ABC Soap Fans Refuse to Be Ignored Any Longer

My friends,

It has now been 9 days since the dreaded announcement from ABC that they were cancelling "All My Children" and "One Life to Live", AKA The A-1 First Class Blunder of the Century By A Network. It even surpasses the cancellation of "FlashForward" (also by ABC), which I have also been quite outspoken about. I have had some time now to process the news of the cancellation of my beloved soaps and can now try to put my feelings into coherent thoughts.  But please forgive me if I don't succeed because the wound is still too fresh. 

When I first heard about the cancellations, my first thought was not "Oh my God!  They're cancelling my favorite soap opera!"  It was more like "Oh my God!  They're murdering my extended family!"  And that isn't an exaggeration.  That's what this cancellation feels like. Like most soap opera viewers, my favorite soap opera characters have come to feel like family to me. You get to know these characters inside and out.  At times, I felt like I knew the characters better than the writers did.  It's so bad that one day I literally found myself screaming at a character on "General Hospital" for 10 minutes straight until I realized how I sounded and thanked God that no one was around to hear me.  I was like a crazy person!  Unfortunately, people who aren't soap opera fans don't get this. 

I have stated in a previous blog post that I have been watching soaps since I was in the womb.  I used to watch soaps with my mom when I was little until she stopped watching them.  I didn't watch again until I was about 13 years old, and I have been watching ever since.  That was almost 30 years ago.  One of my favorite shows was always "One Life to Live".  I have so many memories from this show!  My first memory of the show was Brad Vernon in prison and his wife Jenny at home with their toddler, Mary.  That was the beginning of one of the most heartbreaking storylines ever written for Daytime. I can remember crying when Jenny made the hardest decision of her life, to give up Mary to her real mother, Katrina.  I watched when Joe Riley brought Clint home to meet Viki and then when Joe died.  I watched Viki's children grow up.  I can name every one of Asa's and Bo's wives.  I sat through controversial storylines and the most heartbreaking storylines you will ever see like when Bo's wives Didi and Sarah and Viki's daughter Megan (Sarah's sister) died. I watched Marty Saybrooke and Megan both grow into caring people.  I can name all of Viki's alters (My favorite is Niki) and loved the rivalry between Dorian and Viki.  I could go on and on forever.  That's how long I've been invested in this show. I've cried with the characters and at times, I have been known to scream at the TV or throw something at it if I was upset about something on the show.  I had my favorite characters (Viki, Bo, Sarah, Mimi, Chuck, Tina, Jessica, Megan, Wanda, Jenny, Karen, Larry, Dorian, David Renaldi, Ben Davidson, Sloan, Troy, Colin, Lindsay, Nash, and Charlie are just some of them).  I even got angry when I felt the writers were ruining my favorite characters because I knew them so well.  So yes, it does feel like I'm losing part of my family.

As if the cancellation wasn't enough to deal with right now, we have had to deal with two more problems.  First there are the every day people who join these groups only to post messages on the boards like "Protest something important."  Excuse me?  If you aren't with us on this, why are you even a member of the groups to save the soaps? 

Then there are the snide, rude, insensitive remarks from people who are "in the biz".  Jenny McCarthy and Oprah to be exact.  I mean really--Have you SEEN Oprah's video to her fans...some of whom she has now lost because of her statements in the video?  Since these people are in show business, you'd think they'd be more sensitive to the fact that over 600 people have now lost their jobs. Oprah is the biggest offender here of all.  She talked to us like children in her video. and she clearly doesn't know what she is talking about as far as the numbers go.  To be fair, I thought maybe I was just being overly sensitive when I saw it until I started reading comments from other people.  Even professional journalists have picked up on it.  And she could save the shows if she wanted to. It would even benefit her network, OWN to do so because it would bring in viewers AND RATINGS.  You would think someone as smart as Oprah claims to be would figure this out, but she hasn't. So instead of saying a simple "Thank you for contacting me, but I simply can't help you", she has made a complete idiot of herself, and it is plastered all over the internet for everyone to see FOREVER. And didn't she just have a show about soap operas with some of the big stars as guests?  So she's ok with using them to get ratings, but when they need her to come through for them, she refuses to even TRY to help?  Nice...

There is one other thing that has me completely baffled.  It's been reported that the reasons for the cancellations are low ratings and high production costs.  Ok..makes sense I guess--to anyone without a single brain cell still working.  But what the network fails to consider is that times have changed.  We no longer have just one way of watching the show. It used to be that you could only watch when the show was on.  This was before the days of VCRs, DVRs, and Tivo.  Heck, you can even watch on the internet now. Therefore, Nielsen ratings are no longer accurate (as if they ever were to begin with).  Therefore, they should not rely on ratings numbers.  Fans and professional journalists can understand this.  All of us (fans and journalists) have  come up with ways that these shows can be saved.  The solutions are very simple, yet ABC hasn't been able to come up with them. The question is "Why?".  Is it because they are just looking for any excuse to get rid of these shows?  The fact that they can't come up with a solution makes me wonder if they just want to cancel the shows no matter what...even if there are logical solutions to the problem.

On the up side, I find it encouraging that the sponsors have started listening to us.  Hoover, for one, has pulled it's advertising from ALL of ABC in protest of the cancellation.  A fact that ABC can't seem to understand the logic behind.  They have apparently never heard of a sponsor pulling their advertising to save a show, only to sink it.  I find this fact laughable because this is what protesting is...pulling something, in this case advertising, to protest a decision by the network.  DUH!  What part of that is not clear?  And I, for one, am not explaining it to them.  Other sponsors seem to be listening to us as well.  This is a very good sign. 

There have been other positive signs as well.  The Writer's Guild has asked ABC to reconsider their decision to cancel AMC and OLTL. Plus I have heard through various contacts that the fans are making a difference.  I've even heard rumors that Brian Frons' days at ABC are numbered.  The fans are making a difference just like I always knew we could.  Even if it is a small difference right now, this is progress.  I've never been so proud to be a soap fan in my life.