Carolyn Hinsey’s It’s Only My Opinion

Kind Words: DAYS’s Brady (Eric Martsolf) received a rare display of empathy from Kristen (Stacy Haiduk).

Most people avoid confrontation, but luckily our soap faves don’t. 

Ava messing with Esme on GH was delicious. We know the diabolical Esme got her memory back and is faking amnesia, but all Ava knew was that Esme messed with her bestie and got off scot-free. So when Laura busted Esme for breaking into Wyndemere and forced the bad seed to go to the cops, Ava sat back at the police station and seemed to listen as Laura begged her to let it go. Then… wham!

Ava: “I’d like to press charges. You are still the girl who drugged Trina Robinson. You posted revenge porn of Josslyn Jacks and Cameron Webber and you never paid for any of it. A slap on the wrist isn’t enough, but it’s a start.” 

Finally! Accountability and punishment is so much more interesting than blind forgiveness (sorry, Laura). 

Bobbie’s enemies wish they’d forgiven her long ago. Death does that. 

Tracy: “Lucy and Bobbie had a feud for decades.” 

Martin: “They had a complicated relationship, but Bobbie’s death hit Lucy very hard.” 

Along with the rest of Port Charles. The way GH used B.J. to allow everyone to reminisce about Bobbie (under the guise of B.J. being a reporter but really being an angel sent to comfort them) was everything we treasure about soap operas: A 30-year old story being used to honor a cherished character (and actress, sniff!) who has passed away but will never be forgotten. I also like the way GH didn’t paper over Bobbie’s flaws, like with this conversation between the two people she probably battled the most: 

Scott: “You and Bobbie weren’t copacetic.” 

Lucy: “I thought I could do the Nurses’ Ball better and now I can’t make it right.”

Scott: “I feel the same.”  

Lucy: “I keep reliving that horrible bet I made with Damian Smith.” 

Scotty: “What a pair we were.” 

Lucy: “I don’t want to speak ill of the dead, but Bobbie was no saint.”

Scotty: “When she brought her brother [Luke] to this town my life changed.”  

Lucy: “People forgave her. Why didn’t I get that?” 

Scott: “If you’d been a nurse you would have been forgiven.”

Lucy: “I was jealous of Bobbie. She had the admiration I craved.”  

Insightful, rooted in history, true to life, and it moved story forward as Lucy and Scotty teamed up to steal Deception back from Tracy. That’s not going well. Lucy’s nastiness towards Tracy inspired surprising loyalty from Brook Lynn for her “Granny”, as well as a welcome reference to Lucy’s ill-fated marriage to Alan. 

Brook Lynn (to Lucy): “You are nothing but a gold-digging outsider who managed to trap my great uncle into marriage for 10 seconds.” 

Tracy is battling Lucy, Scotty, Lois and anyone else who wants a piece of her as she calmly outlines her battle plan like it’s a shopping list. 

Tracy: “Cross me and I destroy you.”

Okay, then! 

Long-standing battles are always welcome, but they need to be somewhat based on logic. It made no sense for Y&R’s Victoria to bust into the Newman offices demanding the company jet to fly Claire to Oregon to see the demented Jordan. Victoria knew her family would not be supportive and that her mother was teetering on the edge of sobriety so why didn’t she just… book a commercial flight. 

Of course there was a whole family fight about it.

Victoria: “I’m not going to give up on my daughter!” 

Nikki voiced her objections but was overruled by Victor who offered the Newman jet and a security team.

Nikki: “My feelings don’t matter?” 

Victor: “I don’t need any of this damn drama.”

Cut to Nikki downing vodka and stumbling into the GCAC where Lauren checked her into a room and signaled to Victor that his bride had fallen off the wagon again. 

Memo to Victoria: United Airlines flies out of Chicago. Call them next time.  

Elsewhere, it looked like Kyle was going to be the one to finally bring down Tucker. His scheme to pass on proprietary information about a fake Jabot fragrance looked like just the thing to outscam that scammer until Kyle’s bed partner upended him (and not in a good way). 

Audra: “Kyle has been playing you. Whatever product ‘secrets’ he would be passing along is just another setup.” 

Tucker: “How did you come to this conclusion?” 

Audra: “He confessed it to me. Kyle tried to get me to switch allegiances.” 

Tucker busted Kyle who busted Audra and it was a round robin of “How could you?”

Kyle: “You told Tucker?”

Audra: “To protect you, yes. He knew you were framing him for corporate espionage.” 

Kyle: “I doubt your motive was keeping me safe.” 

The fighting devolved to Kyle punching Tucker which was satisfying but not enough. Y&R seems to have realized they went too far with Tucker’s violent glass-breaking tirade on his honeymoon with Ashley and are trying to dial it back. 

Tucker: “Have you convinced yourself I was violent in Paris?” 

Ashley: “Don’t you dare try to gaslight me.” 

Tucker: “You’re misremembering.”

No she’s not. We saw it.

Ashley (to Jack): “I wish he’d go away.”

To paraphrase Henry II, “Will no one rid us of this meddlesome businessman?” I don’t want him gone, I want him humbled. Thanks in advance.  

What are we going to do with B&B’s Thomas? The character has been on an endless loop of “He’s bad, no he’s changed, he’s bad, no he’s changed…” for over a year with basically a daily fight about it. Revisiting Thomas’s possible murder of Emma looks like it might end that cycle, which would be most welcome. Core character turns violent, is redeemed by the love of a good woman (and lots of therapy which he supposedly got off-camera), and then his new life comes crashing down when the crime is revealed. 

Thomas: “I have proven I’m not that person anymore. I’m not a threat to anyone anymore.” 

Anymore? So… he did it. 

DAYS’s Kristen came in guns blazing that Brady stood up their daughter Rachel for their regular visitation and got an earful.

Kristen: “This better be damn good.”

Brady: “Tate’s in jail. He went to a New Year’s Eve party and Holly had drugs on her. She overdosed. She’s in a coma. To make matters worse, your brother EJ is on the warpath. He thinks the drugs were Tate’s, he convinced Holly to take the drugs, and the reason she is clinging to life is because of my son. He revoked my son’s bail. He’s going to be tried as an adult.”

Kristen: “I had no idea.”

Aside from Brady having to remind Kristen that EJ is her brother (!), their skirmish was excellent because Kristen actually backed down for once. Brady wondered what the catch was but it turned out his ex was just exhibiting a moment of empathy. Whaddya know?   

Sloan also exhibited a speck of humanity wondering if she should return Nicole’s baby to her to ameliorate Nicole’s suffering over Holly. Melinda reeled her in and Sloan was soon back in bitch mode.

Sloan: “It’s too much.”

Melinda: “Try to calm down.”

Sloan: “When in the history of calming down has anybody calmed down by being told to calm down?” 

Fair point.

Nothing is better than John and Patch working together to vanquish bad guys, and Konstantin is rightly in their cross hairs. 

John: “I will make one call to the ISA and your sorry ass is going to wake up on a desert island.” 

Patch: “Plain and simple.” 

I want a ringside seat for that one! 

As confrontations go, I’m a big fan of food fights but that’s where I draw the line. Translation: I could have gone my whole life without seeing Johnny lick whipped cream off Chanel.  

Hey. It’s only my opinion.