[cityprod]

Repetitve & increasingly outlandish?  Repetitive isn't so much an issue, there's only so many stories you can tell anyway, before you start repeating yourself, but as long as yoou tell the stories well, with enough cosmetic changes to not make it too obvious you're telling a story again, it's fine.  The increasing outlandishness is part of the problem, but also the fact it seems to me to be making a mockery of what these shows were originally designed to be.  And the genre has done it so much that it's strayed so far from the original intent of these shows, that it no longer resembles anything close to what they were.  There are already genres out there like Telenovela that do the same kind of melodrama that soap operas have come to rely on and do it better.

American Professional Wrestling?  Yeah, also British (I grew up on it), Japanese, Mexican and others.  Yeah, there are some aspects of that whole history that I don't care for (ahem, Katie Vick), but overall, it's meant to be escapist.  You're not meant to take it too seriously, and most don't.  Soap opera fans on the other hand are well known for taking what happens in those shows so seriously, they start petitions and campaigns for their favourite characters.  They get wound up if anything delays or postpones their favourite show, even for a minute. 

James Bond films?  Yeah, I like them.  But again, it's escapist material and deliberately designed to be that way.  Star Wars, Star Trek, Doctor Who, Babylon 5, the MCU, and many other films and TV shows that I love, all have one thing in common.  They are designed to be escapist entertainment, and not taken too seriously.  Again, soap opera fans, looking at you...

Triggered?  Far from it.  I see soap opera fans get triggered when football coverage or tennis coverage delays or postpones their favourite show.  Rather, I am baffled how these shows have lost so much audience over the years, and yet not been cancelled outright.  Many a show will lose significant audience over time, just like soap operas have, and get cancelled.  Nothing can last forever.  Lots of these shows have had amazing runs that would easily put them in a list of most successful shows of all time, but to my eyes, they're already limping, badly.  Yet broadcasters refuse to put them out of their misery.  In recent years in the US, the daytime soaps have slowly ended, because they were well past their Use By dates.  I think it's time that some of our soaps ended too.  It's just my thoughts and opinions.

Yes and some people like myself would say that you are in the minority.

Erm, 5.5 million watch soaps.  Population of UK is, what 64-65mlln???  Just where is the majority again???  It ain't watching soaps.