Canceled Soaps All My Children, One Life to Live Revived Online

All My Children was canceled weeks ago by ABC, and is now preparing for its final TV episodes. This isn't anything unusual, since soaps have been canceled left and right for the last few years. In fact, both All My Children and One Life to Live were given the ax at the same time by ABC, although One Life to Live will get a few extra months on the air. However, both seemingly dead programs may be ready to rise from the dead, even if it isn't on television.

Soap operas are famous for having characters come back to life in impossible ways after being killed off. Now both All My Children and One Life to Live may have a similarly unlikely resurrection, thanks to the 2-year-old production company Prospect Park.

According to the New York Post, Disney/ABC sold the online rights for the canceled soaps to Prospect Park, and the company plans to take advantage. It will reportedly bring back both programs and air new episodes on the Internet, once they finish their final runs on ABC.

Just a week earlier, ABC announced All My Children would air its last episode Sept. 23. As such, speculation heated up on how it would all end, and whether Susan Lucci's Erica Kane would be knocked off for good. However, with this new news, Erica may stay alive after all; if not, she can be resurrected online later.

If this idea works, then the soap opera industry will have its first bit of good news in a long time. Of course, this comes too late to save As The World Turns and Guiding Light, and doesn't reverse the problem of declining TV ratings for the genre. However, should the likes of General Hospital and The Bold and the Beautiful get killed off, they could explore the possibility of going viral if things go well at Prospect Park.

This could actually help the genre come full circle since it didn't start off on television. Several long-time soaps had stints as radio serials before coming to TV, like Guiding Light. Nowadays, the Internet is like radio, as it is a prime location to catch up with television series and serials.

But can it be a viable alternative for the soap opera genre at a time when it needs a lifeline more than ever before? At the least, it is a lifeline for depressed fans of One Live to Live and All My Children, who don't have to say goodbye soon after all.

For the first time, being canceled doesn't mean a permanent death for a soap opera, just as there are few permanent deaths on the shows themselves. This is an even bigger relief for Children viewers: The final episode on ABC will be met with less dread Sept. 23.

Sources

New York Post- "Beloved soap operas to migrate online"

Cinemablend- "Details Revealed For All My Children Finale; Will Erica Kane Be Killed Off?"