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I couldn't possibly have a site about TV without including a tribute to my dear departed Another World.

Sure there was temporary amnesia and dementia, and people who went blind for brief periods of time, and incurable diseases that were cured, and kids who aged 15 years in about a month, good twins and bad twins, and kidnappings on a regular basis, but it was all glorious. (At least it was up until the very end, with that supernatural Lumina business, and I'm still trying to forget the guy in the gorilla suit in the final episode, and the way they forced the whole cast to sing a James Brown song to woo it off the roof.)

I think AW generally used better actors than most soaps, unless it was just that I got used to them. But I remember when Morgan Freeman was on, and Kyra Sedgewick, and Anne Heche was working double-time to play two leading characters, and Paul Michael Valley was just glorious as Ryan. Charles Keating as the evil Carl Hutchins used to scare me so much that I had bad dreams about him, and even though they redeemed him at the end, I liked him best as the nastiest but most cultured villain on television.

A few story highlights:

The whole split personality story with Sharlene/Sharly, even when she went out one night for romano cheese and didn't come back for 2 years and when she did she'd dropped both Sharlene & Sharly and was some entirely new personality named Kate, who was a brunette instead of a blonde but used exactly the same cookie recipe as Sharlene, thus enabling her husband John to track her down.

Jake getting shot, ending up in a coma for months -- which was nice because it shut him up for a while -- and was so hated in Bay City that everyone in town was acting guilty. Marley was on trial, her sister Vicky thought she did it, she thought Vicky did it, their mother Donna ended up confessing to the crime and she wasn't even guilty.

Frankie's childhood friend Christy showing up, falling hard for Cass, and framing Frankie (actually, she framed Frankie Frame!) for her husband Douglas' murder. And it helped that she was played by Patti D'Arbanville. Classic. (I loved Frankie & Cass.)

Felicia finding out her real long-lost daughter was slutty, angry Lorna just months after adopting sweet, kind 16 year-old Jenna.

Ryan pursuing arch-criminal Carl relentlessly only to find out he was his real father. Oh no!

Donna finally confessing to Marley that she was her mother, not her sister, and then subsequently discovered Marley's identical twin Vicky, who came to town to steal back the fortune she felt was hers. Ah, we got years out of that rivalry, right up until the bitter end. And Donna hadn't even known that she'd had twins because her evil father snatched them away.

And let's not forget switched babies, switched allegiances, switched twins, switched bodies, switched evidence. . .it was a wacky world & I loved every minute of it. (Okay, almost every minute. They lost most of their momentum at the end, especially when carpenter Bobby Reno was revealed to be a racecar driver and then re-revealed to be Dr. Shane Roberts, surgeon extraordinare. And he had a fatal illness, incurable of course until it was cured, only to have him killed in a car accident about five minutes later.)

But it was all worth it. I haven't even mentioned other characters I loved, like the original Maggie Cory, played by Robyn Griggs, who got fired for spending her off-camera time with John Bobbitt. And Iris, who was sent off to jail for a crime she didn't commit, and never returned even after they figured out she didn't do it. I guess they just forgot. Frankie & Joe's detective agency was a favorite, especially when Joe took on Paulina's case, started searching for her missing husband Jake, and fell in love with her. Jake was pronounced dead, Joe proposed to Paulina, and just before they said their wedding vows, Jake walked in the door. And Vicky, everything about Vicky, every story she got and almost every actress who played her. And more on Jake, because he managed to marry each twin at one time or another AND sleep with their mother. I even liked when Victoria Wyndham, Rachel Cory ever since the mid-70s, got to branch out and play her lookalike evil rival, Justine Kirkland, who kidnapped Vicky, gave Spencer a stroke, and ended up getting my fave, Ryan, shot & killed by his brother Grant just hours after he rescued a starving Vicky from her sealed-in basement prison. I was crushed when Ryan was killled -- have I mentioned yet that I really liked Ryan? -- but I was riveted to that story, it was ridiculous but just SO much fun. And the side characters were a blast too, like Bridget Connell and Vivian the maid, and that guy Francois who used to be the maitre'd at Felicia's restaurant.

I could go on for hours, even if I did have to fast-forward through some of the fake Matts and that creepy day that Ken Jordan & Rachel were doing it in every room of the house, including on the stairwell. I'd sit through murder trials and mistaken identities, and spouses returning from the dead -- which happened to Cass TWICE -- and all the subterfuge. And I'd still be wishing things turned out better for Felicia, and for Frankie, and wondering what happened to Morgan Winthrop (who seemed to just fade out of all the stories until nobody mentioned him again).

Well thank god for SOAPnet! We are right back in 1990, with big hair, shoulder pads, and bright colored suits. Jake's headed out of his coma, Donna's in jail for his murder (although she still gets to wear nice clothes, make phone calls, and have lots of visitors who get left alone with her even though she's being charged with homicide), Sharlene's crazy therapist is out to get her, Jenna's all starry-eyed for Matt, and Kathleen just came back from the dead. Life is good.