The REAL problem with Jenna

[CeeCee72]

To me, I think the 1986 to 1987 season was when there was potential to keep Jenna on as a recurring character due to her pregnancy with Bobby's baby and there was no need to have paired her with Ray. Pairing her with Ray was the kiss of death for her character.

Had she been unattached when Pam had her accident and vanished suddenly, I could have seen Bobby turning to Jenna for comfort because of the fact that she was still the one constant in his life outside of his family. And it would have given her daughter Charley more of a motivation to be rebellious because she would be seeing her mother getting her hopes up for Bobby knowing that he would probably break her heart like he always did.

And perhaps Jenna could have still sent Charley off to boarding school because she was acting up, and deciding to move to live closer to her daughter and start a new life free of Bobby... but promising to keep in touch with him and have him be a part of his son's life.

That's how I would have handled Jenna's arc in the final season or two.

Yes. Pairing her with Ray was a disastrous decision - not only for the character of Jenna, but for Ray's character too.

Pairing her back with Bobby after Pam's disappearance would have made sense.

If Ray HAD to be paired with someone other than Donna, I would have put him with Sue Ellen. Ray/Sue Ellen/JR would have been a much better triangle.

 

[Taylor Bennett Jr.]

Yes. Pairing her with Ray was a disastrous decision - not only for the character of Jenna, but for Ray's character too.

Pairing her back with Bobby after Pam's disappearance would have made sense.

If Ray HAD to be paired with someone other than Donna, I would have put him with Sue Ellen. Ray/Sue Ellen/JR would have been a much better triangle.

I'm not sure what led the the producers to think viewers would encounter a "Ray as stern stepfather to Charlie" scene without immediately changing the channel or throwing the nearest blunt object through the TV screen.

 

[CeeCee72]

I'm not sure what led the the producers to think viewers would encounter a "Ray as stern stepfather to Charlie" scene without immediately changing the channel or throwing the nearest blunt object through the TV screen.

Honestly, I was worried about Charlie! We SAW how Ray treated teen girls before (Lucy).

 

[Taylor Bennett Jr.]

Honestly, I was worried about Charlie! We SAW how Ray treated teen girls before (Lucy).

although, if the producers really wanted to be provocative, the “Ray roughs up Randy at the stable” scene could have taken a turn in a different direction..

 

[xab]

Just another missed opportunity among many others. Fairchild's Jenna was a bitch, a scammer when it came to Charlie's paternity. Tacker's Jenna turned up as the same predator trying to catch Bobby we were introduced to.

Jenna WANTED Bobby.

But Presley's one came back as a flawless Mother Courage working hard to raise her daughter. No agenda, no nothing, just a flushing Cinderella coming across her favourite Prince Charming once again.

Yawn.

She should have been written as a two-face gold digger when she popped up in season 7. It could have been such a blast. Katherine Vs Jenna... A nuclear war opposing these two manipulative bitches could have given us a juicy cliffhanger...

 

[Snarky Oracle!]

Just another missed opportunity among many others. Fairchild's Jenna was a bitch, a scammer when it came to Charlie's paternity. Tacker's Jenna turned up as the same predator trying to catch Bobby we were introduced to.

Jenna WANTED Bobby.

But Presley's one came back as a flawless Mother Courage working hard to raise her daughter. No agenda, no nothing, just a flushing Cinderella coming across her favourite Prince Charming once again.

Yawn.

She should have been written as a two-face gold digger when she popped up in season 7. It could have been such a blast. Katherine Vs Jenna... A nuclear war opposing these two manipulative bitches could have given us a juicy cliffhanger...

Perhaps Jenna was just a subtler golddigger by 1983 -- some good plastic surgery so she'd seem softer than Fairchild and Tacker.

A girl has to think about her future. And appearing to have no agenda is the best way to achieve her agenda.

 

[KayLloyd]

Perhaps Jenna was just a subtler golddigger by 1983 -- some good plastic surgery so she'd seem softer than Fairchild and Tacker.

A girl has to think about her future. And appearing to have no agenda is the best way to achieve her agenda.

Exactly, clearly her agenda was to trap Bobby with a pregnancy or she would have used birth control. And it backfired on her, he chose Pam.

 

[Frank Underwood]

Honestly, I was worried about Charlie! We SAW how Ray treated teen girls before (Lucy).

I found it suspicious when Charlie said she left her book bag in the stable...

 

[CeeCee72]

Exactly, clearly her agenda was to trap Bobby with a pregnancy or she would have used birth control. And it backfired on her, he chose Pam.

I thought that at first, but she did refuse any help from Bobby at all regarding Lucas. If she really wanted to keep him trapped wouldn't she have used the kid to stay close to him?

 

[Snarky Oracle!]

I thought that at first, but she did refuse any help from Bobby at all regarding Lucas. If she really wanted to keep him trapped wouldn't she have used the kid to stay close to him?

Punishing him might have been more important to her. Especially since Lucas would have been a long-term link, a dangling, come-hither thingy.

 

[CeeCee72]

Punishing him might have been more important to her. Especially since Lucas would have been a long-term link, a dangling, come-hither thingy.

True.

She should have named the kid Emerald - then Bobby would have loved him.

 

[KayLloyd]

I thought that at first, but she did refuse any help from Bobby at all regarding Lucas. If she really wanted to keep him trapped wouldn't she have used the kid to stay close to him?

But that was out of bitterness, she told him that he had made his choice.

 

[Pandora]

I didn't mind Priscilla Presley as Jenna and liked her relationship with Bobby in the 1st 2 years she was in the show but dream season Jenna was very needy and her acting was very iffy at times.

I think it would have been interesting if Morgan Fairchild had continued in the role as she would have been a different Jenna, Bitchy, catty and would have fought for him and got into a cat fight if required.

Francine Tacker was just plain forgettable, bland, boring, insipid, and used to think no way would Bobby have fallen for her as she wasnt even that pretty and had long lank hair! She was instantly forgettable

The problem I had with Morgan Fairchild's Jenna was that as entertaining as it was, it would not be watchable on a full time basis. She was just too bitchy.

I could kind of buy Morgan’s Jenna as someone just a few years removed from losing her parents (didn’t sound like her mother was still around) and finding out she was not wealthy, and in fact broke - a single mother with a deadbeat con man as an ex-husband and her dependable childhood sweetheart married to someone else.

It makes sense that someone in that position would turn to a Maynard Anderson “rich daddy” type and then her ex Bobby as a way to regain that lost life that was all she’d known until sometime in her 20s. She’d been manipulated and conned by Naldo, so that kind of behavior was fresh in her mind, and going after married men may have seemed like a more realistic goal than the typical “eligible bachelor” given that she was broke and had a child (but still looked like Morgan Fairchild). Hm, where was Mark Graison at this point?

Or, anyway, I could buy the way she was written in that episode more than the super put-together Tacker Jenna from just a year later.

Mark Graison was the man Jenna should have wound up with.

 

[Snarky Oracle!]

The problem I had with Morgan Fairchild's Jenna was that as entertaining as it was, it would not be watchable on a full time basis. She was just too bitchy.

That's it, as I've always said: bitchy, predatory Fairchild was fine for younger, more guileless Bobby, but the Bobby of 1983 wouldn't have bitten Fairchild's apple.

 

[Frank Underwood]

In Morgan's defense, her range goes beyond bitchy and predatory (although that's the "type" she's most known for.)

 

[Jock Ewing Fan]

In Morgan's defense, her range goes beyond bitchy and predatory (although that's the "type" she's most known for.)

Morgan Fairchild is a good actress, possibly an underrated one.
She is also a native of Dallas, Texas

Morgan Fairchild: Bio, Height, Weight, Age, Measurements

Actress Morgan Fairchild was born Patsy Ann McClenny on February 3, 1950 in Dallas, Texas, the daughter of Martha Jane, a high school English teacher who taught at Richardson High School, and Edwar…

www.celebsfacts.com

 

[Pandora]

That while fight was NOT believable. Ray didn't love her enough and Bobby didn't love her at all by that point.

Love wasn't the underlying emotion here. Domination and control was.

That's it, as I've always said: bitchy, predatory Fairchild was fine for younger, more guileless Bobby, but the Bobby of 1983 wouldn't have bitten Fairchild's apple.

I once read a suggestion that the producers could have had Jenna be a character that popped up a couple of times a season and raised cain. Fairchild's Jenna would have been perfect for this. She was great for an hour at a time. She wasn't believable full time.

 

[ArchieLucasCarringtonEwing1989]

I think the issue with Jenna’s character was with the three different actresses we get three different Jenna’s

MF!Jenna of 1978 is completely different from FT!Jenna of 1980 who is completely removed from PP!Jenna of 1983-88.

At first viewing this is acceptable as the appearances of all the 3 Jenna’s were years apart from each other but on rewatches it becomes a problem

MF!Jenna was a bitchy mistress type, whom you could believe Bobby would have fallen for in his youth, but had they married their marriage would have collapsed, this Jenna was a con artist type, very much in the vein of Kristen Shepherd

FT!Jenna was too dowdy in my opinion, and not a believable threat to Pam and Bobby.

Ironically upon rewatches I think PP!Jenna is perhaps the best, she struck a balance between the rich girl who’d fallen on hard times very well, PP could be glamorous and mumsy, this Jenna was a threat to the Pam/Bobby love story, I could see this Jenna having an affair with a married man like MF!Jenna too.

While Priscilla Presley’s acting isn’t always good and she’s nowhere near VP or LG in the acting chops, she’s good at Jenna.

The main problem I find with Jenna also is that the writers struggle to find a way to keep her in the show when she had long passed her sell by date, then they stick her with Ray whom she had zero chemistry with

 

[Mustard]

I recently saw Francine Tacker as Jenna in my Dallas rewatch, and I thought to myself: If she had been the permanent recast of Jenna, I probably wouldn't have been impressed. She was okay, but nothing more. I don't think even Morgan Fairchild would have kept Jenna on the show long-term, and she probably would have met a similar ending to Kristin's, given the show's reluctance to retain supporting characters in the early seasons.

Francine Tacker is by far by favourite Jenna Wade. She is strong and confident in herself, and I can believe a young Bobby falling for her big time. Also, I think Tacker had the best chemistry with both Patrick Duffy and Victoria Principal.

 

[KayLloyd]

That's it, as I've always said: bitchy, predatory Fairchild was fine for younger, more guileless Bobby, but the Bobby of 1983 wouldn't have bitten Fairchild's apple.

I'm not so sure about that, Fairchild 's vixen Jenna had the strongest hold on Bobby and would still have been able to seduce him even in 1983. Bobby getting involved with Presley's annoying Jenna was the least believable to me. I could at least buy him being tempted by Tacker's matured Jenna.