Yesterday was the last episode of All My Children which ended as a cliffhanger. I thought that was perfect because the storyline leading up to the end was a bit sappy with the nasty character of Dr. David bringing back characters who had been dead for years – Dixie and Stuart. Zach’s body had never been recovered so we could let that one go. But there were implications that Babe might be alive, they never resolved that one. I liked the beginning where they blended old and new clips of the families but they didn’t do enough. They should have had a two hour finale and brought back everyone; Tara and Phil and her kids Charlie and Kate; Donna and Chuck, Kelly and Linc, Ellen and Mark with Devon and her kid.
Oh well, it’s over now and I can concentrate on One Life to Live which will end in January. It has more time to come up with a better ending though I am not impressed with how they’ve handled the double Todd storyline, knocking off the one Todd a.k.a. Victor was not good. Now what they should do is bring Dr. David to Llanview so he can raise Victor from the dead – it isn’t like that hasn’t happened already in Llanview!
They are putting a cooking show on called The Chew to replace All My Children. What is daytime television going to be like without soap operas? I can hardly believe that I am lamenting soap operas but the truth is I kind of enjoy them as escapist fare. There have been some really excellent storylines through the years where the soaps made ground breaking history. Soaps were the first shows to have integrated marriages, talk about cancer, talk about teen homosexuality to name a few. All My Children had the first legal abortion story as well as the first lesbian story in daytime TV. One Life to Live had the first gay teen storyline and was also the first show to talk about “passing” as white. That was Carla’s storyline when One Life to Live was still fairly new.
In the beginning soap operas were relatively normal shows about normal people, a lot of working class people that the audience could relate to. Over the years the storylines have gotten really ridiculous, first because actors who wanted off the show were killed off and then when they wanted to come back on the show they’d have to create a miracle cure or some other unbelievable coming back to life story. From there it was just one more step into crazy land. The Young and the Restless and The Bold and the Beautiful (same producers and writers) haven’t gone to that extreme. Instead they have the same characters of about 8 people just sleep until the incest is too sickening to endure. I do not understand how these 2 shows survive when my own soaps have much better stories and characters. They at least bring in new characters all the time so people aren’t sleeping with their sisters or nieces (or daughters).
It’s the end of an era when Erica Kane walked across the room – oh, before that, I screamed with laughter when Jack turned from the door and said “Frankly Erica, I don’t give a damn . . . “ a la Rhett Butler. Too, too funny. I bet he’s wanted to do that for years! Walt Wiley, you had the perfect ending!
Cliff hanger . . . .
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