Have you ever followed a soap-opera?

[Lufia Erim]

From Wikipedia.

"A soap opera, soap, or soapie, is a serial drama on television or radio that examines the lives of many characters, usually focusing on emotional relationships to the point of melodrama."

So im currently at my aunts house with my mother and my godmother and they are watching " The young and resteless". They have been watching the series for LITERALLY decades. Thanks to them i started following it despite the massive amount of cheese and poor acting and find it to be halariously bad but entertaining. It kind of reminds me of dragon ball Z. Complete episodes where little happens, but yet people are still glued to their tvs everyday watching them.

The only other Soap i watched was " Passions" back when i was younger. But that soap had demons and angels and magic, it was pure nonsense.

I'm not too keen on Soaps from other countries, or even if they exist so let's use this thread to teach me something!

Have you ever fallowed a soap-opera, and if so which ones?

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

I liked the Flintstones when it was on. That Fred, always up to something.
I tried getting into the Walking Dead when it fist started, but it was just too hammy for me. Couldn't take any of the characters seriously.

 

[Phasmal]

Eastenders.

I don't remember starting watching it, it was just a thing I always did. I was very into it when I was about 11 I think, back when there was a big drama about someone being shot by someone and then someone being someone's mother. I remember that, vaguely. Then I just sort of fell out of it.

My nan watched pretty much all of the soaps. I watched them with her when I briefly lived with her, but I kept mixing up characters from different soaps. It's hard to keep on top of.

 

[Hawki]

There's two that come to mind.

There's Neighbours, which I followed in my teenage years. Petered off in my interest, probably because of a combination of finishing puberty, and being unwilling to wait weeks, if not months for plot points to be resolved.

The other is one I can't recall the name of, and one I 'followed' only because I held a car washing job at the time. We were paid by the minute rather than the hour (which is illegal, BTW, but for early jobs you have to take what you can get), and as a result, we spent a lot of time in the break room watching daytime TV. There was this soap that I can't recall the name of, only that it was weird (including a lady stuck in a coffin communicating via mobile phone or something) - so, I 'followed' it in the sense that I reguarly saw it while on break as per the break room TV blaring away, as I waited to be called out to wash cars.

Suffice to say, I don't miss that job.

 

[Breakdown]

The only soap I've really been into was Neighbours. I stopped watching it a few years ago when it switched channels, by that point most of the characters I'd grew up with were dead or had gone to Sydney or somewhere like that. I still have my memories though - the plane crash which wiped out Harold's family, Drew falling off a horse and dying, Cody Willis getting shot dead when a police sting operation went wrong on Ramsay Street. Good times.

 

[Saelune]

I did, but then they filed a restraining order. They said it was over when the fat lady sang, but I still came out of it squeaky clean.



OT: ...nope.

 

[Fox12]

I followed The Walking Dead for a while, but I had it on good authority that the acting and writing were incredibly sub par for a soap opera.

 

[Lufia Erim]

I followed The Walking Dead for a while, but I had it on good authority that the acting and writing were incredibly sub par for a soap opera.

Isn't that the staple for any soap opera though? Bad writting and acting is kind of what they are known for isn't it? That and the old "character is dead, oops not really" trick.

Even better, kill a character and have them come back as their long lost twin. I dont know who writes this stuff but it's halariously bad.

 

[MrCalavera_v1legacy]

Do 'Scrubs' count as one?

 

[Hawki]

Do 'Scrubs' count as one?

I wouldn't say so. Soaps, as I understand, don't really operate in standard seasons, there's rather one continuous storyline that's being made on the fly. A storyline that can spread out over more than one episode, but not one that's written in the same way as Scrubs is, which has distinct seasons, a core cast of characters (whereas Soaps characters come and go frequently), and distinct arcs, etc. Same reason why The Walking Dead can't be called a soap, despite the snark of other users.

Not to bash Scrubs though - I quite like it, even if I feel it overuses J.D's 'fantasy moments' a bit too much at times.

 

[Fiz_The_Toaster]

Nah, it's not my thing.

The only time I've ever seen any of them were at car dealerships or auto-repair places.

Someone would always have it on with the remote nowhere to be found. They are too much for me to watch, and I love grade-A media cheese.

 

[Total LOLige]

I used to love Hollyoaks when I was 12/13. It was the "beauty" soap, way more hip than Corrie and Eastenders.

 

[CrazyCapnMorgan]

I watched the WWE for a time back in the late 90's and early 2000. Then I stopped watching it.

...wait, this counts, right?

 

[SmallHatLogan]

Years ago as a teenager living with several sisters/step-sisters it was hard to get away from Neighbours and Home And Away (Australia's two main soaps). I never liked them but I did get to know who the characters were and what was going on.

Twin Peaks veered in to soap opera territory, especially in the second season. Although when it was at its most saopish it could get pretty unbearable.

And the poster above me mentioned professional wrestling which is basically a soap opera. I was into WCW and WWF as when I was young.

 

[Lufia Erim]

I watched the WWE for a time back in the late 90's and early 2000. Then I stopped watching it.

...wait, this counts, right?

I remember when they weren't Soaps, back when it was called the WWF. God I'm old.

God I'm having flashbacks of " PUPPIES" ( What the announcer used to say when the girls would wrestle with their giant breasts.

I tried wathing it recently. It really has turned into a soap opera for manly men lol

 

[bartholen_v1legacy]

Ehhh... kinda. I mean, there's been a soap opera running for over 8 years now of which I've seen every episode. Thing is, those episodes must be pretty expensive to produce, because they only put out like 2 a year. And they are like 2 hours long each. And I have to see them in a cinema. And... okay enough with the fuckery, it's the MCU.

On a serious note, no.

 

[Jute88]

There was a phase in my life when I watched shows like Passions and Sunset Beach. And wrestling. Then I grew up.

 

[CrazyCapnMorgan]

I watched the WWE for a time back in the late 90's and early 2000. Then I stopped watching it.

...wait, this counts, right?

I remember when they weren't Soaps, back when it was called the WWF. God I'm old.

That's OK, buddy. I still remember the Macho Man vs Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat fight. We can feel old, together. ^_^

 

[Bobular]

Soaps used to be a pain in the arse for me. When I used to work at the local Breast Unit there was a story line in one soap involving one of the characters getting breast cancer and suddenly it seemed like everyone thought they had breast cancer, our clinics became constantly overbooked, we started missing the waiting times targets as there were just to many people to see and most of them came in with nothing.

Obviously if anyone has any concerns they may have breast cancer they should go get it checked out and if just one person in the country got their cancer found when they normally wouldn't get checked it was a net good thing, but this story was making hundreds, probably thousands, of people worried and panicky for nothing.

With great viewer numbers comes great responsibility.

I don't watch any soaps myself, but my mum watches Eastenders and whenever me or my brother sees her watching it we'll make fun of whatever silly plot was going on.

 

[Saltyk]

Nope. But it's funny, I remember a joke from someone I knew who did watch Days of Our Lives.

"You can miss 20 years of this show, come back, and you'll still be able to follow along just fine."