‘General Hospital’ Fans Break Down Their Wish Lists As ABC Begins Daily Encore Episodes
General Hospital fans have a lot of thoughts about what they would like to see the show do in the midst of this complicated coronavirus filming hiatus.
ABC is now finding it necessary to air all repeat episodes of General Hospital until the cast and crew can begin filming new content again. California’s stay-at-home orders forced a halt on production in mid-March, and no firm return date for the cast has been determined yet.
The week of May 25 will feature several Nurses Ball episodes from 2014 and 2015. While the annual Nurses Ball is always a fun time with big storyline developments, some fans think focusing on these right now might be a mistake.
“Welp, it’s good to see that this show is digging way into it’s vault for classic episodes,” noted one General Hospital fan on Twitter who added a couple of emoji signaling that she wasn’t necessarily impressed with this plan.
"I'm so excited!" #GH pic.twitter.com/4W93vvj7Jj
— General Hospital (@GeneralHospital) May 25, 2020
In response to that tweet, it was suggested that the decades-old Stavros Cassadine storyline might be a fabulous one to revisit during this encore run. Other storylines that people suggested could really generate some interest and buzz would be the Metro Court hostage crisis, the hotel fire, or the trainwreck, events that happened in the 2000s.
Some fans noted that if ABC wants to focus on old Nurses Ball episodes, they could go truly vintage and show some from the very early days of the show.
Going back just a few years might seem encore-worthy to relatively new fans. However, the most dedicated fans seemingly yearn for really going back in time to bring back some of the shows that shaped what General Hospital has been over the years.
In addition to questioning the current encore show strategy, General Hospital fans are starting to speculate about what happens when filming begins again. For example, some have suggested on Twitter that the writers could incorporate a time jump.
Days of Our Lives did a time jump a while back, and it seemed to be a winner with fans. GH viewers were left hanging on a number of fronts when the last pre-filmed episode aired last week, but that doesn’t mean that the writers couldn’t get creative in how they proceed once they can get back to work again.
“[R]eset the show five or six years, just fill in the blanks and do it right. This way you can get rid of about 15-20 characters, yes some children and couples wouldn’t exist, but oh well,” proposed one viewer.
“Given ratings lows, easy to drop #GH unpopular stories, keep popular Catrina build and reset rest of canvas stories with Finding Hayden/Helena return story,” suggested someone else.
For now, General Hospital fans will need to try to be content with Nurses Ball reruns from the past few years. It seems possible that the cast and crew will details soon regarding a date when they can get back to work and viewers will be anxious to see what the writers do with the new episodes on the horizon.
