Young and Restless: Head Writer Josh Griffith DONE! How to Fix Y&R Fan Demands

Young and the Restless huge news recently broke that head writer Josh Griffith is out at the CBS soap. As of now, Y&R is searching for his replacement while fans are celebrating his exit. I have not seen anybody on soap social media who is sad that this guy is out at Y&R.

In light of this major news, we’re going to talk about some changes that fans really want to see on Y&R when the new head writer starts to work.

Young and the Restless: Josh Griffith’s Exit and Viewer Concerns

Now, what we’ve heard is that their goal is to have the new writer in place for their material to start when Season 54 begins airing this October. Now, CBS claims it was Josh Griffith’s decision to leave, but I think there might be some nuance to that. We will likely never know if he was offered the chance to resign before the network took action. You know how that goes. Ratings are lackluster and fan criticism honestly seems to be at an all-time high under Josh Griffith and it gets worse by the day until we found out he was leaving and then it was a party.

So, now let’s talk about the fans’ wish list. We keep an eye on the comments here and on soap social media. So, let’s get into what people are saying they would like to see more of and less of when the new writer takes over now that Josh Griffith is headed out the door at last.

Young and the Restless: Fan Demands for Change

Let’s start with the most egregious thing on Y&R over the past few months. Way too much sexual assault. They brought back Matt Clark (Roger Howarth), a serial rapist, which is awful. Actor Roger Howarth is great. Love him. However, Matt walking free with no consequences is really tone-deaf.

On top of that, Victor Newman (Eric Braeden) paid Patty Williams (Stacy Haiduk) to kidnap and sexually assault Jack Abbott (Peter Bergman). And if that wasn’t enough, Josh Griffith decided, “Hey, let’s do it again.” And Patty’s forced her way into Jack’s life and is trying to force her way into his bed again. And now Josh Griffith called Phyllis Summers’ (Michelle Stafford) upcoming romance with serial assaulter Matt “delicious.” That’s the word he used to describe a rapist romance. Delicious. So, lots less of that, please. And less of Victor paying people to rape others.

Young & Restless: Kidnappings Excessive and Tiresome

Another thing fans would like to see so much less of are kidnappings. So many kidnappings. Cameron Kirsten (Linden Ashby) kidnapped Faith Newman (Reylynn Caster). We had Jordan kidnap Harrison Abbott (Redding Munsel) and Jordan kidnapped Sharon Newman (Sharon Case) and stuck her in a sewer.

Crazy Martin Laurent (Christopher Cousins) kidnapped Sharon and Phyllis and tormented them. Plus, more recently, Mariah Copeland (Camryn Grimes) kidnapped Dominic Chancellor Winters (Ethan Ray Clark). And then Victor had Patty kidnap Jack and now Patty had Diane Jenkins (Susan Walters) kidnapped. Fans would love it if the kidnappings could stop or maybe taper off to one a year, save them for, you know, special occasions.

Victor Always Winning — Y&R Fans Are Over It

Here’s another one. Fans are tired of seeing Victor Newman win in every situation. Fans are annoyed that he keeps doing all of these awful things to his family and to others, and he never faces backlash, never any consequences, even when Eric Braeden’s character does blatantly criminal things. There’s also the endless vendetta Victor has against Jack. It’s enough already. At this point, the rivalry is tired. It feels forced. And sometimes Victor’s antics are fun. Like when Victor locked Jordan in a cell and made her drink cheap vodka and eat Brussels sprouts. I liked that.

Phyllis Overused — Too Much Y&R Screen Time

Here’s another one. Fans agree we don’t need Phyllis on every episode. I like Michelle Stafford. I liked her on General Hospital too. However, a lot of fans were ticked off that the first thing Josh Griffith did when he took over as head writer in 2019 was to fire Gina Tognoni and brought back Michelle Stafford instead. And he did it in a really insulting way, as if firing her wasn’t bad enough. Josh Griffith said he was bringing back classic faces and returning to what made the show great. That was a low-key insult. And he definitely missed the mark on making the show great. We all know that.

Lots of fans were not happy with the Phyllis recast. And now the character is getting just way too much screen time. In the 20 episodes that aired in May 2026, Michelle Stafford was in 18 of them, followed by criminal serial assaulter Matt Clark, who had 17 out of 20 episodes. And yes, we all know each writer has their pets as fans call them, and it often frustrates viewers, but it would be nice to have some balance. It would be great if front-burner storylines weren’t always centered on the same people over and over.

Need for Younger Characters and Storylines on Young and the Restless

And that leads into the next concern fans have, and again, it relates to what characters are getting storylines. Young and the Restless doesn’t look so young or so restless anymore. It’s nice to honor your vets, but you can’t keep a show going when you lean mostly into your characters who are in their 70s and 80s, like Eric Braeden and Peter Bergman (actor), Melody Thomas Scott (actress), and others.

And I love them all. Lauren Fenmore (Tracey Bregman), Diane, Phyllis, and Michael Baldwin (Christian Leblanc) are in their 60s. Sienna Bacall (Tamara Braun), Nick Newman (Joshua Morrow), and Sharon are in their 50s. And we’ve got Chelsea Lawson (Melissa Claire Egan), Victoria Newman (Amelia Heinle), Billy Abbott (Jason Thompson), Cane Ashby (Billy Flynn), Daniel Romalotti (Michael Graziadei), Holden Novak (Nathan Owens), and Nate Hastings (Sean Dominic) all in their 40s. Holden’s got a baby face, but he’s in his 40s.

Give Other Generations More Screentime

It’s great to have vets. You don’t want them gone or anything. Fans don’t want them gone, but the new head writer needs to put young back into Young and the Restless and focus on younger characters in their 40s and younger.

There’s some in their 30s. Sally Spectra (Courtney Hope), Adam Newman (Mark Grossman), Devon Hamilton (Bryton James), Abby Newman (Melissa Ordway), Tessa Porter (Cait Fairbanks), Audra Charles (Zuleyka Silver), Noah Newman (Lucas Adams), Mariah Copeland, and Kyle Abbott (Michael Mealor), but we don’t see all of them regularly. And the only one in their 20s is Claire Grace Newman (Hayley Erin).

So, this is something that other soaps do much better. On General Hospital, they bring in new hires, usually in their late 20s, early 30s for the steamy, romantic stuff. Days has an active teen/young 20s scene. Bold and the Beautiful has been bringing in young blood as well, and the younger ones on Y&R don’t get as much screen time as the vets.

Underutilized Talent on Y&R

So, another fan complaint is not using the talent they have. Fans would like to see more of Adam, but in a meaningful way with a front-burner storyline of his own. Sharon never gets her own storyline. She’s almost a prop in most scenes. And Mariah and Tessa have evaporated altogether. So fans would like to see more action and age up Billy and Victoria’s kids. Recast Faith and bring her back. Bring in Lily Winters’ (Christel Khalil) twins, age them up a bit, have a whole 20s set. They could also age up Johnny, Connor, and Christian to create a teen scene and then hire some young female characters as part of that teen scene.

Romance and Chemistry — Severely Lacking

And last but not least, one of the reasons we watch soaps obviously is for the romance. And we don’t get a lot of that on Young and the Restless. They have teased a Nick and Sharon reunion for literally the past couple of years without delivering. For heat, we get Sally and Billy sometimes and Holden and Claire doing some sexy stuff now and then, but we don’t get a lot of affection and romance and we get very little steam.

They’re wasting Audra who’s super hot and Nate, he’s a sizzling hunk. No action there. Neither of them have been dating in way too long. Yet, we’ve got Diane trying to flirt her way out of captivity with that creepy Dr. Markham. And Patty is lusting over Jack every day. But we don’t have, you know, the super sexy younger set. And I appreciate mature romance. I do. But you also need to balance it.

Young and the Restless: What the New Head Writer Should Be

So, what I really hope is that they bring in somebody new to replace Josh Griffith. Usually soap writers rotate from show to show and so you get the same kind of stuff over and over. Josh Griffith himself has written at Young and the Restless, General Hospital, Days of our Lives, One Life to Live, and several other cancelled soaps. And I’ve seen some fans mentioning Ron Carlivati, but honestly, no. He’s another that’s been around the block too much and was shown the door at Days recently.

It might be interesting to see them bring in a younger writer, somebody from outside soaps, but that has experience writing for TV, somebody with an eye for romance, drama, some edge, so we don’t get the same old recycled storylines that soaps are known for.

Thinking outside the box, I’d love to see a woman as the head writer, somebody younger, like Kourtney Kang, maybe. She’s in her 30s. She’s written for Fresh Off the Boat, How I Met Your Mother, and she did a Doogie Howser reboot that was set in Hawaii with a female lead. She has a whole different sensibility, and I think that’s what they need.