1993 - Your Reviews

[Dan F]

As the 1993 season draws to a close, we'd like to hear your views on the season as a whole. Again, we're not after a write-up of the storylines, but rather your opinions on the year.

I've been saying it for ages, but we will finally be revamping the Year Summaries section as part of the larger site revamp in the coming months, and the best reviews from this and other years will be published on there.

Such points to consider could be your favourite storylines, the storylines which didn't work so well, any character developments that you found interesting, what you thought of character arrivals/departures...even any points about new underscores/locations/opening titles etc. are all welcome to be part of it.

If you need a reminder of some of the year's storylines, check out our 1993 preview on the main site - though as others have pointed out, this was by no means an exhaustive list and you have other storylines and guests to consider, such as Laura Brennan, Bill Cunningham, Kevin Baker etc.

Please only post your own reviews in this thread, one post per member, any discussion should continue in the 1993 discussion thread.

If the last two season's threads are anything to go by I only expect we'll get 1-2 replies, but worth a final shot

[CaptainHulk]

Hoo yeah!

Right, 1993 was definitely the end of an era as we lost Sophie and Blake in the opening months (Writing was on the wall when they were taken out of the credits). It became abundantly clear that the Teens were going to get a major push this year but the adults were still valuable players. Even Sal got a bit of screen time before fading back into doing little more than studying/bathing Chris.

Alf's flames were probably at their highest until about the coming year or late 1996 where Curtis really pushed his buttons. Too bad he shot off to NYC when Karen was carrying on her nonsense during that return. Everyone felt that the Karen/Sophie thing should been resolved but Rebekah had thrown in the towel (some on here may say mercifully, given the course of her storyline with Tammy).

Greg got WORSE and that was even before Bobby died. I breathed a sigh of relief/danced a jig when he left. Sam's brattishness got a bit much to take (playing with Nick's gunbelt after he SPECIFICALLY said not to, etc), You think Don would have applied some discipline but then we wouldn't have had Morag swooping in and doing her vulture act.

The Guest cast this year were pretty decent; Laura, Kevin, Bill mainly.

Angel was a valuable addition to the show this year, as was Sarah. Luke, slightly lesser.

Bobby will be sorely missed but Nicole admittedly couldn't go on and wanted to spread her wings.

I like how Irene basically slotted back in.

Tug was likeable against Greg but not Shane for the most part. His "stuff Flathead and his poxy school!" attitude did wear thin and it got to point where it was very hard to feel sorry for him.

Glad Pippa and later Alf, saw the error of her ways over Adam. Adam should have paid more attention but most of everyone treated him like he was Hitler.

The good thing about Nathan is him being there helps link back to the Roberts' past. It's funny how Fin won't even give him time of day, yet

in 2002 shortly after he is paroled, Irene mentions she lets him stay with her, Barry and the Kids before giving him the boot

The episode where Dale dies deserved that award. With H&A entering three eps in that category (The two musical ones), one was bound to win.

The comedic side of things was great; With Sal kissing Damo, The Slave Auction, Adam and the Gumball machine! Also, the unintentional comical ones like Karen vs Ailsa w/ The Vase ("Another one bites the dust!").

"Turkey" was a frequent insult this year.

Summing it up 1993 was a pretty sweet season and set the course for the next three years.

[Red Ranger 1]

So we began the year by losing Sophie and Blake. It was probably time for Sophie to go, since her storyline had been treading water for months, but despite an utterly shattering last scene with Michael, her exit was vaguely unsatisfactory, not really resolving anything and just shunting her storyline off screen. Blake's was even less satisfactory, basically amounting to Karen causing trouble until he agreed to leave town with her, then suffering off-screen jerkification as he cheated on Fin. Could have done better.

Luke arrived early on to join the already introduced Roxy: Neither of them have gone down in history as among the show's greats but they can be quite good, especially when mixed up with other characters like Nick, Adam and Tug. By the end of the 90s, the 18-30 age group will be almost gone so at least they're attempting to write plausible young adults characters at this point.

Fin and Sally ended up isolated at opposite ends of the teen spectrum. Fin muddles through and gets a few decent storylines and a decent bond with Damian. Sally did more than I remembered, notably her misguided attempt to join the "in crowd", but still had a tendency to disappear for weeks on end. I'll be intrigued to see if she has more to do in 1994 than I remember. But the main focus was on the new teen group: Shane, Damian, Tug, Sarah and Angel, comprising two existing regulars, two newbies and one promoted guest. All of which culminated in the undisputed Alpha Couple of the mid-90s: Shangel, in modern terminology. Although the long road to their getting together dragged at times, there is a huge amount of natural chemistry between this pair and you can see why they became as big as they did.

Mid-year we lost Bobby and, less importantly, Greg. For a pair who the show seemed to be trying to portray as the love of each other's lives, they didn't seem particularly well suited a lot of the time and it felt like they'd have given up on their marriage if not for Sam. But the second main character death, and second original character death, is going to go down in history as one of the show's major events. It led to the return of Morag, but thinking about it her storyline was very mismanaged. Either the audience and the characters should have remained unaware of Morag's manipulation until the end, or we should have been placed ahead of the characters, knowing what Morag was doing, with them only finding out the truth at the last minute. Instead, when the audience know what she's doing and Ailsa knows what she's doing, it felt like a very long and repetitive time waiting for everyone else to catch up.

And of course Irene began her record-breaking stint, something that probably didn't seem at all significant at the time. Michael and Pippa hit paydirt with the loss of baby Dale: The episodes that followed, with Pippa increasingly withdrawn and lashing out at her family, made for uncomfortable viewing but were well played by all concerned, and on the whole they continue to shine as well-meaning but not wholly dependable guardians. Ditto Alf and Ailsa, who gain another charge as soon as the previous ones have moved out although storylines of their own were a bit thin on the ground.

And that was 1993!