That's the exact impression I got, too.
"Parables and narratives" are no longer considered to be prophetic pictures or prophetic dramas. (That leaves prophecies.) I think a lot of JWs thought that the March 15, 2015 Watchtower was going to remove a lot more of the "silly" teachings, but most of them are still available through an interpretation of prophecy that usually continues to focus on events from 1918 through 1922, with a few apocalyptic plagues that manage to reach another decade or two past that period.
The vulnerability of the parable of the "Faithful and the Unfaithful Slave" is being accidentally highlighted in this week's Watchtower study at the Kingdom Hall. The "Ten Virgins" is no longer considered a prophetic parable, and yet (Matthew 24 & 25) it is immediately adjacent to the parable of the "Faithful and the Unfaithful Slave" (a.k.a. "Faithful and Discreet Slave" in WT-speak, because they only want to focus on Governing Body now.) Also, Luke's corrolary version of the "Ten Virgins" parable, which is the one about the "Servants Who Keep Their Lamps Lit While the Master is Delaying from Returning from the Marriage Ceremony" is also immediately adjacent to the parable of the "Faithful and the Unfaithful Steward" in Luke 12.
Why would one be a prophetic parable and the other be non-prophetic parable?
Daniel's isn't quite as vulnerable, and the Watchtower has already stated explicitly is that one of the reasons for treating it as a prophecy is because it's in a prophetic book about the kingdom which is also clearly a book that is looked to for time prophecies about the kngdom. Of course, Daniel also contains the non-prophetic Lion's Den narrative, and the tree dream is immediately adjacent to the non-prophetic dramatic narrative about the three Hebrews thrown into the fiery furnace, which has been given no prophetic fulfillments since the 1930's and 40's, outside of a more general statements of parallels and foreshadowings as in the 1943 Watchtower about how now that "Jesus has come to the temple for judgment [1918], and he is with the approved ones and their companions in the firery furnace."
Nothing much has been made of the Daniel "furnace" narrative since 1949. Although back in 1934, Rutherford published an explanation of the fulfillment of the Daniel 3 fiery furnace "crucible" that spanned two Watchtower issues, and even went so far as to make a separate application to the various instruments of the music that played when the 3 Hebrews didn't bow down, including: "the League of Nations multitioned horn, the Disarmament cornet, the Economic Monetary Conference flute, the New Deal harp. . ."
The "Tree Dream" is "prophetic" but, of course, the fulfillment is also given, and it's all about Nebuchadnezzar.
In 1942 the Watchtower explicitly said "Nebuchadnezzar was as type of Jesus Christ" and there is a glimpse of this on the Watchtower Library CD:
*** w50 11/15 p. 444 par. 17 Subjection to the Higher Powers ***
In
this capacity Nebuchadnezzar was a type of Jesus Christ. God uses Christ
as his executioner of vengeance against Jerusalem’s modern counterpart,
Christendom, and God also gives him the domination over all the nations
of this world before destroying them at the battle of Armageddon.
This idea of Nebuchadnezzar as a "type of Jesus" has come up again in studies of Jeremiah, but it was also dismissed in 1979. I vaguely remember a public talk outline that still had it after 1979, but I think that officially the Watchtower doesn't like to use that phrase any more.
*** w79 9/15 p. 23 par. 8 The “Cup” That All Nations Must Drink at God’s Hand ***
This does not mean, however, that Nebuchadnezzar was a type of Jesus Christ, who worshiped Jehovah alone as God.
I think the Watchtower realizes that the old focus on "Nebuchadnezzar=Jesus" is embarrassing in that it also swaps the Jewish and Gentile "types" in the picture of Daniel 4's Kingdom that was dormant until the Gentile Times ended. In the tree dream it's a Gentile king dormant when the Gentile's Kingdom comes back after 7 times of being humiliated, and in the supposed fulfillment it's the Jewish/Messianic Kingdom that comes back after 7 times of being dormant.
