Hilary Booth... of course!

I watched what may be my last episode of All My Children with today's tribute to Myrtle Fargate. Eileen Herlie was a grand old lady. She played Myrtle with warmth and wit and fire. I loved seeing all the old flashbacks, how she changed over the years and how she didn't. She had an open door and an open ear for everyone she encountered. And she wasn't afraid to take on all comers. Thorsten Kaye's poem at the end was so beautiful. I will miss her presence.

There's a popular old saying. No one's really dead in science fiction. And it's equally true in soap opera land. Characters rise from the grave more times than we can count. But for some reason, I have different reactions to deaths in one genre than the other. For sf fandom, when a character I like dies, I'm furious, I'm upset. My anger usually knows no bounds, unless it happens to be someone I don't like, which rarely happens. With soaps, I'm just saddened. I don't know why I have such a different response. I grow equally attached to characters in both genres. Soap characters usually have longer to grab my attention, so maybe there's more history involved. Is it seeing the storyline come to final close? Even so, I don't get nearly as riled up. Maybe it's knowing a) they could be back someday b) the actor/actress could go on to better things I'll like just as much. But that's true with sf too, right? I've watched sf characters be thrown away with just as much disregard as soap characters, too. It's very odd.

I noticed this especially this week on "All My Children". AMC is badly resembling AW in the latter days with all the complaints on underused characters and the treatment of veterans versus newcomers. In their usual fashion, they need to clean house, so they invented yet another serial killer storyline. Every time I'm turning around, there's a big murder mystery or massive event. You'd think there'd be an easier way to eliminate characters. ( Cut to spare the soap melodrama & recent AMC spoilers )