It does irk me how they just dumped characters with little or no explanation. Quite often, the actors/actresses did have other things to do, so their characters were just forgotten, rarely written out. Yes, the performers did have to leave for a play, movie, vacation, whatever, or maybe the characters no longer had a pivotal part, but they deserved at least something other than just no longer being there. Another such gotten-rid-of that annoyed me was Magda. Suddenly, there no longer was a Magda. I think they did eventually mention something about her going away to form a 900 psychic phone line service or something, but for such an important persona in the 1897 storyline to just go poof was rather rude.
Gerard