Bill Matthews: dead or alive?
I was doing some random reading on the AW home page and was checking out the episode by episode recaps from the early days of the show. That's quite a bit of fascinating stuff! Especially some of the dialog that is often quite funny and rather prophetic in some instances. One thing that I noticed, however, was that when Missy Matthews phoned Liz from Florida to tell her that beloved Bill Matthews had been killed in a boating accident, it was explained that he fell overboard. His body was never recovered and was presumedly washed out to sea. I, personally, find this rather interesting as I had not previously known this little detail. I wonder if TPTB had revived Bill Matthews at one point and kept him on the show (along with future offspring who'd age to adulthood over the years) whether the Matthews family would have retained their position of prominence in the series. Of course, now it's a mute point, but it's an interesting idea.
I have often wondered the same thing Matt. I have also wondered for years about the decision to get rid of John Randolph. I felt this was a final cut in the Matthews family as John and Pat were destined to be the new heads of the family. Pat went through a series of men after that before just fizzling out. She and John should have gotten back together.
I always felt that John would develop amnesia and come back at some point. I don't think they ever found his body in the fire either.
Rick
Vote for All Time Best Soap Actress
http://www.freevote.com/booth/060665
Re: Bill Matthews: dead or alive?
Back before AW was cancelled, I developed a storyline for it that would bring the Matthews family back into the storyline. I had a now grown Rick Matthews returning to Bay City with his wife and grown children. Not long afterward, Missy returned. Liz latched onto Ricky because, in her own warped way, she saw him as an extension of Bill because Bill loved him like he was his own natural son. Liz went back to her overbearing meddling ways and Missy tried to run interferance. Then, Bill returned home (after decades missing). Of course, he'd had amnesia and had started another family. Everyone was stunned and Liz latched on even tighter. I think this could have been a good way to bring the Matthews family back. The main problem with them was that there were too many girls in the family and not enough boys to carry on the Matthews name in the series. Ricky was Bill's only child (although not biologically) and Russ only had Olivia and Josie (both girls and both added to the Matthews family in the 90s). Even the children of the female Matthews wound up meeting tragic fates (Susan's daughter Julia Shearer was murdered as was Alice's daughter Sally Frame). The only female Matthews that managed to keep her kids alive was Pat with Michael and Marianne. I've always considered writing an alternate time line AW in which the story continued to follow the Matthews and Randolph families. I just always wondered what happened to them after they all left the show during the early 80s.
Email This To a Friend
Topic Commands
Click to receive email notification of replies 
Click to stop receiving email notification of replies