Steph J

Duy sucks. I haven't rooted for a Real Housewives divorce this much since Luann and Tom.

That's the deal the prosecution made with them, presumably because they weren't 100% that they'd get a conviction at trial because the amount of blameworthy conduct by others (the tour manager, the fire marshal) could have resulted in both brothers getting off or both getting no more than community service. Personally, I think the prosecution did bury that fax about the insulation, but that's because I used to work in criminal defense and I've seen the "good guys" do some shady shit. I don't disagree that they should both have done jail time, but it's not unusual for the prosecution to hedge its bets that way.

"Nina doesn't respect boundaries or care about people's feelings." There's obviously no God in Port Charles since Carly didn't get struck by lightning after saying that.

Sandy. Works for a boy or a girl.

I know that people have been finding humor in OJ since, like, the day after the murders and that nothing in comedy is sacred, but there's something especially gross about someone who actually knew Nicole Simpson, and knew her children, making jokes like that. But I suppose it shouldn't be a surprise since "shamelessness" is the Kardashian brand.

I think she's guilty as hell and an absolutely terrible liar (with a terrible lawyer for letting her go on television and put herself on the record like that; she was about as believable as Prince Andrew), but like you I couldn't think of a motive. After mulling it over, I think that either she was high as hell on "someone else's" cocaine and messing around with the gun and shot him without meaning to, or (and this is probably going to sound pretty conspiracy theory-ish) she knew that her relationship was about to implode and that she was about to go up against the Ashcrofts' wealth and power in a custody dispute, and she knew that the victim had a thing for her, so she got involved with him as part of an attempt at manipulating him into "saving her" by getting rid of the fiancee, but when she actually came out and directly told him what she wanted him to do, he balked and she panicked and shot him, figuring it would be easier to get away with killing him than it would be to get away with conspiring to kill her fiancee.

When they played that audio from the podcast where Scheana and sloppy counterfeit James Momoa were talking about Lala not being there and he had the audacity to say "be better," I wanted to punch something. It's awful that Scheana had a miscarriage, but just because you're a narcissist doesn't mean that the world actually revolves around you and everyone can drop everything to be with you at a moment's notice, particularly when you're in different cities. I imagine it has a lot to do with having known James since he was a kid and having seen first hand his relationships with his parents. I hate James. I haaaaaaaate James. But I felt a lot of sympathy for him when his mother was on the show last season? the season before? (it's hard to remember; it feels like a million years ago that the show was last on) Lisa knows that Max is fine and has two parents who love him. James is not fine and has a mother who parentified him and a father who wasn't around.

I legit don't get why Maxie felt she had to do this. Sonny knows what Nina did. He told Jason today and chances are he was going to tell Carly, too, so it's not like this was going to be some horrible secret that Maxie was going to have to sit on for the rest of her life. All she had to do was nothing let it come out on its own. I couldn't even watch the Maxie/Carly/Joss scenes; just seeing the expressions on Colonel Harpy and Lieutenant Colonel Harpy as I ff'd was more than enough.

It's like the show is allergic to depicting consequences or having the lead characters lives change in any meaningful way. I'm genuinely at a loss to understand what's going on behind the scenes that the mandate is for this be a soap without any drama. Imagine if, back in the day, Sonny had found the wire on Brenda and five minutes later been like: *shrug* That's okay, I love you, let's get married. I would have willingly sat through 35 minutes of Michael and Willow if my reward at the end of it could have been seeing Anna shoot Peter in the head and then shoot him there again just to underline the fact that he's really dead this time. I cannot believe that Anna and Valentine both took their eyes off him long enough to let him get away. Friggin amateur hour.

Tracy always was the hero the show needed. I'm not sure what was more annoying: the wedding played completely straight and achingly sincere or Sonny gradually extricating himself from the world's slowest growing fire. Based on how delusional Nina is being - "Well, the good news is, I don't have to lie anymore, we can start from scratch" met by Sonny's "Bitch, what?" face - I'm thinking the next phase is Sonny returning to PC and playing out a Sonny/Carly/Jason triangle while Nina continues to pursue him until mentally unraveling to the point where Cynthia Watros gets to revisit the days of crazy Annie.

Seriously. The only way Jason looking at Carly like that makes any sense at all is if he's been drugged. I'll gladly accept a plot twist that Jason had his wisdom teeth pulled first thing in the morning and spent the remainder of this endless day floating on painkillers. Nina: "His name is Sonny but he answers to Mike." Actually, his name is Michael and he answers to Sonny.

I want Bravo to do a reunion that's just Gizelle and her girls. Watching them mock her for three episodes straight is the only way to justify a multi-part reunion.

If Smike gets arrested, Nina won't have to tell him because once the police run his prints, his identity will be revealed. Though I guess that assumes that the Podunk Nixon Falls PD has a computer and access to a database. Count me in with everyone who doesn't buy Jason suddenly being into the idea of marrying Carly. I semi-shipped the couple back when Sarah Brown was playing Carly, but everything about them getting together now is a hard pass.

Babe and Krystal could have been great characters if only the show had leaned into them as villains. Instead the show insisted on depicting them as heroines no matter what they did and in the process ruined a bunch of established characters by using them to prop the Careys up and excuse the things they did. I liked Alexa Havins as an actress, but as far as I'm concerned the only good thing about Babe is that when she and Josh were a thing a message board (I think it was twop) dubbed them "fetal pig," which still makes me laugh and laugh.

Mia can't even be relied on to accurately report the things that she herself previously said about herself, so I'm not sure why anyone would accept as reliable her narration about what anyone else said about anything. I was cringing when Robyn had that call with Juan at the table. I couldn't even watch the whole thing.

Ryan and Gillian were great - I hated it when she died so that Laura could get her heart (and, speaking of grief sex that never should have happened, Ryan and Liza... yikes). I also liked Ryan and Kendall the first time, which ended with him finding her getting with Aidan and then hoping on his motorcycle and leaving town. I still remember the scene where she chases after him and he looks at her and just lowers the visor on his helmet and then rides off. If only he'd kept on riding and not come back...

I may be in the minority on this, but I actually like that storyline (although I hate that it was rooted in Dimitri and Maria having grief sex, which I found completely unbelievable for two characters who had never previously showed a modicum of attraction to each other). Erica's motivations were clear, the show didn't try to depict her as the good guy, and when it was finally resolved, Erica actually had to face the consequences of her actions. Unlike, say, Tad, who buried a guy alive and was still supposed to be the "hero." Mathison predated Frons by about 4 years and he was fine for his first few years on the show, when he wasn't at the center of it. I've always thought the problem with Ryan later on was actually a problem with daytime generally, which is that shows increasingly started to center around men who spent all their time yelling at the women around them for being stupid. Around the mid 2000's daytime generally started this slide into open, blatant misogyny that completely drove me away as a viewer.

Not to mention, Chase just hands over the piece of paper to Michael, who just hands it over to Austin. If they weren't going to let Chase stay mad, they could have at least milked some drama out of whether or not Michael was going to destroy the paper or hand it over and use that to create some tension between Michael and Willow.

I don't know, he didn't seem too enthusiastic about the prospect of financing her candle empire himself, so I'm sure every check helps in that respect.

I'm sure Wendy walked away from that conversation thinking that she won, but Gizelle was shit stirring in order to get a reaction and Wendy gave that to her and then some. Meanwhile, Gizelle is just sitting there, unbothered by being yelled at because she knows that she's the actual winner because she just proved her continuing value to the producers. Karen needs to let go of this "Gizelle wished death on Ray" thing. There is no there there. Unless there are two Eddies in Wendy's life and we haven't seen the other one, then there's no Eddie who looks like Idris Elba.

I hate it when they time stamp flashbacks as it forces me to consider how much of my life I've spent watching this show. I can't believe the Aviva seasons are nearly 10 years behind us.

Damn, Ramona. Keep an emergency Snickers in your purse if this is what happens when you're hungry.

Michael: I'm going to take Dylan to work with me. I've got five women there who can look after him for me. On behalf of working women everywhere: F**k you, dude. Don't bring your kid to work expecting that you can just pawn him off on whatever woman happens to be nearby, completely disrupting her day. You want credit for taking your kid for the day? Then take care of the kid.

I'm in the mid-600 episodes, where the show is dealing with the aftermath of Hayley's rape and Ted is being such an ass, trying to talk her out of going to counselling so that it can be dealt with "privately." It feels like a real missed opportunity that the show didn't tie Ted and C.C.'s aversion to the idea of therapy to the family's experience with Marcello, since that would have given them an actual reason to be mistrustful of the profession.

Wendy, we get it. You have a body. The point has been made. Robyn was rude as hell ordering Mia to give up her room. What's the big friggin deal about not being on the same floor as Gizelle when you'll be spending all day together anyway?