Can you believe that so far we've had 38 years of The Bold and the Beautiful? Last Sunday, March 23, marked that anniversary, and the party is still raging here on Soap Central as we bring you the penultimate look at the show year by year. This time, we're into the mid-2010s, and while you were constantly upgrading to new versions of iPhones, Caroline's niece Caroline (what is it with so many relatives being named after each other?) went from good girl to vixen and back, we got a new Black family, and Ridge got himself dumped out of a helicopter. B&B also toured the world between trips to Paris, Amsterdam, Abu Dhabi, and Sydney. Let's continue our own chronological tour through the show, shall we?
2013: Sisters are doin' it for themselves
When Katie suffered from postpartum depression after giving birth to Will, she set in motion a chain of events that would tank her marriage to Bill. Fearing she would die because of the problems associated with her heart transplant and therefore not see Will to adulthood, Katie did her best to push Brooke and Bill together. Katie's husband and oldest sister found the suggestion ridiculous in the beginning, but over time, something sparked between them – unfortunately, right around when Katie came to her senses. Bill and Brooke continued to see each other, with him championing her as she rebooted her Brooke's Bedroom lingerie line. Brooke managed to keep miscarrying Bill's baby a secret, but a suspicious Taylor got into Brooke's medical records and exposed Brooke at her own birthday party. It took years for the rift to heal between Katie and Brooke, and, in 2016, Katie descended into alcoholism over Bill and Brooke's continuing connection. Lesson learned: sisters should share accessories, not men.
2014: Not just essential, but Quinn-tessential
Jewelry maven Quinn Fuller had been defanged somewhat by the time her 9-year run wrapped in 2022, but what a hellcat she was when she first appeared. Keeping the identity of Wyatt's father from him and busting a move on Eric was innocuous enough, but soon she was stabbing Bill with his sword necklace and licking off his blood, plus crafting a giant version of the sword with which to impale Liam. Knowing Wyatt was sweet on Hope, Quinn locked Liam in a sauna and then followed him to Paris, where Liam and Hope were slated to get married; Quinn shoved Ivy into Paris' famous River Seine so that Liam would rescue her and miss the ceremony. Then, in a mystery that has yet to be solved, Quinn was implicated in the murder of Ricardo Montemayor, the original owner of the Hope for the Future diamond; when Deacon got wind of it, Quinn pulled a gun on him...before becoming his lover. And that was just in 2014. It took her a while to get going, but Quinn soon whipped things up in SoCal like a Mojave Desert dust storm.
2015: Ladies with an attitude
It's not at all unusual for newer characters not already tethered to core families to get sudden relatives. Maya Avant had been on B&B for two years before her sis, Nicole, showed up, and it was a nice enough reunion. It wasn't long, however, until it became clear that Nicole knew something that Maya would prefer to keep under wraps. When the other shoe dropped...well, the soap world hasn't quite recovered from it even now: “You're Myron,” Nicole announced. “You're my brother!” Yes, in a story still amazingly rare for daytime, Myron Avant had undergone gender reassignment surgery and become Maya – which her beau, Rick, didn't know about. Once Rick learned that Maya had transitioned, he came around (perhaps a little too quickly), but there was still plenty of conflict generated by Maya's crass, intolerant father, Julius. Granted, it required a soft reboot of Maya's arc (the daughter she had arrived on the show looking for changed to a girl she only considered her daughter), but Maya's journey provided powerful lessons about how to adjust our thoughts about gender identity and the prejudices that trans people face, even by their loved ones. Forrester even put on a transgender fashion show! Now, that's progress.
2016: Milk of amnesia
In the mid-2010s, Liam had gotten into a bad habit of bonking his head on things. Apparently, one can only knock their noggin so often because the next time he sustained the same injury, he lost his memory. Luckily – or unluckily – for him, Quinn happened along and spirited him away to a woodsy cabin we didn't know she had – as a way to help Wyatt reappropriate another of Liam's women, Steffy. Because Liam had no idea who Quinn was and had no animosity towards her, he listened as she started opening up about her childhood, and Quinn ended up falling for him hard; she convinced him that their names were Adam and Eve, and the fig leaves came off. When Liam started having flashes of Steffy, Quinn recruited Deacon to help her disappear Liam – only to push Deacon off a cliff instead so she could stay with “Adam.” Eventually, Wyatt goaded Liam into total recall, and Quinn went on the run, with the serpent nursing her feelings for her forbidden fruit quite a while afterward. Putting these two enemies together in this way was brilliant, and Quinn dialing down the evil for Liam paved the way for the kinder, gentler Quinn whom Eric ultimately married.
2017: Spectra visit
The O.G. Sally Spectra who dazzled B&B viewers from 1989 to 2006 never mentioned having siblings, but for 2017, the show rolled out not only a sister, Shirley, but a great-niece in the form of a younger Sally – who turned out to be as spirited as the first one. Sally 2.0 was called upon (via a from-the-back request from “Sally” herself!) to save the abandoned, dilapidated Spectra Fashions building from being demolished by – who else? – Bill, and, for the effort, gained a pre-psycho Thomas as a lover and Steffy as an enemy. Sure, the show was a little too on-the-nose having nuSally literally follow in the footsteps of the grand dame (Steffy shoves Sally in a body of water! Sally finds her crew in Saul's namesake grandson and a similarly named Darlita!), but the fledgling designer had talent, gusto, and innovation to spare. She even gave Thomas his most solid relationship before or since, making Pierson Fodé's incarnation the most likable of all. Sally soon jumped B&B's shark by crushing on Liam after being crushed under Spectra's rubble and faking a terminal diagnosis to sway Wyatt away from Flo, but, while it lasted, Sally was a living, breathing, Technicolor dynamo.
2018: Once you pop, you can't stop
It had been said that the missing Taylor was roaming the globe – and she already hadn't been quite right since her second return from the dead in 2005. B&B fans welcomed Taylor home, except it wasn't just her brunette hair that was different. Taylor, who had already gone down the dark path of alcoholism and vehicular manslaughter (we miss you, Darla), became volatile and unstable – far from the compassionate, knowledgeable, fan-fave psychiatrist Taylor was in the '90s and aughts. She spent much of her time angry, and when she learned that Steffy had had sex with Bill, Taylor went absolutely ballistic. We just didn't know at first that she meant “ballistic” literally: not long after his romp with Steffy was revealed, Bill was shot in the back, and pretty much everyone on the canvas was a suspect. Liam had blacked out (again) and thought he did it. Pam had been off her bipolar meds and worried that she did it. Bill had been sure that Ridge had pulled the trigger. But the culprit was actually Taylor, who had gotten it into her head that Bill had somehow violated Steffy (thanks for running your mouth, Ridge) and wanted retribution. Taylor has had two faces since then, and Krista Allen's version faced some real repercussions from the shooting match in 2023, but because of it, many viewers have just never been able to look at Taylor the same way again.
You've just Remembered When with a look at the not-so-recent past of The Bold and the Beautiful! The '10s (teens?) are almost over, and the next retrospective will be the last, jumping into 2019 and bringing us current by ending at 2024. So get nostalgic by masking up and putting yourself into lockdown... Hey, admit it – you did have all that extra time to catch up on the soapy goodness that is Soap Central!
Watch The Bold and the Beautiful weekdays on CBS or stream the show on Paramount Plus.
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