The ratings aren't great and a lot of viewers are pretty pissed off about an array of recent decisions, but General Hospital has at least one thing going for it lately: After a long period of time during which it felt like stories were being allowed to dawdle and linger far longer than they should have, the overall pace has really picked up in recent weeks. Characters are popping in and out, secrets are being spilled with a quickness, and for the most part, it feels like there's a point behind the stuff we're seeing. I suspect this is still nowhere near enough to counterbalance the current wave of complaints, but it's progress nonetheless, and that's something we can't take for granted in Port Charles these days.
I Hate Turquoise Jewelry
Here's an example of what I'm talking about. The story of Heather's unspeakably strange redemption after her equally oddball descent into homicidal behavior has been puttering along in the background for what feels like an awfully long time, but last week, the writers finally dropped it into gear — specifically by having a judge review Ric's motion and straight up vacate her sentence.
This came as a huge surprise to Ric, who was neither expecting to see Heather released nor looking forward to breaking the news to the Ashfords. He even went so far as to plead with Elizabeth to go with him, but she laughed in his face — rude, but still preferable to the scene he had to face at the Savoy, where he showed up in the middle of Marshall's farewell party to tell Curtis and Portia what was going on. He tried to take them aside and fill them in privately, but Portia refused to go anywhere with him, and instead interrupted the celebration by yelling that Ric had some Heather news he wanted to share with the entire room.
Being yelled and glared at by a roomful of people is nothing new for Ric, but now he has a grown daughter who doesn't take any shit from anybody, so when people started piling on and blaming Ric for Heather's release, Molly jumped in to defend him — which sent TJ storming out of the club and off to General Hospital, where he and Lucas bonded over the questionable wisdom of throwing yourself into your work in order to avoid problems at home. Ric and Molly, meanwhile, went to Molly and TJ's apartment, where Molly essentially told Ric she had his back where Heather's concerned, but she'd really like it if he'd drop Ava as a client.
As we discussed in the last column, Molly and TJ have decided that the one thing they can agree on these days is that Ava needs to pay for her role in Irene's death. Ric's response was that he's defending Ava so he can help Molly move past her need for vengeance by making her believe Ava isn't responsible for what happened — and Molly's response to that was basically "get out of my apartment." Even when they're at odds, you can still feel the love between Molly and Ric, which has everything to do with the way Kristen Vaganos and Rick Hearst are playing it; it's kind of amazing that these two have only been father and daughter onscreen for a few weeks and a handful of scenes.
If Molly's unhappy about Ric defending Ava in court, she's going to be extra pissed when she sees the flirty banter developing between them. A Ric/Ava pairing makes brilliant sense in terms of viewer enjoyment, but it's bound to prompt scornful disbelief across Port Charles — starting with Nina, who delivered my favorite line of the week when she figured out what was happening and realized her warnings to Ava were falling on deaf ears: "Nooooo! Ric Lansing is not relationship material!"
There's a ton of delicious potential waiting to sail with that ship — but for the moment, Ric is still shooting his shot with Elizabeth, even though he knows he doesn't have a chance. His latest attempt came after she found out Heather was being released and immediately assumed he'd expect her to take Heather in; assuring Elizabeth that he didn't like that idea, he quickly added that it might be okay if he moved in too, just so he could keep an eye on the situation, prompting her to laugh out loud. (He joined in, but you could tell it was killing him just a little.) Just as with Ric and Molly, the dynamic between Ric and Elizabeth is tricky; depending on how it's played, these lines could either come across as cutting or affectionate, and the fact that it almost always lands on the latter is all due to the still-palpable chemistry between Hearst and Herbst.
While Elizabeth fretted over whether Heather would ask if she could move in, Curtis wasted no time taking matters into his own hands. After Trina rebuffed his and Portia's attempt to get her to move back home so they could keep a closer eye on her, Curtis assured Portia that he'd make sure Heather wasn't a problem — and then he followed up by reaching out to Steven Lars Webber, who's been a shoe waiting to drop since we heard about his recent release from prison a couple of weeks ago. Summoning Steven to his office, Curtis offered to pull strings and have his medical license reinstated — and throw in some cash as well — if he'd agree to take Heather far away from Port Charles. When Steven declined, Curtis informed him that he'd be responsible for whatever happened to Heather next, warning that the alternatives were a lot less pleasant.
Given their many years of animosity, as well as the fact that Heather killed multiple people, I wouldn't necessarily have expected that threat to stick. But when Heather walked out of the Pentonville gates, it wasn't just Elizabeth waiting there to pick her up — Steven arrived too, and then took her to Bobbie's for a couple of BLTs so he could make his pitch. Although Heather initially rejected his offer to take her to Sedona with him ("I hate turquoise jewelry"), he was eventually able to cut through her Ace-induced blubbering and get her to agree. Their next stop was GH, where they were in the middle of telling Elizabeth about their plans when Laura stepped off the elevator, prompting Heather to rush up and yell about how glad she was to see her. It seems extremely unlikely that the show would go through all this rigamarole just for Heather to skip off to the desert; whatever ends up changing her mind, I'm willing to bet it'll have something to do with Laura's response to the news next week.
One final note: I need to applaud, albeit with reservations, the writers' willingness to have Portia openly wonder whether Heather would have been released if she'd threatened the life of a young white girl. This is the type of dialogue that the show has flirted with, only to drop like a hot potato, a number of times over the years, so I'm glad they stuck it in even though Heather stalked Joss and killed Britt, both of whom definitely fit the "young and white" description. However, I'm not sure they understand how that speech landed in the wake of Trina's lengthy back-burnering following Spencer's presumed death. Why should some judge care about Trina's perspective when the show's writers don't?
Portal Vein Thrombosis
Laura didn't just happen to walk off that elevator, of course — she was there to sit vigil while Sam and Lulu went under the knife. The story's taken so long to get here that I feel like Lulu should have died five times by now, but it's finally happening, much to the enragement of Kelly Monaco fans far and wide.
But before Sam was finally wheeled off on her gurney — flashing an improvised "I love you" sign to her onscreen family (and those aforementioned fans) as she went — the writers tossed in one more twist, with the GH staff discovering at the last minute that Lulu has developed a condition known as portal vein thrombosis. I'm sure a doctor would have a lot to say about this, but I am not a doctor, so all I'll add is that this condition makes Lulu's liver transplant even more of a long shot, which meant they had to warn Sam that she was likely donating a chunk of her liver in vain. This ultimately added up to nothing much, as Sam didn't even seem to give it any additional thought; I guess it's just there to make us feel that much more shocked and grateful or whatever when the surgery not only works, but Lulu wakes up from her coma.
Like a lot of the details surrounding this story, the portal vein thrombosis stuff feels unnecessary. We know there's a new Lulu waiting to make her debut, and we know Sam is exiting, just as we knew Jonathan Jackson was coming back for a long stint. All of these things were officially announced, so rather than trying like hell to ramp up the drama by pretending that literally any other outcome was even possible, they should have just had Lucky return with Isaiah in tow, had Isaiah readily agree to perform the surgery, and presented the procedure as Lulu's best chance of recovery rather than a presumably pointless operation that would have no real impact on her dwindling quality of life.
Much like the show, I digress. Here's what you need to know: Lucas is performing Sam's surgery, Isaiah is performing Lulu's surgery, and everyone is biting their nails while they wait to hear about the outcome. Sam is everyone's hero, to the extent that she even got Jason and Drew to agree to watch their kids while she's out of commission. And Cyrus is still lurking about the hospital, saying prayers for Lulu and making us think he'll definitely have something to do with Sam's looming demise. Meanwhile, Maxie told Spinelli about Lulu confessing her lingering feelings for Dante before she fell into her coma, just as Dante recalled how he wanted to tell Lulu he still had feelings for her. Weddings, funerals, and dramatic reunions are the stuff soaps are made of, so you can definitely see why the writers decided to go this route, but the execution here has been perpetually sloppy. Speaking as someone who never really cared about Dante/Lulu but has really enjoyed Dante/Sam, I just want all this to be over.
She Has My Mother's Eyes
Remember what I said in the beginning about secrets being spilled with lightning speed? This storyline is a perfect example. Nine times out of ten, a daytime show will make you wait for months before someone like Holly tells someone like Sasha that her father isn't actually dead, but the particulars here — Emma Samms' short-term availability, GH's long-running aversion to giving the Scorpios screentime on a regular basis, and the whole "unwitting first cousins who are about to finally have sex" angle — have forced things to move along at a very rapid clip. I suspect this storyline is destined to end as rapidly as it began, with more than one of the characters involved going away when it's over, but for the moment, it's fairly fun to watch.
I say that while acknowledging that the entire thing seems to rest on all of us agreeing to forget about the 18 months Holly spent in Port Charles after Robert and Anna were presumed dead, as well as the fact that Robert and Anna were extremely romantically involved at the time, which would make any hookup with Holly pretty scuzzy. I also think Sasha and Cody are a sweet change of pace as a couple, so I'm not really in love with splitting them up, particularly in such a gross and permanent way. Still, there are things worth celebrating.
High on that list is the opportunity to watch Robert, Holly, and Anna grapple with their past. On one hand, we're talking about things that happened decades ago; on the other hand, Holly and Anna have never shared many scenes, so giving them the opportunity to snipe at each other about the fact that Anna hid Robin from Robert — and now Holly has admitted to doing the same thing with Sasha — comes with a certain amount of overdue satisfaction. There's also the sweet interplay between Robert and Sasha, which I've found genuinely moving at times; although Robert has definitely been prone to being a hardass with people who disappoint him in the past, there's no recrimination here, as he understands Holly's motivations for hiding the truth — at least to an extent — and he's openly interested in getting to know his newfound daughter. In fact, he told Anna he knew Holly was telling the truth even before he saw the DNA test results, because Sasha has his mother's eyes.
It's happy news for Robert, all things considered, but it's devastating to Sasha, who was left in the intensely awkward position of having to tell her boyfriend that they have to break up because their fathers are brothers. Before going to Cody's place, she went to Nina's office, where she spilled her guts and suggested that all this mess is karmic payback for her decision to take Valentin's money and pretend to be Nina's daughter. Nina, of course, wasn't hearing any of it, but their conversation gave Holly time to slink over to the Quartermaine stables and try to lure Cody out of town by offering to cut him in on a con — an offer he was in the middle of refusing for the third or fourth time when Sasha showed up, tossed Holly out on her ear, and ended the week by telling Cody "That woman is my mother, and something is very, very wrong."
Far less interesting — at least to me — is the Sidwell angle. Shortly after tearing into Holly, Anna received an alert letting her know that Sidwell is in the U.S. and has been spotted in Miami. This news also reached Brennan, who leaned on Carly to pressure Jason into telling him everything that went down in Africa; fortunately for Brennan, Jason had just been made privy to the knowledge that Holly skedaddled out of Sidwell's compound with a bag full of raw, unregistered diamonds, which he was happy to share. (Or as happy as Jason ever gets, anyway, which is to say not at all.)
Why did Jason know about the diamonds? Because Holly approached Sonny about fencing them, that's why. It remains irritating to be forced to watch certain characters be wedged into storylines they have no business being a part of, and I really never wanted to watch Holly and Sonny do business together, but in this case, it does make unavoidable sense. If Holly wanted to move some stolen diamonds in a hurry, why wouldn't she approach Port Charles' preeminent gangster? And why wouldn't Sonny immediately tell Jason about it even after Holly asked him not to?
Even after learning that the diamonds were stolen from Sidwell, Sonny remained interested in moving them for Holly, primarily because he thinks it'll be worth $100 million — and if I'm remembering right, he wants a 70 percent cut of the proceeds, which is enough to make him willing to risk incurring Sidwell's wrath. It's a risk he thinks is fairly minimal; as he told Jason, if they can get the deal done fast enough, Holly will be gone again before Sidwell reaches Port Charles, and he won't be able to tie them together.
Of course, this is a soap, so things aren't likely to work out that way. I really have no idea what's about to happen, but it seems likely to me that Sidwell will be Sonny's next big bad, and that's a prospect I find wearisome. He isn't particularly imposing, for starters, and if Sonny fences stolen property, then he's kind of asking for whatever consequences he ends up having to face. More importantly, we've been down the "Sonny is bad! But this other character is so much worse!" road many, many, many times before, and I would really rather witness the return of Herbert Quartermaine than have to watch Sonny growl about how another dues-paying AARP member is a son of a bitch.
Okay, that's enough out of me for now. I'll see you back here next week — until then, here are your customary bullet points!
- Violet left town to live with Finn after one last tea party with Tracy
- Yuri is still alive and working for the Quartermaines
- Stella urged Molly to make things work with TJ
- Jordan told Isaiah about her own experience as a transplant patient
- Dex told Joss he regularly wishes he'd killed Heather when he had the chance, and then they humped
- Gio said a lot of stuff about music and then slept on the couch so Trina would feel safer
- Brad and Lucas had a bit of a thaw in their relationship after Brad bought him a cinnamon roll the morning of Sam's surgery, and they later bonded over their love of the Port Charles Woodchucks
- Anna, who evidently has unlimited PTO, promised Laura she'd find Valentin and bring Charlotte back to Port Charles
- Diane was enraged after hearing about Heather's release
- Brad is fully messing with Portia, up to and including leaving work early to catch a baseball game, and it is delightful
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