Serial Drama

Nothing About This is Okay

I wonder what goes on when the GH writers get together to map out storylines. I envision Bob Guza regaling the staff with tales of movies he saw recently and how to best incorporate their plots onto the show, writers doing Rock Paper Scissors to see what couple they're going to break up that week (reason and sense be damned!), and the muffled sounds of Awesome Writer banging furiously on the door of the closet he's locked in, wailing, "Check your facts, you ingrates! Laura was MARRIED to Scott when she was raped. A freaking moose would be more capable and creative than you are!"

Of course, this is assuming that the writers actually do get together to map out storylines. Part of me suspects that Bob Guza hastily writes scripts on his Blackberry (when he's not staring dreamily at a poster of Steve Burton) the morning scenes are being filmed...

What I am getting at is that this show is terrible and, truly, I feel that a moose would be an excellent addition to the behind the scenes team.

AMC In Review

So it goes without saying that the McTavish-free version of All My Children is about thirty times better than the show had been (of course, the show had only been marginally better than an anesthetic free appendectomy, so it's not a compliment as much as it is a simple fact). But that doesn't mean that it's any good. And I know, I know, I need to "give them time" and "let them ease into the characters" and "drink milk and eat vegetables", but when have I ever been that kind of person?!

In case you've missed any of it, here are some Pine Valley highlights!

RYAN: I kissed Greenlee
ANNIE: What?! Ryan--why?!
RYAN: But it didn't mean anything, I swear to you.
ANNIE: It's days after our wedding and you are already kissing your ex-wife...I must have done something to upset you. I am so, so sorry. I don't know what I did, but I'm sorry for it. I love you so much, please forgive me for whatever I did. Please!
RYAN: Well...okay, I guess I can forgive you.
ANNIE: Oh, thank you! Thank you so much for allowing me to bask in your glory and take your holy name. You're so perfect.
RYAN: Aw, shucks.

News & Notes

I totally forgot to comment on the news that Scott Clifton is leaving GH. Well...good riddance!

I kid, I kid. For most of his tenure on the show, he was truly stellar and Dillon was a great, unique character. He and Georgie were a fantastic couple and he pulled off comedy, drama and romance better than actors twice his age, but the producers (and this is shocking) completely squandered his talent by turning him into a buffoon with hardly any screentime. So it's better that he leave now and go onto greener pastures rather than be like his onscreen brother and get trotted out twice a year for emergencies. I wish him luck and I hope he does well outside of Port Charles.

In serious news, James Reynolds had emergency heart surgery and will be off of Days for six weeks. We send him our best wishes and hope for a speedy recovery.

The Day's Dumbest Dialogue

Can you guess which of these honest to God lines are from The Young and the Restless and which are from One Tree Hill?

1. "God, you are such a slut! Everything about you is disgusting! Who sends out naked pictures of themselves?!"

2. "I was partially naked. At one point I had mittens on cause it was cold."

3. "...dosed us with libido enhancer"

4. "They're your breasts!"

5. "Somebody was being a full on skank diva"

6. "You've got five minutes to prove that you're all that and a bag of Kate Spade"

Answers behind the cut!

GH: The Week in Quotes

I used to feel like GH had the big storylines and then the little storylines. The big storylines took up about 86% of the show's time on the air, and the little storylines were dumped in the remaining 14%. The big storylines (like: the ongoing and uninteresting mob wars, the secret of Jake's paternity and CraigJerryJerryCraig, for example (Hey, those all revolve in some way around Jason and Sonny! Quelle coincidence!) always sucked, but I felt like the little stories (Robin and Patrick, anything involving the Quartermaines) were better.

I was wrong. The entire show blows. I am going to let the show's stellar dialogue speak for itself.

Robin: Huh -- did that just happen?

Epiphany: What, you mean did three gorgeous women just come in here and snake your man? Sure looks like it. Ah.

Shut up Epiphany. Just...shut up. Nobody asked you! Why has nobody hauled off and smacked this woman? For all of her bitching and moaning about how much the rest of the hospital staff can't leave their personal problems at home, all I have ever seen her do is loudly get in their faces about their personal lives. Plus, she is doing a job that Bobbie really should be doing. Since, you know, Jackie Zeman is on contract and has also been on this show for 30 years. But this wouldn't be General Hospital if we weren't disrespecting veteran cast members, so of course they created Epiphany with the sole purpose of annoying me. I swear, they were going for Dr. Bailey on Grey's Anatomy and took away all of her humanity, humor, warmth and ability to use an indoor voice.

Epiphany: Look, the last place that I want to be is in the middle of your personal drama. [Lying liar who lies! --ed.]

Elizabeth: Oh -- no, just -- just tell me. What?

Epiphany: I think that you have been blessed with a healthy baby boy, and how you want to raise him -- and with who -- is none of my business.

Then why are you going out of your way to make it your business, you obnoxious shrew?! ?!?!?

She is truly my nemesis.

The other thing that completely irritated me about the Robin/Epiphany/Patrick/three girls scene is that the three patients Patrick (hotly) treated were supposed to be played by Holly, Kendra and Bridget of The Girls Next Door. Kendra is a huge sports fan and a fan of LaDainian Tomlinson. It's truly better for us all if I do not tell you how I know this. So they specifically wrote lines for a random "celebrity" guest star, but they can't be bothered to remember that Nikolas has family in Port Charles besides Alexis.

This effing show.

Days of our Sighs

I have gone on record before with my belief that Drake Hogestyn is awesome. I mean, how can you not think he's awesome? He's completely stuck in the 80s, his repertoire of facial expressions consists solely of raised eyebrows and blank confusion, and he knows how to beat people with his bare hands. He's a national treasure.

As awesome as he is, I can't help but giggle madly every time comatose John is onscreen. I know that I am a horrible person and probably going to hell, but it just makes me laugh and laugh.

It's just me, isn't it?

I always wonder what he thinks about as he pretends to be in a coma.

"I've given this show some of the best years of my life, and am part of one of the most popular couplings in all of the soap operas ever and yet they decide that the best way to utilize my massive popularity is to put me in a coma. A coma! All I do is lay in this bed and have Deirdre slobber all over me. She gasped so loud the other day that I thought she was having an asthma attack and I broke character to see if I should call 911 and we had to reshoot the whole scene."

"The season finale of Desperate Housewives was totally entertaining. Is it possible for a show to unjump the shark after jumping the shark? Has the phrase 'jumping the shark' jumped the shark?"

"I think Bakhtin was correct when he remarked: 'It could be said (with certain reservations, of course) that a person of the Middle Ages lived, as it were, two lives: one that was the official life, monolithically serious and gloomy, subjugated to a strict hierarchical order, full of terror, dogmatism, reverence and piety; the other was the life of the carnival square, free and unrestricted, full of ambivalent laughter, blasphemy, the profanation of everything sacred, full of debasing and obscenities, familiar contact with everyone and everything. Both these lives were legitimate, but separated by strict temporal boundaries. "

"The word booger is really funny. Heh. Booger"

Coma John leads me to my latest DOOL pet peeve.

Taking "Harebrained" To a Whole New Level

You know, for a place that routinely sees an astronomical number of catastrophes like hurricanes, epidemics, train wrecks and hostage crises, Port Charles really lucks out in terms of the kinds of schemers, international terrorists and general crazies that come to town. Because, really, they are not very good at what they do.

This does go a long way in explaining how Sonny and Jason have managed to stay in power for so long, since it's not like any of their rivals is capable of crafting a villainous plan from start to finish without getting distracted in the middle of it by laughing at just how hilarious the world "evil" is when you really look at it, or contemplating whether not having a mustache to twirl malevolently makes or breaks your career in villainy. Hell, half of these people can't get past "I'm going to do something really bad, like---oh, a Snickers!"

And I know that these people are allegedly villains, so I am not supposed to be rooting for them, but it's really hard to watch a show and get caught up in the drama because there IS no drama to be had since it's the invincible mobsters and friends vs. the "If I only had a brain" gang. I wonder who will come out on top, the people on screen every day or the short term characters who can't tie their own shoes? Those are some high stakes!

I Am Going on a Hunger Strike

Okay, that's not true, though soaps have occasionally had me teetering on the brink of that.  But I am going to be missing around these parts for a couple of weeks because I'm skipping town for vacation.  (By "vacation," I mean trying to track down the girls who made this parody of the Brenda Dickson videos to encourage them to run for some kind of public office.)

While I'm not around, as always, please remember to laugh, cry, and refuse to purchase white plastic sunglasses. 

Our First Soap Opera Digest Column!

Hopefully you've already seen it in the issue that arrived in your mailbox or that you bought at the newsstand, but if not, here's our first Soap Opera Digest column! (text after the cut)

All My Boredom Induced Comas

Megan McTavish's reign of terror is finally officially over: Barbara Esensten and James Harmon Brown are the new head writers.

You know, they could have replaced her with Count Chocula and Franken Berry and I would be like, "I am really looking forward to their complex and delicious brand of storytelling".

The show right now is in that weird limbo state between head writers and it shows. Because aside from the obvious issues I've had with AMC over the past few months (the all encompassing suckage, for example), it's really boring.

I was wondering if I should even bother watching today's episode. The logical part of me said no. The part of me that hates myself said yes. The part of me that was hungry urged me to skip the show and have dessert instead. I decided that I should at least check out the TV Guide summary of today's episode, just to see if there was anything that I couldn't miss:

As Sean and Ava scramble to get dressed, a flustered Erica orders her camera crew to stop rolling. During a phone call home, Annie confides to Di how Ryan is off with his soon-to-be ex-wife. Meanwhile, on the beach, Greenlee tearfully presses Ryan to admit he still loves her. Lily is confused when Sean decides to go stay with his mother for a few days. Adam waves off Colby's concern when she harangues him for endangering his health by drinking too much. Ryan explains to a badly disappointed Greenlee how he gave up on the idea of growing old along with her and found a new love in Annie instead. Pam secretly continues to film as Jackson picks a quarrel with Erica after learning that she knew all along about his nephew's dalliance with Ava. Colby finally makes some inroads in her father's stubborn attitude. Ryan makes it clear to Greenlee that he has moved on. Di defends Ava's charade to Jonathan, who reveals how Lily's sister came on to him. Sean sneaks in through Colby's window after Adam bars him from the Chandler mansion. Later, Colby agrees to let Sean hide out in her bedroom for a while. Jackson attempts to lay down some new ground rules for a scornful Ava. Pam shows Erica the footage she surreptitiously shot at the Montgomery house earlier that day. Ryan and Greenlee finalize their island divorce.

The hungry part of me totally had the right idea.