OLTL: Rex's Parentage

[Cheap21]

Rex is the epitome of everything that is wrong with OLTL. Im not saying he specifically, but his story encompasses so many bad soap elements. You can’t get away from them but usually they ar spread out across different stories. It seems as if so many bad soap elements are all concentrated in his story and unfortunately it dominates so much of the show these days

1. SORASING – They originally SORASED him to be 26 about 3-4 years ago to make him a potential candidate as Paige’s son, so he’s closer to 30 now. Of course none of this is even consistent with what they are trying to say now by bringing back Alison into this mess. Thanks to the TeenJess story, we know she and Nat are 29. So now Rex is the same age as them, maybe older? Um yeah right OLTL

2. Propped characters – Lots of characters have been thrown under the bus to prop up Rex. Some destroyed, others gushing about how great he is, others excusing his actions while calling out others on similar sh--.

3. Characters going psychotic for no reason - The most obvious example of course is the current destruction of Schuyler. He is written out of character, and is being demonized in order to make Rex look better. Schuyler = evil, so Rex must = good by comparison

4. Dropped characters/Fired actors – One of the laziest ways out of a story is to just get rid of characters who get in the way of the pet character. What is the point of pushing Rex/Gigi in a custody story when they got rid of the 3 opposing sides (4 if you count dead Stacy)?

5. Horrible acting – This is definitely up to personal opinion. I wont mention names but many know who they feel just isn’t cutting it

6. Crapstastic Rewrites- I’m getting whiplash trying to follow up. You know things are bad when you rewrite something you just wrote a few weeks ago.

7. Stupidity – lots of problems could be avoided if only the characters would use their brains. Schuyler believing Stacy that he was the father; Gigi and her fake breakup letting Stacy blackmail her. Rex letting himself be played by Stacy. Mitch knowing everything about Dorian’s family, right down to where they are at any minute of the day, yet not knowing Rex wasn’t the father of the baby, nor that he wasn’t his son, etc…

8. Lame Rivalries – Rex vs Schuyler, Gigi vs Stacy, Rex vs Gigi, Rex/Gigi vs Kim. Yawwwwnnn, Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

9. Unappealing Protagonist – Rex is supposed to be likeable? He falls into the class of the unappealing hero, that John, Ryan (AMC), Sonny (GH) belong to.

10. Boring Drama – Some of the worst stories can at least have a sliver of entertainment. This story is just a boring mess with nothing to even look forward to.

11. Who’s the Daddy – For years they’ve dragged out his paternity, revealed it, changed it and now we are back to square one. No scratch that, bc the story has now morphed into a Who’s the Mommy story as well (which I guess it started out as, with the Paige rewrite)

12. Back from the Dead – We had to endure what 6 months of crap bc Mitch came back from the dead to be revealed as Rex’s father and for what? Jared and Pamela got killed in the process. Its thrown Natalie back in John’s orbit. Roxy’s backstory just got screwed. Jessica is a hot mess. Viki and Charlie went splitsville, etc…

13. Cartoon Villains – As if Mitch wasn’t bad enough but now we have Alison to terrorize people. She’s reminiscent of ATWT’s Villains of the Month

14. Baby Switch – OLTL has had a long history of doing these and the Rex/Schuyler one is the worst. Whats the point when Schuyler is leaving and they can’t even explore his parentage?

15. Lame plot twists that make no sense – Does his story make any sense to anyone? I guess this one ties into many of the ones I pointed out earlier. They can try to rationalize the crap that is onscreen, but bottom line is that it doesn’t make sense. The story is like a puzzle and they are forcing pieces from a different box where they don’t belong

16. Rape – Stacy raped Rex and she attempted to do the same to Schuyler. Mitch attempted to rape Jessica. Is this supposed to be entertaining?

17. Lame triangles – Rex/Gigi/Schuyler, Gigi/Rex/Stacy. Any rootability any combination of these had, got thrown out the door with the horrible writing for the individual characters

18. Horrible Backstory – Remember that the Stacy mess started bc of her backstory, falling in “love” with Rex bc he helped pick up her belongings when her backpack fell. Really?

19. Sanctimonious and hypocritical - Many soap fans dont like characters who are holier than though and blatantly hypocritical. Thats what Rex is. Why he thinks he is any better than Schuyler is beyond me.

20. Kidnapping - Sierra Rose was kidnapped. Stacy and Jessica were. Soon

. Trying to find a reason to care, but I dont

Im sure theres a lot more but, I’ll stop there. This show is a trainwreck and Rex is story is a large part of it. Its as if the writers looked back and tried to think of everything that doesn’t work on a soap and tie it all to him. The end result is the crap onscreen which is forcing people to shut it off.

[Eric83]

+1.

[lovely_m]

I'd like to know what Ron's original plan for Rex's paternity storyline was.

Rex's parents are probably someone from a main family; It would solidify Rex's place on the show and give whoever wants him on the show an excuse to keep him.

If I was a long time viewer I'd be pissed if Rex was a Buchanan. First they took away Jessica's Buchanan blood ties, gave them to Natalie, and now Rex will have them too.

[Eric83]

For some reason I think they will re-write that one day.

[Khan]

Me, too.

I still believe Viki's memories of Mitch taking away one of her babies could have been post-hypnotic suggestions planted by Mitch (probably, when he gave her the spiked iced-tea); and that either both Natalie and Jessica are Clint's daughters, or that Natalie really isn't his and Viki's. Among other things, this would explain why Mitch would be so depraved as to want to impregnate his own "daughter," Jess.

Of course, if we presume Viki's memories were, in fact, real, then there's nothing that says Rex wasn't the child Mitch snatched from her in the delivery room. ;-)

Frankly, at this point, it probably doesn't matter, but given how close Rex and Natalie have always been, I think it's entirely possible that they are, in fact, Clint and Viki's children; that Mitch took the one child (Rex) away from Viki in the delivery room, while Allison took the other (Natalie) away later on; that, either by accident or by design, Rex and Natalie ended up being raised together anyway; and that Jess is the one who needs to set up an account on findmyparents.com.

[Eric83]

That confused the hell out of me.

[Khan]

Then, allow me break it down, lol.

1. Viki gets pregnant on the night her personality merges with Niki Smith (for the time being). Everyone assumes she and Clint are having one child; in fact, they're having two, a boy and a girl.

2. Mitch spikes Viki's iced tea (perhaps, to kill her; perhaps, to bring Niki back; who knows). Mitch runs tests on the unconscious Viki and discovers the second baby. His mind begins to work...

3. Viki gives birth. Again, assuming her memories of Mitch in the delivery room are legit, Mitch steals one of the babies (Rex). Nobody knows that Viki is pregnant with twins (except, of course, for Dr. Walter Balsom, and he's one of Mitch's minions), so Mitch can essentially abandon the newborn Rex at the hospital w/ no one knowing.

4. Later, after Viki and Clint bring home Jessica (actually, Natalie) from the hospital, Allison, acting on Mitch's orders, steals her from the nursery at Llanfair.

5. Allison switches Natalie with Jessica. At the same time, unbeknownest even to Mitch (which would be fantastic, I think), Allison switches Rex and Schuyler. Why? Because, Allison loves Mitch desperately, and her sister (a.k.a. Dr. Joplin) raise his child would be the next best thing to having one by him herself.

6. So, Natalie, whom Mitch wanted to "punish" for merely being Clint and Viki's daughter, ends up with Roxy and Walter Balsom; Schuyler, whom he may, or may not, know is his son, ends up with Allison's sister; and Rex, whom he also wanted to punish because he's a Buchanan, inadvertently ends up reuniting with his fraternal twin sister, thanks to Allison, who didn't realize the extraordinary coincidence when she switched the two boys.

7. Jess realizes she doesn't belong to Viki or to Clint, and pretty much falls apart (again), until she learns the truth: she's Melinda's long-lost daughter, making her Dorian's niece as well as Viki's foster daughter.

[marceline]

From your lips to the soap gods' ears.

[SFK]

I know he has his fans and he's by no means the worst character the show's ever seen, yet I still think it's presumptuous of OLTL to assume that we care that much about Rex and his mystery parents. Wrap this [!@#$%^&*] up and wrap it up quick. If OLTL is on borrowed time, its remaining months should not be wasted on this, and by no means should they drop the subject and pick it up later, let's just get it over and done with. I'd much rather see Rex busying himself doing something else. JPL hasn't tempered the character's snark with enough sensitivity (which he is capable of!) to make me really care the way I should about a character in such a s/l. It's going to be exhausting watching a smartass look for his biological parents for weeks on end, even if his snark is a "defense mechanism". He's become the Eric Cartman of OLTL, and hell, I was annoyed having to wait two weeks to find out the answer to that mystery.

[catsmeouch]

Is Rex younger than Natalie and Jessica? If so, wasn't Mitch presumed dead at the time Roxy would've acquired Rex, not in Statesville?

[SFK]

Not sure on the timeline, and you know how they love to play fast and lose with that, but I thought Mitch was already "dead" by the time Viki was pregnant with Jessie (and Mitch retcon raped her).

[Doyen]

Not that I care about Rex and where he comes from...but if they were aiming to finally connect Rex to Bo, then they could easily spin it so that Sarah was pregnant with Bo's kid when Carlo kidnapped her, and she wound up giving birth (to Rex) during that year she was off screen in between Jensen Buchanan and Grace Phillips.  Then Alex somehow got involved, being the woman who abandoned baby Rex at the hospital.

[Khan]

[!@#$%^&*], where did I get the idea that Rex was the same age as Nat and Jess? Oh well. My bad.

[NorrthCafe]

Count me in the 'can't stand the propping of Rex' and 'don't give a damn about who his parents are' crowd. It was clear YEARS ago that the writers were headed this direction when they had Balsom in Bo's face every other hour constantly yammering about Matthew being more like a brother to him than just the son of his good friend (and it creeps me out that Rex's only 'friend' is a middle aged man. Seriously? That's the best you can do writers?) Then the writers had Roxy give the 'remember, no matter what, I'm your mother in all the ways that count' speech. This show is being turned inside out for minor characters.

The paternity the writers need to worry about correcting is Jessica's, as pointed out already. Otherwise? For the sake of a Gigi/Rex propping, we have Jessica nearly being raped by the man she thought was her bio father and we're supposed to be grateful she lost her memory because of that. That's an ugly image to leave fans with, knowing it will never be resolved given Jessica's current state.

it's usually on CBS soaps that fans want to see an entire cast of characters DNA tested because of so many odd and intertwining connections. It's time for OLTL to have a DNA party for its cast of characters.