Whodunit? Who cares is more like it. When was the last time any soap launched a good, solid murder mystery? I get wanting to write a good mystery, especially when everyone is a suspect. As a writer it is always fun to figure out how you're characters would react to such a situation. The problem is, none of the headwriters of the soaps these days do it right.
What brings this up, well AMC chose to kill off David Hayward. Vincent Irizarry is probably the biggest male star on the show currently, and is applauded regularly by both critics and fans. Plus his David is the pot stirrer of Pine Valley, now whose going to do that?
Every soap, every town needs a good villain, Y&R Has Phyllis (welcome back!), B&B has Stephanie and Bill, Days had Sami but she has been defanged, OLTL has Dorian and soon Echo, and GH has Lisa and Sonny (yes he's a villain). AMC mellowed Erica a but too much for her to return to vixenish ways. Like her mother Kendall has been mellowed beyond belief. Greenlee changes character from day to day.
So when was the last successful murder mystery? Many say Days Of Our Lives had it with their Salem Stalker storyline but then ruined it when all of the victims turned out to be alive. I almost agree with their assessment, even people who didn't watch, were tuning in. All of the victims were major, major characters and the murderer was Marlena Evans, arguably the biggest female star on the show. Then they undid it all by having everyone turn out to be alive.
My personal favorite was from All My Children, The Who Killed Michael Cambias story. Everyone had a motive to kill the man, most of them in character. In the end it was Bianca Montgomery who had killed him and blocked it out. Her sister Kendall had faked a pregnancy to protect her and even went on trial for the crime. This brought us the classic courtroom scene where Greenlee tore off Kendall dress revealing her fat suit.
Before you kill off a character make sure there is someone on the canvas already who can take the place of a character, beloved or love to hate because once you write the story there is no way to reverse what you have done. (Of course there is but we'll delve into that topic next week)
What brings this up, well AMC chose to kill off David Hayward. Vincent Irizarry is probably the biggest male star on the show currently, and is applauded regularly by both critics and fans. Plus his David is the pot stirrer of Pine Valley, now whose going to do that?
Every soap, every town needs a good villain, Y&R Has Phyllis (welcome back!), B&B has Stephanie and Bill, Days had Sami but she has been defanged, OLTL has Dorian and soon Echo, and GH has Lisa and Sonny (yes he's a villain). AMC mellowed Erica a but too much for her to return to vixenish ways. Like her mother Kendall has been mellowed beyond belief. Greenlee changes character from day to day.
So when was the last successful murder mystery? Many say Days Of Our Lives had it with their Salem Stalker storyline but then ruined it when all of the victims turned out to be alive. I almost agree with their assessment, even people who didn't watch, were tuning in. All of the victims were major, major characters and the murderer was Marlena Evans, arguably the biggest female star on the show. Then they undid it all by having everyone turn out to be alive.
My personal favorite was from All My Children, The Who Killed Michael Cambias story. Everyone had a motive to kill the man, most of them in character. In the end it was Bianca Montgomery who had killed him and blocked it out. Her sister Kendall had faked a pregnancy to protect her and even went on trial for the crime. This brought us the classic courtroom scene where Greenlee tore off Kendall dress revealing her fat suit.
Before you kill off a character make sure there is someone on the canvas already who can take the place of a character, beloved or love to hate because once you write the story there is no way to reverse what you have done. (Of course there is but we'll delve into that topic next week)
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