User Reviews

Revisiting the pilot of the show having washed it when it first aired and watching a show recurring lie during its six-year run, I never was as attracted to it as the mother show. Steve and Audrey, Jessie Brewer, Lee and Gail, adopted son Scott, the Quartermaines, the Webbers and even the Cassadines had stories that drew you in. But Port Charles started off on a weak note with a group of interns I could care less about for the most part, cliches of young and beautiful and mostly self centered people that just simply were not interesting and certainly people I would not want to have looking over my health. It's like a dozen Britt's of both genders, and characters like that are fine in small doses as long as they don't dominate the show.

There was the interesting premise of the Baldwins being the core family at the beginning, and it was nice to see even on a recurring basis Lee and Gail having important involvement in the story for the first time in years. Scott is a terrific anti-hero, and Kin Shriner deserved leading man status. But poor Lucy, once a terrific vixen, became a whiny put upon heroine, and as much as I like Lynn Herring, she was like water torture here. Former villainesses like Lisa of "As the World Turns" and Iris of "Another World" both got spin-offs as well, and weren't as popular as heroines. Lucy suffered from really bad writing for her character and ending up in comic relief stories lost her bite. There was a better balance for her when she came back years after to "General Hospital".

So we do get Audrey here as the matriarchal character along with Gail, and Lee as the patriarch with Scotty as the lead did add historical value as the Baldwins had been around since the early days of "General Hospital". But changing in writing staff and desperation kept the show changing in themes, and when it went off the air six years later, it was nowhere even close to its original look. Debbie Morgan was completely wasted as a tough resident after her years as another doctor, the much nicer Angie, and her waste here is a daytime crime. Various GH characters will pop over, with Alan and Monica frequent authority figures and Mac Scorpio providing law and order during the vampire chases and other crime sprees that took place here that we're never even mentioned on "General Hospital".

In checking it out again, I find I'm doing a lot of fast forwarding, and the issue is that the new characters that were meant to draw you in you anything but. Several of the actors would go back to GH in there original raw and several of them would also play other unrelated roles. They might as well have kept "The City" on or even bring back "Ryan's Hope" because "Port Charles" did a disservice to ABC soaps in its attempt to be groundbreaking and primetime like. The show did succeed when it allowed the nurses ball to tie both shows together and brought on the Barringtons, but its switch to chapters just seems years later like a cry of desperation.

Before I ever saw an episode of this show, I thought it was dumb that they were doing supernatural things, especially having a vampire on the show. But a friend convinced me to watch it and boy was I hooked. Even through all the supernatural things they did, it was the classic elements that made the show so good. Wonderful acting, although they wasted their best talent (which most soaps do actually) in Nolan North as Chris Ramsey; strong ties of human relationships (including a heavy importance of family and friends, which isn't really seen often on soaps but adds so much). If ever a soap did supernatural the right way, it was this show.

The later arcs got a little tired but their "classic" time, being the arcs of Tainted Love, Tempted, and Miracles Happen, kick butt. Kudos to ALL the actors in these three arcs; they made this show what it was.

The last arc was promising though, and rumors had it that the next planned arc would have shown more of the Ramsey brothers together, which I always ached to see more of. I love familial relationships, especially between siblings, and tire of seeing soaps use the dead plot of ruining family relationships over love. That's why I was happy to see Chris and Jack's relationship do just the opposite. It's things like this that made me love the show so much and value so much the tapes I have of this show.

I just want to say one more thing about the acting: what a superb ensemble cast. All the actors had chemistry with each other. No matter who was on; be it Chris and Jack, Kevin and Lucy, Ian and Eve, Frank and Karen... even people who didn't have a whole lot of scenes together (Jack and Eve or Chris and Alison), they still worked together beautifully. That is why Tainted Love and Tempted were so successful: these arcs demanded that of the actors.

What a shame that Port Charles is gone and Passions is still on the air.