General Hospital: January 2023 Discussion Thread

[Vee]

I was advocating for him getting a secret kid not long ago! But not by Dominique.

[j swift]

Yeah, but you get my point that it is especially terrible that the two stories which stretch credulity are occurring at the same time, along side the Willow and Trina long lost parent reveals.  Someone on the writing staff has got to find a new source of inspiration.

[Vee]

I have never cared about either of their bloodlines and still don't. Longtime fans do not need a child taken away from Taggert for Curtis the Epcot Center Greeter. And it's honestly a C-level storyline no one has interest in for older adult Black characters the show has no frontburner investment in. Willow is a complete nonentity to me, in addition to my never, ever caring about Nina's secret child since they began hinting about it before Michelle Stafford even appeared onscreen (and I suspect back then that the plan was for Kristen Alderson's Kiki to turn out to be hers).

I am convinced GH only does these boring parental stories for the same reason current soaps (and GH especially) allegedly do so many baby stories: They are among the only 'safe' middle America material that the network will easily greenlight, and they fill airtime. They're cruising.

Edited January 5, 2023 by Vee

[j swift]

You may be right because if we look at the current canvas: Bobbie, Sonny, Nina, Heather, Victor, Monica, Alexis, Obrecht, Ryan, Kevin, Scotty, and Jeff have all had long-lost children who happened to move to Port Charles (sometimes more than once).

I would tend to believe it was a sponsorship thing if 23&Me advertised regularly, because they are certainly not selling any diapers with all of these stories of people who abandoned their toddlers.

[Vee]

I think it's more a recent, 2000s-2010s, etc. latter-day issue that we have paternity/maternity stories that seem anemic, pointless and endless. There's nothing wrong with a baby story or a WTP story in theory, they are classic soap staples. But it's when everyone has one of them over and over, or multiple pregnancies for young vibrant men or women, or when the 'who is my secret child/parent' for adult kids stories go on forever with minimal interest like this that it screams what it's rumored to be: One of the only permissible storylines at network soaps, cowed today by what they believe to be a largely older-skewing, conservative white audience in an age of more moral puritanism, where they are straining to hold on to what they believe to be their only shrinking loyal audience.

Edited January 5, 2023 by Vee

[j swift]

On a positive note (fulfilling my 2023 resolution) I would say that I prefer the blank slate status of a long-lost adult child, over a suddenly SORASed 20something who has either none of the personality traits that we saw the child actor portray, or a never-before-seen conflict with their parents due to being SORASed at a boarding school. 

For example, randomly naming a character Serena Baldwin has no dramatic value for me if they are just playing homage to the past, rather than exploring the depths of what it means to be the child of Scotty (and kind of Lucy), which they never do because nobody values intergenerational plot enough to keep the veteran actors on contract.

I think GH has gone wrong when they contort themselves by trying to have each new person be connected to established characters.  But, I still find Josh Kelly compelling enough to want to see what happens next to Cody.

Edited January 5, 2023 by j swift

[AlexElizabeth]

Speaking of Taggert, where the heck is he? He should be all over this Trina stuff. Is there ANYONE who wants Curtis to be her father? It's so lame. 

[Darn]

The usage of history on this show feels very "We skimmed the wiki too!".

All they seem to care is that a reference to someone like Dominique and her family will make longtime viewers ears perk and give longstanding cast members something to do even if it makes no sense.

That's an issue I've mentioned before. Trina, Willow and Cody all have a paternity/maternity story playing out in drips right now. How many different ways can you write that within a 6 month period? It's such an easy story to tell (just like the ridiculous amount of baby switches that have happened on soaps the last 20 years) so I get why they keep going back to that same uncreative well but it's gotta stop.

[BrendaB]

LOL @ Laura's reaction to finding out her son knocked up her grandson's girlfriend.  Liz & Nic remain the most compelling coupling for both characters.  They need to keep them together and in front burner stories, so of course they announce the actor's last air date is this month.

Please register in order to view this content

I'm surprised how visibly they killed the Britt character on screen, making any comeback for the character unlikely.  I would have much preferred her to just leave town and keep hope alive someday for her to have a proper love story before a true finale for the character with her Huntington's disease.  I guess Leisl won't have much to do now that's she's outlived her kids, either.

That snotty break up between Joss & Cam was the most interesting they've ever been.  The actor playing Cam has improved and how pretty is he?  Perfect skin, rosy cheeks, great hair.  They really cast Liz & Zander's son, from a physical resemblance standpoint, with stunning precision.  Anyways, they need to give him a winsome bad girl love interest to really torture him.  He's just the type of good guy that needs a bad girl like Esme in his life.

[carolineg]

That researcher who found that blurb about Mac/Dominique deserves a raise lol!  It seems so silly to bend all credibility to give Mac/Dom a child.  I am pretty sure no one ask for that in the entire current viewing audience (possibly in viewer history)! Just give Mac a kid from some nameless lass in Australia. 

Didn't Mac meet Dominique before she came to PC or was that all shown on screen too?  For some reason I thought she follow him to Port Charles or something.  

[AbcNbc247]

RIP Britt

Once again, the show kills off the wrong character. This smells of a big F you to KT because she decided to leave, but hey, you gotta strike while the iron’s hot. 

And yeah, Esme is totally faking the amnesia. 

And Joss is still a disgusting selfish whore and no crocodile tears are gonna change that. Her actions spoke a lot louder than her words to Cam. I’m sure next time we see her, she’ll be perfectly fine as though she didn’t just break his heart.

Seriously, any bad thing that may happen to her in the future, I’ll probably celebrate, no matter how bad it is. Cam deserves much better than someone like that anyway. Poor kid broke my heart. 

It’s not the affair that triggered me lol it’s the way it was handled. She claims to care about Cam but yet, didn’t give him a second thought as she was screwing Dex. Hell, if Cam had walked in on it, I wouldn’t be surprised if she had tried to turn it in to one of those cuckold porn scenes. 

You don’t write your characters that are supposed to be the good guys, like that. 

Edited January 5, 2023 by AbcNbc247

[Forever8]

I wanted Mac's child to be from his mercenary days to be a daughter who turns out to be a social climbing model for Deception. 

That's why you got to be specific on wishing storylines and characters. 

I've seen photos of Real Andrews back on set filming, so I hope it's coming. 

 

Edited January 5, 2023 by Forever8

[Forever8]

And I hoped Cody was Katherine Bell's con artist son, whom she had abandoned years before moving to Port Charles. But nope, he has to be Dominique's long-lost child with Mac. This would have also been an excellent time to introduce Serena back to the canvas with this long-lost half-brother and her mother (Lucy) being MIA or presumed dead.

[Liberty City]

He was filming in December 2022, which means we'll see him sometime by the end of the month.

[Vee]

How is Dante still having the 'how can I be a cop and love Sonny' conversation in the year of our Lord 2023? How many times have we had this talk? Can this character not evolve to some sort of equilibrium that makes sense either on one side of the line or the other, or decide (as I believe he did by the end of Guza's run) that he will work with Sonny on some things because of the devil you know but keep a careful eye? How long is this going to go on? Dante and Sam are basically C-listers now and I never thought that would happen. Poor DZ. And Kelly finally looks old.