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I tuned in today for Xander's return and hoo boy....after not having watched many scenes of Brady and Nicole these last few weeks (to preserve my own sanity) I was unprepared for just how crappy their dialogue would be. Nicole - dangerous volatile Nicole Walker - just stands around saying "what have you done" like a plank of wood after Brady is shot in Dan's heart? And then keeps asking "who are you?" just to prompt him to take off his mask? Cheese. And not in a good way. I'm so glad I've been skipping the storyline. Sadly not even Xander's appearance excites me that much because I doubt things will improve. Nicole has just become so useless. Has she even had a single scene where she just sits with her daughter happily feeding her from a bottle or something? Its really bizarre that after all of these years of Nicole being unable to have a child, she finally has one and the show doesn't even seem to care about it. Her running away from Deimos and hooking up with Brady and even her moronic neighbors seem to be more the focus of the show right now then her actual miracle child. It also occurred to me while watching Brady and Nicole snuggle in bed that this storyline could have been half entertaining if they had at least done a bit of location shooting. Any of you Another World fans remember Vicky and Ryan up in Canada walking through the snow and falling in love? (Of course you do!) I realize this show shoots in LA but if they had hopped into a van, driven for a few hours and found a snowy field to walk through for five minutes, it might have actually made this story somewhat romantic. Today, Nicole talked about how her life was finally coming together perfectly...but you would never know it because of the crazy neighbor subplot and the show's general disinterest in developing anything these days. With a couple of scenes of her snuggling with Holly next to a warm fire and Nicole and Brady chopping down wood outside or something, this might've actually felt like a worthwhile detour. Is the show really so broke at this point that they can't afford some fake snow? It's warm enough now that there wouldn't need to be any, but I just feel if Dena was going to finally have Nicole and Brady get together she could have at least given the whole thing some atmosphere. I mean she's been wanting to do this for over a year - a little effort please? Sad to see that actor from ER (he played Sam Taggart's crazy ex-boyfriend) doing a one day gig on DAYS. Times are tough. He escaped from prison last fall with Clyde Weston and Orpheus. Orpheus died (multiple times) and Clyde was returned to prison. Deimos pretended Xander died but secretly shipped him off to Greece, thereby fulfilling Xander's ultimate desire to have acceptance within the family while also ensuring himself an ace up his sleeve. Deimos probably sent Xander to Canada to find her, since everyone seemed to know she'd fled there.

Judi is awesome, I agree. Sucks that Adrienne has been meh for so many years now. Annalisa Cochrane looks like the gal who played Melanie. That bums me out a bit. The child actress who last played Allie had a "normal"-ness to her I found really refreshing. I would like to see that maintained over casting some young pretty LA actress type. I guess I'm just really sick of this show casting attractive looking people who could be underwear models or whatever (Lani, Eli, etc) but who don't have a natural presence on camera. Plus I think I was excited by the idea that Allie would take after her mother and that she wouldn't be a conventional beauty and might even be something more than an 80-pound waif once fully grown. To see Sami tell her daughter she doesn't have to have a certain body size would be really nice. I know I didn't watch all that much in the eighties and nineties but I seem to recall Sami struggling with her appearance and comparing herself negatively to Carrie, whom the producers eventually turned into the good girl to Sami's bad. There seemed to be a subtle message there about outward beauty (aka thinness) determining inner goodness and it always made me sympathetic to Sami. It's a smart move to bring Allie on, especially with Lucas still hanging around with little to do. I just still really, really hope they don't waste this opportunity by opting to leave Will six feet under. This show is on its way out, fans are still pissed off about how he was treated and I can't imagine it would be all that difficult to bring Chandler Massey back or recast the part. If they don't do it at this point it's just stubbornness and I don't see how it benefits the show to keep him dead when it so badly needs to drum up positive press and ratings. I look forward to seeing Lucas with his daughter though. Should make him happy...

A good writer - heck, even a semi-competent one - could work with the curveball of Drake's absence and write something plausible. Isn't that how we got Sami/Stan? This was Joe's last storyline. They should have brought their A game. (Still bitter).

John trying to foil Kristen's plans by banging her kind of cemented the divorce. That was 2013. By the time Theresa hit him in the head and he went into a coma in 2014 however Marlena was back by his bedside practically every day. I hate how devoted she is to him when she never seems to get that kind of support in return. Whatever this ISA mission is about had better be damned important, especially if it trumped Marlena nearly getting kidnapped again by Stefano. I really don't want Lucas and Adrienne together so I'm kind of hoping Anne succeeds in catching his eye. Of course I'm also rooting for Eve and Justin to become a couple since they had really great chemistry in the past. Sadly that leaves Adrienne all on her own, but I would like to think this show could write a woman of a certain age being happy without being married to the father of her children. How naive am I?

I'm glad Lani did not get raped. Honestly I'm completely checked out of her as a character and not really paying strict attention. I remain skeeved out by what went down between Lani and JJ. Maybe they were both completely willing and completely intoxicated, but they are also both supposed to be police officers able to detect when someone is heavily heavily drunk. JJ was searching for his presumed dead sister and dealing with a lot of grief. Lani as far as I can recall was not someone who had much contact with him at the station. Let us not forget the last time she must have only been working in Salem six months earlier and I don't think they ever had scenes together. Although considering Jennifer's claims that Abigail went missing for a year today maybe Lani was also absent from Salem for a year? In any case, she didn't know him well. Her running into JJ and not being able to detect that something was very off with him suggests she was either very one-track minded or completely indifferent or so royally intoxicated that she managed to keep pace with a grief-stricken guy. Or just a crap cop. Bottom line: she shouldn't have slept with him. I don't see what her excuse possibly could have been and for her to come back to Salem with a bad attitude because he didn't remember it suggests she's way too hung up on her one night stands. Last year they were starting a storyline where Lani would push Belle out of Shawn's life so that she could have Shawn all to herself. Now we have Lani getting pissy with a JJ to almost guilt him into remembering her/taking her out and him losing Gabi. I'm not really sure how she's much different from Jade in the way she pushes and pushes... Mostly I hate that the producers have twice now given Lani only one motivation - some desire to get with a co-worker. Plus the actress is weak. And I'm also annoyed with how the newer members of the cast seem to get more screen time (probably because they are cheaper than the veterans) and so every new long-lost sibling or child we meet seems poised to eat the show regardless of how interesting they actually are. ... I really can't wait for things to change. I hope they do. It was bizarre seeing Kate and Lucas briefly share a scene today. They're supposed to be related! I almost forgot. But please, back to Tripp and Lani...they're the reasons I tune in.

In fairness, it was hers... I'm surprised Yo Ling stuff made the cut....

I'm sorry but did anybody else listen to Lani's description of someone having sex with her without her expressed consent and think "....karma!" I know we're not supposed to think of her and JJ's romp as rape, but if he wasn't able to tell what he was doing and couldn't remember any of it afterwards and she knew this the whole time...doesn't it basically constitute rape as well? (I'm not hoping that Lani was raped mind you. In all honesty I ignored her scenes in today's episode.) What really galls me is that I just heard Chad say "okay - stealing!" Really? Really Dena?! Chad is now going to become a criminal? Just because Kate told him so? And why the hell does Kate want Chad to steal anyways? She never did this in her other businesses as far as I can tell...and what kind of business is this?? Stealing artifacts from foreign countries and selling them for profit? Wasn't the whole point of this plotline to expose Deimos' criminal activities and have him sent back to jail legitimately rather than exacting revenge? Why didn't they just do that?!? Why didn't they just go to the police with evidence that Deimos was stealing artifacts and selling them? It is totally laughable that Abigail is being presented by Kate as Chad's conscience. Abigail is a twit and a self-serving one at that. The show can never make me forget that, no matter how politely Marci Miller plays this character. I just can't believe Higley would want to take down Chad. I guess it's one thing to corrupt Sonny a little bit since Victor is still alive and overseeing the enterprise but Chad was supposed to be the only good DiMera left. In the hands of a better writer one might think that this was a fake-out designed to thrill us audience members into thinking that Chad was going to the dark side when he really isn't. Here, I just assume Dena doesn't give a crap and will happily trash Chad's almost 10-year character history in order to pull off some cheap shocking twist. She doesn't understand character growth at all.

http://nypost.com/2017/04/25/broadways-biggest-drama-is-happening-right-now-in-a-courtroom/ This sheds some light on my earlier questions about Rebecca. I guess it really is a Much Ado About Nothing situation. I did have to ask myself at a certain point why, if the show was so good, New York investors weren't interested to step up and take it on. It is a dark gothic tale...it is based on a well-loved movie or story...and it clearly had impressive sets and talented actors involved. I guess the book and score stunk. Did anybody ever see this in Europe? Or listen to cast recordings?

I suppose seeing him as the lead in Wonka and appearing on Gilmore Girls and also Peter Pan Live made me start thinking "is he now considered THE Broadway Guy?" I guess you're right though about him having somehow found a string of appropriate roles suited to his talents. Still, he seems to be everywhere with no signs of setting up. I consider Andy Karl much more viable and funny, but he isn't getting the love the way Borle is. Man, that Wonka ad does nothing to excite me. Even Christian sounds bored. And they use the Candy Man song? Meh.

I agree. I miss the laid-back anti-corporate vibe Casey had, but Billy delivered some big scenes I can't imagine Casey doing better with (convincing Stefano not to kill Marlena, watching Abby lose her mind, etc).

This is one of my big gripes with the show - far too much of it was done in this way for these very same reasons. More than half the time I felt like I was watching the characters react to things because Ryan Murphy knew us here in 2017 would want to know what they thought of this or that. I wouldn't have minded if much of the show took liberties with the facts if it was at least well constructed, but I don't think it ever quite got there. It was mildly diverting and this final episode was certainly quite affecting but I found so much of the dialogue artificial or intended to be crowd-pleasing. As you've all pointed out it was very much slanted towards Crawford more than Bette Davis and I'm not entirely sure why. Did Ryan Murphy want to sort of redeem Joan Crawford a bit after the whole Mommy Dearest fiasco? Was Bette Davis the less interesting of the two women? I'm especially disappointed that this is all we'll get of Susan Sarandon playing Bette Davis. I doubt she'll return to the character at any point in the future... and yet I find myself wishing she would. Wouldn't it have been so much more interesting to see Sarandon playing Bette Davis in a movie filmed over the course of two decades? Sarandon still looks very young here so I'd almost rather they start filming a movie about Bette Davis now and then 10 years down the line finish it off so she could more convincingly play the elderly actress. Did Joan stay on the board of Pepsi Cola until she died? I'm a little surprised they didn't try and wrap that subplot up. Also, Mamacita was an invented character, correct? I remember from the bonus features on the Mommie Dearest DVD that the woman who played her lifelong maid in that movie knew Crawford actually had many maids over the course of her life. I watched some Mad Men this weekend to sort of get past my frustration with Feud and I find myself wishing some of the writers from Mad Men had worked on Feud. This feels like a really tragic missed opportunity to me. Does anybody else feel that way? I mean, when are we ever going to get another show or movie focused purely on the Epic Bette/Davis Joan Crawford Feud? I will feel like reading a Wikipedia entry on exactly what happened is more entertaining and accurate...

I haven't heard anything concrete about John. Does anyone know when Eve is coming back? I thought I heard months ago that Kassie had returned to the show full time after getting her medical treatments...when does that happen? Or is she simply not coming back?

Really wish Xander hadn't become this thuggy villain guy...oh well. Will the bullet destroy Dan's heart? Could it? Please??? Is Dena just writing this Eric/Nicole stuff so she'll end up forgiving him when he rescues her? Or will we actually get a love triangle between her and Eric and Brady?

...and isn't faking your death seen as a crime?

I was so hoping it would be Jennifer Aniston from his teases. Oh well.

If I had to guess I would assume this is for a Paulson wedding...but that doesn't account for the bachelorette part does it? Why would someone be dressed in a catcher's mask if this was for John's bachelor party? Surprised Eric's farmhouse set is still going to be seen that far out. I figured we would be done with it after Nicole and Brady left "Canada". I wonder how many story decisions are made based around whether or not the show has to reuse a set in order to save money.

After being so completely unimpressed with the first episode I have to say I've adjusted a little bit and really enjoyed episode 2. I still think the tone of it is a bit too on the nose though. That whole monologue from Bette's daughter did not feel real to me at all and there are plenty of other instances where I feel like dialogue is lifted from famous quotes from books or things other people said or stories that have become legendary... and you can almost always tell that it's a quote from something else. Just a couple of those go a very long way and I feel like in every second or third scene we got some reference to something that Bette and Joan historians can pat themselves on the back for already knowing. It's grating. That said I think this episode worked a lot better and I was able to sympathize with and enjoy the performances of all of the leads much more. We got some wonderful flashbacks to lay out how the women developed their animosity towards one another. I suppose the show is going to jump around a bit and slowly reveal these details over each episode. If I had known that would be the approach I might have enjoyed the Pilot a lot more. The guy playing Victor Buono is awesome and completely has me sold. I'm still not feeling like Sarandon is disappearing into the Davis character but I hope to see that change. Lange is certainly doing great work as Crawford and no, I haven't seen American Horror Story so maybe thats why I'm enjoying her so much. I'm still not loving Judy Davis or Catherine Zeta-Jones so I hope we don't see too much more of them. I'm not sure I can fathom how much cheating Aldridge did on his wife with his various leading ladies over the course of his career. I know Hollywood works that way, but how much can you really get away with before someone leaves you? I love that last scene where I felt like those questions were racing through his wife's mind. It was weird to end the episode with them, though. So no, it's not perfect but this was a vast improvement and I think I'm actually going to be able to enjoy the show now. Seriously, I was so disappointed in the Pilot I wasn't sure if I'd continue. Maybe I just appreciate someone acknowledging all of the ham in Whatever Happened to Baby Jane. I heard "cocktail time".

I somehow doubt that would bother anybody in Salem (glances towards the Hernandez Family siblings and their romantic histories). I caught Wednesday's episode and the big Marlena/John reunion and I thought it was...okay. They were sweet and Deidre's crying was believable... ...but Drake's acting continues to hit the same notes it always has and the writing hasn't improved too much either. I don't understand how a guy who was a millionaire CEO in the public eye for decades can be an ISA agent so valuable and unidentifiable they send him out on missions in his seventies. Marlena should be so sick of his "can't talk about my mission!" schtick by this point. And their exchange about the resurrection of Stefano sounded like he was congratulating her on finding a deal at the grocery store. It further minimized what should have been an impactful storyline. I'm still not over the Stefano/Prague stuff you guys. I basically ignored the rest except that great scene with Kayla at the loft. I'm sorry - the scene that Mary Beth Evans made great at the loft. She really schooled those two kids on how to act. A lesser actress would have just taken the lines of dialogue from Kayla and spat them out at Jade with venom and condescension. Kayla managed to walk this line of being an authoritative figure while still being empathetic yet firm. She could have come out looking angry or cruel - it was after all kind of a smackdown scene - but instead my admiration for her practically tripled. The woman has been paying Jade's rent and her tuition and living expenses after Jade refused to walk away from her son all because she wanted to give the girl a chance. Then she finds Jade trying to use pills to hurt herself to keep her son interested and what did she do? She lays it all out but doesn't do a thing to actually hurt Jade or demean her. Class Act. Mary Beth painted into those lines of dialogue the best of intentions on Kayla's part and filled that otherwise empty moment with a lot of humanity. For a long time I found Kayla really boring because all she ever did was show up to play Doctor. I'm so glad if nothing else in this last year I have had a glimpse of what a wonderful actress this woman is when she's given more than one thing to do. It's a shame that her storylines haven't been interesting to me in the least.

Two questions for today How did Christian Borle become such a big thing? When did it happen? Was it Spamalot or was it Legally Blonde? I feel like he's now considered a Big Deal Broadway leading man and while I do think he has his charms, I don't think his voice is especially spectacular and I'm just not sure how he managed to find this current level of success. There's nothing wrong with him, exactly, I just don't see anything that screams Big Deal Star. Am I the only one? And number two...do you ever think we will see Rebecca on Broadway given everything that has happened up until this point? Please no spoilers about the show itself as I haven't seen it or watched the movie, but the set looked good from the foreign production photos I saw and Sierra Boggess and Tam Mutu together on stage sounds good (I believe they were the ones originally cast). The Producers have kept the website up all this time and seem to have high hopes for it on their Facebook page. While I agree it's probably a long shot with all of the legal trouble it's seen, I'd still be interested to see it finally reach American audiences. Likely?

Wonder what the small storyline was...

I finally got to watch the first episode last night and I was really really disappointed. I didn't go in with high expectations because I heard some of people's complaints about casting, etc. Still the whole thing to me just seemed incredibly weak and bizarrely silly. I haven't had a viewing experience like this ever. The Positives: the costumes and the cinematography were very strong. I thought the sets were very good as well, although I agree Joan Crawford's living room seemed astonishingly small compared to what we had previously seen in Mommie Dearest. I found myself wishing they could have just dug out that set, but since it was completely authentic with the right fabrics and so on, I can only imagine that they sold it off piece-by-piece after Mommie Dearest wrapped up so many years ago. That thing must have cost a fortune! I like seeing Sarandon involved in this project, so that's a positive. And Alfred Molina, someone I don't typically enjoy, immediately endeared himself to me. I think this may be the most I've enjoyed his work ever. The Negatives: where do I start? I'll start with the script that spent almost the entire episode forcing all the characters to not so subtly recap elements of their lives. I could not believe the amount of exposition I was hearing. It became so overdone that I actually stopped looking forward to the next scenes because I knew they were going to have the same structure. When Stanley Tucci started going on about what had happened in the past I think I rolled my eyes because I just wanted someone to have a normal sounding conversation. I felt like I was being spoon-fed information the entire episode. I know it can be difficult to bring a new audience up to speed on who characters are in a Pilot, but this was a complete fail for me in accomplishing that goal gracefully. Which brings me to the second issue with the writing which is the unbelievably direct, blunt and almost condescending dialogue. There wasn't any subtlety. I guess because of the similar era I hoped we'd see something along the lines of Mad Men in terms of subtle or clever dialogue. Instead everyone was just telling us things instead of showing us things and it was driving me bonkers. I was hearing all about how quotable this series is but I honestly can't think of a single line that impressed me. The cursing felt a little overkill and it seemed like the actors themselves didn't even know how to deliver it because they're never asked to in other projects. Stanley Tucci in particular just didn't seem to know how to deliver that line. Starting out with that ridiculous framing device of having people interviewed did not help. I especially dislike Catherine Zeta-Jones and her weird voice so having her try to play Olivia de Havilland was wrong. And then on top of that they have her saying these extremely trite things that I don't believe for a second Olivia would have ever said. It wasn't even cheesy or campy as much as bad. It's like the tone of the piece is so far removed from anything I would consider adult material that I don't know what to make of it. I feel like this was written for five year-olds, do you know what I mean? I'll admit I wouldn't have known why it was important to be the actress seated on the left in that photo op moment where they were both signing the contract, but by the time I heard those journalists explaining to us that there's about to be a showdown I was so worn out by everything else that was spoon fed to me that I still wanted to turn the whole thing off. I know how dramatic that sounds, but that's really how I felt! Like the show thought I was a complete moron and had no finesse whatsoever when it came to providing information about who these people were. And it was so interesting to me that what seemed to be the start of the feud was not even shown on screen. We heard Joan Crawford describe how Betty Davis moved in on one of her boyfriends, but if that was really where they started disliking each other shouldn't we have seen it? My biggest beef was that we come into this episode with the lead characters already basically hating each other to the point that I can't imagine how this is going to build into anything. I feel like I missed whatever got them to this point...and it's episode one! I also found it confusing how Sarandon looked rather youthful compared to Davis in WHTBJ and Lange looked quite old compared to how decent Crawford looked at the time. I'm liking Lange more than I thought I would as Crawford after all the negative feedback, but the script is doing her no favors. The way she tried to throw herself at the director when discussing her allowance was silly. I'd say cartoonish but cartoons are fun. The music was hugely distracting to me and again, felt cartoonish. You guys liked it? The liberties taken with facts were so glaring I couldn't believe it. There's no way Davis showed up for principal photography on day one with no clue how Baby Jane would look. Studios and wardrobe and the director discuss and approve those things. But nope - here they leave it to her to whip something up over lunch! Ta-daaa! ... I just don't get the approach they are taking at all. I hope the next episodes are a little stronger because I felt embarrassed watching this. I really did. It was awkward in so many places. And I'm not sure how they think they'll be allowed to write like this about the Royal family for season two without getting sued to high heaven!

The further away I get from having viewed the revival the more I feel there's too much I would have changed compared to the stuff I enjoyed. I enjoyed Paris in spite of her storylines. I enjoyed Jess in spite of his Obi-Wan Kenobi act. I enjoyed Emily in spite of Gypsy now being her weirdo housekeeper. I wonder if I'm ever going to rewatch these though. I'm thinking I may just do what I normally do and pretend everything after The Prodigal Daughter Returns doesn't happen, except for maybe Bon Voyage.

Wait - Claire wanted to have sex with Theo to make a sex tape? To help her career? Dena, Dena, Dena.... Yep, I'm really not going to be watching this now. We could have had Claire and Chloe teaming up to further their careers...or heck, Claire working on an album...or actually having vocal lessons at college...or maybe tensions between Marlena and Claire over her desire to go into an industry as unpredictable as music...but no. Obviously kids these days just want to make sex tapes to become famous and sell music...just like Kim Kardashian, right? I mean, that's like literally the only way to really make an impact, right? Like yeah! YOLO! Hashtag! Epic! *bangs head against wall*

Greg is definitely a find....if they'd only explore his range. I found her loud drawl and over the top acting highly annoying and I hope she never comes back. The drawl bugs me too and I never even saw the original actress. Plus she looks way too old to be Charles Shaughnessy daughter. I like her otherwise though.

:( :( :( I have no idea what they're going to do about Caroline. I really wish they had planned ahead given her age, but then again they didn't even plan ahead for Joe did they? Is there any reason not to keep her name in the credits? Is there some kind of Union situation where if you keep someone's name in the credits they get paid even if they're not on the show anymore?