History Series / Passions

The show opened as a fairly innocuous daytime soap, albeit with elements of [[LovecraftCountry the paranormal]]. That soon ended with the introduction of Tabitha the witch and her ambulatory doll Timmy. An episode of ''Passions'' makes the the average telanovela look like ''Series/TheWire''. The "villains" belonged in a Silver Age comic book. The ruling dynasty was comprised of [[UpperClassTwit inbred idiots]]. A transgender [[TwoFaced Two-Face]] stalked Harmony for victims to rape/blackmail (the joke being that rapists and blackmailers are the two most common villains in soaps). Zombies, the Devil, and dwarves ran amok. Characters popped over to [[Film/TheWizardOfOz Magical Land of Oz]] for an afternoon... And, in one memorable arc, a faked death involved [[ComplexityAddiction some serious stealth work]].

The show ostensibly follows the lives of numerous families in Harmony, New England: The ''eeeeevil'' Crane family, who orchestrated most of the non-magical plotlines; the Lopez-Fitzgeralds, many of whom fell in love with Crane family members; the Bennetts, who were connected to the Cranes through Alistair's grandson Ethan; the Russells, who have got to be one of the oddest BrotherSisterIncest stories on record; the Winthrops, who get involved in an impressive romantic three-way plot; the Hotchkiss family (involved with the Winthrops); and at least one member of the Standish family (related to the Bennetts).

The show opened as a fairly innocuous daytime soap, albeit with elements of [[LovecraftCountry witchcraft and the paranormal]]. That soon ended with the introduction of Tabitha the witch and her ambulatory doll Timmy. An episode of ''Passions'' makes the the average telanovela look like ''Series/TheWire''. The "villains" belonged in a Silver Age comic book. The ruling dynasty was comprised of [[UpperClassTwit inbred idiots]]. A transgender [[TwoFaced Two-Face]] stalked Harmony for victims to rape/blackmail (the joke being that rapists and blackmailers are the two most common villains in soaps). Zombies, the Devil, and dwarves ran amok. Characters popped over to [[Film/TheWizardOfOz Magical Land of Oz]] for an afternoon... And, in one memorable arc, a faked death involved [[ComplexityAddiction some serious stealth work]].

* CannotSpitItOut: Basically all the men on the show when they're involved with love triangles. Ethan can't ''ever'' decide who he loves more; Gwen or Theresa. Chad couldn't bring himself to curb Simone's delusions of them being a couple and tell her he was dating Whitney. Miguel kept sending mixed signals to Kay when he was in love with Charity.
** Luis though is probably the biggest man guilty of this. It took him a long time to admit he loved Sheridan, and then took another long time to choose between Sheridan and Beth (and then later Sheridan and Fancy). Even while knowing how psychotic Beth was, he could never stand up to her, or even ''stop'' her from running off with Marty.

* CassandraTruth: Passions is based on secrets and truths being revealed.
* CastFullOfPrettyBoys: This show is full of hot men that there is literally no shortage. Luis, Ethan, Antonio, Miguel, Noah, Fox, Chad, Hank...

* CatapultNightmare: Sheridan suffered from very bad nightmares since childhood, where she dreamed about killing someone with a letter opener, seeing blood on her hands, seeing a dead body and being blamed for murdering someone (at one point, she believed that she was the one who had murdered Martin Fitzgerald).

* ChildhoodFriends: Miguel and Kay. They have been friends since childhood, although Kay has always been in love with Miguel but Miguel did not reciprocate Kay's feelings until way later on.
* ChildByRape: Chad. Originally he knew his parents were from the town Harmony and eventually came to believe he was the son of wealthy white businessman Julian Crane and his black lounge singer-turned doctor Eve after he fathered a child with Eve's daughter Whitney. Later he turned out to have not committed incest with Whitney and that he was actually the son of Eve's deranged adopted sister Liz who was raped by Julian's father Alistair. Then we find out he really did have gay incest with Vincent, who turns out to be the actual son of Julian and Eve (thus Chad's half-nephew/cousin and Whitney's half brother. Vincent is also a cross-dressing intersex serial killer (no seriously this is all true) who has violently raped or tricked various of his relatives into sex including his uncle Chad, his sister Fancy and the topper is he becomes pregnant with his father Julian's baby. Yeah.

* BlackGalOnWhiteGuyDrama: Why Julian and Eve couldn't be together in their younger days.

* BrownEyes: Theresa.

'''''Passions''''' (1999-2008) is quite possibly the weirdest Daytime SoapOpera since ''Series/DarkShadows''.

->''"Passions doesn't throw reality out of the window, so much as jettison it into the sun."''
-->--'''CharlieBrooker''', Series/{{Screenwipe}}

''Passions'' is quite possibly the weirdest Daytime SoapOpera since ''Series/DarkShadows''.

The show follows the lives of several families in the town of Harmony: The rich Crane family, headed by the ''eeeeevil'' Alistair Crane (played by [[DiabolicalMastermind a hand holding a cigar]] in the early episodes; later evolved into Ross Webster from ''Film/SupermanIII''); the Lopez-Fitzgeralds, many of whom fell in love with Crane family members; the Bennetts, who were connected to the Cranes through Alistair's grandson Ethan; the Russells, who have got to be one of the oddest BrotherSisterIncest stories on record; the Winthrops, who get involved in an impressive romantic three-way plot; the Hotchkiss family (involved with the Winthrops); and at least one member of the Standish family (related to the Bennetts).

The show opened as a fairly innocuous daytime soap, albeit with elements of [[LovecraftCountry witchcraft and the paranormal]]. What drove the show completely off the rails wasn't that it was cheesy, but that it became a self-parody almost within a month of its premiere. An episode of ''Passions'' makes the cheapest telanovela look like ''Series/TheWire''. The "villains" belonged in a Silver Age comic book. The town's ruling dynasty was comprised of [[UpperClassTwit inbred idiots]]. A transgender [[TwoFaced Two-Face]] stalked Harmony for victims to rape/blackmail (since he/she couldn't decide on which stock daytime villain to be and decided to try both). Zombies, the Devil, and dwarves ran amok. Characters popped over to [[Film/TheWizardOfOz Magical Land of Oz]] for an afternoon... And, in one memorable arc, a faked death involved [[ComplexityAddiction some serious stealth work]]. The shift in tone can be narrowed down to the witch Tabitha and her ambulatory doll Timmy [[EnsembleDarkhorse stealing the show away]] from the 'main' cast. Not that anyone complained.

* DangerouslyGenreSavvy: Alistair and Julian. They always know what is going on around them and they almost always discover everyone's secrets.

* BlondesAreEvil: Ivy.

* SpiritedYoungLady: Theresa, Whitney. Both are enthusiastic, passionate and opinionated.

The show opened as a fairly innocuous daytime soap, albeit with elements of [[LovecraftCountry witchcraft and the paranormal]]. What drove the show completely off the rails wasn't that it was cheesy, but that it became a self-parody almost within a month of its premiere. An episode of ''Passions'' makes the cheapest telanovela look like ''Series/TheWire''. The "villains" belonged in a Silver Age comic book. The town's ruling dynasty was comprised of [[UpperClassTwit inbred idiots]]. A transgender [[TwoFaced Two-Face]] stalked Harmony for victims to rape/blackmail (since he/she couldn't decide on which stock daytime villain to be and decided to try both). Zombies, the Devil, and dwarves ran amok. Characters popped over to [[Film/TheWizardOfOz Magical Land of Oz]] for an afternoon... And, in one seriously memorable arc, a faked death involving [[ComplexityAddiction some serious stealth work]]. The shift in tone can be narrowed down to the witch Tabitha and her ambulatory doll Timmy [[EnsembleDarkhorse stealing the show away]] from the 'main' cast. Not that anyone complained.

The show opened as a fairly innocuous daytime soap, albeit with elements of [[LovecraftCountry witchcraft and the paranormal]]. What drove the show completely off the rails wasn't that it was cheesy, but that it became [[WhoWouldWantToWatchUs an intentional self-parody almost within a month of its premiere.]] An episode of ''Passions'' makes the cheapest telanovela look like ''The Wire''. The "villains" belonged in a Silver Age comic book. The town's ruling dynasty was comprised of [[UpperClassTwit inbred idiots]]. A transgender [[TwoFaced Two-Face]] stalked Harmony for victims to rape/blackmail (since he/she couldn't decide on which stock daytime villain to be and decided to try both). Zombies, the Devil, and dwarves ran amok. Characters popped over to [[Film/TheWizardOfOz Magical Land of Oz]] for an afternoon... And, in one seriously memorable arc, a faked death involving [[ComplexityAddiction some serious stealth work]]. The shift in tone can be narrowed down to the witch Tabitha and her ambulatory doll Timmy [[EnsembleDarkhorse stealing the show away]] from the 'main' cast. Not that anyone complained.

The show follows the lives of several families in the town of Harmony: The rich Crane family, headed by the eeeeevil Alistair Crane (literally just [[DiabolicalMastermind a hand holding a cigar]] in the early episodes; later evolved into Robert Vaughn from ''Film/SupermanIII''); the Lopez-Fitzgeralds, many of whom fell in love with Crane family members; the Bennetts, who were connected to the Cranes through Alistair's grandson Ethan; the Russells, who have got to be one of the oddest BrotherSisterIncest stories on record; the Winthrops, who get involved in an impressive romantic three-way plot; the Hotchkiss family (involved with the Winthrops); and at least one member of the Standish family (related to the Bennetts).

The show opened as a fairly innocuous daytime soap, albeit with elements of [[LovecraftCountry witchcraft and the paranormal]]. What drove the show completely off the rails wasn't that it was cheesy, but that it became [[WhoWouldWantToWatchUs an intentional self-parody almost within a month of its premiere.]] An episode of ''Passions'' makes the zaniest telanovela look like ''The Wire''. The "villains" belonged in a Silver Age comic book. The town's ruling dynasty was comprised of [[UpperClassTwit inbred idiots]]. A transgender [[TwoFaced Two-Face]] stalked Harmony for victims to rape/blackmail (because he/she couldn't decide on which cliched villain to be and decided to try both). Zombies, the Devil, and dwarves ran amok (most famously Timmy). Characters popped over to [[Film/TheWizardOfOz Magical Land of Oz]] for an afternoon... And, in one seriously memorable arc, a faked death involving [[ComplexityAddiction some serious stealth work]]. The shift in tone can be narrowed down to the witch Tabitha and her ambulatory doll Timmy [[EnsembleDarkhorse stealing the show away]] from the 'main' cast. Not that anyone complained.

* ActingForTwo: Dana Sparks portrays both Grace and Faith Standish. They are identical twins.

* ChannelHop: Given its' already strange status, it's no surprise that it also had a very weird network switch; specifically, the show moved from Creator/{{NBC}} to [=DirecTV=] and it's exclusive channel, The 101 (currently known as Audience Network). However, NBC continued to make the show, and [=DirecTV=] declined to renew the show after one season.

* PortmanteauCoupleName: ET or Therethan (Ethan/Theresa), Shuis (Sheridan/Luis), Charguel (Charity/Miguel), Chadney (Chad/Whitney), Gram (Grace/Sam), Savy (Sam/Ivy), Juvy (Julian/Ivy), Evian (Eve/Julian), Therox (Theresa/Fox), Gwank (Gwen/Hank, but although they were never a couple, [[FanPreferredCouple fans liked the idea of the two together]]).

** also [[Spoiler: Juanita Vazquez]] whose the head of the mexican mafia.

** Ivy seemed to support Ethan/Theresa since the beginning and believed that they were true love. At the end of the show, she fully throws her support behind Ethan/Theresa.
* ShirtlessScene: Every episode. She also supported Luis/Sheridan.

** Pilar is pro-Luis/Sheridan.

* SpoiledBrat: Fancy, Pretty and Fox qualify. Theresa and Gwen could also qualify as well.

* SpoiledSweet: Fancy is characterized during her first year as a somewhat selfish, spoiled young woman who nonetheless cares about other people and is only ever rude or cruel out of ignorance and not malice.
** Sheridan as well. She may be rich, but she is kind, caring and good-hearted.

** Christopher Boothe was never punished for his misdeeds and his lies about James' paternity.
** Likewise, Kay never faced any consequences for ''raping Miguel''.

* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: More than a few ends were left loose when the series was cancelled:

** Beth was implied to have survived in the train explosion, but was never heard from again.
** Jared, Theresa's temporary love interest, was never fleshed out as a character and his secret past was never revealed.
** The secret Ivy used to blackmail David was also never revealed.

The show follows the lives of several families in the town of Harmony: The rich Crane family, headed by the eeeeevil Alistair Crane (literally just [[DiabolicalMastermind a hand holding a cigar]] in the early episodes; later evolved into Robert Vaughn from ''Film/SupermanIII''); the Lopez-Fitzgeralds, many of whom fell in love with Crane family members; the Bennetts, who were connected to the Cranes through Alistair's grandson Ethan; the Russells, who have got to be one of the oddest BrotherSisterIncest stories on record; the Winthrops, who get involved in an impressive romantic three-way plot; the Hotchkiss family (involved with the Winthrops); and at least one member of the Standish family (who is related to the Bennets).