CHRISTINE BARTOLUCCI/ABC; Howard Wise/jpistudios.com; XJJohnson/jpistudios.com
Vet Set: Longtime faves like GH’s Laura (Genie Francis), B&B’s Eric (John McCook) and DAYS’s Abe (James Reynolds) were spotlighted in 2023.
My colleagues have done a great job highlighting 2023’s best and worst stories. I agree with most of them… here’s my two cents!
GENERAL HOSPITAL
Best: Playing the vets
Anna dated Valentin and got stalked, Felicia teamed up with Holly to best Victor, Laura ran Port Charles, Robert dated Diane, Lucy tried to save Deception, Alexis upped her game at The Invader, and Tracy, Eddie Maine, Lois and Monica all returned to the Quartermaine fold.
Tracy, especially, is the gift that keeps on bitching.
Tracy (accusatory): “You look unusually happy.”
Brook Lynn: “Chase and I are getting married.”
Tracy: “Sign a prenup.”
Ha! We may not have loved every story (personally, I miss Alexis as P.C.’s legal eagle) but it’s been a long time since this many core faves from the 1980s and 90s were front and center and I applaud it.
Worst: Too many characters
Ryan, Heather, Victor, Nikolas, Britt, Cameron, Gladys, Austin and Mason said good-bye this year but there are still waaaay too many folks wandering around P.C. for GH to effectively tell long story. Example: Charlotte was shot by Anna, revealed to be brainwashed by Victor, gave her “poppa” the death stare, and then disappeared for weeks until her name came up when Liz and Jake were Christmas tree shopping. Oh, right! Charlotte! What’s up with that drama?
Jake: “I started reading about gun control groups.”
No. That cracked little Cassadine could have driven story for weeks (A-listers! Blackmail! Valentin lying to the cops! Nina deleting security tape!) but it faded into a social issue blip so GH could focus on all the other peeps who need airtime.
Fewer characters = stronger storytelling.
More please
OG one-on-ones like Lucy/Scotty, Ned/Lois, Carly/Ava, Anna/Felicia, Laura/Sonny, Alexis/Diane, Tracy/Monica.
Enough already
With the farm animals. Spend the money allotted for llamas and alpacas on flying Emma Samms in from London for another welcome visit from Holly.
YOUNG AND RESTLESS
Best: Core families drove story
The Newmans, Abbotts, Chancellors and Winters haven’t been featured this much since Katherine and Neil were alive, and that deserves a big high five. I’m especially partial to Victor, Ashley, and Jill, who were the straws that stirred the most dramatic drinks, with Nikki joining them the end of the year to get kidnapped and glurg vodka straight from the bottle. Victor’s kids also showed they haven’t learned a thing through 900 marriages, with Nick and Adam both romancing Suffering Sally while Victoria went down yet another tortured romantic path.
Victoria: “You have zero respect for my instincts.”
Victor: “Your instincts led you to Billy Boy Abbott, J.T. Hellstrom, Ashland Locke and now Nate Hastings.”
Victoria: “Leave my exes out of this.”
How can we? She’s the poster girl of bad dating decisions, yet seems to be a very effective CEO. Perhaps the HR department at Newman Enterprises can vet her next boyfriend.
Worst: Too many business stories
We shouldn’t need LinkedIn to follow a soap story but that’s where all the hirings, firings and corporate espionage led us. I’ll give you $10 if you can tell me what Audra’s jobs were in 2023, never mind how she could have slept with Kyle and Tucker in the same day and kept her, um, positions. Newman Enterprises, Jabot and Chancellor-Winters saw unprecedented upheaval to what end? So Kyle, Summer, Audra, Nate, Adam, Nick, Victoria, Billy, etc. could bounce from one office to another? When every business has multiple sets but none of the characters has a home bedroom it’s time to rebalance the action.
More please
The Baldwins! Y&R teased us when Gloria and Kevin joined Michael, Lauren and Chloe at Thanksgiving but then the whole clan disappeared. No one beats them for humor and dysfunction, and Michael and Lauren’s easy marital banter is always welcome.
Enough already
With Tucker McCall. Where is his rooting value? He has to do more than sit around drinking brown liquid in hotel lobbies while nastily threatening our faves.
Jack: “Finally we will put an end to Tucker McCall.”
From your mouth…
DAYS OF OUR LIVES
Best: Classic soap tropes
Amnesia, love triangles, blackmail, characters presumed dead, baby swaps — if it’s an oldie but goodie, DAYS is telling it. The year began with Marlena “dying” in John’s arms and ended with them celebrating their anniversary, just one of many stories centered on a character coming back to life. Abe got amnesia, Sloan stole Nicole’s baby, Leo blackmailed Sloan, Holly lusted after her stepbrother Johnny, and Ava fought her attraction to her late lover Jake’s previously unknown twin Stefan.
Ava: “I’m sorry I called you Jake but you look just like him.”
Stefan: “I have his heart beating in my chest, but that’s where the similarities end.”
Except for his face and body…
Worst: Too many new characters
If you found yourself watching entire episodes and thinking, “Who are these people?,” you’re not alone. The problem isn’t just the mass of new faces in recent years, it’s that they were played front-burner in 2023 mostly in vacuums with each other. Newbies Johnny, Chanel, Sloan, Jada, Talia, Leo, Dimitri, Harris, Ava, Stephanie, Alex, Holly, Tate, Theresa and Everett were lightly tethered at best, and some have already come and gone. (It doesn’t help that Alex, Theresa and Everett are being played by actors who recently portrayed very different characters on the same show.) We’ve lost core Salem-ites Jack, Jennifer, Will, Sonny, Belle, Shawn, Philip, Chloe and Gabi in recent years, and don’t even get me started on the hole where Bo and Hope should be. If we can’t have some (or all!) of them back, at least play the newbies with familiar faces. E.g.: Patch and Kayla advising their daughter Stephanie on her disastrous love life would go a long way towards making us care about those strangers wooing her when the canvas has changed this much.
More Please
The best throwback of the year was BODY AND SOUL, an ingenious soap-within-a-soap that put big hair and shoulder pads on veterans Marlena, Kate and Kayla and had them deliciously overact with dudes named Thrust and Rhett. Spinoff please!
Enough Already
With one-note baddies. Rolf, Clyde, Orpheus, Megan, Konstantin… They come in, do their worst, and get out with no real consequences. It’s so much more fun to have a villain in residence like Stefano DiMera, Sami Brady and Victor Kiriakis, who we lost this year (sniff!). Leo has potential. Flesh him out, and make Stefan more like his namesake Stefan-OH!
BOLD AND BEAUTIFUL
Best: Returning Eric to the front burner
He had good run with Quinn, but she disappeared in 2022 and took Eric’s storyline with her. Eric was revived in 2023 with a renewed romance with Donna, a “fashion challenge” at Forrester against his son Ridge, and a fatal disease that will hopefully turn out to not be so fatal thanks to Finn and his magic doctoring. Most shows have a number of older vets who give us that feeling of coming home when we watch them (think Y&R’s Nikki/Victor, DAYS’s Doug/Julie, GH’s Tracy and Monica) but B&B has only one. Please come back to the land of the living, Eric — and stay!
Worst: Too many repetitive stories
Brooke/Ridge, Eric/Donna, Hope/Thomas, Liam trying to make fetch happen with Steffy… all repeats. After Hope and Thomas did the nasty and everyone was up in arms about it, the dialogue went something like this: “Hope Hope Hope Hope Hope Hope.” Liam got a little more variation: “Hope Steffy Steffy Steffy Hope Steffy.”
I’m exaggerating, but not by much. Liam’s decade of ping-ponging between the two stepsisters would be so much more effective if he honored his three past marriages to Steffy — and two marriages to Hope —instead of pretending last fall that he’s “spent most of his adult life loving Steffy.” We know that’s not true because we watched it. Move on.
More Please
Zende really came into his own at the end of the year, showing talent and backbone within the family company. Yes, Forrester is famous for nepotism, but Eric’s grandson clearly has the chops to take on all comers in 2024.
Enough Already
With characters disappearing. In 2022 it was Shauna, Flo and Quinn. In 2023 it was Paris, Wyatt and Taylor. Taylor is particularly jarring since she’s the mother of two major characters (Steffy and Thomas) and was Brooke’s bestie a scant six months ago. I realize not everyone can have a Stephanie Forrester-worthy exit but can someone at least mention why Taylor is MIA?
GENERAL SHOUT OUT: To all four of the soaps, whose execs and employees did yeoman work while keeping the shows afloat for five months in 2023 without their writers. Some stories slowed down while others sped up, but the shows remained watchable and entertaining while basically treading water (DAYS is TBD but kudos in advance). Well done!
*Hey. It’s only my opinion.
