During my adolescent years, I was the type of student who flashes just enough potential to let the teacher know they're capable of an A, but then spends the bulk of the school year stubbornly refusing most opportunities to live up to that potential. For the teacher, getting a solid assignment out of that type of student can almost be more frustrating — the type of moment that leaves a person grumbling, "Why can't you do this all the time?"
While I think General Hospital has upped its overall game in some meaningful ways lately, last week was a semi-frustrating reminder of how often the show coasts below its full potential. There was a ton of action — numerous times, I had to pause and rewind to make sure I wasn't leaving out anything important while taking notes — but more importantly, the action was largely fueled by emotion, and those emotions were largely earned as the payoff from months, if not years, of situations we've watched play out on the show.
There were things you could quibble with, of course. GH rarely does action well, and while I'd rank last week's set pieces among the better ones in recent memory, that's still a low bar; mostly, on that front, I'm just grateful that we didn't have any pathetic-looking explosions. I also continue to believe that something's wreaking havoc on the way these episodes are scheduled, because Thursday's episode felt like a Friday, and Monday was the type of calm-after-the-storm installment you usually get on a Monday. We had some bumpy performances from some day players, and anyone who's allergic to Carly/Sonny/Joss-propping will probably want to take a Zyrtec before settling in.
On the whole, though? Thoroughly enjoyable. Last week's GH wrapped up some major stuff in satisfying fashion, all while prepping the canvas for a series of storylines to come. Exactly how a soap is supposed to work, in other words. Why can't they do this all the time?
Because everything revolved around the cold fusion storyline, I'll break this into character groups, at least as much as I'm able. This is going to be a long one!
He Shot You in the Ass?
Sidwell started the week in the midst of gleefully blowing Cassius' cover in front of Fitzpatrick after he was caught being smuggled into the lake house by Ezra. This prompted Cassius to point his gun at Fitzpatrick — apologetically, mind you, but still. When Fitzpatrick pointed out that there was a SWAT team nearby, and also that Turner knew where both of them were, Cassius improvised by aiming at Ezra instead. He was betting that while Fitzpatrick might have been willing to gamble with his own life, he wouldn't gamble with someone else's, and he was right; within minutes, Fitzpatrick had been disarmed, forced to kneel, and pistol-whipped into unconsciousness.
Sidwell took this as his sign to leave, but Cassius stopped him, threatening to kill him for blowing his cover. This wasn't a serious threat, even though Cassius had been sent by Cullum specifically to make sure Sidwell didn't leave alive, and it didn't last long; in the end, while Cassius refused to give Sidwell his gun, he let him walk away unscathed. At this point, Ezra tried to tip out as well, but he was also stopped by Cassius, who made him agree to stay with Fitzpatrick until he regained consciousness.
Here's where I join the chorus of recent voices praising Daniel Cosgrove's recent work as Ezra, who has gone from a cartoonishly annoying character to a solid source of comic relief whose inner conflict also makes him eminently rootable. After Cassius took off, Ezra was left to fumble with a conveniently available ice pack while calling 911, and it was all pretty delightful to watch. It's gotten to the point that I actively look forward to his appearances; I don't know what the future holds for Ezra, but I hope the writers find a way to keep him around.
Comedy also ensued at Sidwell's next destination: the Jerome Gallery, where Turner was in the process of pressing Ava for information on his whereabouts while her new bodyguard Ethan looked on. Tired of people thinking she knew anything about where Sidwell might have gone, Ava hastened to point out that he'd tried to kill Lucas; if he'd been a favored customer once, that alone made him someone she wouldn't even bother to spit on. Perfectly timed, Sidwell strolled in and said he'd happily spit on Ava.
After a bit of banter, Sidwell decided his original plan — to take Ava hostage — wouldn't be as effective as taking Turner hostage. Having no more use for Ava, he went to shoot her, but his shot was ruined by Turner, who shoved his arm, allowing Ava and Ethan to flee into her storage room, which they barricaded before Ava realized Ethan was bleeding due to having been shot in the tuchus.
Everyone knows this, but it still bears repeating: Maura West has chemistry with everyone. It should be official GH policy to bounce Ava off every new character just to see what'll happen. Honestly, I think that might be what happened with the budding romance between Ava and Ethan, because their initial interactions didn't feel terribly intentional, but however it happened, they were an awful lot of fun to watch during those storage room scenes last week. For the first time, it felt like Ethan had a reason to be back in Port Charles, and even if that reason amounted to little more than woozily cracking jokes while Ava fretted over the prospect of him bleeding out on her floor and ruining some expensive drop cloths, it was reason enough.
True to classic soap tradition, Ethan's fading consciousness led to a secret being spilled: Confirming his seemingly evident reason for swapping those DNA samples the other day, he confessed to Ava that he isn't Phoebe's father. Remember what I said about things happening in a way that sets the table for the next round of storylines?
Things were far less fun back in the main gallery, where Sidwell had Turner summon Sonny so Sidwell could order him to get his private jet ready for a flight to the escape destination of his choosing. The only interesting part of the argument happened when Sonny told Sidwell that Cullum was the one who murdered Marco. This isn't a revelation that seems like it'll lead anywhere, but watching Carlo Rota play Sidwell in those moments was fascinating — the outward trembling rage, balanced against the looks on his face that made it clear he was putting the pieces together, gave us one more reason to miss this guy while he's off the canvas.
And it does seem like he'll be gone, at least for a while. You can probably guess how it went down: Sonny yelled at Sidwell, Sidwell went to shoot Sonny, Sonny overpowered him, Turner begged him not to shoot, he lowered the gun, the cops rushed in. The end, except for the part where Turner shoved Sonny up against a wall and started making out with him. Ugh.
My God, Anna Was Right
Across the Atlantic Ocean, Anna waited for a private moment with Felicia to reveal that Nathan wasn't really Nathan after all. This was one of the weaker links last week, but here goes: When Anna escaped from the facility and made a run for the border, she ended up at one of Faison's old chalets, which was apparently not only empty, but still full of Faison's personal stuff, just lying around for anybody to wander in and rifle through it. This is a lot to ask us to look past, but the end result is that Anna ended up with a stack of letters, one of which found Madeline confessing to stealing Cassius while demanding some Faison cash in order to keep quiet about it.
(For someone who once appeared to have some potential as a Phoebe Wallingford type, Madeline Reeves has undergone an awfully weird posthumous transformation into a GH supervillain. Ah well.)
Felicia didn't want to believe Anna at first, but she quickly came around, and hurried to call Cody so she could warn him to try and keep James away from "Nathan." Alas, Cody didn't get those calls, because he has the world's shittiest cellphone — ten years after water-resistant models became commonplace, his was rendered unusable for a solid day after a couple of sprays from James' squirt gun.
Due to these technical difficulties, Cody happily arranged for the three of them to have a date at the batting cages. After Cassius skedaddled away from Ezra and Fitzpatrick, he hustled over to the cages, where he almost got away with abducting James; fortunately, Cody's phone started working again just in time for him to hear Felicia's voicemail and let Cassius know — without letting Cassius know, if you know what I mean — that the jig was up.
I'm still not sure how I feel about the writers deciding to do this number on James, but from the minute we found out Nathan wasn't Nathan, we knew that kid's heart was bound to be broken, and the first bits shattered as Cassius realized he needed to let go of his nephew. Explaining that he'd made some big mistakes and he had to leave, he warned James that he was going to hear some bad things, and while some of them would be true, he wanted James to remember that no matter what, he loves him, more than he ever thought possible. Everyone involved did stellar work here, even Josh Kelly, whose part didn't call for much more than silently watching while Cody's heart went out to James… and also Cassius, a tiny bit.
At the end of this exchange, it looked like Cassius was headed off to Canada, because we next saw him in one of Port Charles' many abandoned parking lots, where he took the cover off a car with Ontario plates, emptied his wallet (except for some cash and photos of himself with James, natch), pulled out a new passport, and drove away. As it turned out, though, he had nobler goals in mind.
As for Anna? Per the rules of psychiatric medicine, she was immediately declared fit for release once her doctor found out she'd unraveled the mystery of a dead policeman's long-lost twin. Unfortunately, she may not be as well as she seems, because after saying goodnight to Felicia and closing the door to her room, she turned around to find Peter August smirking in her desk chair and asking her if she thought they bought it.
While I very much do not want to see Peter August again for any reason, dead or alive, I have to concede — at least going into whatever this is — that it makes nothing but sense for Anna to come home bearing some mental scars from her long ordeal. She was abducted and drugged, and the biggest traumas of her life were used against her for months on end; after all that, it'd be insulting if she just tra-la-la'd back to Port Charles like nothing ever happened. On the other hand, I'm truly sick to death of stories that deemphasize Anna's strength in order to portray her as some sort of wilting flower and damsel in distress. I'd rather watch her kick ass than weep, and we've seen far too much of the latter in recent years. I'm curious to see where this might lead, but also very skeptical.
When Someone Stops Breathing, Scream Their Name A Lot. It Helps
Now, a brief Cullum interlude. Our big bad had a really busy week, but he made time for a quick visit to Turning Woods, where he had a sleeping Brennan strapped into restraints — and then, when Brennan woke up, covered his face with an oxygen mask that was connected to a tank of carbon monoxide. Exit Cullum.
Fortunately, Nina arrived not long after, and quickly noticed that something was very wrong with Brennan. Unfortunately, she didn't start doing anything about it until she'd spent several minutes ninnying around and yelling his name; eventually, however, she administered CPR (including mouth to mouth, which I think counts as foreshadowing where these two are concerned) and brought him back around. He told her to call the WSB and warn them; smartly, she refused, pointing out that Cullum believed he was dead, and that was definitely for the best.
"Money talks," she pointed out with one of the best lines from a week packed with great dialogue. "And as it turns out, I have a lot to say." With that, she strolled off to the Turning Woods front desk in search of someone to bribe into opening up a new room for Brennan under a different name.
Not Without My Daughter
Instead of hightailing it to Canada, Cassius made his way out to Spoon Island — and arrived just in time to keep Carly from being bludgeoned by Agent Exposition, who'd been directed by Cullum to kill her after they caught her sneaking through Wyndemere.
Carly was there because Danny and Charlotte told her about Cullum's attempt to kidnap Charlotte, which was explained during an emergency super secret Scooby session at the Quartermaine boathouse that ended with Charlotte giving Carly all the information she needed to get Joss out of the Wyndemere sub-basement. I'm not clear on this because I was rolling my eyes too much to catch it all, but I think Charlotte may have even given Carly the passcode to the cell where Joss was being held?
Well, whatever. Point is, Carly FINALLY took the trip she'd been threatening to make for weeks, only to be caught almost immediately. Unbeknownst to her, she was followed by Danny and Charlotte, who decided to cause a diversion by lighting a bunch of firecrackers.
This brings us to another bone to pick with last week's episodes, which is that they revealed a side of Spoon Island that looks an awful lot like any random industrial park. This is one of those "six of one, half a dozen of the other" situations — while it was definitely jarring, it also allowed the show to increase the scope a bit by including things like the big truck that was being used to load up the prototype device so it could be delivered to the testing site, and it also gave the actors more room to run when the big gunfight inevitably erupted.
First things first. After rescuing Carly, Cassius verified that Carly knew how to get to Joss and Liesl, gave her a gun, and rushed off to the loading dock to stop Cullum from getting away. Carly hightailed it to the sub-basement, where — against all odds — Joss and Liesl were quickly shaping up into one of the funnier odd-couple duos we've seen on the show lately.
Shortly before Carly's arrival on the island, Liesl had been led back to the cell, where she told a horrified Joss that she'd stalled as long as she could, but she'd eventually run out of ways to put it off, and Faison's final project was complete. The device prototype had been completed, and was in the process of being dismantled so Cullum could test it. Determined not to give up, Joss demanded that Liesl use her big brain to help them get out; as she put it, "You figured out nuclear fusion. I'm pretty sure you can open that door." On cue, Liesl revealed a pair of pliers she'd pocketed from the lab, which Joss grabbed and used to punch a hole in the wall, thus revealing a cluster of wires.
For the next little while, Liesl made electrical magic happen. First, she inadvertently killed the lights, but after reversing that, she touched a different pair of wires together and shorted the door — just in time for Joss to open it and find one of Cullum's goons waiting on the other side. She kicked him in the gut, slammed it shut, and had Liesl short it into super duper no-takebacks locked position, and… well, you get the idea. For the most part, it seemed like these scenes were taking place to highlight the comedic chemistry between Liesl and Joss, and it worked. (This is partly because Kathleen Gati can make any scene funny, but still, credit where credit's due.)
Eventually, Carly showed up — the instant Liesl unlocked the door again, natch — leading to what was supposed to be a very emotional reunion. Needless to say, this was not Anna and Robin running up to each other after escaping from Mr. Wu, but that was okay, because it passed in a blip: Carly told Joss and Liesl that Nathan helped her get there, Liesl realized he'd gone off to stop Cullum alone, Joss insisted on helping him, and Liesl zapped the door one more time, locking herself and Carly inside so Joss could go play hero.
When Joss arrived at the loading dock, she found Cassius pinned behind some barrels in a very lopsided gunfight. She was able to eliminate a gunman who was moments away from shooting Cassius in the back, but that just left her stuck in the same position he was in — at least until she decided it was now or never and took a running leap past the barrels, only to get shot in the stomach for her trouble.
After offing the agents who'd shot Joss, Cassius ran out to check on her, but was caught by Cullum, who revealed he'd bailed on escaping from the island and doubled back after realizing there was a WSB helicopter on the way. Deciding to trade his precious project — at least temporarily — for his own freedom, he delivered a good old-fashioned Bond villain monologue about how he was going to kill Cassius and pin the blame for everything on him. Adding insult to injury, he also told Cassius that he'd tricked him into mailing poison-filled vials to Britt — and that Britt had never even had Huntington's at all. Muahahahaha! Unfortunately for Cullum, this turned out to be his final twirl of the mustache, because Joss sneaked her way over to a big-ass rifle, flipped over, and shot him dead.
Worn out after all that shooting and being shot, Joss gazed up at the bright blue Spoon Island sky and slipped into unconsciousness while watching that WSB helicopter approach. When she opened her eyes again, she was being stood over by a bespectacled fellow with a frightening dye job and a British accent, who said "Everything's gonna be okay. I'm here to help."
That fellow, as many of us suspected, was Z, the leader of the WSB, played by John Oliver in some rare stunt casting that actually worked. The next day, Z debriefed Joss at GH, explaining that she'd been in surgery all night, but she was going to be okay — unlike Cullum, who she'd killed, and Cassius, who Cullum had killed. Without exactly coming out and saying so, Z made it pretty clear that it would be to the Bureau's advantage to pin everything on Cassius and position Cullum as a hero, and also that they needed Joss, as the lone survivor, to corroborate that version of events.
While making it clear that she wasn't thrilled with the idea of framing Cassius, Joss said she'd do it if she got something in return, and wryly smiled when Z expressed surprised admiration for her newfound mercenary streak. The price for Joss' silence? Full releases and dropped charges for Valentin Cassadine and Jason Morgan.
I can't be mad at this. It's a time-honored soap trick to paint characters into impossible-seeming corners and then find ways to wriggle them out, and this one works pretty beautifully. I'm not even annoyed that it was Joss who popped the lock — while I still don't think she's remotely believable as a WSB agent, she's at least gotten a lot less annoying about it since being held captive underneath Wyndemere, and there was a gentle craftiness to the way Eden McCoy played these scenes that actually made me wonder whether there's a future for Joss at the WSB. Z certainly seems to think so, although he ended his week being visited by a belligerent Carly, who demanded that the Bureau let her daughter go. Perhaps there's another deal waiting to be made — one that'll put Joss back where she started, albeit with a lot more blood on her hands.
So! To recap where our major players stand at the end of this long, long, long-running saga:
Valentin: Re-arrested by the WSB after giving himself up to Z so he could stop Cullum
Cullum: Dead
Cassius: Supposedly dead, but c'mon, you don't believe that any more than I do
Sidwell: Under arrest
Joss: Cutting deals with Z while coming out of anesthesia
Z: Fending off Carly
Ethan: At GH, having his ass repaired
Ava: Wondering who Phoebe's father really is, and if she can blackmail him instead
Brennan: Eating burgers with Nina in his new room at Turning Woods
Sonny: Making out with Turner, gross
Lucas: Tending to Fitzpatrick and hearing all about Britt's placebo regimen
Carly: Yelling at the WSB
Liesl: Grieving the alleged death of the son she just met, and already feuding with Britt again
Britt: In a cell at the PCPD
Rocco: Back in Port Charles and being yelled at by Danny
Charlotte: Making a "WELCOME HOME PAPA" banner to hang in Carly's kitchen
James: In need of all the therapy
And that'll do it for the big stuff! Until next time, your bullets:
- Charlotte hilariously referred to the Metro Court as a place where "hundreds of people work"
- Referring to the dynamic between Ric and Alexis, Cody told an appalled Molly that "bickering can be a form of foreplay"
- Fitzpatrick likes to listen to '90s grunge while he's on a stakeout
- Sonny and Gio had an interminable, pointless conversation about whether or not it's safe for Gio to live with Sonny
- Amy Driscoll was onscreen for 25 seconds
- Dante told a livid Rocco that he had Britt arrested
- Lulu was gutted to learn the truth about "Nathan"
- Vaughn returned to Port Charles to help the WSB button up the Cullum case
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