Did Neville and Floss only have a proper purpose in the Pilot?

[adam436]

On 29/07/2021 at 08:06, Homeandawayfan. said:

People moan about the lack of fostering in today's show but by the end of 1988 the show was drifting away from Tom and Pippa and the fostering format and became more about the Stewart's, Macklins, Fishers - and Bobby, Carly and Frank taking centre stage out of the foster children. Luckily Pippa was revived 2 years later and given a central role again. I feel by the end of 1988, Tom had reached his natural end, as did the aforementioned Floss and Neville.

You make a good point - we also had characters like Adam, Matt, Marilyn, Grant and Ben who rounded out the early twenty-something cast, taking up space in the cast that foster children could have been.

I guess the fostering was more "shared out" rather than centralised at Summer Bay House - Fisher took in Viv and the Stewarts had Emma, Blake, Karen and Simon, presumably to allow relationships between the Fletcher kids and other foster teens to become more acceptable. Summer Bay House fostering picked up again in 1991ish when Pippa married Michael. It was around then that Sophie and Sally became more prominent character and were introduced to Finn, Damien, Sam. Eventually, we got the likes of Selina, Jack, Shannon, Curtis, Chloe etc. 

  

On 30/07/2021 at 08:07, c120701 said:

Yes, it became the Stacey Macklin show for a while.

Some of us weren't complaining about that

Stacey was an interesting one - she had no real purpose after she left the Macklins and Phillip died. She was given random filler storylines like making jewelry out of shells and shoehorned into scenes, and didn't really have any strong connections outside of Andrew Foley and to an extent, Ailsa and Steven. 

  

16 hours ago, Homeandawayfan. said:

Neville was one of only 2 originals who never returned either chronologically or as a vision such as Tom in 2008. The other one was Lyn Davenport, it has not been said what happened to Lyn in the years since her departure as far as I know.

I guess it depends on how you look at it - Lynn left Summer Bay to live with her parents, but she remained in the opening credits for months and only returned for an episode or two. Personally, I view her as having "returned" after leaving. In terms of actors it has just been Frank Lloyd, Justine Clarke, Vanessa Downing and Helena Bozich (depending on how you view your exit), who never returned in some capacity from the original cast. 

[CaptainHulk]

On 28/07/2021 at 20:32, c120701 said:

I heard that about the magazine too.

The show was definitely changing direction after that first year to focus on the younger cast (& audience), The Bayside Diner was launched, we then saw the Surf Club and the beach which was a secondary character, really started to become more of a focus. 

The show had always been about the young to start with.

[c120701]

On 30/07/2021 at 14:57, Homeandawayfan. said:

Neville was one of only 2 originals who never returned either chronologically or as a vision such as Tom in 2008. The other one was Lyn Davenport, it has not been said what happened to Lyn in the years since her departure as far as I know.

Floss was great, she was bubbly and chatty.

The only thing said about Lynn, I think is that Pippa never heard from her, which she took as a sign that everything worked out with her real family.

[homeandawayroxsomuch.]

On 31/07/2021 at 21:28, c120701 said:

The only thing said about Lynn, I think is that Pippa never heard from her, which she took as a sign that everything worked out with her real family.

In late 1996 when Sally was missing, Steven was talking to Kelly about the rest of original kids that came to Summer Bay with Tom and Pippa, and he said "I don't know where she is" about Lynn.

However, I'm sure I saw an episode from late 1994 where Pippa was telling either Jack or Damian about sending Christmas presents out and I think Lynn was someone she named in that list.

[Trudy Heine]

So did Floss predict the deaths of Bobby and Charlotte (Adams)? Remember she gave her a reading buy didn't tell her about it? Must have been her death she saw

[homeandawayroxsomuch.]

7 hours ago, Trudy Heine said:

So did Floss predict the deaths of Bobby and Charlotte (Adams)? Remember she gave her a reading buy didn't tell her about it? Must have been her death she saw

In the Summer Bay sesquicentary celebrations/Mirigini disaster episodes, Floss had given Charlotte a card reading, and partway through, there had been a bang due to something Don had done, and then when Charlotte was ready to continue, Floss was suddenly like "Sorry, I've lost the connection.  It happens like that sometimes."

Then after Charlotte went back to talk to Jude, Frank asked Floss what had got her rattled - it's detailed on this page: https://www.backtothebay.net/episodesarchive/scripts/2002/3282.shtml

 

[cymbaline]

The show had a "throw in everything but the kitchen sink" feel to it at the start and I got the impression the programme makers didn't really know what they wanted to do with it. Certainly, there were times in the first year where they seemed to have too many characters on the go. The show also could be very cartoony and this, unfortunately, is where Floss and Neville fell at times. I don't remember 1988 too well at this point but was a retired circus couple living in a caravan a bit hokey even by then? 

On 06/08/2021 at 09:34, Trudy Heine said:

So did Floss predict the deaths of Bobby and Charlotte (Adams)? Remember she gave her a reading buy didn't tell her about it? Must have been her death she saw

When I see Floss and her cards, it brings to mind Daphne Moon from Frasier who thought she was psychic but didn't seem to be very good at predicting things. 

[BobbyFridge]

I've just seen their exit episode again and it seems very weak and rushed. Considering they were original characters they could have made an effort to give them a better exit at least. I feel sorry for them because they really didn't do much for most of the time they were on the show. The only real storyline they had was with their son and grandson and even that was never really resolved properly, their son never softened or really agreed that they could see more of Ben. Then they just faded into the background. 

[Smash]

On 18/07/2021 at 05:33, j.laur5 said:

I really felt the only time Neville and Floss seemed like they brought something to the show was in the pilot. At least they were both supporting the Fletchers in establishing themselves in town and the driving  force in Bobby meeting the Fletchers .

 I feel after the pilot neither really brought much to the show other than Floss's prediction about one of them dyeing and  that came somewhat true later on when Frank nearly died and Bobby died several years later. 

I think it's possible that Neville and Floss could have easily magically disappeared after the pilot like Doris Peters and the show would not be that much different. 

Personally I am glad they didn’t as I liked their characters. But at the same time I do think that unfortunately they were very one dimensional characters and unnecessary once the Fletchers became established. 

 

In fairness, the only reason Doris Peters never appeared after the pilot was because Gwen Plumb took a role in the short-lived Richmond Hill between the pilot and H&A going into production in 1988.  This is the reason Celia appeared as the town gossip and they nicely tied it in with Celia being a Stewart.  

Like you, I liked Floss and Nev, and any under-utilisation was, I feel, on behalf of the writers rather than the abilities of the actors.   I think many people tend to overlook the fact that there are often solid, dependable characters in soaps who never appear to be at the forefront of the major action, then someone says "oh, so-and-so has been in the show for 1000 episodes" and you end up being surprised at their longevity, whereas other more "powerful" characters might have burned out after 300 episodes, but left a lasting impression because of a particular storyline.  

Floss and Nev were unique in that they were (for the most part) comic characters who were much older than the usual comic duo.  Coupled with Lance and Martin, when they moved into the mobile home, I thought they made a great foursome in terms of humour.  It was a shame that F&N were written out in 1989 and L&M a year later.  H&A tried unsuccessfully to do comedic/scheming to earn a dollar characters following this, most notably with Adam, who started out as a great character, but quickly became a joke.  Absolutely nothing wrong with Mat Stevenson's acting, he was just given dross to deal with. 

One Floss and Nev story I would have liked to have seen is the resolution of their relationship with Scott, either for the good, or the bad.  Preferably the good - they deserved it.  Then, if they had to be written out, it would have been nice to have seen them go off to live in an annex at Scott's property where they could spend as much time as they liked with their son and grandson, Ben.  

[adam436]

On 19/09/2021 at 07:41, Smash said:

One Floss and Nev story I would have liked to have seen is the resolution of their relationship with Scott, either for the good, or the bad.  Preferably the good - they deserved it.  Then, if they had to be written out, it would have been nice to have seen them go off to live in an annex at Scott's property where they could spend as much time as they liked with their son and grandson, Ben.  

That's true, their exit was pretty bad. Having them rejoin the circus felt a bit silly. A happy ending with their son would have perhaps made a bit more sense.