adam436

Thanks for sharing. It definitely had the nostalgic feel with returnees like Lance, Pippa, Carly etc. I guess I didn't enjoy the melodramatic direction it took in 2005 onwards, nor many of the newcomers from that period. That's a good point. I have fond memories of the Liam/Joey/Casey/Steph years (admittedly not seen them since though), as that was the era I first started watching. And the Nash years of 1998-2000, because I was a little older and understood more of what was going on. 1997-2000 are still some of my favourite years of the show (having seen most of 1988-mid 2005 and 2013-mid 2016), but I know those periods aren't as highly regarded by some.

Aside from Ailsa's exit, 2000 also saw the revamped titles and theme song, losing the original Stewart house and original Diner location and a brand new family moving into Summer Bay House. Plus the huge cast turnover that occurred over late 1999/2000 which included some fairly iconic characters like Sam, Ailsa, Marilyn, Rebecca, Travis, Chloe, Justine, Jesse and the Nashes among others. May I ask why you consider that a golden period? Admittedly I stopped watching for a long time from mid 2005 because I'd lost interest, but I wouldn't have rated those years I did watch particularly high.

It's hard to believe sometimes. I consider the Early Years to be 1988-2000, which seemed like such a long period at the time, but now it's less than a third of the total period on air. I know others consider the Sutherland era and perhaps even the years up to Sally's exit as the "Early Years" though. But still, in 3 years time, Sally would have only been on H&A for half its run.

Other than the Fisher connection, they pretty much were. I'm surprised Roxy pick up with Nick where Lucinda left, since Nick did next to nothing for the remainder of his time on the show. 1993-1994 was generally poor with twentysomethings. Nick was pretty forgettable, Adam had overstayed his welcome, Roxy and Luke weren't great characters. It felt like Bobby and Greg had been "aged" up too once they'd formed the family unit with Sam. Marilyn, Ryan and Lucinda had all left the previous year too.

That must have been a disappointment to the producers, since she was only around for a year all up. Adam was a character I never really liked. I feel like he was brought in as a "sexier" and smarter Martin, with Matt as his sidekick, filling the Lance role. The show was moving to increase it's sex appeal I think, with more beach scenes (and therefore more bikini and speedos) and older characters like Floss, Neville, Celia, Morag and Tom being written out and replaced with more youngsters. This meant both Lance and Martin became surplus to requirements. Even Marilyn migrated over to Adam and Matt eventually, completing the transition. I much preferred Martin over Adam, but he and Lance were caricatures at times.

They broke up long before that though - Emma dated Steven's friend Paul for a while before she left. I really can't see the Scott and Charlene similarity to be honest, other than to maybe cash in on the Minogue connection. Frank and Bobby had more of that vibe in the early years in terms of the tomboy girl and the male heartthrob, but that ended pretty quickly due to Alex Papps leaving. Another age gap romance between a teen and young adult was Chloe and Lachie. Chloe was barely out of school and he was a fully qualified doctor.

Those characters continued to be created though - I think there were just fewer of them. Charlotte Adams, Jude Lawson and James Fraser all fall into that category. Charlotte rarely interacted with anyone outside of their fellow twentysomethings unless it was a medical emergency. Jude was the same, but least had Noah around, which gave him a little more. And James was just there as Chloe's love interest and nothing more. I think the show struggled to write for that age group in the early 90s because the majority of the cast were either teenagers or the foster parent of a teenagers, and the writers didn't really see much of a vision beyond that. That's probably why we ended up with so many teachers in that age group. Or in Nick's case, a younger brother was introduced for him. Roxy and Lou also had family connections too, presumably to make them more relevant. I'd agree with that and also add Rebecca, Jesse v1, Rob and Donna to the list. I think creating more well-rounded characters was part of the overall shift that occurred in the writing/tone of the show in the mid 90s.

Donna could do lighter stuff like the country music competition too with Irene, and her role at the school and initially living with the Rosses meant she tended to interact with a wider range of characters. As opposed to someone like Travis, who was initially limited to his fellow twenty-something and incidental interactions at the diner. Donna's exit felt quite sudden too - they'd started the story with her brother and then wrapped it up rather quickly only for her to have a blink-and-miss-it exit. I think the writers got better and working with these characters in the mid-late 90s. It could be because the show took on a darker tone in 1995, meaning the writers could do more with that age group (i.e. Donna's abuse, Chloe's rape), or maybe those characters tended to just resonate more with the writers. The early 90s had characters like Nick, Lucinda, Roxy, Luke, Grant, a post-high school Carly and Matt. None of them had particularly memorable storylines. Or characters like Marilyn, Lance, Martin and Adam (up to killing Bobby), who were generally used for more comic relief stuff.

The current H&A is predominantly 20somethings and 30somethings, but the early years was completely opposite, with them being almost the most underrepresented age group. In fact, they were almost entirely absent from 1988. There was Lance, Martin and 18 year old Frank, but otherwise that group was entirely recurring guest characters like Phillip, Stacey and Brett. Given how scarce that group were in the 80s and 90s, we tended to get more rounded characters and better storylines, but I still feel it was a mixed bag. Who were your favourites and who do you think didn't work out so well? I guess given the teenage focus, many of them were teachers at the school, but many seemed difficult to write for at times - Lance and Martin got repetitive, Nick was underused, others like Rob and Luke didn't last long. Some of my favourites: Steven's second stint Travis and Rebecca - they were given the responsibility of Summer Bay House later on though, rather than the standard 20something storylines other characters like Kelly, Donna, Shauna etc. got. Stacey Macklin - around for over a year, so pretty much an unofficial regular. She was a fun early years character who seemed to move between the older and younger characters relatively seamlessly. Marilyn's second stint - she was probably lumped more with the senior cast moreso than her peers though Donna and Rob - I loved both their characters, but both were gone way too soon. Donna in particular, made a big impact in a short amount of time. Not so successful: Nick Parrish - completely underused as character and generally pretty bland Ben Lucini - terrible character

I was never a Jesse fan, but he was treated pretty poorly in his exit storyline for very little long-term gain. Especially when you consider his last regular love interest Josie left a few weeks earlier, and he could also have got a happy ending with Chloe. The writers seemed at a loss with Jesse after he and Leah broke up, but it's a shame they undid all the development they'd made with his character over his second regular stint.

Would she have been told when she signed the contract? Or found out after? We assume the former, but she might have just been told the overall story arc, since her death was literally over and done with in about a minute and had nothing to do with the story arc of escaping her abusive partner. Even her actual death episode was focused on Martha, and Chloe's death was just a quick/cheap shock twist at the end of the episode. I wasn't Chloe's biggest fan, but she was pretty much just seen as expendable character because the show wanted a death for episode 4000. At the time, I thought Olivia might have become the next young foster child (a la Sally and Sam), to join Sally's expanding foster brood, but she was swiftly written out too. At least her death gave Jesse and Irene a storyline. I stopped watching not long after, but didn't Irene have some sort of breakdown after Chloe's death and kept hallucinating that she could see Chloe?

Irene had Joey living with her at that point, giving Irene that maternal relationship, so Chloe wasn't really needed. I can't remember if anyone else was living with Irene around that time. Will and Hayley didn't arrive until 1998, and Marilyn moved out in 1996 after she married Don.

I guess with Rob the writers at least made the effort to isolate him from the rest of the characters before he stopped appearing - he'd quit his job at the school and bought a business that characters had no reason to visit, he'd moved out of Irene's place and his friendship with Donna was pretty much over. Chloe would be a little more difficult unless they had taken similar steps to remove her from the lives of the characters first. I found Kristy's reaction a little odd - she certainly wasn't the first regular character this happened to. Other names like Tom, Jack, Casey, Nick, Brody/Brodie, Natalie etc. have been reused among the regular cast. Reading between the lines, Kristy seems a little bitter that her Chloe was killed off.

If she was axed over something that happened behind the scenes, they certainly gave made sure she got a pretty rough exit story too. She was the first regular character, and one of the few characters in the 80s/1990s to depart on a negative note. Pretty much every other character either got a happy ending or left Summer Bay for a new job etc. It was more common in the early 90s for characters to leave after a year or so though. As well as Karen, others like Viv, Emma, Haydn, Ben, Grant and Simon come to mind, so it could just be a case over Belinda Jarrett moving on at the end of her contract.

The show had definitely moved on from Chloe by 1999 - it was like she didn't really fit in anywhere. She even felt like a hanger-on in the Irene/Will/Hayley/Joey unit at times. I don't really recall her having any meaningful interactions with anyone other than Irene, James and guest character Diana, though it's been 25+ years since I've watched the episodes.

I agree - it's not even like they set James up as Chloe's happy ending and wrote them both out together in 1999. According to Wikipedia, it sounds like Richard Grieve's relationship was somewhat unplanned: Grieve decided to leave the show in 1998, which gave producers a dilemma. They had developed the partnership between Lachlan and Chloe in advance. They cast Michael Piccirilli as Lachlan's brother James to take over the relationship with Chloe. I also assume that Kristy Wright was too popular at the time to be written out in 1998 with Lachie. She was one of the most popular characters at the time, and the show had already lost some big characters over the previous 12 months with Pippa, Shannon and Selina. Lachie and Chloe also felt like an afterthought too to be honest - I feel like the original plan was for Shannon to have the Lachie story arc, but when Isla Fisher quit, they threw Chloe into it instead. I may be wrong though.

I think it stands out more when the older actors work alongside the younger ones. For example, the actor playing Dylan was nearly 10 years older than the actors playing his peers. Likewise, the age difference was obvious between the actors playing Ric/Cassie and Henry Hunter, and Jett and VJ once he was recast. If all actors with a group are a similar age or within 2-3 years, it's less obvious when there older actors playing teenagers. When the age gap is 5+, or in the more extreme cases closer to 10 years, it really stands out.

I think I found it quite jarring because I was 16 in 2005, yet the actors who played Ric and Cassie looked so much older than me. Especially when you put them next to Tobi Atkins, who played Henry Hunter. I was a bit younger when Dylan Russell was on screen, so I probably didn't notice thr age difference so much at the time.

Yes, I recall reading somewhere there were plans for Beth to fall pregnant and not know whether she wanted to keep the baby or not. I always assumed it was Tammin Sursok's decision to leave, since she had her eyes set on a music career, but Max, Rhys and even Noah for that matter were let go by the new producer. Dan Bennett wanted give Sally pride of place at Summer Bay House and have her come full circle as a foster mum, so that meant the decision to lose Rhys, Max and Rhys and Beth's marriage were collateral damage in that. The plan for Sally and Flynn fell apart somewhat quickly too though, since Joel McIllroy decided to leave and the producers stopped at two foster teenagers (who were also dating and looked way older than their characters' ages).

I have a feeling Paula Forrest wanted to leave (I think she had a young child at the time!), but the producers fought for her to stay, so the sporadic appearances were probably a compromise. As I said, the decision to write out Rhys must have been a fairly 11th hour decision, since they'd married him off to Beth and created the blended family. Kit was another character who departed the regular cast, but didn't really "leave" until 2007. I think Channel 7 wanted to get rid of the character, but the producers wanted her to stay for vice versa?

Shelley returned a few times throughout 2003 and 2004. I'm pretty sure she returned when the truth about Jade not being a Sutherland came to light, then she returned for Kirsty and Kane's second wedding (the double wedding with Noah and Hayley), and then finally when Rhys was leaving. Given all the drama the Sutherlands had, I feel like there were probably more return appearances I've forgotten. She also returned with a new partner at one stage, though I can't remember if that was part of one of the aforementioned appearances or not. Me too! I liked Shelley and Max (who didn't arrive until much later!), but I couldn't stand Dani, Rhys, Jade, Kirsty and honourary Sutherland Brodie.

I never understood the creative reasoning behind splitting up John and Marilyn. I really liked them as a couple and neither have really developed as characters since. Given both Shane and Emily are still around, they would have been on track to rival Alf and Ailsa's as H&A's longest-running onscreen marriage at this point if they were still together. Irene must be the only long-term character to never have a permanent love interest. Ken and Barry Hyde are her only love interest who was part of the regular cast and those relationships lasted less than a year, and all the others like Paris and Lou, are only guests. Yes - Natalie and Shelley both returned for the exits of their husbands. I suspect Rhys' exit must have been quite a hasty decision, since he'd married Beth to a few months and the producers had gone to a lot of trouble to set up the Sutherlands/Hunters as a new central family unit.

I've said it before, but 1998-mid 2000 were very much transitional years for the show between Pippa and the foster kids, and the nuclear Sutherland family. I think the Nash family were meant to be the post-Pippa "shot in the arm", but it took them a year to move into Summer Bay House, and even longer before they were the sole parenting couple of the house. I imagine Travis and Rebecca were brought in as a gentle transition post-Pippa, rather than ripping off the band-aid and instilling a nuclear family in there from the start. Eventually it transitioned into the nuclear Nash family (plus foster kids Peta and Justine), but that took over 18 months. I'm not sure what went wrong - I liked all of them, but they were pretty much all written out in favour of the Sutherlands. I'd still take Joel, Peta and Justine over Rhys and the girls any day!