Members Adam Posted July 18, 2011 Members Share Posted July 18, 2011 Excellent, ACTOR'S episode. Everyone brought their A game and for once had the writing to back up their performances too. I loved all the flashbacks. Jane is absolutely hysterical The story may be flawed, but at least Susan would appear to be having fun on the way out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Kylie Posted July 18, 2011 Members Share Posted July 18, 2011 Wow, I thought SL did such an amazing job flashing back to Erica's rape. She played it so subdued and subtle. I felt her pain. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DRW50 Posted July 18, 2011 Members Share Posted July 18, 2011 I haven't watched a lot of AMC in recent times (not because of any big outrage, I just wasn't interested) but Eric convinced me to tape the marathon. Unfortunately my DVR isn't working properly, but I did get to see Friday's episode. I think the Erica/Jane story is very clever, not because of the impostor story, but because Jane lives out the life which is a brittle parody of Erica, or what Erica easily could have been. I especially liked how she barely even acknowledged Greenlee, and how rude she was to Opal. It was nice to see some of the issues of this friendship (class and so on) brought up again. They did a good job with Kendall's reactions - lost, desperate, and trying to find anything to "blame" this on. It's too bad Bianca just sat around in a stupor, but then what else has she been in the last 4-5 years anyway. I'm not sure why Greenlee was there - wouldn't Krystal have been a better choice? - and Budig was even more wooden than usual. Considering that Erica's scenes were all expository flushing to a poorly acted stranger, I thought they were very cohesive, and believable, and it was nice hearing Erica talk more honestly about her relationship with her mother. Her conversation about her father, and Richard Fields, was very stripped down, no self-pity or melodrama. It was a controlled performance that Lucci never gets credit for. I couldn't help comparing this to the David/Angie scenes, which were very well-acted and which were full of a lot of conflicting emotions and definitely worth watching, but were so bogged down that at one point Angie just started essentially reciting a Wikipedia entry of David's life. I guess these characters have been so poorly defined over the last few years that Broderick wants to remind people of who they are, but it was a little rough. I guess JR is supposed to be using Marissa as an excuse for his problems, and he doesn't actually care that much about her, but his going off the wagon because he can't have her doesn't work for me. He also kept shouting his lines at random intervals, like he used to do on GH. Other than that I thought he and Tad had a good bond and the conversation seemed much more like what I'd expect of the characters, especially Tad, who has emotionally been stripped down to nothing at this point. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members R Sinclair Posted July 18, 2011 Members Share Posted July 18, 2011 Bingo! I know exactly what you're talking about because that was the first thing I thought of when it was happening. I totally was having GH flashbacks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members R Sinclair Posted July 18, 2011 Members Share Posted July 18, 2011 Actually, it was Rebecca Taylor's script. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Skin Posted July 18, 2011 Members Share Posted July 18, 2011 Thank God I wasn't the only one who saw this. Jacob Young continues to play angry instead of using a variety of emotions to make JR multifaceted and while it may be strong in choice intervals it's weak when it's consistently used. Especially when there is no vulnerability or anything behind it to give it further weight. I would give my left arm for him to play something different. I remember there once was a time where he would shift up the game a bit and do the wounded little boy routine with the small voice and the face scrunched almost cry, but it seems Young has no one left to challenge him outside of his comfort zone so we just get regressive Bernard-GH style yelling. Wasn't a fan of that what so ever. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members EricMontreal22 Posted July 19, 2011 Members Share Posted July 19, 2011 I'm glad you watched, I pretty much agree completely, actually. That's why the Janerica story actually has, despite itself, more or less worked. I think that's a valid point about the Angie/David stuff, and actually there has been a fair amount of that. But I think the reason is exactly as you say, these characters have been so poorly and fairly one dimentionally treated for such a long time, that they are working, sometimes a little too hard, to remind people of the past and build back up the characters. To be fair, the JR stuff is more complex than just a frustration over not being able to get Marissa (though that seemed to be the final straw), and has been building for a while. Tad has definitely been one of the characters who has benefitted the most from the writer change. (Oh and Greenlee was there because she set it up--she was the one who found Erica and David half naked coming out of his room and then called Kendall. And I guess she's worried for her father, so it didn't bug me. I was just glad Ryan didn't gate crash). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DRW50 Posted July 19, 2011 Members Share Posted July 19, 2011 Thanks for the extra info. I guess I meant why does Greenlee need to be in the story at all? I suppose there is the Jack connection but she mostly seemed more focused on David. I don't remember all that much of these atrocities he committed against her... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cheap21 Posted July 19, 2011 Members Share Posted July 19, 2011 Every sngle horrible thing she did last year was David's fault. The show retconned it that he manipulated and used her to hurt everyone. From forcing her to marry him to get even with Ryan, to framing Erica from embzzlement. She and the show has said it is all David's fault as if she was some mindless puppet that was under his spell. Anyone who watched knows that damn well she was not a victim and was in fact calling most of the shots but now we are to beleive he was some big bad guy that nearly ruined her life Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DRW50 Posted July 19, 2011 Members Share Posted July 19, 2011 Thanks. I thought he had convinced her she had a terminal illness or something. I just don't ever pay attention to her stories. It's always someone else's fault with her. But at least she cares about Jack, so that's good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members EricMontreal22 Posted July 19, 2011 Members Share Posted July 19, 2011 Well to be fair he did blackmail her and then fake his own death partly so he could lurk around and hear her say how she felt so bad--and putting her and people she cares about marked as potential killers... But even still, I pretty much agree with what Cheap said (and I actually like Greenlee--well when not with Ryan...) Re JR's drinking, Broderick seems to be trying to make it more about JR's failure, despite his attempts, to live up to his dad's image. One of this goals was to have a succesful family in the Chandler house again (again? did they ever?), and there's been some talk mentioning even that alcohol plays apart in this--ie a real man can hold his liquor. It's kinda flimsy, but it makes more sense than just being upset over Marissa. I think that was meant to be the lynchpin, and JR decided it was just better to stop trying and give in. I also think this will obviously play into Dixie's return and Adam's later on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members R Sinclair Posted July 19, 2011 Members Share Posted July 19, 2011 That was completely after the fact. She turned on him long before he faked his death. The whole marrying to get revenge on Pine Valley scheme was Greenlee's idea. After Greenlee's surgery in Gloucester was done, David was ready to go off and leave Pine Valley for good. She talked him into going back and getting roped into the stupid plot. Then, when everyone started turning against her instead of feeling guilty for whatever she thought they needed to feel guilty for, that's when she started backpeddling and "Well, David, I didn't say we should do that..." or "Well, David, I didn't agree to go this far with it..." and suddenly, she was David's victim. As a matter of fact, Greenlee led David on just so she could get laid. He told her he didn't want to have sex with her because he was falling in love with her and only wanted it if she felt the same way. She was all "Oh, yeah, sure, David! Love you lots! Now bang me!" So, Greenlee can go sit down with this whole "What David did to me... When David was manipulating me..." because the bitch was manipulating the hell out of that man just as much. The whole blackmailing, fake death situation didn't happen until Greenlee bailed on the partnership she had insisted upon. As biased as it sounds all because I'm the one saying it, that's exactly how it played out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members EricMontreal22 Posted July 20, 2011 Members Share Posted July 20, 2011 I actually agree with that, but the question was why Greenlee cared at all abotu what David was doing now. Anyway it was too bad, I liked her with David--Greenlee is a self absorbed bitch, so of course she'd be there. (Interesting it was under Broderick's brief return that they were paired up) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Kylie Posted July 20, 2011 Members Share Posted July 20, 2011 David just about killed Erica for that ungrateful b*tch and she still treats him like something she stepped in. Ugh. I remember her telling him to do whatever he had to do to stop Erica from getting back to PV and her looking at him like he was horrible for listening to her selfish ass. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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