Asp Burger

I did love me some Rosie. She had amazing chemistry with everyone, even the Dylan Cash Michael, and really lifted the scenes she was in.

Whether you love, hate, or are indifferent to him yourself, Steve Burton's Jason is like a big planet whose force affects smaller bodies in proximity when it drifts back around. His returns are always bad news for other guys in the cast who got more or better things to do in his absence. Zander in 2002 went from being a fairly competent character with many strong relationships on both sides of the law, to a whiny, jealous fuck-up whose number would eventually come up in the dead pool. At the same time, the Billy Warlock AJ shifted from interesting-gray to dull-black. The Billy Miller version of Jason became Drew, lost his romantic pairing, and was put on the B/C-list with Kim and Oscar while the actor's contract burned off. Dex became a day-player cop who has love scenes with Joss once in a while. CamMat's Drew actually does pretty well in action/adventure/rescue material, and I think the actor likes playing that stuff, but it usually goes to Jason, so Drew has to be a glib aspiring politician.

I can see what CeChase means. Jonathan Jackson also stood out in the '90s, but he wasn't the most castable type of young male. He was a very fine actor and he got some good post-GH credits. He proved he could hold the screen opposite great actors like Michelle Pfeiffer and Al Pacino, and he didn't Kirk Cameron up his career by making everything about his religious beliefs. But even the biggest JJ fan knew that as handsome as he was/is, that frame and that soft voice might keep him from being considered for a lot of roles in his age range. (Yeah, I know—Chalamet came along later and is also slight, and he's done well for himself, but whether that will be sustainable into his thirties is to be seen, and anyway, there are exceptions that prove the rule.) NAC is well positioned for "leading man" success. The movie isn't something I'm very excited for, myself. I love my share of horror films, but the best that could be said for the 1997 I Know What You Did Last Summer is that it was slightly above average for that kind of movie, and it sated fans who had loved Scream a year earlier and were counting the days until the Scream sequel a couple months after IKWYDLS. Still, I agree it's another good credit for NAC. I guess, if the roles he's played to this point are a guide, he'll be the next-gen version of Ryan Phillippe's character (the good-looking but entitled, short-tempered, violent jerk of the gang). I think this is intended as a sequel rather than a reboot. The Deadline article says Freddie Prinze Jr. and Jennifer Love Hewitt are "in talks to return." Unless it's a Ghostbusters 2016 situation in which original cast members are playing different characters for cutesy fan service, I'm guessing they're the now-middle-aged survivors, and their story is still part of the continuity.

I also remember a lot of scenes beside the lockers for Patrick and his duplicitous med-school friend who was still carrying a torch (Lisa?), and a cutesy scene of some female character (Maxie?) walking in on a naked Griffin. I think they made the choice about the locker room just to facilitate those scenes. Carly horning into everyone's lives is the real story on page one. But of course she does. I wonder how many oft-married middle-aged moms in the real world are that aggressive on behalf of their surgeon brother. I'll give Laura Wright this: she always plays those types of scenes (with everyone Carly wants to "protect") with the right note. As if it's maybe half real concern and half just relishing the opportunity to get in someone's face.

Very brief tangent, but it will lead somewhere: I'm rewatching an old Curb Your Enthusiasm from 20 years ago called "The Surrogate." Larry's faux pas in this one (well, it's Curb, so one of three or four faux pas) is that he goes to a baby shower and brings two gifts, one for the expecting parents and one for their surrogate, who's in attendance. Then he chats with the surrogate and is praising her for this difficult, selfless thing she's doing, carrying a baby for nine months and not even being able to keep it. He goes on way too long with this, and is completely oblivious that he's jeopardizing everything for his friends by making the surrogate rethink honoring the agreement. It's a better-told story in every way than the Molly/TJ/Kristina one! Hey, Curb has run its 25-year course now. Maybe Larry could either join the GH writing staff or act the role of a new character who gets into everyone's business? Like an entertaining version of Carly?

Anything involving Holly has become a big ol' SKIP to me, unless she's in a scene with someone I really like. And I like Tristan Rogers fine, but, no, not enough. When she was sharing space with Jonathan Jackson, for example, and he was newly back and I was still getting my JJ/Lucky fix (unflattering styling and all), I was putting up with her. I hate saying that, because I know ES is a vet from happier times, but not every character/actor from happier times brings happiness in the present. Holly's storylines in both recent returns have been awful, and I can't get on board what the ways ES is trying to sell them.

I agree, and I wish it were only a trope, and not something that mirrors reality too often.

All I really have to add to the discussion of Willow (and all related things), on a tough and sleep-deprived day, is this: Recently I skimmed through about a week's worth of shows I had missed, watching only the parts I found interesting (insert your own punch line about how long that took me). I think KMc has come a long way as a soap actor in six years. I never disliked her as a performer, and she's physically lovely and all, but she has a somewhat Herbstian gift for staying sympathetic even when the character is written to do things the audience will find unsympathetic. Now, she's up against whiplash-inducing (thanks, FTVG80) writing choices, like everyone else on GH at present, so there's only so much she can do. But she plays "tortured" or "guilt-ridden" very well. I find this Willow far easier to follow than the one who was icing out Nina at every opportunity, irrationally accusing Nina of being everywhere Willow and Michael went (even when Nina had clearly been there first), and generally smugging up the joint a year or so ago.

Complete agreement. And it isn't the only example I could use of a modern trend of aggressively pursuing some position with regard to real people about whom one might not be as well informed or objective as one thinks, reading around or dismissing what isn't useful to the thesis, trying to pound a square peg into a round hole, and digging in if challenged. The behavior I've seen even from people who generally hold similar views to mine in recent years has been the most dismaying part of growing older in the 2010s and 2020s.

Now that Alexis is out of the journalism sphere, Lulu will probably resume her brilliant career as Girl Reporter. Even if she's not up to pounding the pavement yet, she can write powerful thought pieces on the racial angle of Heather Webber's reprieve. I haven't loved any of the three Jordans overall, but the middle one (Briana Nicole Henry) was the only one I slightly bought as a law-enforcement professional. She had a little more toughness and savvy to her. The first (Vinessa Antoine) was the most charismatic and likable.

If this were a really good show on premium cable, created and overseen by David Simon or someone of his caliber, and it was rigorous in its commitment to a lifelike quality on medical matters, I might join in saying I don't look at or hear the new Lucas actor and think "surgeon." But this is GH, which just in the last ten years has given us brain worms, childbirth through jeans, disfiguring facial burns that disappear with two applications of The Treatment™, and the ability to extract memories and store them on a flash drive for easy re-uploading. On that background, he'll do. I like this actor so far. Even on better-written soaps, doctors tend to fill the roles that will get the contract players the most scenes. There's stupidity I'll complain about and then there's stupidity that's such a genre convention that I don't even realize I'm auto-hand-waving it anymore.

LOL. If there's one thing lamer than a soap twin reveal, it's a soap twin reveal quickly followed by, "Eh, never mind." B&B did that in the '90s with a short-term villain played by the late Anthony Addabbo. And GH did it again with Carlos. Ater he was dead, his twin brother (Joe?) showed up for a while to no apparent purpose. Maybe Frank liked that actor and knew that he had his eye on a new set of Venetian blinds?

That looks to be where they're going with it. Kristina and Molly having to work to repair their relationship now, with the awareness that Sam died for their sins or something.

Mickey Mantle too, in 1995. I remember his being controversial, and refreshing my memory per Wikipedia: "Some felt that his fame had permitted him to receive a donor liver in just one day, bypassing patients who had been waiting much longer. His doctors insisted that the transplant was based solely on medical criteria, but acknowledged that the very short wait created the appearance of favoritism." He didn't live long after the transplant in any case.

I'm reusing my own old material here, but it's relevant. A few years ago, during an especially fallow storyline period, I was keeping up with the show online and getting through it more quickly by setting the video to play at 1.5x speed. This would make everyone else, but especially fast talkers like Carolyn Hennessy and Kirsten Storms, sound as if their characters were excessively caffeinated or worse. But it would make Kelly Monaco sound as if she were fully awake and talking at an average rate of speed.