It’s Only My Opinion: The Thirstiest Characters on General Hospital, Young and Restless, BTG, DAYS and B&B
Desperate characters are a cornerstone on soaps, but some of the thirsty characters on soaps are over the top! Carolyn Hinsey takes a look at some of these players on General Hospital, Young and Restless, Days of Our Lives, Beyond the Gates and Bold and Beautiful, including GH’s Lucy, Y&R’s Phyllis and B&B’s Carter.
Thirst Quenchers
Thirsty characters can be entertaining, but forcing people to like you has its limits.
B&B’s Sheila is acting like a buzzard hovering over Deacon because she knows her lies have torpedoed their marriage. Her attempts to charm his kids are positively cringeworthy.
Sheila: “You are going to like me. Your dad certainly does. Your dad loves me. You don’t want to come between us, or I’ll kill you. I’m kidding!”
Deke: “You think that’s funny?”
Sheila (trying to be cute): “Your dad and I are both a little naughty.”
Deke: “Right. Joking about homicide.”
Deke ain’t playing. He later told his dad “your eight-toed wife is upstairs waiting for you” and encouraged Deacon to pursue Taylor — which he is.
Elsewhere, is there a thirstier dude on all of TV than Carter Walton? He literally has a “true love” every year, most recently Steffy’s sudden AMIE from Paris.
Daphne: “I can’t believe you got Ridge to design a wedding dress for me. It makes me even more excited to become your wife.”
Carter: “Excited enough to do it right away? Let’s get married right now!”
A real woman would run from a guy that needy, especially one who jumped from Zoe to Quinn to Paris to Katie to Katie’s niece Hope in five years. Carter only ended his engagement to Hope last October because she balked at his insistence that they get married “that day.” Sound familiar?
The wedding was pretty funny, though. After Daphne agreed to the impromptu ceremony, in walked Ridge, Brooke, Eric, Donna, Steffy and Finn, along with Zende, who became an officiant that morning to marry them in the Forrester offices. How bizarre that Daphne had no friends or family; no one from her home in France that she wanted to witness this momentous occasion in her life. We are just supposed to think her life began a year ago when she and her nose walked in to develop a fragrance at Forrester.
Carter (saying his vows): “I’ve known how I felt about you for a very long time.”
“Long time” as in the four months since he and Hope broke off their engagement.
Daphne: “I’ve known what I wanted to say if we ever got to this point standing in front of our friends.”
Actually, his friends. But Daphne did kind of stalk Carter when he was with Hope, so I guess it’s good that LA’s two most desperate people found each other. Every pot has a lid, right?
Does DAYS’s Leo have a lid? We thought he did when he married Javi, but Dimitri showed up and the marriage disintegrated. Leo’s M.O. is to run to Marlena when things go south, and the neediness just oozes out of him.
Belle (opening Marlena’s door): “Hi. Bye.”
Leo: “She can’t stand me, can she?”
Marlena: “She was racing off to work, that’s all.”
Leo: “Most people race off to somewhere when they see me.”
Like I said, needy. Does Leo pay Marlena for her endless patience? He calls her “Dr. Evans” and pours his heart out to her about Javi and Dimitri, claiming he just sympathizes with Dimitri’s legal woes and wants to help him. That desire supposedly shows growth, but then he says things like this:
Leo: “If it wasn’t for Dimitri, Javi and I would be happily married.”
That’s not how marriage works, sweetie. An ex can’t upend a solid union.
Leslie is the poster child of thirst on BTG, but her dirty tricks are getting her nowhere. Bill, on the other hand, is letting his regret at divorcing Dani eat him alive and he’s nabbed a few kisses. He tried to kumbaya with Vernon — who would have none of it — and went on to using “the girls” to get close to Dani. Then it was Andre’s turn to have none of it.
Andre (blocking Bill’s entrance): “You cheated, and then you bounced.”
Bill: “Get out of my way. I need to talk to my wife.”
Andre: “Your ex-wife is busy.”
Bill’s desire for his ex even prompted him to put alerts on his phone when Dani is tagged on social media, so he was able to jump up from Hayley’s fake sobbing after her phony attack to watch Dani’s big fashion announcement.
Bill: “Dani was amazing in that press conference.”
Hayley (snarky): “I liked the part about her new husband.”
Credit Hayley with forcing Bill to 1) like her, 2) leave Dani, and 3) marry her. But her machinations have stopped working, so she’s plotting to kill him. Force only goes so far.
On GH, Lucy tried to force Sidwell into liking her, but her true motivation seems to be beating Ava to the punch.
Ava: “Jenz has the heart of a collector which is something you wouldn’t understand since all you’ve ever collected is husbands.”
Lucy: “I would much rather collect husbands than arrests.”
It went on like that until Lucy decided to press her luck with the rich baddie.
Lucy: “If we’re going to continue to be close, I need you to make a choice. Ava or me?”
Sidwell: “I don’t take ultimatums from anyone.”
Lucy: “Then I guess I’ll be going.”
And off she went. Lucy asked Sonny to punish Sidwell for dissing her and he wisely refused, so Lucy decided to re-date Sidwell (is that a word?) so she could exact revenge. In a contest between Lucy and Ava for a man, the quest for bragging rights is even with their desire for his money.
And from the “Let’s make excuses for our partner” club, Lucas’s desire to whitewash what he knows are nefarious deeds being committed by Marco has so far outweighed the far superior logic of walking away. Did he learn nothing from his years with the entertaining but shifty Brad?
Not being helpful was Elizabeth, who took a page from her years with mobster Jason to defend Marco’s lies to Lucas.
Elizabeth: “Maybe Marco is lying to you because he thinks he’s protecting you. That doesn’t erase everything you’ve shared. Love doesn’t vanish because of some lies.”
No, but normal people see the lies as a red flag and aren’t so desperate that they ignore them.
Y&R’s Phyllis is another one desperate for attention, love, respect, you name it. When Cane and Billy worried that stealing Newman Enterprises might cost them their kids, Phyllis downplayed their concerns with a hearty who cares? She insisted they’d all be forgiven and forged ahead. Her son had other thoughts.
Daniel: “You stole the man’s empire. He will get it back and he will destroy you. Give Victor back his company or you will never speak to me or Lucy again.”
There’s a limit to how many times Phyllis can force her kids to forgive her, and this feels like it. Billy is in a similar (Ja)boat with Victoria threatening to tell Johnny and Katie everything he did to steal their Newman legacy out from under them. Victoria let Phyllis have it, too.
Phyllis: “I have sole ownership of Newman enterprises and I’m not letting my ‘precious’ go.”
Victoria: “You would betray anyone, including your daughter’s father. Is Summer talking to you?”
Nope. Being thirsty may be entertaining, but it’s also costly.
Hey. It’s only my opinion.
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