Did Blair Get "ABC-ified"?- It's About the Women, Stupid, Part Two!

So, it seems that the blog about Gary Tomlin got a lot of people thinking and talking.  As an academic, I’m thrilled as that’s supposed to be my cause in life!  I have to spend most every day trying to get eighteen year olds to think and they aren’t always happy to do it.   As usual, the OLTL crowd was insightful and interesting.  As one poster said on DD, OLTL fans seem “the most intelligent”.  I don’t know if that’s true, but speaking as one, I can appreciate the compliment.

So, here’s what I found.  Gary Tomlin was hated by many, liked by some, and loved by few.  As I mentioned, I’m in the “like” crowd- seeing positives and negatives to his time on OLTL.  I didn’t watch when he was a writer, nor did I see his tenure on DOOL, so I can’t speak to those.  However, I did watch his entire tenure as EP on OLTL, so I do feel that I can respond with some semblance of credibility on that issue.

Okay, much of the criticism I saw was about his treatment of Blair.  Now, although I agree that Blair’s character did suffer to some extent under Tomlin, as did all characters, I don’t see her treatment as destructive as many others. I thought Todd was seen as an idiotic asshole which was so bad it was second only to the horrific TNT days.  But, I still enjoyed them as, well, you take the good with the bad as a fan sometimes.  I saw them attempting to make her into an “adult” Blair, which, IMO, is a dull Blair, but I think that was the intent.  She was a mother and a wife, to both Todd and Max, and that should bring with it some semblance of maturity.  Note the use of “should” and “some”.  However, it also was the last time I saw some full-blown Bitch Blair.  I didn’t watch the “SNV Years”, as I’ll call them, so pardon anything I missed.

I saw her scheming with Max to rip off Asa.  I saw her planning revenge on Max and Skye.  But, mostly because I was most interested, I saw her scheming with Todd and against Todd for much of Howarth’s early return.  The framing of Skye, for example, was some good stuff. The attempts to counteract Todd’s manipulation to get his family back were fun. The way she tried to throw him off and torture him, such as on New Years, were also manipulative and angry but hot and fun, as well.  So, there was that.  I can’t remember the last time I saw Blair be bitchy, really, so maybe that’s it. It’s about nostalgia.

If we’re keeping the conversation to Blair and Blair only, it seems that it’s only fair to judge her treatment in context.  No one has given the character her due, with that I agree. However, it is not necessarily the fault of the writer or the producer.  But, let’s be honest, it’s so fun to blame Carlivati as he gets so mad.  If he could find a way to block me from writing this, I’m sure he would.  Poor Ronnie, can’t take the criticism.  Deal with it, Buddy, it’s part of the job!  At any rate, it seems to be a policy on ABC- or was as it’s effectively out of the business- to make any woman who was a “bad girl” into a “good girl” or “less of a bad girl” as she ages.  They seem to believe that bad girls won’t fly in a medium made for women and, guess what, that’s a crock.

Okay, now I’m turning academic. In the 1980’s, there was a scholar who wrote on soaps.  Her name was Tania Modelski and she claimed that the lead figure on soap operas had to be the matriarch as that was the character that the women watching could relate to and who spoke for them.  The bad characters were key but only because they could then be forgiven by the matriarch but it was the matriarch that was the character with whom the audience could identify.  I see her point and while I never thought the matriarch was not vital- see “Viki-fying Marlena”- I always thought Modleski’s rationale for her importance was incorrect.

The audience, IMO, had changed by the 1980’s and fractured. There was still the older fan who could relate to the matriarchs.  But that was just one small segment of the audience. The younger crowd, like myself and many of you it seems, did not relate to the matriarch but to the bad girl.  Thus, the enduring popularity of Erica Kane would seem to prove that.  Personally, I always preferred Brooke English, as I saw her as smarter than Erica who I thought was flash with no substance.  Brooke began bad but, in typical ABC style, was neutered and whitewashed to be good.  Hayley Vaughn, again, started “rough” then became a saint, for God’s sake.

It seems that the only “bad” girl who stayed even a little bad was Blair. But, eventually, she would have to be sacrificed to the ABC practice.  Erica Kane was whitewashed to some extent but I found it interesting that, even in the end, ABC would not give her satisfaction and a happy ending.  Although I know that was for practical purposes with PP’s pipedream looming, I thought it fitting with their agenda.  She was still going against societal norms and had to be punished for it.  She refused to stay home and wring her hands and worry and get matronly, so she had to be alone at the end, the ultimate punishment according to ABC, it would seem. Sexist executives promoting this ideology was the idea here.  Women cannot be happy without men and children and therefore those who don't tow the line will be punished. They are left alone as they are going against the dominant ideology of what women should be. Those who seek alternatives to the patriarchal order must be made to pay.

Now, when it comes to Blair, I think the audience, her loyal fans, and ABC have three different ideas.  Her loyal fans, and being a fan but not one who would characterize myself as such first and foremost, seem to think she’s been shafted over the years.  There is some definite validity to that statement.  But being more in the middle of fandom, I think it’s more than that.  I think she’s been “ABC-ified”.  As time wore on, she was made to want to be more “normal” and have a quieter life about her children and be truly loved by someone who’s not a lunatic…like Todd. For real people in the real world, that’s understandable and valid.  But for a viewing public, it’s boring and seen as out of character. Choosing to be with the chubby dullard Tomas, in the real world, has a logic to it (even though he was a party to locking up her husband- what???). That stupidity aside, in the real world, motherhood may have made Blair softer and years of craziness with Todd’s obsessive behavior and crazy-ass schemes, might warrant the change.  A little peace may be just what she needed.

Yet this isn’t the real world. It’s TV.  Not only that, it’s soaps.  ABC seems to subscribe to Modleski’s antiquated notions.  They were making Blair into a full-fledged matriarch.  And, as many of us don’t like it, that has been their agenda.  She was always there but never given a story of her own.  She was reactive instead of proactive.  She had, in some ways, become the typical ABC middle-aged character. As ABC does, she would then be pushed aside for the newer model but trotted out to wring her hands about her kids.  Look at Brooke English, not only was she turned into a third wheel in the Tad and Dixie saga and then the Jack and Erica snooze-fest, she was then summarily dismissed until she was needed to take Adam offscreen.  And, although I loved the moments at the end, her treatment was far worse than Blair’s was.  At least Blair was there.

Look at the treatment of Viki and Dorian.  Viki, once a vital and active member of her own stories, was given material it seems more as a tribute to Slezak than Viki.  Although she and Dorian were both given stories, they were relegated to either matron with issues- Viki- or almost grotesque joke- Dorian.  Thankfully, I wasn't watching, but her gay wedding/later David years sound thoroughly repugnant.  It seems that if you aren't the matronly type on ABC, you are either a thing of fun or don't exist.  Anna, on GH, one of the strongest, most interesting female characters on GH ever, is being brought back simply to end the show and prop McBain.  Once again, she's playing some semblance of matriarch, only still a bit hot.  Like English, she can appear at the end as a bone thrown to fans of the show who missed having someone to whom they could relate. And, in English's case, give Adam a final partner fitting his intelligence, charisma, and all around fabulosity!

Blair as the show ended, was just a part of Todd's life.  That's true.  But at least she was still seen as interesting and desirable.  She did do her share of handwringing and was shown to be easily manipulated by Todd and, I'd argue, that Douchebag Tomas.  However, it should be acknowledged that DePaiva not only made Blair interesting in her handwringing but you saw the old fire in her face.  The scene when she and Howarth are wrestling for the gun, for example, had the old fun in it for me.

It is the actors that make this crap work.  No one in control seemed to get that.  The way Todd looked at her as if he wanted to ravage every part of her, especially when she railed at him, made it apparent that not only was Blair still relevant, she was still hot. Look here at about 3:15. Let's not even talk about the innuendo about candy and bowls and such.  It's enough to make me blush!:

 And that's unusual on ABC. But, honestly, who's hotter or more fun than these two?

So, it seems that the Tomlin treatment of Blair, in my mind, was the last time she had any meat to her character.  She was neutered to some extent, I agree, but at least she still had vestiges of Blair.  ABC highlights the men, that’s a given.  Blair had become, and still was until the end, part of Todd’s story. It wasn’t about Blair and, really, it never was going to be.  Women on ABC suffer that fate. I’m not sure it was Tomlin or even Valentini who were responsible. I think it’s the way ABC ran…and maybe why they’re dead.  They were antiquated, like Modleski’s model. It was about the women, Stupid, but not the women you thought. And I’m not calling Modleski stupid, BTW.  You know who I mean.  I’ll call Ron stupid just to piss him off.  I can’t help it!! It’s too fun now……..