Look, we never cheer for anyone to lose their job. But we’ll admit it: We were bummed to hear that Sony Pictures TV’s Steve Kent was going to continue to oversee The Young and the Restless. We’re not sure what soap he’s been watching the last few years, but were the late, great William J. Bell still around, we’d be willing to bet an organ that he’d want to give Kent an earful.
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And here’s the thing: We’re rooting for him as well as headwriter/executive producer Josh Griffith. It may not seem like we are, because we can be hella critical, but we are. We want the show to be not just as good as it’s ever been but better. And sadly, it is neither. It. Does. Not. Have. To. Be. This. Way.
Call us dumb. Call us clueless. Call us outsiders who have never written or produced a daytime drama. That’s fine. But even being as dimwitted as we may be, even without a day’s experience on a soap, we were able to come up with a 10-step plan to make Young & Restless 10 times better. (And not for the first time.) Read on and then, if you can, say that it wouldn’t improve the show that is currently airing.
10. Get Out of the Business Business
The corporate infighting is pointless, unrelatable and, worst of all, boring. Nobody cares about which ridiculously rich character gets to sit in the corner office. Stop pretending that we do. (Frankly, we’d be more invested if Billy kept ignoring Lily’s “This is mine!” labels on her yogurt in the executive fridge.) While we’re on the subject of Genoa City’s infinite population of CEOs, how’s about we lay off the “master plans” that amount to nothing? (Looking at you, Tucker, Audra, Nate, Mamie, Kyle, Billy… )
9. Put the ‘Young’ Back in Young & Restless
Born in 2001, Kyle should only be 23 years old, but he’s already a twice-divorced father and business exec. Summer is, technically, even younger, and her track record is even longer than her ex-husband’s. Time to introduce or reintroduce some next-generation characters who will actually behave like kids and be able to plausibly use inexperience as an excuse for their reckless and impulsive behavior. Where’s Genoa City’s next playboy or supervixen? (Here’s one idea.)
8. Respect Your Vets
Look, we love having Jack, Nikki, Victor & Co. front and center. But instead of playing them as action heroes chasing after cartoon villain Jordan, how about playing on their history and having them pay it forward? Have Victor mentor an up-and-comer who, like him, was born with nothing but determination. Have Jack and Nikki team up to open a rehab center for those who, unlike them, don’t have gazillions of dollars. Have Traci do more than be everybody’s talk-to; give her a damn love interest already!
7. Finish What You Start
Is Young & Restless getting dotty in its old age? Time and again, it’s started what promised to be major plots and then dropped them as if they were nothing. Audra and Noah were supposed to have been the hottest of red-hot lovers, but she didn’t even bother to throw a monkey wrench into his romance with Allie. And where is Allie, anyway? The show jumped through hoops to give Jack a granddaughter, only to banish her to storyline Siberia. What was the point of giving Sharon her own corporation? For that matter, what was the point of her abruptly (and inexplicably) ending her fling with Chance? Did Nikki cure her MS by forgetting that she has it? We could go on!
6. Get With the Times
When was the last time Young & Restless told a story that was of the moment? Or even mildly controversial? Did Nate ever get to float the idea that, as the only Black employee of Newman, he might have been given short shrift? Have “Teriah” been fearful about anti-LGBTQ+ legislation? Has a character wanted an abortion and realized that Wisconsin’s proposed ban would have made it impossible for her? Don’t think so.
5. Kill the Green Screen
We 100-percent understand that the Young & Restless of today doesn’t have the budget for location shoots in exotic locales, fresh flowers in the Abbott mansion and day-player bartenders who are actually allowed to speak. But for the love of Mary Williams, please lay off the terrible green-screen effect. It only rubs salt in the wound that is our memories of when the show had top-tier production values. If you’re afraid we’ll be bored by a scene if it doesn’t take place outdoors, maybe that’s a problem with the scene, not its setting.
4. Tell, Don’t Show
Under the current regime, the soap has fallen into the bad habit of playing beats off screen — and often, the ones that we most want to see. Like? Over the last few years, most of Amanda’s evolving relationship with her mother, the bulk of Mariah and Tessa’s adoption journey, Summer’s face-off with Audra after getting a whiff of her affair with Kyle, Ashley’s first transformation into Flo from Alice Belle. On a related note…
3. Cut the Exposition
Unless Young & Restless is going to write extremely witty and/or engaging recaps of past action — and if Traci isn’t doing the talking, that’s unlikely — skip it. We’re watching every day. You’re just telling us stuff we already know. And if you beat the audience over the head with the fact that you rehash everything that happens (and usually more than once!), even your loyalest viewers will realize that they don’t have to watch every day. That can’t be the goal, right?
2. Solve Your Identity Crises
There was a time when we felt like we knew the characters on Young & Restless as well as we did the back of our own hands. Now? Not so much. Daniel cheating on Lily felt like a backstab to fans as much as to her. Phyllis’ outta-nowhere fixation with reuniting with Danny made zero sense. And who the hell are Billy and Chelsea anymore? He meanders from career to career wearing his privilege like a designer suit. Is he just obnoxious? Now that Chelsea’s reformed, is her sole purpose in life to wring her hands over Connor and the well-intentioned PSA in which he’s occasionally featured? To know these characters is to love them, and we no longer know them.
1. Give Us a Romance
We were starting to write a story the other day and thought, “OK, which couple from Young & Restless should we include?” And then it hit us: There are, like, no frontburner romances on the show. We’ve got relatively stable couples like Jack and Diane and Danny and Christine, but where’s the yearning, the desire, the lust? Adam and Sally have been backburnered. Summer has become more about hating Claire than loving Chance. And Audra actually stated that she’d prefer to talk about mergers and acquisitions with Tucker than have any more sex with him. Come on, Young & Restless, you want our hearts to skip a beat, not altogether flatline.
Review the below photo gallery to revisit the rich history of The Young and the Restless.
