You take the good, you take the bad. You take 'em both, and there you have the facts of life — and also last week's General Hospital, which offered up a sometimes sweet, sometimes savory, and sometimes gag-inducing blend of the best and worst this show has to offer. It's been a really long time since I was genuinely excited about a GH storyline; for me, watching has become mostly about focusing on individual moments, which allows me to appreciate superior lines of dialogue and acting choices even if they arise as I'm being dragged kicking and screaming from one narrative anchor point to the next.
All of which is to say that even though I'm less than excited about every single story currently developing on GH, I can still walk away from a batch of episodes feeling reasonably entertained if I'm given enough worthwhile moments. Did last week do the trick? Let's find out together.
Mom's in Jail Again
Alexis started her week off in the PCPD interrogation room, where Mac suddenly remembered that conflicts of interest are a thing and had Detective Bennett question her about her whereabouts and activities the night of Jagger's murder. With Diane tied up defending Sonny, Alexis was left without an attorney, so she opted to represent herself — and promptly lied up a storm, telling Bennett that she found the gun glinting in the moonlight near her driveway and simply wanted to get rid of it. She also verified that she was the only one who drove her car on the night in question, which came back to bite her when Bennett revealed that cameras on the Quartermaine state captured her car on the premises.
(Apparently, there are no cameras near the boathouse. Also, the boathouse is allegedly still an "active crime scene" despite serving as the setting for Cody and Sasha's brunch with the Scorpios, not to mention Willow's morning yoga. Fascinating.)
While Alexis dug herself deeper into her latest legal hole, Kristina confronted Molly, asking if she turned her in for Jagger's murder. More Davis sister-fighting ensued, but it was mercifully broken up by Dex, who called Molly to let her know Alexis was at the station; she hurried over just in time to get into it with Sonny, who'd just arrived to pay Alexis' bail, only to be informed that his ex was busy "burying herself to protect your daughter."
Now, obviously, this entire thing is completely Sonny's fault. He's disgusting for murdering Jagger (not to mention claiming he did it "for the family"), and he's doubly disgusting for standing around while Alexis and Kristina face potential repercussions for his actions. But if the framework surrounding this chapter of the Jagger story is rickety as hell, it's still capable of producing some decent drama by pitting Sam and Molly's desire to protect Alexis against Michael and Kristina's sick compulsion to defend Sonny, and we saw some of that conflict develop last week.
Sam — played by Lindsay Hartley again, apparently because these scenes were taped while she was on set filling in for Kelly Monaco during Irene's funeral — got in Michael's face on Tuesday, saying everyone knows beyond the shadow of a doubt that Sonny either ordered Jagger's murder or did the deed himself. Michael, doing what he's done every step of the way anytime anyone has tried to investigate the murder, told Sam that trying to figure out who did it would be a waste of time; instead, he tried to convince her that the only truly useful move would be to find the gun Alexis pitched over the bridge, so it could theoretically be proven that it wasn't used to kill Jagger.
Michael's prevaricating gave Sam some unfortunate food for thought — more on that in a minute — but first, she had to attend to the unpleasant business of showing up at the courthouse for Alexis' arraignment, where she found Kristina looking for Sonny, who had promised to be on hand for moral support. Molly arrived just in time to tell Kristina she'd put the kibosh on Sonny's plans, warning him that his presence would do far more harm than good, but it didn't matter much in the end, because Alexis was still denied bail and remanded to Pentonville to await trial.
Going to Pentonville is old hat for Alexis by now, of course; no matter how many times the writers try to trick us into forgetting her past by forcing characters to say she's incapable of murder, we all know good and goddamn well that she will absolutely shank a bitch if she's backed into a corner. For that reason, the somber prison intake montage depicting Alexis being forced to pose for her mugshot, remove her jewelry, and get perp-walked down the hallway felt more than a little unnecessary, especially given that it led up to the eyeroll-inducing revelation that Alexis' cellmate is — coincidence of coincidences! — Heather Webber.
Nancy Lee Grahn and Alley Mills are both extremely talented, and I have no doubt that tossing them in a cell together has the potential to produce some entertaining dialogue while potentially laying some track for Heather's next act. But this show relies on coincidental developments far too much and far too often, and those coincidences are often artlessly deployed, which is definitely the case here. Again, I'm not saying this won't lead anywhere worthwhile; I'd just prefer to reach that destination without my show notes including lines like "Christ, they're cellmates."
With Alexis putting her career and freedom on the line to protect Kristina from legal jeopardy, Kristina showed her appreciation by letting Sam steer her over to GH for a chat with Felicia, who did her duty as a patient advocate by talking about the various options available to her for psychological and emotional support while she grieves the death of Molly and TJ's child. When I mentioned moments from last week that highlight the best this show has to offer, I was thinking first and foremost about the scenes between Felicia and Kristina, which were not only given time to play out, but also included some really strong, subtle work from both performers. I only hope that Kristina Wagner actively wanted to be part of this, because it was hard to watch her say things like "losing a child is devastating," and I can only imagine how it must have felt for her. Hopefully the experience was cathartic as well.
Also on the "good moments" list: The long-awaited Sonny-Ric reunion, which took place at Ava's gallery. For the second time in as many weeks, Ric happened to saunter into a location just as someone was in the middle of taunting one of his clients without knowing they were one of his clients; in this case, it was Sonny, who was gloating over Scott's abrupt disappearance and predicting she wouldn't be able to find a decent lawyer to take over for him in the custody case. Enter Ric, who assured Sonny that he isn't the slightest bit afraid of Diane, and then antagonized his big brother by imagining how he'd use Kristina as a cautionary tale to prove to the court that Sonny is an unfit parent. This led to all sorts of sniping between Sonny and Ric while Ava looked on in concern (and probably at least a little arousal), concluding with Sonny telling Ric that he had to go clean up the mess Ric made by reporting Alexis to the police, and Ric telling Sonny that if he really wanted to help, he should turn himself in for the murder he committed. Touché!
The war between Sonny and Ric is old news, and it's even older because the writers never let Ric notch any meaningful wins, but it was still fun to watch Rick Hearst and Maurice Benard spar, at least for a few minutes. The way Ric's been used and written since his return has been pretty much uniformly excellent; however long they intend to keep him around this time, it won't be long enough.
Okay, now for the bad stuff. While Alexis was having heart-to-hearts with her daughters, Sonny got to have one with Michael, which essentially took the form of Sonny tearfully thanking Michael for not doing his civic duty and turning him in when he caught him standing over Jagger's lifeless body with a smoking gun. I have no doubt that we were supposed to find this heartwarming, but watching Sonny tearfully say he loves Michael for letting him get away with murder was simply gross.
Also gross, at least potentially: Watching Sam tell Dante that she's planning to try and do what the cops couldn't do by single-handedly searching the river until she finds Sonny's stolen gun. Did we just watch the start of Sam's exit storyline? I don't know for sure, but this show often mistakes symmetry for poetry, so it seems at least somewhat likely, and it also feels remarkably cruel — if Alexis is meant to suffer the guilt of having one daughter die trying to free her from the murder rap she willingly accepted in order to protect another daughter, then I hope you'll forgive me if that's one storyline I end up not giving my full attention. Hysterical tears are obviously part of the fuel that any good soap runs on, but some things are too grim to entertain.
(One last note before we move on to the next storyline: Sonny's big plan for saving Alexis was to use Brick to force Martin to return to Port Charles, and then hire him to represent her. For those with shorter memories, we last saw Martin in February, when he fled town after catching Scott and Lucy humping in the hay. At the time, he was supposed to be off to spend some time eating hummingbird cake with his mama, but he apparently also had time to shave his beard and lose his Southern accent.)
She Still Looks Like Mom
What little time we didn't spend on Alexis' arraignment last week was mostly spent on Lulu and Lucky, and this story — to put it as politely as possible — is a bit of a silly mess. This is frustrating, not only because it's a waste of our time, but because it should be a slam dunk; I'm very bad at math, but I'd be willing to bet that at least 70 percent of professional writers would be able to make ruthlessly effective drama from the tale of a sister slowly dying while her family desperately searches for the brother who might be able to save her. This has not happened so far.
To be fair, a lot of this storyline's shortcomings can be traced back to clumsy pacing, and it would be unkind for me not to at least point out that the writers and showrunners face a difficult task in terms of patiently establishing the stakes for Lucky's return while also trying to create a sense of urgency around Lulu's condition. If she isn't at death's door, then there's no need for a dangerous caper — but the longer this goes on, the less it really feels like her life is really at risk.
All of which is to say that on the Lulu side, there was lots of time for doing the stuff people do when they have a loved one in the hospital — namely, sitting around and waiting. Cody led the brigade when he made his inaugural visit to her bedside, where all signs point to him eventually blabbing his and Dante's big, dark secret to her comatose body; while that was going on, Danny showed up at the hospital so he could tell Dante that Jason had flown off to Africa in pursuit of Lucky. Danny's arrival prompted a conversation between Sam and Elizabeth, who kinda argued/kinda bonded over the spectacularly poor and dangerous decisions made by Jason and Lucky.
Next on the visitors' list was Lulu's uncle Cyrus, who showed up, Bible in hand, and copped to his rather significant role in the explosion that injured her in the first place. (In a bit of deflection that would have impressed even Sonny Corinthos, the master of shirking responsibility, Cyrus pinned the lion's share of the blame on Julian, saying none of this would have happened if he hadn't screwed up the bombing Cyrus blackmailed him into carrying out.) Vowing to find some way of helping her, he left a flower resting against her wrist — which was soon found by Dante, who was skeeved out enough to remind a nurse that Lulu is in critical condition and shouldn't be receiving random visitors.
Lulu also had a visit from Rocco, who hilariously noted "she still looks like Mom"; meanwhile, down the hall, Jordan was busy bringing a BLT from Bobbie's to Isaiah. Upon arriving at Isaiah's room, she was annoyed to find Cyrus, who'd stopped by on what are apparently his regular rounds; after interrupting Cyrus and Isaiah's pleasant conversation about football (Cyrus is a Seahawks fan), she filled Isaiah in on her long and sordid history with Cyrus.
Why Cyrus' past is being dredged up right now, I have no idea. Jeff Kober is wonderful, and I'm happy to have him on the show; I just can't see what purpose any of this serves, unless they're setting the table for Cyrus to redeem himself by dying to save Lulu somehow.
Redemption of any kind seems far less likely for the Lucky leg of the story, which has been fairly thoroughly botched thus far. On one side, you've got an increasingly greasy Lucky, who's being positioned as a smooth-talking adventurer and savior of doctors, but really just looks like the stunt double for Casey Affleck in a grueling drama about sad people in Massachusetts. On the other side, you've got Anna, Jason, and Holly, all grasping in vain for the sort of addictively entertaining derring-do their characters were associated with decades ago. Working against them is the passage of time, the shrinking of the show's budget, and a bunch of choppy editing that consistently kills any semblance of momentum — and those factors are currently combining to kick this story's ass up and down the canvas.
Here's what's happening in Africa: Jason, much to Danny's delight, has jetted off with Anna to try and run a con on Sidwell so they can figure out where he's keeping Lucky. Imagine their surprise when they strolled into a chintzy-looking nightclub (which I'm pretty sure was just the Savoy with slightly different decorations) and found Sidwell with Holly! I repeat: coincidence of coincidences!
Holly spotted Anna, Anna spotted Holly, and they bickered with each other while Jason tried to beat Sidwell at poker long enough for Anna to clone the SIM card in Sidwell's phone. For a moment, it looked like Jason had lost, but then he accused Sidwell of cheating and pulled a hidden card out of another player's sleeve to "prove" it; suitably goaded into sticking around for more, Sidwell ended up losing all his fancy chips AND a fancy bejeweled bracelet. By this point, Holly had warned Anna that Sidwell's compound was too heavily fortified for anyone to just sneak in, so Anna changed her plan, telling Jason she wanted to trick Sidwell into inviting them. Just when it looked like her gambit was about to work, one of Sidwell's goons pulled him aside to share everything he overheard while Anna and Holly were talking. He invited them anyway, but now we know that Sidwell knows what they're up to.
It's easy to see what the writers are aiming for here, but whenever the 21st-century version of GH tries to recapture the fizzy espionage of yore, the show really only serves to remind the viewer of how much better this stuff worked in the '80s. Part of it is due to budget constraints, part of it is due to the fact that these actors have been asked to hit these beats countless times over the years, but I think the biggest issue is really the writing. We've had Lucky back for weeks, and all he's really done is get beaten up, play cards, and — most recently — hallucinate a dream version of Elizabeth to tell him what a chickenshit he is for running off and deserting his family. Anna and Jason weren't even planning on going to Africa together, but I guess after she (sigh) sat in his seat on the plane, they spent their flight hatching a plan. This stuff should be exciting, but you don't even get the sense that the writers really care. More than anything, this part of the story serves to reinforce how desperately GH needs a set of younger characters who can serve the same function served by Frisco, Felicia, Robert, and Anna during the '80s.
Also, aren't any of these people the slightest bit concerned that no one's heard a peep from Laura and Kevin since they left for Africa? I hope this means we'll end up seeing Laura save the day by sneaking in, freeing Lucky, and braining Sidwell with a lamp or something.
Drew Q for Two
Well, now that we've gotten all that other funny business out of the way, we can finally answer the questions everyone has been asking, namely: How is Drew's campaign going, and what does it mean for his stewardship of Aurora?
What's that you say? You haven't been asking either of those questions? La la la, the writers can't hear you. Oh my gosh, you guys, they can't hear you so much, it's almost like they want so see how bad they can make this storyline hurt. I, on the other hand, only have your best interests at heart, so I will keep things brief.
So apparently, Drew has so little campaign infrastructure that it took Nina to solve his biggest problem, which is that as of the middle of last week, he was down by four points in the polls and worried about losing to his "family values" opponent. If the voters only knew that Drew is so dedicated to family values that he's on the brink of an affair with his nephew's wife while he's also schtupping her mom! Anyway, I digress. Nina's big idea to shore up support for Drew was to pretend she's his girlfriend, which seems awfully silly, but was apparently so incredibly effective that Drew was up by seven — seven! — points a day or two later.
Personal political crisis averted, Drew quickly decided he was all in again, and when Nina suggested that he take a step back from Aurora so he could focus on his campaign, he walked up to Curtis in the middle of the Savoy and told him he was being appointed acting CEO, effective immediately. Another new job for Curtis! This makes it what, three in the last two years? Exciting times for the Ashford family, especially Portia, who's spent the last couple of weeks whispering in Curtis' ear about how Drew was destined to make this exact move. Thus emboldened, Curtis is already thinking about Drew's odds of winning the special election next month, and how a Quartermaine victory could put him in the CEO chair permanently. Less enthused is Michael, who fully expected Drew to give him the role, only to be told that his time was better spent on ELQ.
While Nina was busy giving Drew's campaign a boost, Willow was left to desperately try and stop herself from ovulating every time he walked into a room. When a sweaty and topless Drew interrupted her yoga session on the Quartermaine docks, she swooned and would have given herself a concussion if he hadn't caught her; when she spotted him at the Savoy, she tried to call a car and flee for home. Not even a sob session with Sasha, who admitted she'd seen Willow and Drew slobbering on each other during the July 4 fireworks, was enough to curb her lust.
Meanwhile, not only does Michael have his wife screwing around behind his back, he also has to deal with Ned, who… uh, I can't even pretend to understand or care about what these two were fighting about last week. As is so often the case with Q-related storylines, I watched Ned and Michael yelling at each other and felt nothing more than the strong sense that the writers felt like it was time for another ELQ argument. The gist, I guess, is that Michael wants the board to vote on a resolution that sidelines Valentin, but Ned said their lawyers are already working on that, as well as taking steps to prevent Valentin from doing anything with his shares, so it would seem that these two agree on everything that matters. I guess we're seeing this stuff so there are higher stakes or something when Michael finds out Willow quivers for his uncle and becomes Dark Michael again?
Hip to Be Jailed
Finally, it's time to spend a few words talking about the ongoing saga of Heather Webber. As I mentioned previously, Alexis is her new cellmate; prior to getting that piece of information, she was visited by her new attorney Ric, who brought the unfortunate news that her most recent blood tests show a negligible difference in cobalt levels pre- and post-surgery, which means — as he told her — "You're never getting out of here."
Heather reacted by getting weepy, as Heather often does, which made Ric want to double-check on those test results — especially after, while blubbering about wanting to be a grandmother to Ace, she stopped mid-sniffle, remembered he'd just lost a grandchild of his own, and expressed her condolences.
Clearly, Portia messed with the test results, which is something we were all expecting her to do and is also the type of narrative device that typically tends to extend a storyline by six or seven months so innocent parties can suffer until the truth is finally discovered. Not this time! Turns out Ric also had Heather's blood sent to another lab, and those results came back wildly different from the ones GH provided — something Ric confirmed when he showed the two sets of data to Elizabeth, who told him "there's something seriously wrong."
This does raise the question of why Ric told Heather she'd spend the rest of her life in prison before he'd bothered to check both sets of results, but whatever; for the moment, I'm mostly just happy that we don't have to wait until 2025 for someone to figure it out. That happiness is tempered somewhat by what feels like the high likelihood that Portia will pin the blame for this on Brad, who deserves better than to be brought out of mothballs just so he can serve as someone's scapegoat, but we'll see how this develops.
That's it for the big stuff. Now for some bullets!
- Tracy told Sasha that she needs to take her work more seriously; in response, Sasha accused Tracy of being afraid of losing Cody to her and the Scorpios
- Stella gave Trina a pep talk about getting on with her life
- Gio ordered a BLT
- Ric decided to shoot his shot with Elizabeth, and took it like a man when she firmly but gently told him it was never going to happen
- Ric also offered to beat up Finn, who's being mentioned an awful lot lately
- Lois bizarrely offered to mediate between Ned and Sonny to help them be friends; just as bizarrely, Ned retorted that he didn't know if he could trust her without her old accent
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