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Ready, Set, Faux Pas: 40+ Times Our Soaps Totally Screwed Up
Friday, April 21st, 2023
We’re all on the same page, right? We want our soaps to nail it day in, day out and whatever comes between day in and day out, too. But just like nobody’s perfect, no show is perfect, either. So now and again, they… um… They screw up. Big time.
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It’s OK, though. We forgive them. We forget. We tune back in tomorrow and hope for the best. And it’s been this way since the dawn of daytime. Just look at the below photo gallery, which recounts some of the most major mistakes The Young and the Restless, The Bold and the Beautiful, Days of Our Lives and General Hospital ever made. And not just them but past shows like Guiding Light, Santa Barbara, All My Children and As the World Turns. Not one of them has been able to avoid the occasional misstep.
For one daytime drama, that meant trying to sell viewers on the idea of former siblings as lovers. (Hard pass.) For another, that meant killing off an adored character, then trying to undo the oopsie by giving their portrayer another role. (Nice try, but no dice.) For yet another sudser, that meant transforming itself into an unrecognizable program that even its former devotees didn’t want to watch. (Why? Just… why?!?)
But enough with the teasers. Let’s get into the nitty and the gritty, shall we? Click below to see if you agree with our picks for the times soaps screwed up the worst. Then hit the comments with the mistakes you’d have added to the list.
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Image: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
1/48
<p><em>All My Children</em> established itself as a trailblazing daytime drama by having Erica Kane get soaps’ first legal abortion in 1973. Thirty-two years later, new execs shrugged off the milestone and altogether undid it — “Who needs continuity!” — by introducing the diva’s grown son.</p>
Image: John Paschal/JPI
2/48
<p>In 2015, <em>Bold & Beautiful</em> attracted the rarest of rarities — actual mainstream attention — with its reveal that Maya Avant is transgender. Then the show capitalized on its moment in the spotlight by… Oh dear. Backburnering and writing off the vivacious character.</p>
Image: Jill Johnson/JPI
3/48
<p>Rather than recognize what a charismatic leading man it had in Robert Scott Wilson, <em>Days of Our Lives</em> made Ben Weston the Necktie Killer, then had to do backflips to redeem the serial killer so that he could be cared with Bo and Hope Brady’s daughter, Ciara.</p>
Image: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
4/48
<p>After <em>General Hospital</em> bumped off Duke Lavery, it tried in 1989 to replace Ian Buchanan with Greg Beecroft, a move that backfired so spectacularly that the storyline was yanked in only a matter of months. When the show finally brought back Buchanan in 2012, it demonstrated that it had learned, er, nothing by dispatching Duke yet again.</p>
Image: Sean Smith/JPI
5/48
<p>After the cancellation of <em>As the World Turns</em>, <em>Young & Restless</em> managed to snag Maura West to play Diane Jenkins in 2010… and wrote the character so atrociously that the powers that be, if not Nick Newman, kissed her goodbye a year later.</p>
Image: Jill Johnson/JPI
6/48
<p>The 1994 storyline in which <em>Days of Our Lives</em> heroine Marlena Evans was possessed by a demon has gone down in soap history as a classic. Not everyone liked it, but boy, do they remember it — <em>and</em> its epic climax. But instead of come up with an original idea, the show trotted out this same old one in 2021 but without the emotional stakes or sense that had made the first time around hella compelling.</p>
Image: Jesse Grant/JPI
7/48
<p><em>Bold & Beautiful</em> viewers are used to its quasi-incestuous undertones. But even they couldn’t stomach the proposed 2012 pairing of Ridge and Bridget Forrester, who’d spent their entire lives believing that they were either father and daughter or siblings. (We don’t blame ’em for closing their eyes, either; we did that, too!)</p>
Image: NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal/Getty Images
8/48
<p>In 1985, <em>Days of Our Lives</em> shifted its focus from generational stories to youth-oriented plots, doing vet Jed Allan’s Don Craig the ultimate disservice in the process. His popular character was treated as such a nonentity, he was simply sent on a trip to the post office from which he never returned.</p>
Image: Jill Johnson/JPI
9/48
<p>When Steve Burton returned to <em>General Hospital</em> in 2017, the show basically said “pass” to the golden opportunity to play a love triangle between his real Jason Morgan, Billy Miller’s unreal Jason Morgan and “their” wife, Sam.</p>
Image: NBC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
10/48
<p>Behind-the-scenes conflict with the powers that be led to <em>Another World</em> supercouple Steve Frame and Alice Matthews being broken up by the firing of their portrayers, George Reinholt and Jacqueline Courtney. But it was <em>One Life to Live</em> that had the last laugh, as it quickly snagged the fan favorites for new parts.</p>
Image: Suzanne Opton/Getty Images
11/48
<p>As ALS took its toll on Michael Zaslow in the late 1990s, <em>Guiding Light</em> recast one of its brightest stars as Roger Thorpe rather than acknowledge that he and only he should play the iconic villain.</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI
12/48
<p>Yeah, it <em>would</em> be hilarious, the idea of <em>Young & Restless</em> deconstructing its hot Summer/Kyle/Lola triangle long before its expiration date and backburnering (and ultimately losing) future movie star Sasha Calle… if that hadn’t been exactly what happened in 2021.</p>
Image: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
13/48
<p>In 1991, <em>General Hospital</em> granted Anthony Geary’s wish to play someone other than Luke Spencer. But the audience didn’t take to Luke’s cousin Bill Eckert nearly as much as Julia Barrett did, so the Emmy magnet ultimately had to get his hair re-permed and go back to his original role.</p>
Image: NBC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
14/48
<p><em>Another World</em> achieved its desired shock when it killed off beloved Frankie Frame in 1996. But the NBC soap was dealt a nasty surprise of its own by viewers, who ultimately responded by tuning out in protest.</p>
Image: CBS screenshot
15/48
<p>Jacqueline MacInnes Wood gave her all to the <em>Bold & Beautiful</em> storyline that turned Steffy Forrester into a drug addict. But when all was said and done, the plot was wrapped up and the character, completely recovered in as little time as it just took you to read this caption. That’s <em>not</em> how drug addiction works!</p>
Image: John Paschal/JPI
16/48
<p><em>As the World Turns</em> denied that it had put a kissing ban on its gay supercouple, Luke Snyder and Noah Mayer. But furious fans thought otherwise, especially when “Nuke” was the only twosome not to smooch on Valentine’s Day 2008! (If you’re gonna BS folks, at least don’t be <em>obvious</em> about it!)</p>
Image: Jill Johnson/JPI
17/48
<p><em>Days of Our Lives</em> should have had on its hands another great love-to-hate vixen a la Sami Brady in Gwen Rizczcech. But every time we came close to feeling something more than ambivalence about talented Emily O’Brien’s character, the writing undermined her yet again.</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
18/48
<p>Hoping to goose the ratings of brilliant but struggling <em>Ryan’s Hope</em> in 1984, ABC hired <em>General Hospital</em> MVP Robin Mattson to step in as Delia Coleridge. But the role was a poor fit, and OG Ilene Kristen was soon brought back to her infamous role.</p>
Image: Procter & Gamble Productions
19/48
<p>From the time that Kim Zimmer returned to <em>Guiding Light</em> in 1995, Reva Shayne was given one silly story (she’s Amish!) after another (no, she’s a princess!) after another (time travel, anyone?) and another (“Let’s clone her!”). Pretty sure, had the show not ended, Reva would have been in outer space by now.</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
20/48
<p>Instead of champagne and an anniversary party, <em>General Hospital</em> gave Stuart Damon a pink slip in 2007, the year that he should’ve been celebrating three decades as Alan Quartermaine. To add insult to injury, Monica’s better half wasn’t just <em>written</em> off, he was <em>killed</em> off, leaving Leslie Charleson fuming to<em> Soap Opera Weekly</em> about “the blatant disregard for the veterans.”</p>
Image: Sean Smith/JPI
21/48
<p>The 2012 marriage of <em>Young & Restless</em>’ Sharon Newman and father figure — not to mention frequent father-<em>in-law</em> — Victor turned the “ick” factor all the way up to 11.</p>
Image: John Paschal/JPI
22/48
<p>Unable to spot any future use for a legacy character like Aly Forrester, <em>Bold & Beautiful</em> killed off Thorne and Darla’s unstable daughter in 2015 in a plot twist that had… Hey, whad’ya know? No long-term repercussions whatsoever.</p>
Image: Getty Images
23/48
<p><em>One Life to Live</em> fans were totally sold on Marcie Walsh’s romance with Al Holden — more so perhaps than the show realized. After killing him off, the powers that be were forced to rehire his portrayer and drop the character’s soul into a new (and very familiar-looking) body.</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
24/48
<p><em>Ryan’s Hope</em> had a hit on its hands in 1981 with the love triangle that had formed between Michael Pavel, his boss and her daughter. So what did the show do? Kill off the cad and let the hot plot go corpse-cold.</p>
Image: John Paschal/JPI
25/48
<p>Darius McCrary is a fine actor. But <em>Young & Restless</em> had to have been as high as a kite in 2009 to think that fans would accept him — or <em>anyone</em>, for that matter — as a recast for Shemar Moore as Neil Winters’ brother Malcolm. Ever since McCrary left Genoa City, it’s been Moore who has brought Malcolm home for visits.</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI
26/48
<p><em>Young & Restless</em>/<em>Bold & Beautiful</em> psycho Sheila Carter is <em>hardly</em> the only character to come back from the dead. But she <em>is</em> probably the one who has done so the most often. At this point, she’s been resurrected more often that Michael Myers and stretched credibility well past the breaking point.</p>
Image: Jill Johnson/JPI
27/48
<p><em>Days of Our Lives</em> struck pay dirt with the pairing of Xander and Sarah but broke them up so quickly and often, we could almost forget that they were a couple, never mind a super- one.</p>
Image: JPI (2)
28/48
<p><em>General Hospital</em> tried unmake the mistake of killing off Emily Quartermaine by reintroducing Natalia Livingston to the canvas as her character’s surprise twin. Surprise: It didn’t work.</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI
29/48
<p><em>Bold & Beautiful</em> made even us queasy with the 2021 twist that found Zoe wrecking sis Paris’ date with Zende by ensuring that she would have… let’s say… digestive issues. “What are we,” we wanted to ask, “7-year-olds?”</p>
Image: New World Releasing/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
30/48
<p>Don’t feel bad, ma’am, we dozed off, too. NBC’s last-ditch attempt to save <em>Santa Barbara</em> — by installing Paul Rauch as EP and Pam Long as headwriter — actually doomed the once-brilliant soap, which on their watch ceased to resemble the show that we had known and loved.</p>
Image: ABC
31/48
<p>Though <em>General Hospital</em> viewers didn’t love to hate Peter August, they just plain hated the villain, the soap kept him going for so long, he might as well have been played by the Energizer Bunny.</p>
Image: Jesse Grant/JPI
32/48
<p>In 2003,<em> Young & Restless</em> had the bright idea to make mortal enemies Katherine and Jill mother and daughter. Thankfully, fans said loudly and clearly enough that they wanted the adversaries at each other’s throats and not in one another’s arms that their history was soon re-rewritten.</p>
Image: NBC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
33/48
<p>When <em>Another World</em> hit No. 1 in the ratings in 1978, EP Paul Rauch had the bright idea to expand the show to 90 minutes. The trouble was, even then, who had an hour and a half to devote to their favorite show every day? So while the length of the program grew, the number of its viewers did not. In fact, ultimately, the number <em>shrank</em> in large part due to…</p>
Image: Toronto Star/Getty Images
34/48
<p>NBC used the expanded <em>Another World</em> to set up Beverlee McKinsey for her own spinoff. But when the soap legend took megabitch Iris Cory to <em>Texas</em> in 1980, two million fans abandoned the mothership. </p>
Image: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
35/48
<p><em>General Hospital</em> is by and large a show that has some surplus cast to it. But in 2008, it loosed the Text-Message Killer on… altogether the wrong people! With the murders of Maxie Jones’ sister Georgie and the Quartermaines’ daughter Emily, we wound up with “two legacy characters killed off for no real reason,” tweeted Rory George, “both of whom had had popular pairings.”</p>
Image: NBC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
36/48
<p>We understood why ABC would want to snap up Linda Dano after <em>Another World</em> was cancelled in 1999. But hiring Felicia Gallant’s portrayer to reprise the forgettable role she’d played on <em>One Life to Live</em> in the late ’70s — <span style="text-decoration: line-through">Gretel</span> Rae Cummings — was a head-scratcher. Then crossing that character from <em>One Life to Live</em> to <em>All My Children</em> to <em>General Hospital</em> to <em>Port Charles</em> was just too much of what was already a questionable thing.</p>
Image: Jill Johnson/JPI
37/48
<p>We’re gonna go ahead and let this photo from <em>Days of Our Lives</em> speak from itself. Though, if we were it, we’d exercise our right to remain silent.</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI
38/48
<p>Why did <em>Young & Restless</em> bother casting a hottie like Rory Gibson as Noah Newman if only to saddle the character with endless amounts of man pain and a dead-end romance with Jack Abbott’s surprise granddaughter? The show could learn a lot from <em>General Hospital</em> and its slow burn — emphasis on the burn — with Evan Hofer’s Dex.</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
39/48
<p>With all the lawsuits and everything, we got why <em>General Hospital</em> had to have Roger Howarth stop playing <em>One Life to Live</em> fave Todd Manning. But we’ll never be able to wrap our brains around the fact that after he miraculously made Franco Baldwin a viable love interest for Elizabeth Webber, the powers that be killed him off <em>just</em> so that they could immediately bring him back as Austin Gatlin-Holt — a character we’d trade for Liz’s late hubby any day.</p>
Image: Paul Skipper/JPI
40/48
<p>Ever since <em>Days of Our Lives</em>’ headline-grabbing but ultimately pointless Melaswen story in 2004, the show has seemed to kill off and resurrect characters so frequently that, at this point, their loved ones barely break their stride to bother mourning.</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
41/48
<p>After 15 years as headwriter of <em>The Edge of Night</em>, Henry Slesar had made the soap one of daytime’s smartest; its mysteries were worthy of <em>Law & Order</em>. Nevertheless, ABC fired him in 1983 and suffered the consequences: The show was dead and buried by the end of ’84.</p>
Image: Sean Smith/JPI
42/48
<p>Even <em>Young & Restless</em> seemed to realize how dumb it was to kill off Jerry Douglas’ beloved John Abbott in 2006. Afterwards, the show brought him back as other characters, visions, ghosts — you name it.</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty Images
43/48
<p><em>General Hospital</em> has historically shown no reluctance to recast Lucky Spencer. The show has replaced Jonathan Jackson twice, first with Jacob Young, then with Greg Vaughan (Eric, <em>Days of Our Lives</em>). So keeping Luke and Laura’s son away from Port Charles all these years — he last popped up in 2015 — just makes him look like a deadbeat dad. That can’t be the goal… right?</p>
Image: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
44/48
<p>Too soon! Too soon! <em>General Hospital</em> couldn’t wait to give Anthony Geary’s Luke Spencer a new love interest after Genie Francis left as bride Laura in the early ’80s. So Demi Moore was rushed in there as Jackie Templeton… and rushed into a different coupling almost as fast!</p>
Image: Jill Johnson/JPI
45/48
<p>We’re down with the occasional mask that changes a character’s height and voice as well as their face. But at one point, <em>Days of Our Lives</em> was using the over-the-top gimmick <em>so</em> much that we could scarcely tell who was who. Worse, we didn’t <em>care</em>.</p>
Image: John Paschal/JPI
46/48
<p>For a show about a fashion dynasty, <em>Bold & Beautiful</em> seems to have no problem whatsoever with leaving threads dangling. It ended the marriage of Rick and Maya Forrester without telling viewers why, then it went and did the same damn thing with Zende and Nicole Forrester. We want closure… now! Well, ideally long before now, but you know what we mean.</p>
Image: Brian Lowe/JPI
47/48
<p><em>The Young and the Restless</em> may have gotten the love triangle between Nick and Sharon Newman and “other woman” Phyllis Summers out of the death of the couple’s daughter Cassie in 2005, but was it really worth the heartache viewers suffered over the loss of Camryn Grimes’ original character? “I’m still not over it,” tweeted fan Mandie Cross. “This is why Mariah will always be a bittersweet character for me.”</p>
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48/48
