What's your opinion of the Cally Harper Ewing storyline?

[Swami]

I really grew to like Cally, but HATED the storyline. Would still vote for her head and shoulders over Kim Cryder!

I disagree, there was good potential to keep Kimberly Cryder on as a member of the supporting cast.

Swami

[OilBaron10]

I agree that storyline was horrible and totally unnecessary.

[witchboy]

I did like Cally, she was a good addition at a time when the show needed new blood.
I wanted to her wind up with James in the end though. It would've suited JR to realise how good he had it once she was with his own son.

[Clayton Farlow]

Storyline was awful... but Callie/ Cally was hot and worth looking at each week.

[Ewing27]

I thought season 12 was great.It took Dallas to Haleyville and then to Europe.We got to see Afton again and the season opened strong with JR having been shot,great acting between Larry and Linda(first 2 episodes)fighting over John Ross,the father and sons hunting trip and the Southfork range war!All the episodes were awsome.And lets not forget the episode where Bobby and JR got stuck in the elevator overnight.The season brought back Ray for closure and introduced Mack.Now onto Cally.She was the best thing to happen to JR.His character evolved in a way it didn't in past seasons.He became a family man and real brother to Bobby(Europe).In all the seasons before,I think he told Sue Ellen he loved her once in a moment after her and Mickey were in the car accident while she was sleeping and you almost believed him.With Cally it was entirely different.I think he truly did love her.Even Bobby told April "as strange as it sounds,JR really does love Cally".I was on the edge of my seat when JR ran into Vanessa to see if he would cheat on Cally and surprise surprise,he stayed faithful.But this is the world of Dallas and the real JR showed his true colors again.It broke my heart when JR destroyed his self portrait that Cally painted for him by taking a magic marker to Cally's name.Well,enough said,I'm a Cally fan.

[pkenep]

I loved Cally. She was a better edition to the cast than many others were. I think that she and James would have been a good fit. Cally's relationship with JR was better than the forced relationship between Ray and Jenna. Ray worked best with Donna when he was able to deal with her success and money. Jenna should have been paired with Jack after breaking up with Bobby. I hope Cally returns to Dallas and South Fork for an extended stay and not just a one line cameo like Ray and Lucy had. I can just see a jealous John Ross trying to deal with the return of James, Jimmy, and Cally's son while trying to deal with Christopher.

[bogus jock]

it was a dumb storyline that took away from the show.

[Colonel Lucas]

Callie was a doll, but the story line was weak. JR, a billionaire, a ruthless, cutthroat who took down foreign governments, could buy and sell anyone of us into white slavery, YET he's forced to marry a backwoods hick hillbilly. Why didn't the Ewing lawyers take care of this when they returned to Dallas? I've only seen this story once, when it aired.

Totally agree about Jamie! Why wasn't she written and portrayed like this? Jamie was one of the many mistakes that crept in, she didn't ruin the show, but never once did I buy her character or Harrison's odd performance. When her mouth wasn't agape from shock she was bursting into tears. Her insults were pathetic as she could barely mouth the words.

[JR's Long-Lost Son]

I loved Cally. The chain gang was a little much, but for JR to fall for a smoking-hot waitress in a little country town was not as far fetched as some made it out to be. As Ewing 27 said above, I truly feel JR loved her in a way we didn't see with any of the other women in his life. When she showed up at Southfork, JR tried to distance himself, but eventually (with a little prodding from Mrs. Ellie) couldn't stay away from her. His strong feelings about her showed again when he found her in Florida and left her alone (wanting her to be happy), and in the final episode when you could tell he really wanted good things to happen to her in the "what would their lives have been like without JR" clips.

I am really hoping that we see Cally and her son in the new series. For JR to have a son out there and not be brought into the storyline seems like too big of an opportunity to pass up.

[bogus jock]

it helped kill the show. plain and simple.

[david1987]

Halfway through Season 12 and I really like her. A vast improvement over his last wife & no mistake.

[Via_The_Void]

Well I really loved Cally, I thought she gave the show a lift with Cathy Podwell playing her. Here's one old series star that I'd love to see come back in the new series.

Cally was one of the better characters introduced in the shows final seasons.

[sonulle]

Now I watch the 12th season (miniseries = 1 series) and I quite liked Cally. She is so cute that I want to adopt her. The story about JR but I do not care. Sometimes I laugh. But I'm still at the beginning of the series so we'll see. JR and Cally relationship I find rather funny than romantic. JR is in love. Why not? I only hope that it will not take long. I want suffering JR. As Sue Ellen's loyal fans

[Sarah]

I disagree, there was good potential to keep Kimberly Cryder on as a member of the supporting cast.

Swami

As what?!

[Jock-1981]

The whole plot of JR being put to work by Cally's brothers etc just rubbed me the wrong way. That whole period was when the show was sliding downward. James did not help Cally's character when he had his vendetta against JR and Cally worked with James and that angle with the institution and JR stuck there.
James was not a likeable character and in doing what he did to JR with that mental institution and having Cally get involved,it hurt her character,in my opinion.
Cally as a character? I prefer pre-1988 Dallas.

[richard avery]

I thought cally was a mistake she was very whinny

[Moonsky]

It was an appalling story, one of the worst decisions they made. Whilst the show never claimed to be realistic, they really did take liberties with that story. It wasn't as bad as Michelle getting Ewing Oil, but it was really poor. I think she should have been killed off whilst giving birth to give introduce some humanity for JR. Or she should never have been introduced. Again my criticism is of the writing not the actress or her acting skills, she made the best out of a poor job.

[Pam's Twin Sister]

I do like Cally but the Haleyville storyline was dragged along unnecessarily and should have been used only to introduce her in a self-centered episode. Anything related to it is vomit-inducing: her brothers, the sheriff, the penitentiary people, they all are so lacking of humor or irony that one can´t believe who wrote these episodes or was behind the season arcs!!

I am rewatching this season and I think I woke up from a 15 episode-dream a la Pam when Cally went to Dallas claiming her marital status! I think Cathy Podewell is a much underrated actress and her chemistry with Larry was fabulous, as we could see in the following 20 episodes. But oh no, Season 12 misuses her and makes her a professional whiner (no wonder, being April´s friend) and a jealous pseudobitch. Her relationship with Liz Taylor´s son is painful to watch though the idea of making Cally evolve in front of our eyes was one of the best in the latter years. Hers was indeed evolution instead of April´s nonsense transformation into Maria von Tramp.

We are now complaining about how they are misusing Linda Gray in the new Dallas but the Katzmen should have been ashamed of what they did to Sue Ellen then! She seems to have become only John Ross´s mother and JR´s vicious ex!! Go figure!! Her alliance with Jeremy Wendell should have turned out to be something but it´s just a way to keep Linda under contract for one more year. Anyway her line to him about the "carnival geek" is precious...The sad thing is that, everything goes down the toilet from that moment on: the Don Lockwood episodes are so lousy that you must really re-evaluate your affection towards the former Miss Texas and wonderful Linda to keep watching. But one moment, think if it might have been worse: yes, Sue Ellen might have married Bruce Harvey or Oswald Valentine. That would have been really hideous!!

Back to Cally, the woman becomes prettier and prettier in each episode (apart from that scene with bitchie Lucy after they have gone shopping!!!) and JR was not unsensitive to feminine beauty at all, though Cally was probably the youngest woman he ever slept with in the whole series...About her painting, I wonder if the Harper hillbilly boys let her enough time to paint between chicken feeding and pig feeding (no pun intended to Lucy!).

Cally´s competitors in Season 11:

- Vindicative Sue Ellen and her frizzy hairdo.
- Whiney April and her nasty grin.
- Tracey Lawton and her big lips (this one was far better than all the others though, at least they tried to depic a complex character).
- Linda Evans/Bo Derek´s double Tammy and her Bobbsession.
- Ultrathin Lucy (underused as usual).
- Redheaded, pretty but a bit annoying Afton.
- And last and very least, Granny Beaumont (who probably went to high school with Miss Ellie...).

Any doubt why Cally/Cathy spent 2 years in the show?

[Pam's Twin Sister]

I disagree, there was good potential to keep Kimberly Cryder on as a member of the supporting cast.

Swami

She should have joined the diminished Cartel and become a regular character, I agree. The problem with Kimberly when she returned briefly in Season 11 is that she puts Carter at the reins of WestStar. Doesn´t she know that he was an accessory to criminally convicted Jeremy Wendell and his multiple crimes in the previous crimes, which included shooting children? Doesn´t she know that McSweat also had to do with Mafia as we are told in Season 13? Kimberly is my favorite character from the latter years but the Katzmen once again made this woman a bubblehead in the end as usually. All in the name of keeping in the show stronger names like George Kennedy...

[Jack_Beauregard]

Cally´s competitors in Season 11:

- Vindicative Sue Ellen and her frizzy hairdo.
- Whiney April and her nasty grin.
- Tracey Lawton and her big lips (this one was far better than all the others though, at least they tried to depic a complex character).
- Linda Evans/Bo Derek´s double Tammy and her Bobbsession.
- Ultrathin Lucy (underused as usual).
- Redheaded, pretty but a bit annoying Afton.
- And last and very least, Granny Beaumont (who probably went to high school with Miss Ellie...).

Any doubt why Cally/Cathy spent 2 years in the show?

i always thought that i don't really liked her and the storyline...but you have pretty good arguments that she was maybe not that bad