh telling her she is like Bianca. I had to switch the channel. They destroyed totally the Ryan I loved with Gillian, and the Jilly story is revolting in my opinion. The problem is I could go on for another five paragraphs but I will stop there. And yes Frons I am in your target demo audience.

Wiccachick... I APPLAUD YOU!!!!!

I got lost in your words for a moment, and thought I was reading an editorial piece from a soap mag! VERY VERY well written, and I agree with every word!

Work it, baby!!

Wiccachick... I APPLAUD YOU!!!!!

I got lost in your words for a moment, and thought I was reading an editorial piece from a soap mag! VERY VERY well written, and I agree with every word!

Work it, baby!!

LOL! Thank you! I really didn't know I had that much brewing in me about my show! hehe...I feel like I should yell "I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore!" *giggle

So do they want out of daytime or are they going to get rid of this guy who is destroying three soaps?

I don't think they want out of daytime but I KNOW they see it as terminally ill and thus they see no need to perhaps consider replacing Brian. To them it's not Brian's fault or his team's fault, daytime is simply dying and there is nothing that can be done about it so just let Brian keep his job because it does not matter who is running the ship. The people above Brian basically have a "well daytime is a lost cause so lets just focus on the prime-time line-up" mentality.

Wiccachick... I APPLAUD YOU!!!!!

I got lost in your words for a moment, and thought I was reading an editorial piece from a soap mag! VERY VERY well written, and I agree with every word!

Work it, baby!!

I absolutely concur.

And to add one more point to my talk about historical references and dumbing down scripts, this post got me thinking about when I first really entered the soap world. I began by watching Another World because it was on at 11:00 AM which was the only soap convenient for me at the time. This was around 1994 when the show was still relatively complex and had not eliminated most of its history. Personally I enjoyed the challenge of trying to figure out who was related to who, what everyone's history was with everyone else, who the past characters were that were mentioned in the dialogue. I was not a teen at the time but I refuse to believe it would be any different for them. If you want peope to invest in your show why not make it so they have to put in some effort, some time, maybe some online research? That will get them to invest, not a show that seemingly has no history.

In a word:

Marlena.

Wow, wiccachick, what a post. ITA. I don't know how you AMC fans can persevere this. I applaud you!

Its to make the show more easily accessible to new (teen) viewers. References to the past might confuse their small minds and make them change the channel to an simple NBC show. As just one example there was a reference a while back to Billy Clyde Tuggle. It was nothing more than a 'blink and you'll miss it' line thrown in by the script writer as a nod to long-time viewers. Regardless it got that writer a spanking from the higher-ups.

Considering AMC has always been known for using history of their characters (before MMT's latest reign of terror in changing every bit of history she can think of ) I'm shocked that they have been allowed to do this. So what if the young people don't know who Billy Clyde Tuggle was? All they have to do is do a search on one of the AMC sites and they will read all about it. . Its ridiculous to think that young people are not intelligent enough to do that or that they will change the channel if one or two names from the past are mentioned. Are we not supposed to remember Mona Kane, Erica's beloved mother, who was a mainstay in Erica's life? Are we not supposed to remember there is a Ruth Martin who is the mom of Tad , Jeff and wife of Joe? Just because they haven't been seen for a while doesn't mean AMC has to try to make them appear to be forgotten.

I still maintain that the loyal viewers of these daytime shows are the people who have watched it for years. We get disgusted and sometimes tune out for a while, but for the most part we stick with it and if it weren't for us there would be no daytime dramas..JMO of course

And to add one more point to my talk about historical references and dumbing down scripts, this post got me thinking about when I first really entered the soap world. I began by watching Another World because it was on at 11:00 AM which was the only soap convenient for me at the time. This was around 1994 when the show was still relatively complex and had not eliminated most of its history. Personally I enjoyed the challenge of trying to figure out who was related to who, what everyone's history was with everyone else, who the past characters were that were mentioned in the dialogue. I was not a teen at the time but I refuse to believe it would be any different for them. If you want peope to invest in your show why not make it so they have to put in some effort, some time, maybe some online research? That will get them to invest, not a show that seemingly has no history.

See I completely agree with you. As a long time soap viewer I personally believe that the appeal of soaps is that they provide a fictional place where all the people and places are familiar. It's like a fictional home away from home and you grow attached to who these people are. That's not going to happen if the characters are constantly written differently to accomodate playing fan wars or to get a WTH moment. It won't happen if a viewer remembers a very important part of Pine Valley history because it changed the canvas or told a very compelling story and then that story is completely rewritten. The viewer loses that connection. Storytelling weaves a tapestry and if you tug a big string like Erica's abortion storyline, you are unraveling the whole thing.

I think that daytime can draw in new viewers if they ACTIVELY do the exact opposite of this "dumbing down" that you mentioned. People will be attracted to the "home" feeling of Pine Valley, Port Charles, Genoa City or whatever soap city you like if they feel involved. In order to make it home and people to feel involved, the history HAS to be there, the characters have to be strong and consistantly written, and there has to be a real story to tell. The more stories and adventures that a viewer experiences with characters they love, the more connected they will be and then they're hooked. It's the HOME of it that is the hook- not the young hot bods or friday shockers.

I don't think they want out of daytime but I KNOW they see it as terminally ill and thus they see no need to perhaps consider replacing Brian. To them it's not Brian's fault or his team's fault, daytime is simply dying and there is nothing that can be done about it so just let Brian keep his job because it does not matter who is running the ship. The people above Brian basically have a "well daytime is a lost cause so lets just focus on the prime-time line-up" mentality.

I absolutely concur.

.

So it's a self fulfilling prophecy. Because they can't be innovative and creative enough to produce a quality product they doom themselves to failure.