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TV Soaps (Soap Operas) & Continuing Dramas

One special episode of Crossroads opened with Meg Richardson in her office talking to her son Sandy and then she looked right into the camera and started to address the viewers. Sandy looked 'startled' and said something like "you're not allowed do that" Could have been interesting, fortean even, if only Sandy had been a more convincing actor. And if the viewers hadn't been forewarned by the Prog Announcer that Noel Gordon was to give a special announcement that would further bend your already tenuous grasp on reality and probably make your head EXPLODE.
So we learnt that the episodes of Crossroads shown up north in Granada Land were six months ahead of those shown in the south (the joys of regional TV). Granada decided that it would be more advantageous, advertising-wise, if both regions had the same time-line ie the south would skip ahead. Meg/Noel then spent four minutes filling us in on 6 months of highlights and drama we would never see and tying up current loose plot ends - plenty of time. The spell was broken and it all sort of went downhill after that.
 
Indeed it was with its cardboard scenery. Why is it that soap operas always seem to peddle depressing misery? Take Australia for example they could have made a great uplifting story in the "lucky country" but instead they gave us Prisoner Cell Block H, which most people only watched to hear the beautiful theme tune.
Ive just remembered that the producer/creator of Prisoner, neighbours, son and daughters and the young doctors, Reg Watson was also the creator and producer of....Crossroads!
 
The best, and by best i mean it was terrible, soap I've ever seen was Sunset Beach

it was american and ran for 3 years in the late nineties. American soaps rarely ran on uk tv.

Set in a californian beach town, it had the requisite square jawed male hunks and skinny women with fabulous hair.

And it was ridiculous. Back stabbing bitches, stalky men. Evil twins, amnesia, faked pregnancy, stolen babies, murders, fake murders as well as the usual bed hopping and poor people with fabulous homes.

Im sure they did a titanic inspired story?

Also many, many dream sequences and fantasy flashbacks.

And it was so slooooww. Lots of long close ups and staring at the sea.

You could not watch for a month (it was on daily) and the same plot would be running.

It ended with it all being Megs dream and her waking up wizard of oz style, only for that to be the dream and she was in fact living happily ever after in sb.

In the uk this was shown on channel five in the mornings. Pre internet people would write in the the continuity announcer with comments, poems, fan fiction etc, who would read them out over the credits because the credits went on forever.

Should you wish to partake it seems some desperate soul has uploaded the lot.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLGhpQhEcSwdIJAlr4lvm8X3fk9hlNQpq3
 
Yes I loved Sunset Beach. :D It was a brilliant parody. So many people didn't get it, even when you explained that to them.
My favourite storyline

In one of the most outrageous storylines on the show, Virginia drugged Vanessa and, using a turkey baster and some stolen sperm, impregnated her with the child of Tyus Robinson, to make it appear Vanessa had been unfaithful to Michael, who was sterile


in fact the show was even more bonkers than remember

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunset_Beach_(TV_series)
 
Actualy that seems quite normal.

Im sure in some places its a weekly occurance.
 
My favourite storyline

In one of the most outrageous storylines on the show, Virginia drugged Vanessa and, using a turkey baster and some stolen sperm, impregnated her with the child of Tyus Robinson, to make it appear Vanessa had been unfaithful to Michael, who was sterile

in fact the show was even more bonkers than remember

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunset_Beach_(TV_series)
Yes that was my favourite too! I also remember some extreme silliness with Annie and a whipped cream bikini. :rollingw: And I used to love the little asides the characters used to make to the audience. Great stuff.
 
Yes that was my favourite too! I also remember some extreme silliness with Annie and a whipped cream bikini. :rollingw: And I used to love the little asides the characters used to make to the audience. Great stuff.
So now ive fallen down a sunset beach rabbit hole and found an interview with one of the continuity guys.

the bizarre plots - which went on soooooooooo slowly they could be lapped by an elderly snail -



He mention the whipped cream bikini. I dont remember that, but i do remember bens arran jumper!
 
They had McLeod's Daughters on at the hairdressers. It's amazing how well turned out those women manage to be while spending their days wrangling cattle.
 
I remember the Flying Doctors when they were using a Auntie JU 52
or a Ford Tri-motor not sure which but it was a long time ago.
Here's the soundtrack... Hawkwind, from a period where some of those legal difficulties meant they couldn't actually call themselves Hawkwind..
 
When I was too poor even to get a TV and only had a radio I listened to "the Archers" and got quite good at it... (1988 - 92) Helped I was lodging with a guy who religiously taped every episode so I got to hear a lot of the back archive too.

If you asked me about The Archers today - I would not have a clue.
 
I can't believe I'm responsible for a TV soaps thread...

spank-lanalang.jpg


Doof Doof ...
 
One special episode of Crossroads opened with Meg Richardson in her office talking to her son Sandy and then she looked right into the camera and started to address the viewers. Sandy looked 'startled' and said something like "you're not allowed do that" Could have been interesting, fortean even, if only Sandy had been a more convincing actor. And if the viewers hadn't been forewarned by the Prog Announcer that Noel Gordon was to give a special announcement that would further bend your already tenuous grasp on reality and probably make your head EXPLODE.
So we learnt that the episodes of Crossroads shown up north in Granada Land were six months ahead of those shown in the south (the joys of regional TV). Granada decided that it would be more advantageous, advertising-wise, if both regions had the same time-line ie the south would skip ahead. Meg/Noel then spent four minutes filling us in on 6 months of highlights and drama we would never see and tying up current loose plot ends - plenty of time. The spell was broken and it all sort of went downhill after that.
That’s f***ing mental
 
1o6BOq3.jpg
Bad Bungle: can't resist. Apparently this was a real Superman strip in the 1950's. (Lois Lane apparently found her way to the Fortress of Solitude. An annoyed Superman instructed the guardian robot to bend her over his lap and deliver chastisement. Spanking ensued.)
 
When I was too poor even to get a TV and only had a radio I listened to "the Archers" and got quite good at it... (1988 - 92) Helped I was lodging with a guy who religiously taped every episode so I got to hear a lot of the back archive too.

If you asked me about The Archers today - I would not have a clue.

It didn't end well for Nigel (Elizabeth née Archer's husband), that's for sure... I stopped listening to it after that.
 
It didn't end well for Nigel (Elizabeth née Archer's husband), that's for sure... I stopped listening to it after that.

{{Sighs, heavily}} - And Nigel Pargeter was at bottom quite a nice guy, too. Sort of PG Wodehouse-lite, upper-class twit, but in his way a top bloke. Depressing, isn't it?
 
It didn't end well for Nigel (Elizabeth née Archer's husband), that's for sure... I stopped listening to it after that.
It's got more bonkers since then. Give it a whirl! Current plots involve people-traffickers and slave-owners, a pregnant alcoholic being packed off to Rehab and the village gossip giving her neighbours special mentions.

Nigel's death was much-discussed among mathematicians and physicists because of the duration of his death-cry. It went on so long, it was calculated, he'd have had to be falling from the dome of a major cathedral rather than the roof of a country hotel.

One of the aspects I love it for is the clever script.

Recently someone was advised to allow an unsuitable person to join in with something because it was better for him to be, (I paraphrase) y'know, on the inside and getting things wrong or whatever rather than stuck on the outside causing trouble for everyone who's been included in something he's been excluded from...

Or, more succinctly, inside and pissing out rather then outside and pissing in. :chuckle:
 
One special episode of Crossroads opened with Meg Richardson in her office talking to her son Sandy and then she looked right into the camera and started to address the viewers. Sandy looked 'startled' and said something like "you're not allowed do that" Could have been interesting, fortean even, if only Sandy had been a more convincing actor. And if the viewers hadn't been forewarned by the Prog Announcer that Noel Gordon was to give a special announcement that would further bend your already tenuous grasp on reality and probably make your head EXPLODE.
So we learnt that the episodes of Crossroads shown up north in Granada Land were six months ahead of those shown in the south (the joys of regional TV). Granada decided that it would be more advantageous, advertising-wise, if both regions had the same time-line ie the south would skip ahead. Meg/Noel then spent four minutes filling us in on 6 months of highlights and drama we would never see and tying up current loose plot ends - plenty of time. The spell was broken and it all sort of went downhill after that.
didn't know this - I've just adapted this for a page on tvtropes, if this is ok?

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/BreakingTheFourthWall/LiveActionTV
 
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