The passing of As the World Turns
At least that’s what it feels like to me. I haven’t watched regularly in recent years, but I grew up with As the World Turns. My grandmother watched, my mother watches and I loved sick days so I could stay home from school, lay on the couch wrapped in a quilt, and watch, as my mother called them…her stories. I used to think I was introduced to the romance genre by Linda Howard. Now I know the truth. I was introduced to romance by Soaps.
What I watched was the titillating, the forbidden. Unlike mainstream television, in my mom’s stories women were sexual beings. People had affairs and premarital sex. Women bore children out of wedlock and even more scandalous, children fathered by men other than their husbands. Whoa!
My mom and grandmother would discuss the characters as if they were neighbors and friends.
“Did you see what she did? Oh, that Susan. If I were Kim, I’d…” and their discussions might last for hours. True love waited just around the corner, but there were obstacles and challenges and lies and betrayal, and there was always the villain to come between our two protagonists. In it’s heyday, As the World Turns was positively yummy!
Yesterday I shed a few tears. I knew the show was coming to an end so I made certain to watch the last few weeks. How sad. I know the prevailing opinion is that Soaps are passe, that their glory years are long gone. I disagree. I think that’s a bunch of crap. T’was bad writing killed the Soaps, not viewers.
Many thanks to Steph at fangs, wands, and fairy dust for the unexpected plug yesterday so I’ll plug her right back. She’s a True Blood and vampire devotee. http://fangswandsandfairydust.blogspot.com/
Also, thanks Susi, book blogger extraordinaire over at http://thegeekybookworm.blogspot.com/
and author Katalina Leon, http://www.katalinaleon.com/
ya’ll know why!
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September 18th, 2010 at 8:50 am
The only thing passe about Soaps is the programming hours and the terrible lighting and writing. I predict the Soap will be reborn in a gloriously streamlined internet friendly international form and rediscovered some time soon because people didn’t stop needing to identify with someone else’s problems, yesterday…
My late mother in law was a Soap addict, and had a network of friends call and keep her up to date on the nonsense of “Passions” when she was on vacation. She wouldn’t record the Soaps on a DVR-she had to hear the update from a friend as if it were real first hand gossip. She once called from China for an update! That ‘s powerful stuff… lol
XXOO Kat
September 18th, 2010 at 10:43 am
Kat, I hope so - there is an audience for a good soap. What is True Blood after all? An adult soap. Isn’t it interesting how that generation felt so connected to these characters - my mom is the same way. She won’t video or DVR anything, she calls her niece to keep up with her stories when she’s traveling!
September 18th, 2010 at 12:32 pm
I used to watch soaps until I realized I was planning my day around AMC and GH. So I quit. Cold TV. In Maine watching TV is consider tres outre. SO we who do will say, OH did you see, “ccc” and people will respond, “Is that on the Television?”
BTW, Vancouver, Victoria, quick stop in Seattle to have dinner with my oldest friend who I met on the first day of college in 1977.
September 18th, 2010 at 12:46 pm
Steph, have fun! I love Victoria - wow that’s an upscale place! You gonna stop in Forks?
My mom plans her day around her soaps to a certain extent. I did feel a certain amount of loyalty to ATWT so I made sure the watch the last two weeks. If I missed a day, I just watched online. I feel like I grew up with Julianne Moore!
September 19th, 2010 at 10:29 am
I grew up with it too. My mother, aunt and uncle never missed it. In fact, I got my mom and aunt As The World Turns T Shirts many years ago:)