Classic AMC/OLTL

[DRW50]

This was the episode where Babe admitted to JR that she'd had sex with Josh. I actually thought this was a well-crafted episode - I don't care about Jamie/Julia but the stuff at the club (I'm not going to type it's name - too stupid) was fun. I liked seeing the Fusion women having fun but it wasn't done in a horribly annoying SATC-ripoff type way - they were just in the background. I liked the contrast of Zach and Kendall moving towards a happy life while Babe and JR were imploding. Using Colby to comment on the action was a good idea. They had Josh and Erin almost having sex (on a club terrace - tacky), and of course he stopped himself because, as he'd told JR a few days earlier on one of the more infamous lines, "Babe is a walking miracle." I thought the whole thing was a little degrading to Erin, even though he did tell her she was sexy and it wasn't about her, etc. I mostly liked the idea of people on a soap having genuine no-strings sex without it involving someone lying about their feelings, or this being painted as psychologically wrong. There's something I find fascinating about Erin, and she's very unique. She reminds me of Karen Gillan.

The JR/Babe scenes were beautifully acted, decently written, and superbly edited (the way they cut in flashbacks at just the right moment seriously impressed me). I liked that he didn't completely turn until she admitted she'd told Josh she loved him. I can see why people hated Babe but I find her very compelling in this storyline.

The only major complaint I have is when she found Josh at the end and slapped him - it was one of those hideously fake soap slaps.

[Jonathan]

So do I. That is the only time I remember the show using that particular set. So much better than that damn Fusion set you like so much!

[EricMontreal22]

Agreed

[DRW50]

I'm not sure when this aired in 2006 (sometime in November?) but I guess this was one of Julia Barr's last appearances as Brooke (at that time anyway). She had some fun lines with Jack, talking about how Erica would behead him and she wanted the scoop for Tempo. It's too bad Frons didn't want to have her around, as she showed more spark here than she did in those miserably years earlier in the decade and in the late 90s.

Was any of the stuff with Lily learning about Jonathan/Amanda and cutting herself shown oncamera? This episode just showed her in the hospital. I missed Friday's episode so perhaps that had it.

The Jeff/Erica stuff just sucks. They have no chemistry, I don't believe he'd commit adultery with her since Jeff was supposed to be a very moral man. The ugly argument she had with Adam in this episode had about twenty times more chemistry. Maybe the show should have had them fool around.

The scenes in this episode where Bianca finds a drunk JR in Josh's hotel room and has it out with him were superbly written and acted. It's strange to me how in the midst of what was, essentially, drek, you can have such standout moments. I'm sorry it had to end in a crappy way (Erica walks in, they say he can't leave, he jumps out a window, like Helen Hunt in that bad afterschool special).

[ellabelle]

Brooke also attended the disastrous Kane-Montgomery Thanksgiving that year. Her appearance with Jack was what led Erica to leave and then show back up with Jeff and Josh as her dates for the evening. It's appalling what TIIC did to Brooke. Julia Barr never should have been let go.

IIRC they did show Lily grabbing her hand and screaming "RED". I think it was in the earlier episode.

I used to think that Susan Lucci and John James as Jeff Martin has no chemistry. Then I watched them in a bad 1980s supernatural/ghost movie, playing a married couple. Dear God. Compared to them in that movie, Jeff and Erica had smoking hot, melt-the-paint-off-the-walls chemistry. The actor did sort of resemble Charles Frank who played the original Jeff Martin, but he didn't click with Susan Lucci at all. Erica and Adam did fool around a little bit in late 2008, and it was fabulous while it lasted. Unfortunately the way it was written made it totally unbelievable, and then the whole thing was just dropped.

But you're right - the whole Jeff falls in love with Erica again storyline made no sense and was merely a device to break up Jack and Erica. If they'd wanted to give Erica a son, there were so many other ways they could have done it that would have kept the legal abortion storyline intact and made for much better drama.

[DRW50]

Thanks for answering my questions.

The Jeff/Erica bit never makes sense to me. There were plenty of other men if they needed to break Jack and Erica up. Not to mention that bonding over a 25 year old son doesn't quite work. Or however old Josh was supposed to be. At times I think he had to be older than Kendall but then I remember Kendall had to be older than him, by about 4-5 years.

[ER Tosh]

The Bianca/JR parts of the show were great. I really wish that JR's history with Kendell and Bianca was not ignored post-MMT.

[DRW50]

The scenes where he talked about how close they'd been and how he remembered his first beer with Kendall were just great. I never understood why the show chose to destroy that friendship.

[AllMyDaysatGH]

Omg it looks like I am missing some good episodes. Wish I had time to watch them everyday, looking forward to having another marathon over the weekend though when I have time. Schools kicking my ass!

Carl its to bad you missed those Lily scenes when she accidently cut herself. I thought they were really good and definitely stood out. I hope this doesn't sound to mean but I loved whenever Lily had her meltdowns. Leven Rambin was so mesmerizing to watch!

Bianca/JR, Kendall/JR, WASTED POTENTIAL within both relationships - especially Kendall & JR. Enough said! I'll savor their scenes! At least this past year AMC seemed to kinda go back to JR & Bianca's relationship, but it ended up turning into something worse. And Kendall/JR were totally forgotten about, except for that completely random moment in Nov 2010 before Zach died when Kendall invited JR (& Annie) to the Thanksgiving dinner she was planning. I really thought JR & Kendall's relationship was on the path to being fixed but nothing happened after that...damn.

Bequiet!

[EricMontreal22]

I think it was meant to tie into Josh but they barely touched that aspect so it was a mistake.

[ellabelle]

I know. The whole Erica/Jeff relationship would have made a lot more sense if they'd actually been shown talking more to each other. There was a great scene in the Valley Inn when she first moved in where she talked about how she had trouble remembering who she was when she was married, how she had gotten good at living alone, and how she struggled with addiction. They needed a lot more of that to make the relationship believable, and it would have been helpful to know more about what Jeff had been doing with the rest of his life. Yeah, he was in Africa being the good doctor, but a huge amount of time passed between Mary dying and Jeff returning in 2006, and some explanation for what he was doing or why he didn't marry again and have a family would have been nice. After all, a big factor in them divorcing was him wanting a traditional wife and family and her wanting a modeling career, so him falling in love with the way Erica turned out didn't really make sense in the context of their past.

I think it would have been FAR more interesting if Erica's eggs had been stolen by Madden when she was a patient in a psych ward back in the mid-1970s after her hysterical pregnancy with Phil Brent. That still would have been over the top and a gross violation of her body, which would be doubly traumatic for a rape victim, but it would have left the abortion intact, and it would have been more believable than an embryo transfer since egg retrieval and IVF pregnancies did happen in the late 1970s. Plus it would have opened the door for ANYONE to be Josh Madden's father. Had the writers gone that direction, they could have had Madden wanting to create what he believed to be a genetically superior embryo for his wife and thus pairing Erica's eggs with sperm from a brilliant medical student who later turned out to be none other than David Hayward. Josh even looked a lot like Erica and David, far more so than he did Erica and Jeff. It would have been seriously awesome to watch a married Jack and Erica dealing with the fall out of her having a long-lost child with David, who she'd loved, but who she then hated because of the mess with Miranda and Babe, but she'd have to tell David the truth about Josh because they'd have to stop him from sleeping with Babe, who would have been his half-sister.

[DRW50]

That would have been interesting. Of course then the show couldn't have done Josh/Babe, but that's not a huge loss...

[reallyhateskateonlost]

Just played the ep where Adam decked the Fetus and Jeff...lol Erica calling Babe a tramp.

[DRW50]

Those scenes of everyone sitting in the hospital, so tense, waiting for news on JR were a great use of the cast, a good sense of community. Hard to find on soaps in recent years.

I loved that nasty bitching between Brooke and Erica (Erica telling her she's trolling the hallways for men, and to go upstairs for the unconscious ones!), and it sounded like Brooke was interested in Jack. I guess the show did have some story plans for her and her absence was Frons.

The scenes with Brooke/Erica and Erica/Jack in these episodes were generally well-written and made sense for the characters. It's the Jeff stuff which is forced. When he was talking to Tad it took me a while to remember they were supposed to be family.

I don't understand why David wanders around eavesdropping on conversations and giving advice to random people, most of whom tell him to go to hell. Is this just a way to fill time? The stuff with Julia and Jamie was especially odd. I get that he hates Jamie, but who cares, since Jamie isn't in Babe's life by this time? At least the quick scene with Dixie, about Emma, was nice.

The whole thing about this JR/Babe mess splitting Adam/Krystal and Adam is going to go for custody (not realizing it could be Tad's son), I guess I see the dramatic point, but it's not fun to watch. I am probably one of the few who liked them, although I don't know if I would have felt that way at the time.

They generally had the balance right for Kendall at this time. She's very loving with her family, and a very blunt pain to most other people if they cross her. There's a certain vulnerability there which makes it less obnoxious. I thought her scene with Adam, threatening him, was done very well - usually in those types of scenes, one person would have to look good and the other bad. I also liked the scene where she confronted Tad about his lies.

I guess I may be saying this because I know she's gone soon but Dixie seems very out of place at this point. She has no real friends, she's very damaged, self-loathing, and has very little of the spark or backbone she once had. I get why someone, a writer, or McClain herself, would want a more mature Dixie, and I get the idea of your mistakes crippling you, but I'm not sure it was the best fit for this character. I do like her relationship with Di, and the scenes where she confronted Babe.

There's a darkness pervasive in most of the show now (like the various gruesome closeups of JR's bleeding hands and face). I'm not sure why they decided this was the right time for a serial killer story.

I liked that Ryan talked about his arrival in town, conning someone at a bus crash. That was such a great first scene, especially Gloria (not mentioned of course) busting him. I wish it was on Youtube.

[ellabelle]

The show was such a mess then. There were some really good points, as you mentioned, but some bad ones too. Julia Barr was horribly wasted. Her scenes with Jack and Erica were great, that's pretty much all she had. She had no storyline. The same goes for David. He was tormenting Dixie and Tad over Kate, but he really had nothing of substance to do, which is why he was written off a few weeks later. Such a waste of great talent.

You are spot on about the show being very dark already without adding a serial killer storyline. I definitely think they had too many characters on the show at this point, but they could easily faded some into the background and written some off without having a series of murders, particularly one as contrived as the Satin Slayer. There was just no HOPE on the show any more: the reveal that Erica had been violated again to explain her long-lost son, a no-longer impaired Jonathan faking mental illness to hang out with an autistic teenager (seriously creepy), Greg Madden trying to steal Kendall's baby and using his own sperm to impregnate women, Dixie and Tad searching for their lost child and trying to take Annie's child away from her, Erica and Jack's marriage falling apart before it really even began, Tad burying Greg alive and torturing him, JR trying to kill the woman he supposedly loved more than life itself and nearly killing a pregnant Kendall and her baby instead, JR drinking again and throwing himself out of a 4th floor window. Then you had the murders start up on top of the incredibly awful way that Tad and Dixie's daughter was found: her adoptive father killed in a horrific car crash at Christmas, followed by her adoptive mother dying shortly thereafter.

AMC was just plain depressing in 2006. Who wants to tune in to watch an hour of misery?