This weekend I've been watching tons of old All My Children episodes featuring Tad and Dixie because I'm still in denial over All My Children killing Dixie off. She's as real dead as you can get on a soap. We saw the death and the body. There was no car crash or fall off a bridge with a mysteriously missing body, no hope of a return from the dead. And, please, do not get me started on the indignity
of her death by poisoned pancakes.All My Children has done a lot of dumb things in the past but this one I really don't get. Dixie has been a part of the All My Children universe since 1989. Dixie was a beloved character. We saw Dixie grow from a scared pregnant 18 year old into a self-assured, independent, and loving woman and mother. She brought heart and goodness to All My Children. Cady McClain portrayed Dixie as adorably quirky, loving, and complex. She was one of the nicest characters in Pine Valley, but not so nice it was obnoxious. Even when you questioned her actions, it was impossible to not love her.
Dixie's romance with Tad started not long after she arrived in Pine Valley. Tad (played by Michael E. Knight) and Dixie have had an amazing relationship from the start with all the drama and romance you'd expect from a soap couple but they had several things that set them apart - amazing chemistry, humor, devotion to each other that defied all logic. Tad and Dixie are a prime example of a soap super couple. When you have a true super couple, you keep them. It's not rocket science, ABC. When you have a couple who can be sexy, romantic, hilarious, dramatic, and always completely lovable, you keep them. Tad and Dixie currently had a great storyline building. They were working their way back to each other after a long and bitter separation, Dixie's faked death, and their missing child. Their daughter Kate was alive and they were searching for her and slowly realizing their love for each other all over again.
Tad and Dixie had one of those great epic romances that fans could get swept away in. They overcame all sorts of obstacles to be together - sickness, marriages to others, infidelity, amnesia. If you can think of it, chances are Tad and Dixie have been through it. And they still had this beyond all common sense kind of love for one another. Take this quote from Dixie when Tad was married to Brooke for example, "Do you know by now that I would just curl up and die inside if anything ever happened to you? Even if this is it, even if we don't go any further than this, even if we're not together, and even if you and Brooke and Jamie move off to the hind end of nowhere, I wouldn't want to live in a world without you in it." That, my friends is true love. True 'I'd follow you to Canada or anywhere and get shot at and nearly drown for you even if you are married to another woman' kind of love. It's the kind of love that sets us soap fans all asquee.
Despite their often larger than life circumstances, Tad & Dixie always seemed real. The wished on stars together and shared a love of chicken fingers. Tad proposed for the first time by donning a chicken suit and putting the engagement ring in a bucket of chicken fingers. Tad and Dixie had a sense of humor and fun together and they bickered about random things like Tad putting candy bars in his cereal. Dixie would call Tad names like "royal jackass" and "a big fat stupid head" and moments later they'd be making up. Their love didn't seem too fictional; their love didn't seem unattainable. Watching them almost made me think that kind of love was possible in real life.
Even when the writing wasn't great or the plots were semi-absurd, Cady and Michael as Dixie and Tad could pull it off. They were never anything but amazing too watch. All My Children had an awesome thing, and they threw it away. None of the young couples have that "thing" that Tad and Dixie did. Heck, not even any of the older couples have comparable history and chemistry! Watching old clips now, I am struck how Dixie and Tad had that magic from their first moment on screen together. And with the way All My Children is going, they are never going to have a couple like that again.
So, farewell AMC. Thanks for the memories, but your golden days are obviously in the past. If you find some miraculous way to bring Cady back to the show and Dixie back from the dead, I'll tune in. Until then I'm done.
If anyone wants to write the show, you can find addresses at TadnDixie.com. You can also sign the Save Dixie Petition.
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