The Teen Scene: Past and Present

[WendyCR72]

1 hour ago, methodwriter85 said:

It doesn't look like teenaged Hope really had one either- I was told she was similar to Laura on GH where they had her pretty much only interact with young adults instead of being seen in high school.

Didn't watch then as in the '70s/early '80s I was only a kid, but young Hope seemed to have story line involving her father, his wife Lee [whom Hope had grown close to?], and Julie and Hope's resentment of the latter. And Hope's unrequited crush on her cousin Jessica's [Nick Fallon's mom!] boyfriend.

Though Hope and Julie did make peace and share a warm goodbye before being shipped off to boarding school in '81.

 

[methodwriter85]

I saw a clip of Hope and Bo first meeting and she told him that she went to Lincoln.

That makes me think they didn't set up a Salem High until Frankie and Jennifer. (Although I guess that might just be where she went to boarding school.) So yeah, it looks like Frankie/Jennifer was the first proper teen scene they had. That prom scene was just delish!  Then it was Sami/Lucas, the Last Chance Blast Crew (and the best one they're ever going to have) the Abigail/Chelsea scene, the Will/Gabi one (both cohorts were pretty good and kind of mingled a lot), and then the back-to-back flops of JJ's scene and  Ciara being played by Jo from the Facts of Life. (Minus the acting talent.) 

Edited June 14, 2020 by methodwriter85

[methodwriter85]

Currently watching clips of Brady and Chloe during the post-graduation storyline where Chloe has cancer and Brady sees his mother as an angel. I love how quirky Kyle Lowder's Brady was- he kind of reminded me of Jack. I remembered finding him so off-putting when he first came in the show, and then once he and Chloe started singing together I just loved them. I am so glad they were mostly uninvolved in the teen alien storyline. Still pretty funny to remember the hideous wig they put on Chloe, although she later got a wig that somehow looked exactly like her own hair. 😉

 

Edited August 26, 2020 by methodwriter85

[methodwriter85]

Tate is the first teenager we've seen on the show since like 2017. Lol The last ones were Ciara and Claire. 

Edited October 9, 2023 by methodwriter85

[DisneyBoy]

I'd would prefer they'd keep Tate and Holly younger - say 14ish - to give the actors time to grow into their roles.

Carrie and Sami became great cast members because they were permitted to grow into the roles and become confident over time.

Maybe there's doubt that the show will last long enough to see a 14 year old child actor investment pay off, so to speak. So they just jump to older actors.

Gabi, Will, Chad, Abigail and Sonny really paid off.

[methodwriter85]

13 hours ago, DisneyBoy said:

I'd would prefer they'd keep Tate and Holly younger - say 14ish - to give the actors time to grow into their roles.

Carrie and Sami became great cast members because they were permitted to grow into the roles and become confident over time.

Days doesn't usually do the 14-year old thing- you're more likely to see that on General Hospital. Carrie, Sami, and Will are the only characters I can think of that got to be at that gawky 14-year old stage instead of skipping from child to fully grown 16-year old. (Being played by a 20-year old model.) I guess Sarah kinda counts as well as she was supposed to be 13/14 when she left the show in the early 90's.

We did see a little bit of Shawn as a 13-ish year old, and there was a tween Abigail at the time of Chloe's The Fault in Our Stars storyline, but yeah. The massive SORASes to 16/18/21 are a lot more often than not.

You did get a 14/15-year old Hope here, though:

Off to boarding school you go until you come back as an 18-year old model!

Edited October 10, 2023 by methodwriter85

[WendyCR72]

15 hours ago, methodwriter85 said:

I guess Sarah kinda counts as well as she was supposed to be 13/14 when she left the show in the early 90's.

No, she wasn't. She was at least 16. Because Sarah pulled the "in bed with Neil" bit just before she left for Tennessee with Melissa. No way would the show have a 13/14 year old do that.

[methodwriter85]

18 hours ago, WendyCR72 said:

No, she wasn't. She was at least 16. Because Sarah pulled the "in bed with Neil" bit just before she left for Tennessee with Melissa. No way would the show have a 13/14 year old do that.

Oh, okay. For some reason I remember someone saying that Sarah's birthdate had been moved from 1981 to 1977 so she should have been about 13/14 in 1990-91.

[WendyCR72]

4 hours ago, methodwriter85 said:

Oh, okay. For some reason I remember someone saying that Sarah's birthdate had been moved from 1981 to 1977 so she should have been about 13/14 in 1990-91.

The show loves to mess with timelines. For a time, Sarah and Carrie Brady were friends and peers. Since Christie Clark was born in 1974, Sarah's birthday was probably retconned to around then.

And, of course, changed again with Sarah being deSORASed.

[methodwriter85]

3 hours ago, WendyCR72 said:

And, of course, changed again with Sarah being deSORASed.

I would guess that Sarah's de-SORAS was probably back to her 1981 birth year. They pretty much treat Sarah like she's contemporaries with the Last Chance Blast crew, so early 40's. The same thing happened to Abby- her birth was pushed up to 1989, but then got pushed back to 1992. She was kind of in a holding pattern with her age.

Anyway, back to Teen Scene....so far Holly and Tate seem to be fine to me. There's potential. I wish we were getting Parker and Adrianna, though.

[WendyCR72]

Quite honestly, I think the show regrets Parker. He doesn't rate. I'm just shocked no one has killed him off off screen yet.

[methodwriter85]

1 hour ago, WendyCR72 said:

Quite honestly, I think the show regrets Parker. He doesn't rate. I'm just shocked no one has killed him off off screen yet.

I'm trying to think of who the alternative can be, though. They need to add at least two more 20-year old models to make a teen scene work. I don't think it will be Thomas, although it would make me laugh because Billy Flynn is still pretty youthful-looking.

[CanaryFan98]

19 hours ago, WendyCR72 said:

Quite honestly, I think the show regrets Parker. He doesn't rate. I'm just shocked no one has killed him off off screen yet.

Probably because Chloe comes and goes so often he's a good reason for her exit. 

17 hours ago, methodwriter85 said:

I'm trying to think of who the alternative can be, though. They need to add at least two more 20-year old models to make a teen scene work. I don't think it will be Thomas, although it would make me laugh because Billy Flynn is still pretty youthful-looking.

They could've brought back Pocket/Tyler of course it would've been better with Phillip around but he fits in that age range. Maybe he finds out that he's Victor's grandson and wants to stake a claim in the Kiriakis fortune. Plus it might give Steve/Kayla a story.

[JBC344]

Actually Tyler is only a couple of years younger than Claire so he would be early twenties.  He would be more contemporaries with Sydney. 

Arianna and Parker would be the only two "kids" outside of Rachel. 

[WendyCR72]

2 hours ago, JBC344 said:

Actually Tyler is only a couple of years younger than Claire so he would be early twenties.  He would be more contemporaries with Sydney. 

Like the show cares. Brady and Abby were born mere MONTHS apart: Brady in May 1992, Abby in October 1992.

And Brady ended up at least a DECADE older than Abby.

So these characters can be any age the writers make them.

[CanaryFan98]

7 hours ago, WendyCR72 said:

Like the show cares. Brady and Abby were born mere MONTHS apart: Brady in May 1992, Abby in October 1992.

And Brady ended up at least a DECADE older than Abby.

So these characters can be any age the writers make them.

EJ is older than Will and Abby who were born before him

[AManfred]

Possible UO, but I always love the soaps' teen scenes. The actors are green, they are sometimes cringy in their line deliveries, but I find it overall endearing. It's nice to see when some of the actors go on to larger careers (or the ones we get to see for decades like Nadia).

I was somehow unspoiled by the SORAed Tate and Holly, so it was a pleasant surprise to see them. I like Holly, she reminds me of the actress Meg Connelly from American Housewife and Disney's Zombies movies.

[methodwriter85]

On 10/13/2023 at 8:50 AM, AManfred said:

I like Holly, she reminds me of the actress Meg Connelly from American Housewife and Disney's Zombies movies.

Agreed. I like both her and Tate, which is a good start. Let's hope they don't mess this up as badly as they did with the last teen scene of Ciara/Claire/Chase/Theo/Joey. 

[methodwriter85]

On 10/13/2023 at 7:38 AM, CanaryFan98 said:

EJ is older than Will and Abby who were born before him

Mike Horton was born on-screen in 1968, was a young adult by 1975, and then stayed about 25-30 years old all through the 80's going into the 90's. Roark Critchlow is only 5 years older than Mike's onscreen birth so Mike is more or less where he should be. 

[methodwriter85]

On 10/13/2023 at 8:50 AM, AManfred said:

Possible UO, but I always love the soaps' teen scenes. The actors are green, they are sometimes cringy in their line deliveries, but I find it overall endearing. It's nice to see when some of the actors go on to larger careers (or the ones we get to see for decades like Nadia).

I honestly did not think that we'd get another teen scene on the show after the back to back failures of the Paige/JJ one and the Ciara/Claire one. When I realized the show was having Johnny and Allie skipping being teenagers altogether, I pretty much figured that was it. There's also just the budget issue, which they learned the hard way when they tried to recreate Last Blast with Ciara. I guess they figured out how to do a teen scene with a microbudget wherein we never see them in class and school dances are mentioned but never seen. LOL That's what GH does. It gets annoying but I really have enjoyed their teen scene for the past few years especially once Nicholas Alexander Chavez came in.

[methodwriter85]

Well, it looks like the teen scene is officially defunct again as I don't think Holly will be back. That has to be the most abrupt write-off I've ever seen.

Here's hoping they get someone for Tate to play with, though, because I like his character and the actor playing him.

[oceanblue]

That scene with Julie and Hope was so sweet.  That's the Julie I remember, the one who acted instead of all the yelling.  And when was the last time we got that kind of dialogue?

[methodwriter85]

I guess I spoke too soon about Holly and Tate. Here's hoping they add in a bad boy with a heart of gold.

[DisneyBoy]

At the time I didn't think I'd ever be nostalgic for it, but I kinda miss the Claire/Theo/Chase/Ciara/Joey teen scene. At least they seemed to have unique characteristics. Claire was the aspiring singer who wanted her folks back together, Theo was autistic and tech savvy, Joey the doofus, Chase the...well, nevermind since that got ruined fast.

It was a decent little group, in hindsight.

 

Edited March 29 by DisneyBoy

[4evaQuez]

Because of how unhappy I am with current Days and our current "teen" scene, I wanted to agree with you that I'm nostalgic for the Ciara/Claire, etc., teen scene. I mostly wanted to agree as a way to insult current Days.

However, when I thought about that teen scene I realized that I still think they're just barely serviceable. 

1. Ciara - I still think the actress was set up to fail. The show gave the actress entirely too much too soon for a new character. Not long after her introduction, Ciara has to deal with her father coming back from the dead and then dying again. Her stepfather attempting to kill her mother. Her stepfather being "revealed" as the necktie killer before the real reveal. After all this, she had to deal with being raped by her stepbrother on the Horton family couch. Even a young Meryl Streep would have struggled to characterize Ciara.

I actually think the original Ciara actress had a much better mother/daughter rapport with KA/Hope than the recast. Although the recast was a better actress. I think if the show had stuck with the rumored Ciara characterization, a young Erica Kane, the actress and the character would have greatly benefitted. Personally, I think Hope and Bo raising a young Erica Kane makes total sense with their personalities and family dynamics. What could have been?

2. Claire - I think ORK was the strongest actor in this teen scene. Unfortunately, I thought the writing let her down to being a great character. First, I'm not even certain if I could characterize ORK's Claire as a heroine, antiheroine, or villain. It's not because she had such dynamic writing that created a complicated character that was hard to interpret; unfortunately, it's because the show seemed to have no idea who they wanted Claire to be and often Claire felt isolated from the cast or as an appendage to Ciara. (I think the appendage was more to recast Ciara than the original Ciara). 

Claire was connected to the Brady, Horton, Kiriakis, Evans, and Black families. (I can't remember when John's parentage was retconned for the last time, but I think ORK's Claire was a blood Dimera at one point, too). The show often made Claire feel superfluous, and I still remember how excited we would get on the board whenever she would have family scenes with anyone outside Ciara. The alleged rumors that KA/Hope didn't want to be seen as the grandmother to a teenager also didn't help Claire. This stopped the Ciara/Claire rivalry from reaching new heights that would have elevated their interactions, raised stakes, and even added context to their interactions. Instead, their "family" scenes always felt constrained because Hope was not their anchor, and the show has done such a poor job of managing Shawn D's legacy - and Belle to a lesser extent - that Claire often felt aimless and superfluous as a character. My unpopular opinion is making her a pyromaniac was the most the show seemed interested in the character - even that was just angst for Cin.

3. Joey - I've never liked the Brady/Johnson branch of the show. Joey was no exception. I thought the only interesting thing he's ever done was kill Ava, and the show retconned that. The show won't even give Tripp and Joey any type of rivalry considering Joey attempted to kill Tripp's mom. I don't think the show lost anything when Joey left, nor do I think it gains anything when he returns for his brief visits.

My unpopular opinion is I wish the show had given Joey a coming-out storyline. It still would have been a few years after Will, and I think it could have been interesting for Steve to not be accepting. There also could be a good contrast and rivalry with Tripp doing the less "masculine" medical career and Joey doing the perceived more "masculine" detective or cop career. It could have been interesting to see how the citizens of Salem and Steve responded to a gay "masculine ideal." Without that, I see Joey as just another forgettable Brady, and the show apparently agrees with me.

4. Theo - I don't think the show knows how to write black male characters. Nor do I think the show writers are comfortable portraying black male characters as 'whole people. I also have my suspicions that the show is still concerned with portraying black male / white female romantic relationships. I could never take the idea that Theo would get with Ciara or Claire seriously as a romantic partner because I wasn't certain if Days would actually invest in a romantic pairing. I felt the same way about Abby and Cameron. Did Eli ever have a white love interest? I know there were Sami and Brandon, but at this point, they were literally decades in the past.

As a result, I didn't find anything interesting about Theo because I didn't think the show would ever take him seriously as a character regardless of his legacy status and connections to the canvas. Even with the recast, the show seems to isolate Theo and overly emphasize his relationship to Paulina, instead of John, Marlena, Roman, etc. The show does a good job with his relationship with Chad at least.

5. Chase - As you mentioned, that was ruined pretty quickly. I think Chase was supposed to be the Chloe of this group. A character with no biological relationships with any of the major families that could have a somewhat outsider perspective and we could see their relationships with the various families grow over time. Unlike Chloe, Chase had a wonderful anchor with Hope and Ciara and was an honorary Horton. After the rape, there was nowhere to go with the character. 

 

I would argue that Ciara was the only person who actually recovered from what was mostly a failed teen scene. Even with Ciara, that took a recast and an unexpected pairing that blew up - Cin - however, Ciara took a back seat to that pairing. That pairing was about Ben, and Ciara's legacy and importance to the cast elevated him and salvaged her from being a character as forgettable as the rest of her teen scene set.

[boes]

I haven't seen a good teen storyline on any soap since Erica, Phil and Chuck on AMC in the early 70's, and I liked them better as they aged out of it.

JMO, but but I could live quite well without ever seeing poorly written and acted teen angst EVER again.  It's tough enough to deal with in real life.

Not that there's anything wrong with it.....

[brisbydog]

When I was a teen Frankie and Jen were the hot teen couple and I found them so tedious. Pair of annoying do gooders. Eve was awesome though. I have zero interest in Holly but I do like Tate. Honestly I'm so old now that Janel and Trendy feel like teens to me.

[CanaryFan98]

2 hours ago, 4evaQuez said:

Because of how unhappy I am with current Days and our current "teen" scene, I wanted to agree with you that I'm nostalgic for the Ciara/Claire, etc., teen scene. I mostly wanted to agree as a way to insult current Days.

However, when I thought about that teen scene I realized that I still think they're just barely serviceable. 

1. Ciara - I still think the actress was set up to fail. The show gave the actress entirely too much too soon for a new character. Not long after her introduction, Ciara has to deal with her father coming back from the dead and then dying again. Her stepfather attempting to kill her mother. Her stepfather being "revealed" as the necktie killer before the real reveal. After all this, she had to deal with being raped by her stepbrother on the Horton family couch. Even a young Meryl Streep would have struggled to characterize Ciara.

I actually think the original Ciara actress had a much better mother/daughter rapport with KA/Hope than the recast. Although the recast was a better actress. I think if the show had stuck with the rumored Ciara characterization, a young Erica Kane, the actress and the character would have greatly benefitted. Personally, I think Hope and Bo raising a young Erica Kane makes total sense with their personalities and family dynamics. What could have been?

2. Claire - I think ORK was the strongest actor in this teen scene. Unfortunately, I thought the writing let her down to being a great character. First, I'm not even certain if I could characterize ORK's Claire as a heroine, antiheroine, or villain. It's not because she had such dynamic writing that created a complicated character that was hard to interpret; unfortunately, it's because the show seemed to have no idea who they wanted Claire to be and often Claire felt isolated from the cast or as an appendage to Ciara. (I think the appendage was more to recast Ciara than the original Ciara). 

Claire was connected to the Brady, Horton, Kiriakis, Evans, and Black families. (I can't remember when John's parentage was retconned for the last time, but I think ORK's Claire was a blood Dimera at one point, too). The show often made Claire feel superfluous, and I still remember how excited we would get on the board whenever she would have family scenes with anyone outside Ciara. The alleged rumors that KA/Hope didn't want to be seen as the grandmother to a teenager also didn't help Claire. This stopped the Ciara/Claire rivalry from reaching new heights that would have elevated their interactions, raised stakes, and even added context to their interactions. Instead, their "family" scenes always felt constrained because Hope was not their anchor, and the show has done such a poor job of managing Shawn D's legacy - and Belle to a lesser extent - that Claire often felt aimless and superfluous as a character. My unpopular opinion is making her a pyromaniac was the most the show seemed interested in the character - even that was just angst for Cin.

3. Joey - I've never liked the Brady/Johnson branch of the show. Joey was no exception. I thought the only interesting thing he's ever done was kill Ava, and the show retconned that. The show won't even give Tripp and Joey any type of rivalry considering Joey attempted to kill Tripp's mom. I don't think the show lost anything when Joey left, nor do I think it gains anything when he returns for his brief visits.

My unpopular opinion is I wish the show had given Joey a coming-out storyline. It still would have been a few years after Will, and I think it could have been interesting for Steve to not be accepting. There also could be a good contrast and rivalry with Tripp doing the less "masculine" medical career and Joey doing the perceived more "masculine" detective or cop career. It could have been interesting to see how the citizens of Salem and Steve responded to a gay "masculine ideal." Without that, I see Joey as just another forgettable Brady, and the show apparently agrees with me.

4. Theo - I don't think the show knows how to write black male characters. Nor do I think the show writers are comfortable portraying black male characters as 'whole people. I also have my suspicions that the show is still concerned with portraying black male / white female romantic relationships. I could never take the idea that Theo would get with Ciara or Claire seriously as a romantic partner because I wasn't certain if Days would actually invest in a romantic pairing. I felt the same way about Abby and Cameron. Did Eli ever have a white love interest? I know there were Sami and Brandon, but at this point, they were literally decades in the past.

As a result, I didn't find anything interesting about Theo because I didn't think the show would ever take him seriously as a character regardless of his legacy status and connections to the canvas. Even with the recast, the show seems to isolate Theo and overly emphasize his relationship to Paulina, instead of John, Marlena, Roman, etc. The show does a good job with his relationship with Chad at least.

5. Chase - As you mentioned, that was ruined pretty quickly. I think Chase was supposed to be the Chloe of this group. A character with no biological relationships with any of the major families that could have a somewhat outsider perspective and we could see their relationships with the various families grow over time. Unlike Chloe, Chase had a wonderful anchor with Hope and Ciara and was an honorary Horton. After the rape, there was nowhere to go with the character. 

 

I would argue that Ciara was the only person who actually recovered from what was mostly a failed teen scene. Even with Ciara, that took a recast and an unexpected pairing that blew up - Cin - however, Ciara took a back seat to that pairing. That pairing was about Ben, and Ciara's legacy and importance to the cast elevated him and salvaged her from being a character as forgettable as the rest of her teen scene set.

Eli never had a white love interest but he was involved with Gabi first.

[methodwriter85]

On 3/29/2024 at 6:31 PM, CanaryFan98 said:

Ciara - I still think the actress was set up to fail. The show gave the actress entirely too much too soon for a new character.

It's disappointing though, because she was actually quite good in her audition tape where it seemed like they were going to write Ciara as a bit of a flirt and a little bit like Teen Erica. What they did instead didn't do her any favors. 

Allie technically wasn't a teen (although the actress playing her was 19) and I thought they made nearly the same exact mistakes they made with OG Teen Ciara. However, in her case, she did have pairings that people seemed to be rooting for. I did think towards the end of her year on the show, when they did the Halloween possession storyline, Lindsey Arnold really came into her own and actually looked like she was having fun. 

Back to the 2015 teen scene...man, it was such a waste to destroy Chase's character like that. But it was Josh Griffith running the show then so of course there has to be a teen rape. 

It was frustrating because there were some really good ingredients to that teen scene (especially Olivia Rose Keegan) and it had potential, but alas.

[methodwriter85]

New Tate has karate skills. This makes me hope Ron decides to rip off Cobra Kai. Like some evil dogo sets up shop at Salem High, and it's up to Tate to save the school from the Cobra Kai's. Or, em...Venom Fangs?

[methodwriter85]

With all the jokes about how old New Tate is, it makes me wonder- who was the oldest Salem "Teen"? Any guys over 30 playing a teen character? We did have a 29-year old Peter Reckell playing Bo, but his character was meant to be like 21 so he wouldn't count. I also don't think Austin was actually a teenager when he showed up, but early 20's. I could be wrong on Austin, though. But if I'm remembering right, he was a 21-year old hanging out with the teen characters, similar to Brady in the early 2000's.

Edited Monday at 06:04 PM by methodwriter85

[DisneyBoy]

I still can't get over EJ jumping from a 2 year old to a 28-or-so year old in the span of what....less than a decade?

On 4/6/2024 at 9:30 PM, methodwriter85 said:

New Tate has karate skills. This makes me hope Ron decides to rip off Cobra Kai. Like some evil dogo sets up shop at Salem High, and it's up to Tate to save the school from the Cobra Kai's. Or, em...Venom Fangs?

That would be SO COOL! This show needs to make more use of its actors' skills for sure. Original Teen Claire was a decent singer/musician for example. I don't know they didn't give her more chances to do something with that.

Tate studying martian arts wouldn't even require a big expensive set. Lord knows we need someone to replace Steve and John in the Action Heroes department.

Edited Monday at 08:51 PM by DisneyBoy

[peachmangosteen]

1 hour ago, DisneyBoy said:

Tate studying martian arts wouldn't even require a big expensive set.

I know this is a typo but I would so be down for some martian arts.

[methodwriter85]

2 hours ago, DisneyBoy said:

I still can't get over EJ jumping from a 2 year old to a 28-or-so year old in the span of what....less than a decade?

To put this in perspective, I was 11 years old in the summer of 1997. This is when Kristen was parading Baby EJ around as John's. By 2006, I was 20 years old and EJ was at least 26-27. 

[methodwriter85]

5 hours ago, DisneyBoy said:

That would be SO COOL! This show needs to make more use of its actors' skills for sure. Original Teen Claire was a decent singer/musician for example. I don't know they didn't give her more chances to do something with that.

Tate studying martian arts wouldn't even require a big expensive set. Lord knows we need someone to replace Steve and John in the Action Heroes department.

I get the reason why the show doesn't display singing chops as much as they did in the Last Chance Blast Days when they actually had the budget to license pop music, but yeah- it would be easy to let Tate show off his karate skills. 

[Nique]

On 4/22/2024 at 2:03 PM, methodwriter85 said:

With all the jokes about how old New Tate is, it makes me wonder- who was the oldest Salem "Teen"? Any guys over 30 playing a teen character? We did have a 29-year old Peter Reckell playing Bo, but his character was meant to be like 21 so he wouldn't count. I also don't think Austin was actually a teenager when he showed up, but early 20's. I could be wrong on Austin, though. But if I'm remembering right, he was a 21-year old hanging out with the teen characters, similar to Brady in the early 2000's.

JKJ as Phil was 22 playing 15 in 99. The other main four were either really teenagers Kirsten and Farah both being 15 or on the edge of ending their teenage years Jason and Nadia who were both 19

[methodwriter85]

1 hour ago, Nique said:

JKJ as Phil was 22 playing 15 in 99. The other main four were either really teenagers Kirsten and Farah both being 15 or on the edge of ending their teenage years Jason and Nadia who were both 19

Yeah, I'm wracking my brain and I can't think of anyone who was more than a couple of years out of their teens. Ashley Puzemis was 23 when she started playing Holly. Maybe that's why it's so jarring with New Tate. 

[peachmangosteen]

I also think the guy playing Tate now actually looks his 27 years. He is not at all passing for a teen while Ashley Puzemis does.