Thanks for giving me an insight into the show with no spoilers

I got into Knots Landing first run by accident at the start of the story where Valene gave birth to twins - who were still born, but Val was convinced she had heard them crying... Well that became a huge storyline and I was hooked. After that storyline was over I did slowly drift away from the series. I did see the arrival of Paige and Anne Matheson but was losing interest by that point.

It was a well made series with great characters (Abby, needless to say, was my ultimate favourite.) The storylines were very complex and often long running. I must admit I didn't always fully understand who had been responsible for what or remember all the twists and turns that had taken place in some of the shady schemes, political intrigues, and business deals explored by the series.

A few years after my introduction I caught up on all the early seasons in a daytime repeat run. Well I still considered myself a fan at that point so was compelled to view all the early episodes. The first two seasons could be a bit of a trial. I personally disliked the self contained stories in the early seasons. I came to the series thinking it was a soap yet the early years had neatly delineated self contained stories so you didn't get too invested in the drama as you knew whatever unfolded on screen would be wrapped up in 50 minutes, and then never mentioned ever again.

They even had a "To come..." opening montage. While I *loved* this aspect of episodes of The Thunderbirds and Mission: Impossible where it was done well with snazzy music and became a cool feature of the series, I hated it in Knots Landing. For me it broke my suspension of disbelief even before the episode began and kind of spoiled things too.



Some of the early episodes are excruciatingly bad. Some are OK. The first season - before Abby arrived - is clearly missing something. It doesn't have a real villain, nor does it have a sexy vixen, while other night time soaps of the day had these types of characters. But Abby's arrival fixed that as she was both. But even with Abby in place it was still self contained episodes so like what happens in sitcoms, you'd have this generic story and Abby would be involved even though in reality she wouldn't be there. For some reason three episodes stand out for me. Episode 1 with Sid's wayward daughter from his first marriage, which was OK. Then there was an episode where I think all the female regulars have a girls night in one of the houses but are held hostage by home invaders. Abby was in this one and had somewhat incongruously been invited to the party. The worst was another episode featuring only the female lead characters, where they have a weekend away and Val finds a jewelry box and communicates with ghosts (of three sisters, I seem to recall). Again Abby is along for the ride and acts as the antagonist making one wonder why she was invited?

Later it becomes more interesting as the storylines span multiple episodes. By the time of the arrival of characters like Chip and Ciji, things get a lot more interesting.

You're welcome though worrying about spoilers hadn't actually occurred to me so that was lucky really! Good job i didn't mention something about season 3 which would have been quite a big spoiler.

I don't think this is spoilerish as i think you mentioned you've watched Dallas. One thing i did like about KL moving into 'big' money and business is that it was a natural evolution as it tied in with Gary inheriting money and interest in Ewing Oil following Jock's death rather them all just having money overnight having previously been firmly lower middle class (except for Gary but he was cut off from his rich relatives) because glamarous Soap was the 'thing' at the time.

I was going to reply on KL but then thought it would be better to start another thread so as not to put off people that want to discuss dynasty, and not KL.

What are people's views on the Reunion episode and how each character's storylines were tidied up

The Reunion is odd because for all it was billed as a way of wrapping things up as it wasn't 'fair' to leave all of those cliffhangers - none of them were directly addressed.

In some ways that was understandable as it was set 3 years later and perhaps it would have been odd to have everybody discussing how Fallon and Ktystyna got out of the mine, what happened to Dex, was Adam charged or was it deemed an accident due to the Bannister being unstable in which case was sable charged for negligence etc, etc. Basically they just forgot everything that happened in Season 9 (Miles and Jeff seem to believe they're brothers again as one examole) except Krystle's coma and Blake shooting Handler.

For all that, it did provixe closure to a certain extent and there was a sense of the status quo being re-established. Everybody was back 'where they should be' (Blake with Krystle, Fallon with Jeff, Adam with Kirby, Steven happy and accepted in a homosexual relationship but with Sammy Jo in place as Danny's Mum, Alexis playing nice but with an edge. But there was a feeling that things would go on as before, this is just the lull before the storm. Jeff and Fallon wouldn't stay contented together because they never do. Alexis will start causing trouble again, Adam will feel insecure about something so start scheming and probably lose Kirby because of it.

So, business as usual.

Poor Dex was explained away in a throwaway conversation between two bit part characters where they explained that Alexis managed to turn in mid air and land on top of him. All that was said of him was that "he didn't fare too well". So it was unknown whether he died or was left paralyzed or what.

There was a multitude of problems with the Reunion. Reverse-recasting Steven was pretty ridiculous considering his change in appearance had been explained in the original series. Recasting Adam. The dialogue. Trying to pass off that other house as the mansion. I know that the original sets would've been long dismantled but they could've shot somewhere that remotely looked like the original. It was all just really dire.

On the subject of American soaps, Knots Landing's final two episodes air on CBS Drama tomorrow, bringing to a close the long run of 80's US soaps that the channel aired over the last few years.