Every week, I say I'm going to try and keep this column under 3,000 words (or even fewer, if possible); every week, I somehow find new and unexpected excuses to torment you good people with my blathering for far longer than I intended. But this week? This might finally be the week. In true General Hospital tradition, the show followed up an action-packed week with one that was largely pleasant, yet also largely sorta skippable. Some important things happened? Maybe? On the whole, however, if you missed last week's GH, you really didn't miss much, especially compared to the insane real-life soap opera that keeps erupting around us every time a news alert goes off on our phones.
But enough about the real world. Let's talk about Port Charles, shall we?
For Sale: One Cassadine House, Lightly Used
The most consequential scenes of the week centered around Anna and Valentin, whose (ultimately very brief) sexy spy dance concluded, at least for now, with Anna pilfering his satellite phone, hacking her way into its digital records, and coming away with all the evidence in the world that he's the head of Pikeman.
After months on end of twists, turns, and buildup, there was never going to be any way that this would feel anything other than anticlimactic, but Finola Hughes — as always — sold the hell out of it. When Valentin went off to make her coffee the morning after their latest roll in the hay, she looked pained as she stole his phone; when she told Jason she had the phone and had verified it was a "treasure trove," she made us believe in Anna's dilemma as she tearfully refused to hand it over to him until she'd had two hours to convince Valentin to take Charlotte and go on the run. Did it make a lick of sense for her to sob that Charlotte wouldn't survive without her papa? Absolutely not, but that almost didn't matter, at least in the moment.
When Jason reluctantly agreed to give her two hours, she hustled back to Valentin's and came clean, telling him she'd sold him out to the FBI and he needed to get the hell out of town — news that he greeted with his trademark smirk in the face of danger. He tried to convince her to go on the run with him; when that didn't work, he finally gave her the truth, admitting he'd always known about Pikeman, and telling her he agreed to take over in Brennan's stead because after he and Anna split, he was "out of reasons to be a good boy."
While Valentin and Anna talked, Jason dealt with Jagger, who stormed into his room ranting and raving about Sonny and demanding that Jason turn over everything he knows about the Corinthos organization. Of course, Jagger has always disliked Sonny, but his animus was further inflamed by Ava, who convinced him she was afraid for her life due to the pending custody battle over Avery. Jason, naturally, was unmoved, cautioning Jagger not to believe anything Ava tells him; round and round they went, until Jason had successfully waited out the two hours he'd promised Anna — at which point he gave Jagger the phone and told him it contained all the evidence he'd need to put Valentin away.
Of course, by the time Jagger and his men reached Valentin's place, it was empty — the site of a fruitless raid that Anna watched from across the street with a smile on her face. So what happens now? It seems pretty unavoidable that Pikeman is now fatally compromised; even if the FBI doesn't have Valentin, it has evidence of deals and money transfers that should shutter the organization either way. One would assume that Valentin's records also include evidence of Pikeman's dealings with Sonny, but I'm sure that's too much to ask; instead, now that Pikeman's dust, I expect Jagger will stay in town so he can help Ava against Sonny, and probably get caught in the crossfire somehow as Sonny's placebo meds turn him into a raging mess.
As for Valentin, I have no idea. Given how infrequently James Patrick Stuart has appeared on the show since joining the cast of The Villains of Valley View, I'm guessing this will turn out to be an extended exit — which is a shame, because I really enjoy watching JPS, but Valentin is arguably too important to too many storylines to be played by a non-contract actor. If this is really goodbye for now, I hope to see him again in a year or two. I'm also guessing Charlotte will be back relatively quickly… but more on that in a minute.
The last loose end right now is Brennan. Again, one would seemingly safely assume that whatever records are gleaned from the satellite phone will also point several fingers at him, but one also gets the sense that the show still has plans for the character, and the biggest, most recent sign appeared last Monday. After being visited by Carly at Pentonville and engaging in another round of allegedly charming but really fairly tiresome flirting, he was approached by a man in a suit, who said "They're ready for you."
Who are "they"? Beats me, because we didn't see Brennan for the rest of the week — but if you've been watching GH for any length of time, you can probably guess that this little exchange is the prelude to Brennan cutting some sort of deal that springs him from prison and puts him back on the main canvas so he can mix it up with Carly and help her in her ridiculous war against Jagger and the FBI. This is not what I want to believe, to put it mildly, but given that Carly and Jason spent the last two days of the week hanging out on their dumb bridge and talking about how much trouble Sonny is in, it's pretty obvious that the Pikeman storyline is about to become a story about Sonny, Carly, and Jason against Ava and Jagger, with Avery's custody — and presumably more than one character's life — hanging in the balance. No one will ever know that it was Valentin who initially screwed with Sonny's meds, and his inevitable public breakdown will be added to the growing list of things that are All Ava's Fault.
You Son of a Bitch. You Kissed My Daughter?
The other significant event that took place last week happened when Willow showed up at Nina's office on Monday, tearfully telling her "I kissed Drew the way I kiss my husband." There was some fancy dancing here on the part of the writers, who bent over backwards to come up with a reason beyond "we thought it would be interesting" for the kiss; according to Willow, she and Drew were "bonded in a way that I've never felt with anyone else before" when he saved her life in Greenland. (I know, I know.) Anyway, after convincing Willow not to say anything to Michael, assuring her that it was just a single moment and a minor slip she'd soon forget, Nina summoned Drew to her office and slapped him right in his stupid face.
This was a legitimately soapy moment of the type GH has far too few of these days, but it quickly fizzled out — Nina threatened to tell Willow that she and Drew had been having sex, Drew took complete blame and promised not to pursue Willow, and Nina not only said she was choosing to believe him, she assured him he'd have the Invader's endorsement. Meanwhile, Willow was over at Sonny's penthouse, trying to broker peace between him and Michael — a conversation that ended with Willow looking startled as Sonny shouted at one of Diane's associates and hung up on them for being someone other than Diane.
After filling Willow in on his custody battle with Ava, Sonny headed over to Nina's office, where he arrived just in time to stop more gross flirting between her and Drew. Once they were alone, he asked her if he could count on her supportive testimony if she was subpoenaed during the custody hearings, which led to the longest and most pleasant conversation we've seen between these characters since their breakup. Will it lead to a reconciliation? Well, Nina quickly told Maxie that she feels like she's moved on from Sonny, and she now understands that their lives were never a good fit, but soap characters change their minds about everything all the time. For now, it's just nice to get another small dose of the gentle, subtle interplay between Sonny and Nina; even after everything, she still brings out the best in him.
Following the departures of Sonny and Maxie, Nina was visited by Kristina and Blaze, who told her about their upcoming interview and asked her if she'd be willing to coach them. This makes sense! What does not is the revelation that their interview will be with Perez Hilton. To be honest, I'd pretty much forgotten he would be appearing on GH, so it came as a particularly unwelcome surprise to discover he'd be the one conducting the interview with Kristina and Blaze — not just because it's stunt casting, which rarely works on this show, but because of Hilton's extraordinarily problematic past as a scummy media figure who's been responsible for outing numerous closeted celebrities.
I know Hilton has apologized for his past actions and claims he's changed, et cetera, and speaking as a person who's made countless mistakes of my own, I'm not going to argue that positive change or redemption are impossible for someone like him. What I will say, however, is that the show could have picked a WHOLE bunch of different people who would have been a WHOLE lot less upsetting for this gig. Regardless of anyone's intent, it's messy, and indicative of the ham-handed way this whole storyline has been handled from the beginning. When it comes to representation, GH is almost always either making no visible efforts or fumbling their efforts so badly that you almost wish they'd just stop.
Don't Let My Failings Mess with Your Future
There isn't a lot to say about these scenes, but they were the scenes of the week for me, so I'm giving them a paragraph anyway. After hearing from Elizabeth that Jake got into an art school in Barcelona, Jason headed over to their house with an envelope containing a check to cover his tuition — and ended up getting caught by Elizabeth as he tried to slip it under the door. Awkwardly accepting her invitation to come in, he talked with Jake, speaking plainly about how he's been largely an absentee father, accepting responsibility for his mistakes, and urging his son to accept the money even if he isn't able to accept a relationship between the two of them.
It was really great stuff, and as an avowed anti-Jasonite, you know I'm not saying that lightly. This is exactly the type of thing the show should have focused on immediately after bringing Jason back — he's too old to be mixed up in military contractor work or mob wars, and this chapter of his life would be far more interesting if it were devoted to facing the impact that his decades of extralegal activity have had on the lives of his loved ones.
I would dearly love to believe we'll be getting more of this on a regular basis, but I'm not getting my hopes up.
More Harm Than Good
Finally, I would be remiss if I didn't devote at least a few words to Friday's scenes between Laura and Dante, who had an unplanned meeting when Dante showed up at Lulu's hospital room while Laura was there. Their conversation was pretty inconsequential — there was lots of talk about how Rocco knows Lulu more as a coma patient than as his mother, which is absurd, given that she's only been in that bed for four years and Rocco is being portrayed as a teenager lately — but I feel like the scenes were still more than filler.
We know Lucky is coming back. We know it'd be extremely easy for the writers to have an offscreen Valentin decide that life on the run is no good for Charlotte and send her home to Port Charles. What better time for Lulu to finally wake up? I don't know if I'm outright advocating for this, necessarily — I felt like the show was really flailing for stuff for Lulu to do during Emme Rylan's last couple of years, and I somehow doubt the writers have come up with a compelling long-term path for the character in the interim — but those scenes definitely felt like the show tapping us on the shoulder.
What could be interesting, at least in the short term, is Lulu helping Charlotte come to terms with her Cassadine heritage. Before Valentin took her on the run, she had a tearful reconciliation with Anna, disavowing her uncle Victor's influence while also expressing fears that she's inherently evil because of her bloodline. As she put it, Cassadines are bad unless they die trying to be good, and while I tend to think the character would be a lot more interesting if she was lying through her teeth when she told Anna all was forgiven, there's stuff here for Lulu and Charlotte to work through if that's what the writers want.
And hey, actually, maybe we're on the verge of a Spencer/Cassadine renaissance of sorts — while Laura and Dante were talking across Lulu's bed, Joss and Trina were having a long conversation about the porcelain turtle doves shared by Trina and Spencer, including Joss asking Trina if anyone ever found Spencer's after he went overboard during the struggle with Esme. Was that an anvil dropping? Are we about to see the other turtle dove? Beats me, but if it keeps Trina from sharing Moments with Gio, I think it'd be an improvement.
Okay, I think that's it for the major stuff. This still ended up taking like 2500 words, but I'll still take that as a win. On to the bullet points!
- Lois told Gio she'd lined up a Broadway gig for him, but he turned it down due to his prior commitments with PCU and Ava's gallery
- Carly and Lois had a long talk about Gio's parents, which felt deeply weird and made me very apprehensive
- Natalia asked Sonny to bankroll a new label for Blaze's music and he agreed, provided Brook Lynn be the one to run it; Brook Lynn said she'd do it if Natalia accepted a list of conditions that essentially sideline her from Blaze's career, and she agreed
- Jason talked wistfully about how uncomplicated his relationship with Britt was
- James stole Georgie's phone and booked a ride to the Quartermaine stables, where he told Cody that Mac is making him get a new riding teacher; after picking up James and taking him home, Maxie told Spinelli she's already lost one sibling and will not lose another
- Dex talked to Chase about his shitty relationship with his father and brothers
- Gio ate a sandwich and insulted Staten Island
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