Bill C.

Parker at least was always intended to be short-term, if perhaps shorter-term than planned since Ashley Jones got pregnant. (Still not sure about that.) Darby's the one I'm not sure about: was she ever meant to be more than a spoiler for Morgan and Kiki? If so, what the heck happened? Cut to afford ME?

Hell, we need a little more humor on this dreary show (which for the most part is concentrated between Kevin, the Chipettes, and depending on your point of view House Brand Cookie Lyon). So for that alone I'm at least curious to see how/where Nikki moving in with Sharon and Dylan goes. Perfect Hair Forever getting it on, though...where the heck is Kyle?

...hell, I'd allow it in this case. I'd almost say watch it for the scenes with Ridge, Caroline's headlights (dammit--but, really, Caroline was actually kind of sensible today, and interestingly so was Ridge in a soap-logic way) and Dr. Whatsit...but, coming off the past few episodes, you could actually skip this one and not really miss that much. The ending will likely be rehashed to open Monday's ep anyway.

No clue, Wendy. Dr. Xerox finally saw the Tree at the end of today's episode, and he went...wait for it..."Oh, my God. It's him." Apart from FH just rocking the self-righteousness and Franco and Kiki, I spent today in the shallow end of the GH pool. Anna's new 'do, MS in very tight jeans, and Ava's noir femme-fatale getup (Shut up! MW made it work!)...yes, please. OTOH, we also got Hamtaro claiming to Carly that he has "diabetes"...which, thankfully, she believed about as much as we did. Yippee.

A couple of hours removed from Caroline's headlights...uh, today's episode, and I'm thinking the last twenty seconds were actually a swerve of sorts. It certainly appeared to be skewing towards Ridge accidentally pushing Dr. Whatsit out into the street or something, but then he walked away...but then it looked like he was considering going back and clocking him, but then Dr. Whatsit went thud on his own. That said, it's still the most utterly random thing the show's done so far this year. As for Caroline's h--er, Katie's secret stash (or part thereof) being exposed...that obviously was to keep her from blabbing to Bill about Ridge's situation (which...damn, Katie!). Since she's the first and so far only person to know about that, though (or rather everything involved--Brooke only knows about the vasectomy), it forces the issue: she can't be out of circulation because she has to reveal what she knows. Even if just to Ridge.

So....wait.......is this going to be Liam pursuing Steffy, then, instead of the usual vice versa? Because I might at least be able to let that go--that is, if it wasn't coming right on the heels of WTHQuil and Steffy and Wyatt's marriage. Come on, show. What's the point if you're immediately pulling the trigger again on the Triangle of Doom? And where does this leave Ivy, anyway?

I can almost...grudgingly...let Brooke slide on riffling through Bill and Katie's kitchen today looking for booze. There was a precedent, after all. (Brooke unnecessarily getting Bill to discover the booze on his own, now...) Katie straight up intercepting Dr. Whatsit to ask about his chat with Ridge, though...let alone his actually blabbing about the damn vasectomy...that was so utterly random I'm still not sure what to think about it. I guess it was meant to be a swerve from Rick being the one to find out, but still. And I'm still expecting Douglas to be Ridge's kid in the end, dammit.

Up until Michael showed up at the Metro Court, this actually wasn't a bad episode. A little goofy in spots, but not bad. Liesl's doth-protesting-too-much hate for Hamtaro is life. Kevin and Laura's quasi-meet-cute over Helena's gift? Also life, pretty much just for Kevin unceremoniously dropping a book. Jasus saving ELQ from the he's-still-evil-shut-up-show Black Prince...okay, fine (grits teeth). I could even kindasorta handle Sonny saying one of the reasons he didn't whack Carlos was Carly urging him to "try a different way." But then Michael went to the MC... ...and that derailed the entire damn episode. Seriously, show, you couldn't go one day without pissing on his Q connection a little bit more?

Damn, I completely forgot about episode 10,000 (Victor's funeral)...so it's only been four years since the last time anybody thought he was dead. Which brings me back to where this tidbit came from...?

I'd love to know where that bombshell came from, though it occurs to me that if memory serves it's actually been almost a decade since the last time Victor was pronounced dead (see also: Walter Palin). And, in keeping with the show's current path, it actually does make a certain epically fucked-up sense for them to do this and then drag the Newman clan fully into the slop. Would it, though? Victoria, I suspect, would be the one to go full retard and be all "If all this hadn't started because of Phyllis and Billy, my father would still be here!" I think it might be worse than it is now, if in an industrial-strength way, and that thought terrifies me.

God--I think I'd actually be seriously pissed off if the show whacks Sage before the Sully reveal happens. But, as with various other things in the past three months or so, it'd be exactly in TPTB's wheelhouse to do something that makes negative sense. Weirdly, I can see Billy in general with a motorcycle as a "fun ride" thing. I'm just not sure I can see this Billy with one, though that's a comparatively minor quibble in the face of the INCREASINGLY DAMN NAKED agenda pushing Phyllis and Billy together. Kind of curious to see what a mud-stained Gina Tognoni looks like, though...

True dat, but since that'd be seriously doubling down on his falling back into The Life I have to wonder if that'd screw with his current just-when-I-thought-I-was-out thing. Right now, at least, he's only in it to protect his sister--and he's previously made a point of apologizing to Anna about all things Duke, if memory serves. It'd make no sense for him to do it, or at least for him to do it and let it go through to completion...and I've probably jinxed it.

Something like that, yeah. That was when Nina pushed for full control of Crimson instead. Whomever it was that said that Michael just being fed up with playing babysitter would be a good thing? You are correct, sir/ma'am! Why couldn't he just go off and raid Dad's booze stash and bitch for an episode about how this is his life or something? (And then probably get walked in on by Sabrina, because this show, but still.) And while Anna should absolutely have pulled a gun on Sonny and then went "Then you'll have to shoot me too," FH kind of singlehandedly saved this episode. Only Anna Fucking! Devane could have pulled off "My business is justice!" and meant it, even after the rabbit hole she's been corkscrewing down for the past month or so with the Scowl. Kind of a shame Ecuador Cop basically freaked out when Sonny pulled a narco move on him, though, but under the circumstances that was probably overdue. As I put it elsewhere: if Morgan is mini-Sonny, and Kiki is mini-Carly, does that make Dillon potentially a mini-Jax--a voice of relative sanity doomed to forever be a door number two for a pretty hot mess? He straight up said he thought Julian should know Carlos was coming back in case he needed to "take care" of anything. We're already on a fine line--again--since Julian's lying to Alexis yet again about The Life, but would this fakakta show actually go there and have Julian order Carlos taken out on top of that?

I have to wonder if the writers literally went "Under the circumstances, it's probably a good idea if Zende isn't the only sane person in the young-adult crowd. At least for a minute."

Wyatt wasn't fundamentally wrong, but holy mother of God did the THIRST shine through like the sun on a tidal wave crashing through that damn beach house when he asked Steffy to promise him that they would tell Liam they got hitched. But never mind that--Reign Edwards acted today, y'all! She acted! Mostly bitchfaces--albeit surprisingly good ones, to be fair--at Sasha, who inevitably had to come to her and go "I'm sorry I'm with your man now, but we're in lurrrve!", but still! (Zende shutting that shit down to her later was probably just as inevitable.)

Lulu and Dante actually out in the park doing a relationship exercise was silly and fluffy, and apart from being such a massive shift from the rest of the episode was nice in its way. And Valerie got her nice hairstyle back, but apparently regressed to a teenager anyway upon seeing Curtis giving Rayden a hug. Urg. The rest of the episode...when will suckers learn? Don't let Anna or Sonny get within arm's reach of you, or you will get ganked. (At least Anna's gambit was almost hilariously over the top.) Flip side, Paul going all the way to House of Cards territory for a minute was bizarrely pleasant in its own messed-up way. Franco still being relatively anti-Sonny and pissing off Carly in the process...random, but I'll take it. And as for Nikolas swearing he wouldn't forgive Sam or Jason for forcing him to give up ELQ--in this case for money, versus Rayden's incredible deal of nothing--Sam could have made up for months of being on the sidelines by literally brushing that shit off. Seriously, all they had to do at that point was let her do that and then go "And on that note, Nikolas, I'm through with you. Have a nice life in hell." It would have flown in the face of heroic!Sam, somewhat, but I think we might all agree that we need that one bit of...angry closure?...from her.

There was a scene midway through today's episode where Steffy was standing in place, staring off past the camera and blinking, and the resulting "She's really a fembot and even she's having trouble processing this shit" mental joke from that almost saved this episode. Okay, that and Lt. Baker snacking his way through Quinn's cabin. TBH, it was just a talky "And now, back to our usual insanity" ep. Sasha doubling down on declaring her feelings for Soulverine, though...I guess it goes with the whole "Nobody loves me" thing she does, and that kind of works and kind of doesn't work depending on how strident Felisha Cooper gets. That said, Julius still doesn't have the moral high ground here...and whatever high ground Soulverine had he's pretty much lost due to plot. I just want Sasha's paternity to come out so Nicole can lose her baby, and more importantly so Vivienne can smack the taste out of Julius's mouth so hard everything tastes like brown for a week. Speaking of weeks, however: how many will we have to suffer through before either a. Liam fully regains his memory or b. Wyatt and/or Steffy finally tells him they're married?

I didn't really get that much comic material out of it until about the halfway point, but that was when RS really started channeling Rebecca Hotchkiss. ITA, though--it would have been better if they'd been more consistent about the tone, and preferably more of an overall serious tone to match the rest of the episode. Actually, at least up to this point, he hasn't let her escape or anything. But he still let her go on way too much about wanting to bail and take him with her. Since the show's established that he's still got a thing for her, it at least fits...so far.

Even with the show lampshading it at the end, I'm still frigging amazed that Paul was able to contact an Ecuadorian judge and get an arrest warrant issued before Anna and Sonny touched down there. The rest of the episode was basically Show saying "Hey, look, we're making Hayden more of an actual villainess now! Doesn't Nikolas look better?" and me saying "Uh...no?" ...and Josslyn Jacks as Kimmy Gibler! You too? Yup. But the whole thing leading up to Carlos actually drawing down on Sonny in Showdown Number Ten Thousand, Three Hundred and Forty-Nine might have been worth it...for a split-second. If that.

I'm actually surprised today's episode didn't end with Quinn clocking Deacon with something and making a run for it, though their back-and-forth pretty much covered the entire episode. It might actually have been more effective if Deacon had at least briefly threatened her with that axe, though the fact that he was even halfway willing to listen to Quinn in full-on sociopath mode (and more than a little reminiscient of the great Andrea Evans' crazy-ass Rebecca Hotchkiss from Passions, only without the boobs) after she made him take a really long swim was a little annoying. OTOH...points to Show for basically outing the whole Adam and Eve thing to both Bill and Steffy, including (no doubt deliberately) the fact that Liam and Quinn did get it on. Minus points, though I'm not really surprised, for it conveniently not having anybody tell Liam that Steffy went ahead and got hitched. I'll be very surprised if that comes out before the end of the week...if not month...because if memory serves, Show's done this once before a few years back.

B&B had a scene a couple of weeks back where Katie threw a glass of whiskey/scotch/whatever on the floor and then couldn't stop herself from taking a big swig from the broken glass. I've got to imagine Nikki snagging somebody's leftover booze is/was a nod of some sort to that, if in a "rock bottom" sort of way, but damn--I'd expect that from Neil, God forbid, but not Nikki. And since it does play into Victor's damnable "the road less traveled" thing...augh.

No, that was it--Stephanie gave her that gun and made a strangely, fucked-up, compelling case for Brooke to off herself to save her kids more grief. This was the episode that gave us "You can't even shoot straight!"

Everybody involved needs a good long sit-down with Dr. Whatshisface. With a straitjacket or elephant tranquilizers involved in Quinn's case. And I'm still calling Quinn being pregnant as her hole card, though then we also get to the question of Steffy being pregnant by Wyatt. I don't see the show giving her a child yet, let alone one not by her one true waffle love, but the conflicts in both women being pregnant could be interesting in a trainwreck sort of way...and the drama actually persists if Quinn has a kid, versus Steffy. Stephanie was a bit more single-minded than Quinn: she almost never benefited from her plans herself, loony as they sometimes were. They were always in the name of her number-one son, Thorne every blue moon or so, and/or on a couple of rare occasions Felicia. That said, Stephanie is still the woman who almost got Brooke to commit suicide. For that alone, she still wins on crazy. (If you can call it winning.) ...yeah, I'm not sure I would have wanted to use that term either. But this is the story that seems to have cemented Steffy as his Brooke, and with their only competition being Caridge... But yes--after this, either put Steam back together and let them be together for a good long while without any interference (say, through the end of the year?), or let them be apart for a good long while. They deserve it, either way--and so do we.

I can't help thinking that somebody, probably Wyatt, needed to just say one damn line about how "things aren't quite the same" or some such to still-kinda-Liamnesiac. I can simultaneously forgive it as an omission in the heat of the moment and bitch because they could have gracefully left that door open a crack with just a vague reference instead of leaving it open all the way and air-conditioning all of Bell-A by ignoring it entirely. I suppose this means Monday's episode will end with Liam finding out Steffy and Wyatt got hitched. That aside...it was a little goofier than yesterday's episode, but RS and SC actually stepped it up. I genuinely suspect this will be either RS's or SC's Emmy reel for next year...and deservedly so. Wyatt actually continuing to be a good guy was just a perk, though with Liam still having a fuzzy memory I wonder if this means he gets to stay with Steffy for a while...

Hamtaro ended up, as I put it elsewhere, mainlining lemon-lime Kool-Aid in a shower. Combined with the hand thing it appears to indicate that he's self-medicating against something muscular or neurological, but still--that was hilariously wrong, and punctuating it with Dr. Xerox revealing he believes in God (though that led to Hamtaro's faintly Alec Baldwin-esque diatribe about God in the operating room) only more so. Jason going to try to convince Sonny not to go after Carlos would have been perfect if it didn't happen at all, but at least Jason himself was the one who basically went "Yeah, he's going, but I'll try to talk him down." This would still have been one perfect time where Carly called and he didn't come running, buuuuut... Nina freaking out due to her baby rabies? In a bizarre way, this was almost graceful in its consistency--and it's reinforcing that Franco and Nina will likely split up over this, which could be a good or bad thing depending on how doped up the writers are that week. The most annoying thing about today's episode, though? Anna shutting Andre down cold thanks to the man handcuffed to her staircase. At least temporarily, there went our chances for #teaandsympathy.