B&B December 2021 Discussion Thread

[Soapfan8]

I’m going to go with these in this order.

1. Heather tom

2. Rena Sofer

3. kimberlin brown

4. Katherine Kelly lang

5. Jacqui Woods

honorable mention: Annika Noelle

 

[soapfan770]

That’s a pretty great assessment. I remember a few years back when the show was without Steffy and Hope so Thudley felt the need to make Ally and Ivy them instead and it bombed big time lol. I think having Deacon, Sheila, and Taylor in the mix is actually to drive new developments and help structure the show better. At least we get multiple stories out of it and something finally different for all the characters but I also know the recent momentum will collapse by February sweeps lol.  
 

LOL $Bill, Shauna, Wyatt and Flo are DOA at the moment. Pretty sure Bowden is off contract too and none of them are missed.

[Videnbas]

I agree having Deacon, Sheila and Taylor back is good for the show. If done right, it could be a kind of reset to the last time the show was good (this combination of characters feels very 2001-2002, and the storylines that are revisited now are also from that period - Breacon and Sheila shooting Taylor). 

By the way, I'm only just catching up on December episodes, and although I like that the focus is more on the legacy characters now, some things in the dialogue just make me go "huh?".

Taylor feeling honored that her grandchild Hayes was named after her?

Ridge asking Hope to move out and Brooke going "this is my house!" - and Ridge NOT replying (or remembering) that he's the one who bought the house for her.

Taylor the scientist talking to Ridge about how she has no idea what an "elliptical orbit" is - and neither does he.

But on the whole, I like this shift back to the "core" of the show.

Edited December 27, 2021 by Videnbas

[AbcNbc247]

Brooke was channeling her inner Ridge in today’s episode

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[FrenchBug82]

Yep. I don't want to gush too much but the parallel was too obvious not to be intentional and, I can't believe it I am saying this, this is actually clever writing.
 

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[AbcNbc247]

Well, I'm glad they remembered to do that 

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I do like the way the storyline has been going lately, though I do think using Brooke's alcoholism, sobriety, fear of falling off the wagon etc. could have been done with a little more nuance.

[Videnbas]

Brooke's alcoholism has never quite seemed believable to me. We have never really seen her struggle to stay sober. She just drank too much for a while and once she realized it was too much, she stopped. It never seemed that difficult for her to stay sober. Her drinking never truly seemed out of control.

It was not like with Macy for example, where you truly felt that she might literally drink herself to death. 

[Videnbas]

Just watched today's episode. The choice of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata when Sheila swapped the labels on the bottles was unintentionally hilarious. I have to wonder what they were thinking. Was it Sheila listening to that piece of music (if so, when did she develop an interest in classical music? in prison?)? Was it supposed to be just part of the background music (which literally never sounds like this on B&B, so it was quite a jarring break)?

And the result was this tragic mood while the camera panned the motionless champagne bottles submerged in water. I honestly felt like those poor bottles had drowned.

[soapfan770]

Brooke’s alcoholism story wasn’t much of a story to begin with, just a sped up version that lasted a few weeks enough for Emmy bait and sweeps. Similar to both Amber and Steffy’s pill addiction stories.

The last time I remember Brooke’s alcohol is being referenced at all was about two years ago when Quinn & Thomas spiked a drink of Brooke’s to sabotage her but absolutely nothing happened afterwards lol. Kind of like earlier this year when Zoe put colon blow into Paris drink lol. 

[Ponds]

Anyone who knows anything about wine/champagne will tell you this story is absurd as there are no non-alcoholic substitutes that taste like the real thing.  We were part owner of a wine shop in the 80's so I do have a background in wine tastings.

[Maxim]

I am here for Brooke sleeping with Deacon, because she was drunk. 

[FrenchBug82]

I am really not. This was the dumb cliched soap twist that I mentioned earlier I was afraid they would lazily go to.
Yet another "member of a supercouple accidentally cheats on the other due to alcool/misunderstanding and then has a secret" SL that completely sets aside the interesting organic conflict this started with. A bit cheap if they go there IMO.

[Darn]

Aren't they tired of using Brooke this way? I thought they'd reached their nadir when Brooke slept with her daughter's teenage boyfriend under the impression it was her 50 something year old husband because they were wearing the same mask.

[Soapfan8]

The slut from the valley returns lol

[Videnbas]

Unfortunately, Bell always seems to default to one of two default storylines: the secret or the triangle (and sometimes it's both at once). Every storyline that it set up eventually gets simplified into one of these formulas.