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General Hospital took a break from filming for a few weeks and stopped airing new episodes in May. However, when the show returned in early August, viewers noticed that Sam McCall had a new look. The character has been portrayed by Kelly Monaco but was temporarily taken over by Lindsay Korman-Hartley.

Monaco has since returned to set, though now some fans realize they like Korman-Hartley as Sam a lot better.

Lindsay Korman Hartley and Kelly Monaco
Lindsay Korman Hartley and Kelly Monaco | Paul Archuleta/FilmMagic and ABC/Todd Wawrychuk

Lindsay Korman-Hartley replaced Kelly Monaco for about two weeks

General Hospital began filming in mid-July. Because of the current coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, the show required actors to comply with social distancing and mask-wearing regulations.

Monaco reportedly had difficulties breathing due to an issue with her mask, and she was asked to temporarily quarantine herself at home. Her mother, Carmina Monaco wrote on Twitter, “First day back she had a hard time with the Covid mask and was given a rather unexpected 14-day quarantine even though she tested negative twice for Covid and a third negative test for Covid antibodies.”

In any case, soap veteran Korman-Hartley was brought in to replace Monaco for about two weeks.

Some fans think Korman-Hartley played Sam better than Monaco

Monaco has now returned to her role with the new episodes showing her as Sam instead of Korman-Hartley. However, some fans believe Korman-Hartley played the character better than Monaco.

“Lindsey is so much better for the role of Sam. Kelly seems bored in that role. She has played it out, time to move on to another role,” one person said on Reddit.

Meanwhile, another user also agreed that Korman-Hartley grew on them during her short stint on General Hospital. The user said, “I was not familiar with [Korman-Hartley] but was quickly drawn to her after being initially judgmental. I like her tooooo. Bring her back as anyone!”

Other fans think Monaco has not been given good material to work with lately

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However, some fans do not think this situation is Monaco’s fault. These viewers believe Monaco would shine a lot more as Sam if she was given good material to work with.

“Kelly has earned that role a thousand times over,” a fan wrote. “Yes, there are issues, but replacing permanently with the new one would be awful… The writing is the problem. Sam was at her best when she had a dark side. Sadly, that hard to pull off when you’ve got multiple kids… You have to respect the actors that have played these roles for decades. It’s the writers job to give them material that will excite them. Hopefully they rebound if COVID ever subsides.”

Aside from Sam, some people also seem to have a general problem with the way female characters on the show are written nowadays.

One viewer said, “Sam is completely awful now. Alexis is disbarred after mooning over a man, Anna is being all mopey about Peter, Ava veers from comedy femme fatale to sobbing about Kiki every damn episode, Nina’s basically abandoned anything other than her necklace like a high fashion Gollum, and Willow is such a nothing character. Lulu, BLQ, Olivia, Molly, Elizabeth are all whiny children right now… Give us strong women acting like strong women!”

Sam is currently dealing with her relationship with Jason Morgan. At the same time, she is also reeling from the aftermath of giving Valentin Cassadine her children ELQ shares in the form of voting proxies. To see how the character will progress, tune in to General Hospital every weekday.

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