understand the initial impulse, but then again, I feel that action is more appropriate if we were telling a story where she had all of her memories. It's not that I don't get or understand the seriousness of putting these two characters together, but I don't think we're in any way damaging Marty's character." Carlivati stated that "this is not the same Marty and, to me, it's fascinating to watch because you're wondering if and when it is all going to come tumbling down". On September 5, 2008, Todd and Marty share a passionate kiss as Todd helps her walk. He initiates the intimate contact, and viewers, as well as critics, argued that, given his sexual intimacy issues, it was out of character for him to be as sexually bold towards Marty; Marty being his rape victim had been the main source of his sexual hangups. On September 23, 2008, the show went further with intimacy between the two and had them almost engage in sex. Todd eventually backs away from the contact, presumably due to his conscience. In his September 29, 2008 article, TV Guide's Nelson Branco declared the soap opera in a "state of emergency" due to its insistence on going through with a Todd and Marty romance. Critics and fans questioned whether the current head writer of the show was the same head writer who had successively given the series good storylines just a year before. In addition, the romance was speculated to be a ratings ploy, and Brian Frons, president of ABC Daytime, was speculated as having dictated which stories Carlivati wrote. Romantically pairing Todd and Marty had been contemplated and proposed by several One Life to Live writers, even though the notion was considered career suicide. Howarth and Haskell's refusal to act out the storyline is what largely kept writers from going through with the story. Haskell, however, decided to return to the series as Marty in 2008, and had seemingly reconsidered the possibility of a Todd and Marty romance due to Carlivati's insistence that this was not the same Marty. Branco stated, "Three weeks ago, Carlivati's risky and oh-so-reckless decision to turn the gold standard of rape stories — Michael Malone’s [1993] Emmy-winning gang-rape storyline — into a soap cliché culminated in a shocking, controversial and highly publicized kiss." Expressing his dismay at One Life to Live's decision to turn Todd and Marty's relationship