There are people in the world who work best under pressure, operating under the theory that, once you limit yourself to a tiny window of time in which to get something done, you have left yourself no choice but to do it.
I am one of those people. Why do something months in advance when you can do it in a few hours the day before it is due? I find it much easier to focus that way. I have fond memories of the fall of 2004, drinking an entire case of Diet Coke with Lime in one night while I wrote a paper on British War Poetry (...yeah. Good stuff) that was due the next morning. Granted, I was physically shaking and worried that I was going to die of heart failure when I handed it in the next morning, but I got an A, so whatever. Irregular heartbeats can't keep a good woman down!
The people at All My Children, on the other hand, are not that kind of person. This is not to say that I think they'd do a good job, per se, if they had a ton of time to do something, but if they started something far enough in advance, the law of averages says it would have to be a couple of steps up from the crap they get when they rush something.
Like, for example...Tad's reunion with KathyKate. How epically has this been botched?!
The idiocy starts at the top: in the most recent issue of Soap Opera Digest, there is an article about the big reunion with a quote from Brian Frons expressing surprise that it is something that viewers really want to see. Whenever that man opens his mouth, he says something so stupid that words in the English language don't even exist to describe it. I know that he thinks "soap" is a dirty word (hee! Because...soap is clean...whatever, I'm in a mood, shut up) and can't fathom that people tuning into soap operas want to, like, watch soaps, but how is it possible that the man in charge of ABC Daytime is like, "Ohmigod, you guys, it's the weirdest thing, people liked Tad and Dixie together or whatever and they have been waiting for a couple of years to see Tad reunite with their daughter. Can you believe that? These viewers are like martians, with their need for 'emotional payoff' and 'closing open plot threads'. Zany! Let's talk more about reality tv..."
I mean, he could not possibly care less about this. Even the SOAPNet email for this week mentioned Tad's reunion with his and Dixie's daughter LAST in their little AMC blurb:
My main question is...how on earth is Babe capable of going UNDERCOVER as a prostitute? Everything about her screams "I whore myself out to the highest bidder", from her clothes to...um, the fact that she literally does have sex with people for money, social status and to blackmail people into donating bone marrow. But my OTHER question is, shouldn't Tad realizing that his daughter with Dixie is alive and in town be kind of a big deal?
So because Frons is sick of hearing focus groups ask for it, he finally tells the AMC writers to write some sort of story that shows Tad who his daughter is.
BARBARA ESENSTEN: So we need to reunite Tad with his daughter.
JAMES HARMON BROWN: But his daughter is living with Whatshername right now.
BARBARA ESENSTEN: Damn.
JAMES HARMON BROWN: We could have Adam tell Kathy that she'd Tad's daughter and Kathy could be like "Yay! I love Tad! Whatshername sucks!"
BARBARA ESENSTEN: Or we could have Whatshername just get sick of taking care of this kid and drop her off in the park and run away and Tad and Krystal could find her.
JAMES HARMON BROWN: Or we could have aliens take over Pine Valley and transport her from Whatsherface's house to Tad's and Whatsherface could be like "Well, if the aliens want her to be with Tad, who am I to judge?"
BARBARA ESENSTEN: Or...
BARBARA ESENSTEN and JAMES HARMON BROWN: (In Unison) We should totally kill Whatsherface! HIGH FIVE!
I mean, I don't know why I am surprised. This is ABC Daytime we're talking about. You know the episode of The Simpsons where Bart and Lisa play Rock, Paper, Scissor and Lisa thinks to herself "Poor predictable Bart, always choosing rock" and Bart thinks to himself, "Good old rock. Nothing beats rock"? That's what I feel about ABC Daytime. "Poor predictable ABC Daytime, always choosing murder" and ABC Daytime is all "Murder! Woo!"
Blood lust aside...killing off Julia is really the best story here? Really?
