OLTL- All Better in 3 Easy Steps

A muse writer? Meaning a chance to send in all of my positive happies and not so fluffies when the urge to either hug or break my TV overwhelms me? Wow, almost too good to be true. I’m Becca, 22 meaning I’m somewhere in that target demographic that shows love to mention when the ratings look flat, and I have lived on all three ABC soaps since I was born.

Things recently on all three have been hit or miss with GH doing a lot of the missing and AMC coming close but still not quite hitting the nail on the head or not picking the right vile of Dr. Hayward’s to dupe the audience into disregarding all previous history. Actually come to think of it GH could use some of that too. But that is another rant for another day.

Today I want to talk about the show that I stayed the most loyal to but which lately has lost my interest, One Life to Live. I have devised a three part system that would easily place my favorite soap back on track. Dena, I hope you are taking notes!

1.) Drag, Drag, Drag… Bam!

This timing thing has got to stop. Really. No soap messes up the delicate art of timing a storyline like OLTL does. Sure on AMC they drag them out and on GH they cut them short but OLTL has both offenses causing a hodgepodge mess.

Example one: John and Natalie- I watched the two of them beat around the bush for three damn years, enough to make me think maybe Paul and Natalie were adorable. Obviously the excruciatingly slow pace caused brain damage. Then all of a sudden they were a couple, a real intense couple in a blink of an eye. And then Cris was back and they were broken up. Where were my little moments? The stuff they had been stringing me on with for three years. Instead it was wham bam let me leave some cash on the night stand. I wanted to see John awkwardly fumbling to ask Natalie out, to see them slowly transition from friends to more. But alas OLTL doesn’t do that.

Same thing with Michael and Marcie.  For months and months they were split up. Why? I can’t even really remember. And the sudden urge to give it another go wasn’t what irked me. What irked me is two weeks after they started dating again Michael popped the question. Should the fans get a little wooing first? Or at least a steamy love scene? Sorry but you are cutting out the whole yummy part… which brings me to…

2.) Mix it up.

I don’t know why. I loved Marcie and Al but I just never felt the same spark with Michael and Marcie. I’m not sure if that is a compliment to NM’s acting ability but Al and Michael are just too different for me. However in a rather dull summer the idea of Natalie and Michael was really kinda hitting the spot for me.

They were cute but no too cute. She punched him and he called her on every little game she was playing. They hated each other but not really and its those love\hate things that always seem to have the most passion (harking back to Sarah Brown and Maurice Benard’s Carly and Sonny) And it didn’t hurt that Melissa and Nathan had chemistry in spades. Yet before they could even think about letting it slowly play out (I for one who have loved Mikey being Natty’s shoulder when she learned that both Cris and John had lied to her) Dena was whisking Michael off wedding chapel. And for us fans it will boil down to this, Michael and Marcie will become irrelevant and then fade away.

Which sucks. Because I love Marcie and while I was drooling over images of Nikey (Natalie+ Mikey) the whole Rex and Marcie dynamic caught my eye and that would have been an interesting little foursome. I’m sorry but repetitive triangles aren’t for me so why not space it around a bit.

Example- Cris\Vangie\John (Or Maybe Hugh), John\Natalie\Michael, Michael\Marcie\Rex, Adrianna\Rex\Marice,

It’s not the same foursome swapping partners. It’s involved and layered and positively brilliant if I do say so myself.

And some swapping might help the vet couples as well. Didn’t anyone get a kick out of David and Viki? And this debacle of Todd and Blair is too messy to fix right now. Give them some new partners and maybe in a year I can forget that the whole Margaret storyline ever took place. Seriously chemistry testing ala this summer is fun. So why not go for it?

3. Family Matters

This is where OLTL has really been bad. I can’t understand what has happened to the families. Besides Dorian and her Cramer girls (and I haven’t seen much of Kelly holding Blair’s hand lately) their isn’t much in the way of family.

Why didn’t Asa spend the summer mucking up Natalie rescue by throwing money around? And why isn’t he just all over Jessica’s DID? Because he is too busy worrying over Spencer Truman? Give me a break.

Bringing in NuClint was a start and so was bringing in Layla. I love her and Vangie but where was she when her sister needed her at the trial? I assume watching Jaime since Antonio seems to have forgotten his daughter and both Vega boys can’t remember their mammi.

The thing with family is if you are not gonna play it then that’s fine- just don’t expect me to care when you make some character a long lost Buchanan. Because right now the Buchanan clan like the rest of the families just ain’t much more than a holiday obligation.

So, Dena, I hope your notebook is full and I hope everyone else will let me know what they agree or disagree with at Dreamer17555@aol.com

I’m Outtie,

Becca

Please note (from Katrina):  We have two different Beccas posting Muse Columns at EOS today.  They are two different people.  :)