Random thoughts on Days...

Poirot

Poirot

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I know we all talk of the kind of stories we would like to see, so this is not about that. Am sure as we watch the show, we have these fleeting thoughts about different things. Like the gala, where someone suggested that just a couple of tables with pretty cloths, some flower decorations, and they would have had a lovely ball room, maybe 10 square feet instead of 1 square foot.

While I have no idea what the weekly budget is for this show, with the various exits that have occurred, it does seem there might be some $$$$ to spruce the place up. I really would like to see the end of "the square", which has gotten to be such a joke. Or at least, cut it in half, and bring back a pier.
The Club.....is it a coffee shop or a night spot. Make up the mind, stick to it.
Create an office, one that at least looks like a decent office. You have 3 walls, move them around. Same with window/door/desk. Days has soooo much furniture, it CAN be done.
Enough already with Salemites living in hotel rooms. Overdone, and unbelievable. People just DON'T.

And yes, I understand why some families have to all live under the same roof, it is a budget thing.

Can the show at least mention seeing pics of Austin, Carrie & their baby? Can Maggie mention talking to Melissa or Sarah? Can Hope say something about Belle & Shawn. i.e. They got to "wherever", loved it, and decided to stay a while, both have jobs, Claire is in school.

Why can't Kayla say she went to meet with Steve (Patch) somewhere, so he could have Joey for a while. He is taking him to visit Jo, but she wants to stay close to Caroline for now. ????

How come the Gala could not have been held at Chez Rouge?
 
I really think that Kate has lived in a hotel suite the entire time she has been in Salem aside from the times she was married to Victor and Stefano and Roman. Yet we rarely if ever see such hotel suite. Kate has been in Salem since the early 1990s.

Why can't Nicole just get an apartment in Jeannie Theresa or Daniel's building? I don't think she has had a real home either unless she was married.

I want to see Bo and Hope's house again as well as the penthouse.

Enough of all of these conversations happening in public places or in stranger's homes creating odd scenes(i.e. Hope at Daniel's apartment).

I want Shawn/Belle/Claire back onscreen, never mind being mentioned. Same goes for Carrie, Austin and baby if written properly.

I want to see storylines centered around the workplace again(Salem PD, hospital, the corporations)--what happened to that large police station set where JJ was booked? Let's bring that back instead of everyone using the same office with different photos on the shelf.

Enough of the Samantha Gene and Elvis show!
 
The Club.....is it a coffee shop or a night spot. Make up the mind, stick to it.
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That's just it : TPTB still don't know, thus the name : Club TDB (To Be Determined). :rolleyes:

While I agree with all your points, Poirot, I will add that I would not mind the overuse of sets if the story telling made me forget about such a thing. But my main problem with Days is precisely that : the lack of good, compelling storylines. Or when there is potential for a good story, it is dropped. So many, many examples come to mind, but I will name just a few : Jack's PTSD was so powerful (and with an actor such as Matthew Ashford, it could have been something truly inspiring), but alas, after just one or two scenes, it was dropped, along with Jack himself, down an elevator shaft. (I'm still so angry about that !!!!).

How about the Nick storyline ? Instead of seeing Nick get redeemed and get over his ordeal in prison (being raped repeteadly), we got to see him go back to the dark side, which frankly, made no sense at all after the Smith Island adventure. Nick did bring Arianna to Will in the hospital, so why go back to evil Nick ? :confused:

Is it because writing purely evil characters is so much easier ? No more grey zones, just pure evil ? There are really not many characters I want to root for anymore. Either they're boring (Jordan), ruined (poor John), underused (Lucas, Rafe, Roman, etc.), or the exact opposite, overused (Jennifer the shrew and her martyr act, Daniel the super doctor hero, Sami, EJ, Kate the witch). There is no more balance on this show. It's all or nothing. All drama, all evil, no more really good, strong characters. No more balance between screen appearances because only a few take up all the screen time . Practically no more humor, just gloom and doom. Too bad, really, as there would be so much more to do with Days, that would not cost a penny more.
 
Heather4CU said:
Why can't Nicole just get an apartment in Jeannie Theresa or Daniel's building? I don't think she has had a real home either unless she was married.
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I think that in the back of her mind Nicole has this idea that she should not have a permanent home because she wants to be able to move in with the man of her dreams the second he comes along. If I were her therapist, one of the first things I would do would be to encourage her to get a real home so that she stops feeding that needy compulsive side that encourages her to self-sabotage.

Back on topic, today when Hope and Ciara were in Brady's pub, I thought, Of course Hope didn't go home. Then they'd have to show her house. I'm sure there's a way to show more people's houses without blowing the budget. Couldn't they rearrange that Horton house set a bit to make it into Hope's living room instead?
 
@Heroic Muse......from what I understand, the Horton house is a wood built, stationery set, that takes quite a bit of time to set up, and take down. When Alice died, they had decided previously, that when it happened, that would be the end of "The Horton house"....thus, there was this scene of Hope, taking that one last look around.
But...then minds were changed, and it was decided to use it, after all. Some of the actors had a hard time sitting in "Alice's chair", but the set is not one to be taken down.

It does bug me no end to always see Hope & Ciara at the Pub....having breakfast, dinner, ice cream, etc. etc. The Brady home set seems to have vanished.I don't care if Hope can't cook well. Cold cereal & milk is not cooking. Neither is a glass of milk, cup of tea, or pizza ordered in.
And when a set goes up (The Pub, K mansion, DiMera house) it gets used over and over and over for different characters' meetings, etc. Same for that dumb "park" set.
 
Agree with everything said thus far, especially with Writer's point about the sets being secondary to good balanced storytelling, and Poirot's point about off-screen characters.

The only thing I'll add is how characters are changed to fit the plot, rather than writing story points around character's traits and habits. (Nick is a good example.)
 
I agree too. Especially with TheWriter. Here are things that bother me:

Even if old sets are not used, why not mention them? Jordan and Rafe could mention (for example) the time they drank coffee on the pier. Or Hope could tell Ciara they will go to Chez Rouge for dinner, and then that can happen off-screen. Better than endlessly showing the Pub or the park.

Focus more on friendships. The other day, EJ mentioned something about Rafe "not being far behind" Daniel with losing faith in Nicole. How would we know? Most recently, they barely interacted over the Liam debacle, and that was after months of them not sharing scenes. Many fans want them together, but we would also settle for them being just friends it only it were shown more. Same with family members. I have not seen Will interact with his siblings, Caroline, Eric (until today), or anyone outside of Sami and the occasional Lucas, Marlena or Kate for so long. He definitely has not shared enough scenes with the Deveraux family. Makes no sense at all.

I want to see more alliances that would make sense. While Kate and Sami are enjoyable to see working together, I doubt it will be long term and it also does not make too much sense in the grand scheme of things. I would prefer to see Jennifer go to Nicole, work things out with her, then perhaps enlighten her on the Sami-Abby situation, and they team up to take down Sami. It would make Jennifer's character much more interesting than her moping over Daniel and her high school rivalry with Eve. Furthmore, it would make sense and make for an interesting storyline, Nicole and Sami scenes are always fun.
 
JasonDíSpeech said:
Agree with everything said thus far, especially with Writer's point about the sets being secondary to good balanced storytelling, and Poirot's point about off-screen characters.
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More and better sets would be nice, but better story telling would indeed offset use of the same old, same old. I once saw a play at the old Studio Arena Theater in Buffalo, NY, that deliberately used minimalist sets, including a line of chairs to represent a passenger airplane, which worked because the audience focused on the plot and the acting, not on the sets. That said, it might be nice if the writers would please do a little research. How hard can that be in an age when all sorts of information is seconds away via a Google search? I almost fell off the couch when Aiden offered a realistic reason why the Eve-Jack contract could be held invalid (vaguely written terms), but that was a rare exception. Instead, the audience is regularly treated to flawed portrayals of medical procedures, police work, the courts, etc. C'mon writers, Days viewers would enjoy the show a lot more if they weren't frequently saying: "OMG, that's ridiculous."
 
I would like to see more of the hospital. Anymore it just looks like it is only 1 floor unless da plot calls for an elevator fall.

I want to see more of the Club part of Club TBD. Is it still a club even? All we get to see & hear is about the coffee part of it.
 
These writers have no idea of all the history in Salem with families, as I said before Corday is a cheap jerk no wonder our show doesn't get nominated much. Even if just mentioned once in awhile it would be nice to see or hear about our missing families on the show.

replaced word....JS
 
Even if just mentioned once in awhile it would be nice to see or hear about our missing families on the show.
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It drives me crazy that Shawn and Belle are not in town to help with the issues their parents/families are facing or not even mentioned at all. Shawn could be around to help Hope and Ciara out with Bo out of town, and Belle is badly needed as the person who could possibly get through to Brady and his addiction, or to help her estranged parents.

Victor is always complaining about Brady and his addictions, or praising Daniel, but he never mentions his own son, Philip. Also, I have never understood why Brady is still CEO of Titan. With all of his issues in the past year, Philip should have been made CEO. If they cannot get the actor or do not want to pay an actor for the role, Philip does not have to be in town or we don't have to see him. He could run the company from the Chicago office with mentions of what he is doing for the company, etc by Victor or even Brady if he starts straightening his life out.

Based on not seeing a character but just mentioning them, they could have let Steve and Kayla stay married. We barely see Kayla as it is, and when she is not on, she could be visiting with Steve, or, Steve could be in town with her but we just don't see him (like Justin), and they could bring up the activities he is doing with Joey, etc.
 
:OT:I realize they have a larger budget than Days but Grey's Anatomy actually has real doctors consulting with the producers and when they show surgeons operating, it is real surgeon hands. Not the actors.
:back:

Maybe Days could do a variation of that?!?
 
Days used to have consultants. No more.
@jgk.....agree with every word.
In my opinion, Corday has proved over and over to be a poor manager of this show. I wonder if he even watches it. He really seems to have no knowledge as to what is going on, how viewers are reacting, or what his writers are really doing to the characters/
 
The writing used to be clever. We would get clues if some of this would have been written 15 yrs ago maybe even 10 , "Cousin Joan" would have turned out to be Jordan. I agree they could talk about characters (if they would remember what they said lol). They could explain some things ,it wouldn't hurt. Like...

Where did Celeste go?

Carrie's baby boy or girl? I think they keep that open purposely. lol I remember soaps where fans would argue that so and so had a girl... NO, a boy ... off screen...
 
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