Y&R: Week of November 10, 2008

[dm.]

[DaytimeFan]

Monday's episode is soooooooooo good.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

Promo for this week, looks good!

[Paul Raven]

Some random thoughts on the week that was

The Paris scenes are good,so far,not great.The green?scenes were done well and i don't think the casual viewer would have picked them up.

Had to laugh at Ashley going up to random people in the street in a city of millions to ask if they've seen Victor.

Her prayer was soapy but effective.

Sharon looked like a hooker in that mini dress.

Phyllis' "I have to go to Paris" was too contrived-Couldn't she have just decided to fly off on the spur of the moment to surprise Nick?

Loved the Jill/Nikki dynamic as they worried about Katherine.The whole Kay/Marge story continues to be A+

The Neil /Karen/Tyra stuff needs to pick up steam.Hate the way all the characters were shoe horned into 1 episode.Neil,Karen,Devon,Tyra,Olivia,Ana and the cop were all hanging around Indigo.Why does Ana have to be there?What purpose does Devon serve?

Hopefully they are laying the ground for a meaty story and the cop(Gil?) stays around.There could be some interesting triangles/quadrangles come out of this.

[DaytimeFan]

The Nikki and Jill dynamic is what is really selling the Kay/Marge storyline to me. The promo is excellent, a screaming Michelle Stafford is a good Michelle Stafford.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

Again, the music used in Monday's episode is stunning!

Sharon Case is a bit hyper, but the scenes were wonderfully directed of Nick and Sharon walking through Paris.

Eileen Davidson and Eric Braeden are so good and subtle together. Ashley and Victor's scenes were sweet.

And Katherine's bloody hand scared the crap out of me.

Kevin's also getting a bit intriguing again. Maybe he'll go psycho again. LOL!

The sets the built for Eden and Noah are gorgeous. The actors didn't go on the Paris trip, so they're using sets for them.

This week is going to be good, especially in regards to the Kay/Marge storyline.

[DaytimeFan]

I was waiting for that! It's really terrifying!

[BadZoe]

How funny that Katherine is once again driving someone to their death. What a good time it would be for a flashback of her killing Phillip.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

Also, Jess Walton and Melody Thomas Scott play so well off one another, I like the Jill/Nikki dynamic. It's so nice seeing these two women given material where they can sink their teeth into.

[Paul Raven]

I thought monday's ep was a letdown.

Everything was built up so well on Friday,but Mon was sluggish

All we got was Amber going on and on about her suspicion of Kevin

A brief scene of the car crash.

I agree that Sharon's attitude was annoying.

Nick says he's been to Paris so many times,he's jaded,yet Sharon says she's never been?Guess his many trips all happened outside their long standing marriage.

The blu screen when Sharon and Nick on the boat looked fake.

I also found Victor and Ashley to be over the top.Mind you,I find Victor hard to tolerate,although his self obsession is totally in character.Interesting that his undying love for Sabrina seems to be forgotten when he starts smooching Ashley.

Noah and Eden were boring.I thought the cemetery set was effective.

Nikki,Jill and Esther were the saving grace.

They have really gone all out with the sets.

In addition to the cemetery,we had 2 restaurant sets ,the car crash set and the bookstore.I didn't recognize them as being used previously.

Katherine must have a stable of cars-she mentioned driving a 62 Bentley a few weeks ago but the crashed car was a BMW 7 series.

[shadow]

Loved the Jill/Nikki stuff, looking forward to more of their scenes.

I cant wait for Vicor/Ashley to heat up.

Its a damn shame that I find Noah and Eden more interresting than Nick and Sharon.

Ugh I see no growth in these two, they are acting like they are teens, especially Sharon. What de hell is wrong with her, is she on somethang? I aint seeing not one ounce of sexual chemistry between these two, anxiously awaiting the tears and the Cassie card to be thrown out there.

The green screen is OBVIOUS!!!

Loved the Jill/Nikki stuff, looking forward to more of their scenes.

I cant wait for Vicor/Ashley to heat up.

Its a damn shame that I find Noah and Eden more interresting than Nick and Sharon.

Ugh I see no growth in these two, they are acting like they are teens, especially Sharon. What de hell is wrong with her, is she on somethang? I aint seeing not one ounce of sexual chemistry between these two, anxiously awaiting the tears and the Cassie card to be thrown out there.

The green screen is OBVIOUS!!!

[MarkH]

You know, what I thought LML might achieve (but failed to do), MAB has done.

I was a big fan of EARLY Lynn Latham. It was in the sudden concordance of three stories that I thought she was hinting at genius:

1. John having memory lapses, based in his history of cardiovascular disease and previous lapses
2. Brad's secret history, tied somehow to Parma OH, slowly being revealed
3. Victor's traditional behavior of "head butting" getting him into SERIOUS trouble...smelling lavendar and epilepsy.

I liked all three of these stories because [A] they were surprising and unusual, they were based in character traits and history from the past, [C] they propelled interesting new stories. Of course, in retrospect, I (and others) was wrong.

Rather than REAL history, LML had grabbed at small and trivial pieces of backstory, and amplified them. Victor's epilepsy was NOT neurologically plausible, really. Brad, as I have often been reminded, would not have lived such an open life if he was hiding from the Nazis. (We might have seen hints of his secret judaism too). And John...dear John...was sacrificed (LITERALLY) at the altar of this plot.

Later LML devolved further...plot with no basis in history, pushing too many newbies to the forefront, no narrative throughline, no consistency of voice. Nothing made sense anymore. (Why was Nikki suddenly running for Senate? What did the Senate race and the Clear Springs deal have to do with each other? etc.).

So now, here we are...SHOCKINGLY, less than year after the end of LML, and just a year after Clear Springs.

Look at today's front burner stories:

• Victor, with a lifelong fear of abandonment, a mixture of love and hate for having been raised in a Catholic orphanage, has broken down. Some people think it is implausibly based on losing Sabrina, but I think that is just a part of it. The role his family played in her death, capping a lifelong fear of abandonment, has all finally come crashing. The man who controls EVERYTHING could not control Sabrina's death...and he has finally succumbed to acknowledging he is ultimately powerless. It is ironic, that in all of this, his "safe harbor" of childhood...the Catholic Church...is again there for him.
• Ashley, who THREE TIMES lost her mind, was THREE TIMES rescued by Victor. Yet, Ashley and Victor had a permanent and abrupt end when she prematurely left Brad, confided her love for Victor, and was rejected by him (because he was committed to Nikki). Obviously, there is so much unfinished business. Better yet: now it is Ashley rescuing Victor from a breakdown. And...in delicious irony...the saint to which she is pray (Raymond Nonnatus) is the saint of LOST BABIES (harkening to the abortion Ashley had, and later the baby she lost in the car crash...two things that drove her mad), and the FALSELY ACCUSED.
• Nikki, drawing on her past (remembering Ashley's role in Victor's life), but nonetheless pushing Ashley toward Victor. Nikki...now working with Jill to try to find and save Kay. In the process, Jill and Nikki are cemented as "the daughter Kay never wanted" and the "daughter Kay never had". I feel this is foreshadowing for a bitter Nikki-Jill rivalry to come.
• Jack, still stunted as always, trying to claim or destroy Newmans (Sharon, Adam, Victor), trying to master his father's company. Locked endlessly in a self-destructive loop from which he can never seem to emerge. It was this feud that cost him Phyllis...and it is this feud that will cost him Sharon.
• Kay, twice, has "died". Once, in 1979, it was in the mental institution fire (where she was put after being driven mad by poisoned chocolates). An inmate had stolen Kay's rings, so Kay was presumed dead. Kay escaped to Liz Foster's house, de-toxed and recovered, and bided her time to come back in the most triumphant way possible. In the meantime, she watched how her heirs and enemies reacted. Again, a few years later, a drunken Kay made a suicide leap off a cruise ship railing...but she was rescued by Cuban radical "Phillipe" (interesting name..given her history with many men named Phillip) who helped her detox, heal, and reclaim her life. Could we be seeing this story again? Jeanne Cooper says it was amongst her all time favorites.
• Marge...a "one trick pony" (evil doppelganger with a good heart) from 20 years ago...interestingly drawn back onto the canvas. Why? We can speculate...but it seems she is just a plot point in a much larger tale.

My point is this. The vets are front and center. The stars are in their 50s-80s...but the show doesn't feel "old" at ALL! It feels young, vibrant, energetic...and the recent spate of cliffhangers have been edge-of-your-seat. Some of us literally can't wait till the next episode.

MAB has done what LML failed to do in a long term way: Play the vets, in stories based in history which are nonetheless surprising and novel, doing things that make sense. Let each story have long-term fallout. (Nikki's calling on Ashley has roots in the early 80s and ever since; Kay's repayment of kindness to Marge has roots in the late 80s/early 90s). Even Sabrina's death, in early August, still plays as a front-burner story 4 months later. Cassie's death, over 3 years ago, still fuels the Noah-Sharon-Nick-Phyllis arc we see today.

I was obviously wrong in celebrating early LML. Jack Smith (and before him, Kay Alden) had lost sight of history and the veterans. So, when LML seemed to be playing them again, I was delighted. In the end, I was deluded. She had no real interest in doing what MAB has done...writing DEEP, grounded plots that draw on 20-40 years of motivation, and that will have repercussions for years to come!

These days, you don't hear anyone complaining that "Amber" or "Kevin" or even "Gloria" is stealing the show. Everyone has been put in their proper place and perspective. I am a fan! It does make you wonder what the HECK went wrong from March-August of 2008? This team has skills!

[Cat]

WORD to everything you said, MarkH. ^^

Some SLs are not grabbing me (Jack's smug, blowhard attitude = FF) and I'm still not sold on Eden but everything else feels like Y&R -- to me. It also makes me realize how weak some of Kay Alden and Jack Smith's stuff was. The destruction of Ashley being a case in point. Now I cannot wait to watch her scenes with Victor! And IA about Nikki/Kay/Jill. It's like a "triangle," not in a relationship sense, but in a familial sense.

As for March-August of 2008, I'm going to put that down to transitioning from Lynn Marie Troll's destructive non-writing campaign of Evil Boringness. Followed by panic when the ratings started to dip. People really reacted badly to the introduction of Sabrina. I think we all wanted a plotting, evil vixen, hellbent on destroying the Newmans. Plus, remember the Mmmmm, Mmmmmmmmmm chérie, Mmmmmmmm, Mon amour, Mmmmmmmmmm stuff? It took me a while to realize that Sabrina was actually rather kind and sweet and lonely -- and I was ok with that. Unfortunately, by the point, the decision had already been made to kill her off, triggering the umbrella SL we are currently watching.

I don't know anything about Maria Arena Bell or Hogan Sheffer (or Scott Hamner, for that matter), but perhaps the arrival of Hoagie added some tightness and purpose to the writing? I noticed that with the lead-up to Sudden Impact, the show started feeling like a soap again in terms of pacing and cliffhangers. Paul Rauch's unexpectedly serendipitous hiring helped to restore an old-school, dark, luxurious ambiance to Y&R which I thought was gone foreover. It's like he came in and said "Hey! We're producing a fabulous daytime soap, not Law & Order! Embrace it! I want moody lighting, sumptuous sets and fancy locale shoots in Europe. Now, I'm off to dig out some of Y&R's orchestral background music from the archives."

[Heyou]

I like Kevie when he's BAD!! I can't wait for this.

MarkH you made some excellent points and I think all of the power that was handed to LML went to her head and she lost track of WTH she was doing.

[rangethatrover]

I don't know anything about Maria Arena Bell or Hogan Sheffer (or Scott Hamner, for that matter), but perhaps the arrival of Hoagie added some tightness and purpose to the writing? I noticed that with the lead-up to Sudden Impact, the show started feeling like a soap again in terms of pacing and cliffhangers. Paul Rauch's unexpectedly serendipitous hiring helped to restore an old-school, dark, luxurious ambiance to Y&R which I thought was gone foreover. It's like he came in and said "Hey! We're producing a fabulous daytime soap, not Law & Order! Embrace it! I want moody lighting, sumptuous sets and fancy locale shoots in Europe. Now, I'm off to dig out some of Y&R's orchestral background music from the archives."

STAY DOWN THERE PAUL AND KEEP DIGGING!!!

Because I am loving the sound of the show, the look of the show-- Paul always LOVED big cliffhangers, at least on OLTL... Did he do this on GL?

The show is an absolute class act. Far and away the best on daytime.

I think Bill Bell would be proud.