So what if they have earned the distinction of “least watched daytime soap?”
Sure, almost every character has shot or been shot by another character (or both), and people pop in and out of comas like the little heads in a Whack-a-Mole game. Affairs and kidnappings occur with the regularity of a Boomer on a fiber supplement, and every scene ends with one character staring vacantly into the camera so that the audience will come back for The Response.
This is what soap operas DO, and I am distraught that As the World Turns won’t get to do it any more, come September. This neverending charade of misery has been my guilty pleasure on and off since my mother hooked me in high school during summer vacation, and I am going to miss Carly, Barbara, Jack, Lucinda, Margo, Emily, Kim, Bob, Lily, weird Paul and even perky Katie and stolid Holden like I would miss a big pack of familymembers that suddenly disappeared.
I don’t get to see it every day but most soaps can be caught up with in about the first ten minutes every five years or so. It’s one reason they are so popular. They never make you feel dumb.
Besides, ATWT has hatched such stars Meg Ryan, Marisa Tomei and Julianne Moore and scored enough daytime Emmies to fill the party goods warehouse where Barbara has recently been held hostage by evil Iris Dembrowski. That’s proof enough it’s quality entertainment.
Besides, this show has entertained daytimers for 54 tear-stained years. With backstory like that, the characters in ATWT are so multi-dimensional that they frequently shapeshift from beloved heroine to hated villainess and back in the same episode. Of course, often that gets them committed to mental health institutes (I hope Meg gets out before the show ends).
Watching ATWT has even taught me a few things that have come in handy in my own work: mainly, that people will watch (read) anything if they care enough about the characters, and that a writer must never leave a scene without a gasp uttered, a secret learned, a body discovered, an illicit kiss stolen, a villain snickering, a hero passing out, a patient’s amnesia starting to lift, a pregnancy test stick turning pink, or a note carelessly tossed into a wastebasket from which it is sure to be retrieved.
But don’t misunderstand; I am not trying to justify having watched ATWT all these years — I am pretty much over the guilty part of the pleasure. I merely mourn the passing of old friends who wear designer gowns to the local burger joint and get really great facelifts every few years so that they never seem to age.
I do so love fantasy.
Lindagodfrey's Blog 
Why, thank ya, Ma’am fer those kind words…t’aint nuthin’ really…just have an old bad habit of lookin’ stuff up. Back when ah was knee-high to a sasquatch we had to go to the library fer that…and now that we have these computin- machines ah just sorta natcherally….
No, but seriously. I was afraid that many of your readers might be too young to remember the shows I referenced. If you want to know how long ago that was they still advertised cigarettes on TV and what followed Edge of Night (at least in Chillicothe, Ohio where I was then living) was the syndicated version AMOS AND ANDY. Other shows that were quite popular then were Art Linkletter’s HOUSE PARTY and QUEEN FOR A DAY and DECEMBER BRIDE and…
and all of them are gone and most of those people (including the people I was watching the shows with) are dead.
THAT’S how long ago that was.
Change…progress… (sigh).
Well, it’s like they say:
“Like sands through an hourglass
So are the Days of Our Lives….”
Meanwhile, over on my wordpress blog I’m celebrating the Centre for Fortean Zoology and its director, Jon Downes who had a guest spot on FACT OR FAKED (the Beast of Dartmoor segment). Jon is a great friend of our mutual buddy Nick Redfern (nice plug he gave you in MEMOIRS OF A MONSTER HUNTER btw) and the CFZ does very important work as I’m sure you know.
Anyway, I got mad when Fact or Faked glossed over who he was (they also edited the hell out of their interview with him but one expects that—the show is only so long) but they didn’t even MENTION the Centre.
So I’m all about giving it (and Jon, whose book THE OWLMAN AND OTHERS is one of the basic crypto-texts everyone should read…like your book THE BEAST OF BRAY ROAD and Nick’s THREE MEN SEEKING MONSTERS (did nyou see my review of that for Amazon.com? Nick liked it 🙂 http://tinyurl.com/2wlr25y
is one everyone SHOULD read.
Cass you have such a fine way with online documentation of shows and such. True that progress will march on, but not always to fine places. I guess sooner or later all those facelifts will crumble and the actors will not be able to dodder onto the sets anyway. At least they can all go out looking good.
Yes, I felt bad for GLers last year too – those people DO become your friend in a weird but comforting way. I agree with your sentiments to CBS.
I know how you feel! I watched Guiding Light for thirty-three years and when it ended last September, I was so sad. It felt like when your best friend moves to another city. I know soaps are silly. (My husband always said I’m too smart to watch soaps. Haha, fooled him!) But they are definitely addicting, and for a storyteller, they are rich with lessons about characterization and building suspense in a storyline.
Sorry we’re losing ATWT. Damn you, CBS!
😀 Nicole
If only one of the characters were a werewolf…then maybe we could get a five year extension while they try to figure out which one 🙂
The passing of the soaps is sad…they began with radio and have been part of television from ITS beginning. But they are “too expensive” for modern sponsors…who get more “bang for their buck” lesser fare.
So As the World Turns leaves the airwaves…joining THE EDGE OF NIGHT http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Edge_of_Night and SECRET STORM
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Secret_Storm and the others I remember watching as a child with my mother and grandmother on the amazing and magical thing called television which looked VERY much like this: http://www.wired.com/images/article/magazine/test2007/bb_greatestgadget_ff.jpg
But one can’t hold back progress…only sometimes it we wish we could.