Boogie Chillen, S01E08, C2P3 (Wed, 5-8-13)

I guess Winifred got over her hatred for Adam; she's back working for him and even RUNNING for him.

Where is Adam going?

Miranda doesn't realize that her biological father raped Bianca; she thinks she "came from a cup" via a sperm donor. Bianca was telling her about how hard it was to have Erica Kane for a mother and how the tabloids ran stories about her being gay. Miranda seemed surprised. Now she's telling Celia about her origins. I think I see some research about her father in the offing. Kendall was on trial for murdering him, but then Bianca remembered that SHE had shot him. That was ALL over the news and tabloids. It shouldn't be too difficult for Miranda (or Celia) to google Bianca and find all sorts of info about her. I put the video on pause to write that, and the next thing out of Miranda's mouth was that she DOES wish she knew who he was or at least what he was like. Foreshadowing much?

Was David FARTING while he was talking to Cara?

How many female characters are on the show right now whose names begin with "C"? Off the top of my head, we have Cara, Celia and Cassandra (Kathy's name starts with a "K").

Ha! Did they just diss The Bachelor (aka, an ABC show)? LOVE IT!

I thought the name of the nail salon was Fancy Finger Nail Salon. The sign on the outside said New Image Nails. New ownership?

Dixie slams Adam for telling the comatose JAR that he's the biggest disappointment of his life. Yet there she is, dumping her frustration that David is back and now honing in on AJ. JAR may be in a coma, but that doesn't mean he can't hear things. WTF? So far he's heard that his father thinks he's worthless, and his arch-enemy is honing in on his son. He cannot even react to it. Adam did reconsider, and told JAR that he loves him.

Speaking of JAR, his face looks very well toned for an alcoholic with MANY severe injuries (not to mention cancer) in his history, who has been in a coma for 5 years. You'd think he would at least be slightly slack-jawed. His hair is also nicely done WITH some kind of product.

Robin "they must have had to degunk JAR's eyes & mouth several times a day" Coutellier

Boogie Chillen, Thursday - 5-2-13

Oh yeah, I believe there are adult-size jeans that Miranda can't fit into. She's such a butterball, after all.

AJ tells Miranda that the trailer park called and they want their trash back. Has anyone ever sat him down and told him about his mama (and Grandma Krystal, for that matter)? Yeah, there's a hospital wing at PVH named after Babe -- there's also a pier in San Diego where quite a few sailors have carved her name in the wood. I wouldn't be surprised to hear that the pier had collapsed from the structural damage!

I see/hear that Griff still sounds like he's about to break into tears with every syllable he utters.

So know we know that JAR is the assh--er--mystery patient (they spelled his name wrong, though (AFAIK). Babe always pronounced it JAR and I'm sticking with it. We still don't know what happened to Tad, though.

David always DID have a hate-on for JAR (and vice versa).

All that medical equipment in JAR's hospital room looks sparkling clean and fresh out of the box. Do they ship in new factory equipment every day for the rich guy?

Now we know for SURE that eBabe (aka Marissa) WAS killed 5 years ago. Well, at least we know there's a gravestone for her, and people seem sad that she's gone.

Pete assures Celia via video that he is NOT a cyber-stalker. He assures her of this via an iPad with the words: TOUCH ME on the screen. In her BEDROOM. There are also flowers for her. In her BEDROOM. Pete's waiting outside her window for her with more flowers. Nope. He's not a stalker. Only creeps who don't respect boundaries are stalkers. Pete's romantic.

The show ends with David putting his hand around JAR's throat. David had decided that JAR being in the prison of his own body was better than him dying; but then he saw JAR's fingers twitching and he's not about to let JAR wake up NOW. So. How long before someone comes into the room and punches David in the face? 5 ... 4 ... 3 ... 2 ...

Robin "I appear to be getting some of my AMC snark back; it's like riding a bicycle" Coutellier

Boogie Chillen, Wednesday - 5-1-13

I'm glad to see that Brooke managed to heal Adam's heart. I've also missed Adam's hissssssses whenever anything he says has an ess sound in it.

The squiggle artwork in Adam's living room reminds me of the squiggle artwork Jack used to have in HIS living room. Or in his house with Erica. Or maybe in his office. Well, Jack had some squiggle artwork SOMEwhere.

OH FGS! There's yet ANOTHER child hidden from David? I think Leora was the ONLY child he ever got to be with from birth and she died at, what, 4 months?

Was McKenzie the little girl (who is now a teenager) that Cara championed the last time around? I remember that Cara had leukemia when she was a child and she was isolated and over-protected and HATED it. So when she saw another little girl being treated the same way, she stood up for her (against the girl's PARENTS). I think Cara got fired and/or banned from the hospital for it.

Questions:

• Do people in PV still go to the Yacht Club?


• How long will it be before someone blows something up?


• How long will it be before a baby or child is kidnapped? We ALREADY have an adult being kidnapped right off the bat, after all.


• ARE there any babies left in PV? If not, how soon before someone is sporting a baby lump?


• Where are Kathy and Jenny? Jenny would probably be with Krystal, assuming Krystal survived, but Kathy is Tad and Dixie's daughter.


• Did Jane buy BJ's and remake it into Jane's Addiction?


• Is there still quicksand out by Willow Lake?


• Did Jamie hire caretakers for the Wallingford estate that he inherited, or did he sell it off or rent it out so he could continue to be a doctor in Africa?


• Is Evelyn the Headmistress really Celia's biological mother or aunt?


• Does Colby Chandler feel eclipsed by Petey's success with apps, given that she had become a video-blog sensation 5 years ago? I don't get the feeling that she was a casualty of the infamous megadeath/engagement party.


• Did Caleb finally say "take this job and shove it" to Cortlandt Electronics? I get the feeling that he abandoned it.

Robin "did Adam beef up security after the 'incident'?" Coutellier

Boogie Chillen, Monday - 4-29-13

In case you haven't heard or realized it yet, it's HERE! AMC, as put forth by Prospect Park, is now available via Hulu.com! On a technical note (before you race off to watch it), I've found that navigating it much more likely to be successful using the REWIND ICON (10 seconds) in the browser player window than it is to try to click on a position on the progress bar. Clicking on the bar resulted in odd behavior for me, including losing my audio. I also had problems with Firefox and had to use IE to successfully watch it, but that may be due to some add-ons I have in Firefox. The new show is 30 minutes, rather than 1 hour. I don't know if it will be this way for future shows or just the premiere, but I was able to see it on-line on Hulu by 1-1:30am on (pacific)!

In case you don't recognize me or the "Boogie Chillen" in the header, it's what I called my daily or near-daily comments on the show before it was canceled, and I am now resurrecting it! I have read and posted little in RATSA since the show went off the air, feeling SO betrayed by ABC canceling the show after 41 years! But I'm back NOW. The backstory to Boogie Chillens is that people asked about my comments often and it made it easier to find by giving it a "name". I love John Lee Hooker's music and the Chillen ties in with Children, so that's how I picked the name for it. Please note that BCs are NOT necessarily UPDATES; they are my comments. Certainly this first one for the 2013 resurrection is more of an update, but some days I won't have much to say or will go 2-3 days without commenting and/or lump multiple days together in a single post. I post BCs in rec.arts.tv.soaps.abc on USENET and in this blog.

WELCOME BACK, EVERYONE!!!

AMC starts 5 years from the end of the ABC version, which ended with a cliffhanger. JR was out of control and tried to shoot Bianca and/or Marissa, JR's ex- or soon-to-be ex-wife, who were now a couple. JR was furious that Bianca had "turned" Marissa into a lesbian. Erica got in the way of the bullet as she headed toward the door after Jack. Most of the children are teens now. Oddly Lucy, Maya's baby that Jesse swapped out for he and Angie's baby, who was stillborn, has apparently GRADUATED (high school? college?) and got a job in Portland. Presumably Portland Oregon, not Portland, Maine. And now I keep wanting to spell Portland as "Portlandt". Anyway, Lucy was a BABY the last time we saw her; so far she wins the prize for having the worst case of SORAS (Soap Opera Rapid Aging Syndrome).

Brooke has a nightmare. In the nightmare, David and someone else are wrestling over a gun. She suddenly wakes up, finding herself on the couch. The classic AMC photo album with the words "ALL MY CHILDREN" on the cover is on her lap. Adam rushes to her to reassure her that he's right there for her.

WHOA! A brief, but HOT love scene with Cara and David! I don't know yet if it was a fantasy or a memory. This is DEFINITELY no longer ABC! Cara and David were doing it up against a WALL and showing a *LOT* of skin! A LOT! Maybe I WILL stick around to see how this goes!

Ah, SO nice to see Jesse and Angie in a HOUSE where they belong!  I LOVE Angie's colorful robe, too! I also love that she and Jesse actually look and mostly act like REAL people and they look fabulous doing so!

Dixie looks at a photo of herself and Tad in happier times. She is wistful and misty-eyed, and looks heavenward with love.

Petie is definitely all growed up now (and completely un-dorkified). He had an in-joke while talking on his iPhone, telling someone that it's all changing; everyone is watching TV on-line now :-) He drives around in a sporty convertible and looks like the trendy, hot-shot, rich young man that he is.

Someone has been in a coma or otherwise incapacitated for 5 years, but we don't know who yet. We know this because Cara and Griff, wearing doctor gear at PV Hospital, discuss someone (who is just off-camera) as they look at charts and over to the person in the bed, etc. They obliquely discuss how David would be very angry about whatever it is they have been doing with the patient.

There's a new theme song. It's COMPLETELY different from any of the variations we've heard over the course of 41 years. My closed-captioning gave the name of the song and the artist(s), but I don't remember right now and don't feel like looking for it; I'm sure someone will provide it soon enough. Something about friends and love. The opening montage shows characters, mostly shown in pairs, and has the characters' first names written underneath each one. It's actually a clever way to introduce people to characters, former and new, that they will be seeing.

Adam and Brooke have still not married (the cliffhanger ending was at an engagement party for them 5 years ago). Adam re-proposes. Apparently it's "complicated". AJ comes into the room, mentions Brooke's recurring nightmare, and tells them that it's been 5 years and they need to get over it and move on. Brooke agrees, but can't seem to let go of whatever happened at the party, because so MUCH has been lost.

AJ comes out of the bathroom playing or pretending to play his guitar to music on the stereo. His towel drops unnoticed from around his waist to the floor. We can see quite a bit! Miranda walks into the room and he gets all modest and says "SHIT!" among other things. Miranda makes it clear that they've grown up together and it's no big deal; she's seen him naked LOTS of times (mostly when they were little, though). They clearly have a very strong sibling-like relationship.

He replaces the towel around his waist, and they sit on the bed and look at a post someone wrote on Miranda's facebook wall. The post asks "Is Miranda Montgomery a VAG-itarian or does she eat meat?" Miranda calls them assholes (no bleeps, no wimpy substitution curse words).

Now we know that Cassandra, Natalia and Frankie are still alive, because Angie talks about how blessed she and Jesse are to have such wonderful children and how well they are doing in their lives.

Angie and Jesse have sex on the couch (we don't see that part, just the afterglow). Angie makes double entendres about the size of Jesse's equipment.

Jesse has a BIG surprise for Angie. She can't get the surprise info out of him, though. She goes to take a shower and makes more comments about he and his BIG surprise joining her in the shower. He does, but that happens off-camera.

Jesse's big surprise is that he has arranged for Cassandra to come to visit. He leaves her a message that a driver will be waiting for her with a sign with her name on it. We see her phone lit up with his call. The call is purposely being ignored.

Cortlandt Electronics is going down the tubes and Petie, who is apparently an apps genius, doesn't really want to deal with keeping it from going under. Opal urges him to do otherwise, for his dear departed father's sake, as CE was Palmer's heart and soul.

Wow, SOME of the lockers at  PVHS actually have LOCKS on them! Not Miranda's, of course. I also noticed that the front door to Jesse and Angie's house apparently does not have a deadbolt, despite it belonging to the Chief of Police (assuming he still IS COP), and despite all the chaos and mayhem that has occurred in their lives since the 1980s. Some things NEVER change. I couldn't quite see if the door had a thumblock.

Cara mentions that David is behind bars for manslaughter (presumably due to someone who died (it sounds like possibly MORE than one person died) at the cliffhanger party 5 years ago); she'll deal with him when the time comes. Oh look, there's David NOW, leaving prison! He's headed for home sweet home ... I predict some more Cara/David skin-on-skin action in the not-too-distant future.

Pete (I'll have to stop calling him Petie) is driving around town and sees a teenage girl wearing a plaid schoolgirl skirt get bumped into on the sidewalk, and her stuff tumbles to the ground. She is wearing a very showy charm bracelet. Pete gets off his wheeler-dealer phone call and helps her pick stuff up. She picks up an apple from the ground and takes a big bite out of it. She has to get going. He asks if she's late for detention. She says she's not a student. She's taking a "gap year". She teaches Art History at her old high school. He says he took an extended gap year from Stanford. She asks about it and he tells her he went to California and started his own company. He asks her name as she rushes off to school. She calls back that her name is Celia. Pete sees something shiny on the ground. He picks up a heart that must have fallen from her charm bracelet. It has a photo in it.

Miranda is all ga-ga because Hunter, the most popular boy in school, said "Hey" to her in the hallway. AJ is not impressed and tells her that the guy is a douche and a player. BTW, AJ is a ginger now. I think. It's hard to tell with the lighting. He's definitely not sporting the childhood blond mop-top hairstyle.

All the regulars are  looking GOOD! I noticed that the outdoor scenes/backdrops are quite realistic (I see plain old houses in the near distance out the back window of the taxi David takes to PV. I don't see any mountains or urbanization of PV, but it also doesn't look like the quaint town from the early days of AMC)

Pete tells Opal that the old CE factory may have more potential than he thought. He looks at the locket in his hand. He's planning to stick around for a few days. Opal gushes over him and wants them to do scrapbooking and tai-chi together while he's home. He smiles patiently at her.

Celia arrives in her room at her "old school", wherever that is, and an older woman, presumably a headmistress (or a mom or someone in some sort of authority over Celia), gets on her case for being late and then wants her to explain THIS ("this" being a condom, mercifully still in its package as opposed to recently having been donned on someone's package). Celia looks annoyed. **Edited to add that I didn't even realize that the headmistress is played by Francesca James, who played Kitty/Kelly on AMC way back in the day and later went on to become a director and producer on several soaps.**

Jesse talks on the phone to the limo driver. The driver has bad news.

David visits a grave. We do not see the name on the headstone. He says he's been in prison 5 years for what happened to "you".  Tears run down his face. But now he's back -- and there's going to be hell to pay!

All in all, I'm impressed with the first new show. I'm hoping that the fact that the show is on-line only and clearly has fewer restraints, may make it a little more realistic in some areas. Don't get me wrong; it's still a SOAP, but they clearly can show more skin and say curse words, so we may never again have to hear an AMC character use the word "crud" unless they are referring to baked-on, hard to clean food-matter in a baking pan that was left in the sink, untouched, for 3 days. It's all SHIT from here on out, and I mean that in the nicest possible way!

The teenagers are quite polished. Of course, when I say "polished", I'm thinking of The Tin Man being buffed by machinery in the Emerald City. The young actors, of course, usually have very nice young, firm skin to begin with, but even that skin has been polished down to an exquisite, doll-like finish. It's like they all just came back from a high-end detailing service. I don't have an opinion, one way or another about their acting skills. I think I like Miranda the best, though.

The adults all look marvelous, and yet more realistic than they ever did on ABC. I LOVE that so many of them are still there! It makes the transition to the revamped soap so much easier.

Robin "here we go again!" Coutellier

ON THE NEXT AMC:

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Bianca tells Miranda that she's the coolest mom EVER. Miranda asks why. Bianca says that her friend, Mallory, just scored 4 tickets for a One Direction concert at Madison Square Garden.

Jesse and someone at airport security are viewing video. The guy at the computer says the guy going through some glass doors with someone looks like a driver, presumably with Cassandra. Jesse protests that the driver HE hired said he never even picked her up or even SAW her.

Jesse tells Zach over the phone that he will never guess how "that car" was registered -- under his casino. Zach turns in his chair toward the camera and says "My casino?"

BC - Tue, 8/2/11

If Jake has been asleep since last night, why is the laptop screen still showing what he was looking at before he fell asleep? No screensaver on THAT puppy.

Presumably David keeps hounding Ben to find Dixie. How is Ben supposed to find her if he has to spend all his time on the phone being lambasted by David for not finding her? And why doesn't David have a codename for Dixie (like DADD (Dumb As Dirt Dixie))?

David is going to hint to all sorts of people that all sorts of people are still alive. Who has died that could possibly be brought back?

• Leo (Miller Falls, body never found)
• Hannah (Miller Falls (body never found)
• Zach (plane crash, body never found)
• Jenny (jet ski accident)
• Will (head smashed in with a crowbar)
• Trevor (beheaded, frozen)
• Stuart (shot)
• Braden (Just Braden) (shot and caved-in)
• Cindy (AIDS-related complications)
• Noah (shot)
• Julia (liver failure after explosion?)
• Ethan Cambias (Mardi Gras explosion aftermath)
• Babe (tornado-induced butt bleedout)
• Frank Grant (Jesse's uncle, stroke)
• Edmund (burned alive in the stable)
• Michael Cambias (shot, rotted)
• Zach Grayson (shot by Marian Colby)
• Estelle LaTour Tuggle Sago (car accident)
• Rebecca Fowler (Natalia's mom, cancer)
• Gillian (shot in the head, heart transplanted into someone else)
• Billy Clyde Tuggle (thrown off bridge in explosion, since buried)
• Ray Gardner (exploded on the Martin front lawn)
• Vanessa Bennett  (Miller Falls, body never found)
• Natalie (massive stroke)
• Silver Kane (stabbed with scissors by Natalie, last seen bobbing to the surface in a pond on the Cortlandt estate)
• Josh Madden (unaborted, shot by Zach, heart transplanted into Kendall)
• Di Henry (shot)
• Richie Novak (tire iron to the head via Annie)
• Mary Kennecott (shot by burglars in 1974)
• Erin Lavery (Satin Slayer victim)
• Stan Ulatowski (jumped out of a plane, body never found)
• Simone (Satin Slayer victim)
• Christopher Stamp (shot)
• Roger Smythe (shot)
• Jeremy (encased in cement? shot? Killed on another show)
• Sybil Thorne (died in childbirth)
• Greg Madden (buried alive, suffocated by earthquake-induced cave-in)
• Frankie (Bianca's girlfriend, shot)

(Yes I have read some possible spoilers, but I'm hoping there may be more surprises in store for us)

Robin "the mind boggles!" Coutellier

BC - Tue-Wed, 5/10-11/11

Today's product placement:  Cheerios (with a prize inside)

Those were interesting shoes Cara brought to rough it on a DWB stint (we saw them when Jake remembered her standing in front of him in a tent as she was wearing a matching bra and panties with her platform shoes.  I'm they they came in  handy when she had to slog through mud and over rocks to get to wounded people.  Okay, he did mention that it was their wedding day (he was dressed in a grubby t-shirt, loose casual pants and dog tags).  I have to say, though, that her bra DID seem to match the color of his t-shirt.

Asher creates an updated Cortlandt Electronics website (because the multi-national conglomerate doesn't already have one).  He puts bios of Caleb and Erica on the site, too.  Erica's photo, ever professional, pretty much says "LOOK AT MY BOOBS!"  I know that's the only thing that truly gives me TOTAL confidence in Cortlandt Electronics; it's all *I'LL* ever need when it comes to putting my consumer electronic needs, corporate electronic needs, and investment funds into the company.

Ryan tells Madison that he doesn't want her to be stressed at ALL; that's why he plans to micromanage her doctor appointments and probably everything else in her life from here on out.

Why do addicts in Pine Valley always have decanters out at all times?

They missed a golden opportunity when Emma asked Greenlee if she was okay.  Greenlee (lying) said:  "Good."  Emma SHOULD have said:  "Really.  I think you're miserable and I'm REALLY glad!"  What she DID say was:  "Good.  Me, too."  I'm pretty sure they meant she was not upset that Ryan and Greenlee's problem wasn't about her this time, but if they really wanted to, they could spin it that Emma was okay, too, because she knew Greenlee was on Ryan's shit-list.

Semi-TAN:  I like how Jack mentioned jury selection and how people thought he was a fool of a lawyer (because he let Erica dump him like that).  As many of you know, I'm following the Casey Anthony trial now and they are still in the process of jury selection, so it's on my mind.  BTW, one idiot of a juror in that case decided that he could get out of jury duty by talking to a news crew about it (even going so far as to tell them that's WHY he was talking to them about it.  He DID get out of jury duty.  He was also convicted of Contempt of Court and fined $450 and repeatedly blasted by the judge on national TV, and then physically escorted to the clerk's office to take care of paperwork and make arrangements to pay it off.  He'd get away with it at the Pine Valley courthouse.

Robin "but jury selection in real life is a whole 'nother story" Coutellier

BC - Tue, 3/29/11

Remember back when Colby was with her friends (Dre, etc.) and Petey was hanging around her constantly?  They had a storyline that she had a drinking problem but then dropped it.  I'm kind of surprised they haven't restarted it what with her current problems.  If anything could drive someone to drink, it would be finding out that your mother had sex with the boy/man you loved.  OTOH, it's nice to see someone working through it without resorting to substances, not that airing one's dirty laundry on youtube or pvtube or whatever is particularly healthy.

It's ridiculous that Krystal is running a business, yet she's STILL Jack's paralegal (a job for which she has no qualifications whatsoever).

Caleb tells Erica that he's waited a long time to feel alive again.  He delivers the line with all the energy and passion of someone waiting for an article about pork futures to load on the CNN website.

Line Of The Day:
Jack explains how the dockworkers helped him rescue Krystal from the water.  Erica:  "Well, how lucky the FLEET was in!"    Meee-ow!

JAR tells AJ that his mother IS going to come back to the house an they'll all be a family again.  That's a PROMISE.  What an arrogant asshole!

Robin "Have I ever mentioned that I think JAR is an asshole?  Oh yeah - a LOT" Coutellier

BC - Tue, 3/22/11

Does everyone in Pine Valley ONLY look at Pine Valley-centric things on the internet?  Does EVERYONE know about EVERY video that "goes viral"?  There are millions of things to see on the internet, yet every time anyone in PV puts anything up, regardless of the site, seemingly everyone in town (except the computer-phobic ones like Caleb) has seen it.  And Liza knows better than to go back to the place where she humiliated herself, yet she goes anyway, and wearing a tight, one-shouldered top, at that.  What time of day is it?  Is that what she wore to work as the DA?  I've made some questionable fashion choices in my working days, but I was a lot younger and I wasn't the DA.

Will Miranda Google her name and find out that she was switched at birth with AJ, JAR was her "father", a woman named after a pig was her "mother", JAR fought giving her up even when he knew she was not his biological child, and he pushed her mother over a balcony (not to mention that she was a product of rape and her mother killed her biological father and her Auntie Kendall stood trial for it)?  Of course, some of those details could get lost in all the links that would come up mentioning Erica Kane, Kendall Hart and Bianca Montgomery and involving the keywords murder, rape, trial, kidnapping, embezzlement, prison, escape, marriage, drug addiction, unabortion, divorce, coma and serial killer, along with assorted everyday keywords such as perfume, eyeliner, supermodel and fashion.

I became curious after writing the above paragraph, so I went to Wikipedia and googled some characters.  Bingo!  There are Wikipedia links for:

Bianca Montgomery
Kendall Hart
Erica Kane
Jackson Montgomery
Travis Montgomery
Barbara_Montgomery
Adam Chandler
JAR Chandler
AJ Chandler (aka Adam Chandler III)
Babe Carey
Richard Fields
Children Of All My Children
and many more, I'm sure

Reese was building a house in Paris for Bianca before they got married.  Who will get the house in the divorce settlement?

Look, there are Bianca and eBabe in the same scene.  Nope, still can't tell them apart at first glance.  Even their hair color is similar.

There were 8 candles  on AJ and Miranda's birthday cake.  AJ was six last year when he decided he wanted to be called AJ.  So is one of the candles "one to grow on"?  Once again, poor little rich boy AJ has a dismal party consisting of his parents, Miranda and Miranda's mom.  That's it.  So not only does he not have a lot of kids at the party, he has to SHARE the cake and attention with a GIRL!  And vice-versa for Miranda.  Where is Gabrielle?  She IS Miranda's sister, after all.

Erica and Caleb talk about getting a younger celebrity to draw in a younger customer base for Cortlandt Electronics.  Colby comes in bragging about her video blog fanbase and it's practically a done deal.  Cortlandt is a well-established multi-billion dollar corporation.  Can't they afford to get a REAL celebrity? 

Then Erica nudges Caleb to hire Asher to head up the project.  Yeah, because Asher not only knows everything there is to know about computers, but he has lots of management experience (consisting of stalking, corporate espionage, planting viruses, hitting people over the head and being an overall henchman for Cortlandt's arch-enemy).  Plus he has a semi-romantic involvement with their new spokesperson, who is currently a hot mess.  What could possibly go wrong?  (For one thing, I doubt either Colby or Asher even know their own social security numbers, although I suspect Asher knows a lot of OTHER people's social security numbers.)

Well, now we have the answer on the adoption issue -- Reese DID legally adopt both Gabrielle and Miranda, and now she is going for full custody of both children.

Hey, JAR.  Time to give your henchman a raise to keep him on your side.  Oops, too late.  Said henchman has decided that his nefarious workdays are a thing of the past.

Erica one-ups (or one-downs, as the case may be) Liza's one-shoulder top by wearing a one-shoulder, OFF-the-shoulder dress, thus baring both shoulders.  Is it a subliminal display of power between two rivals?

Is Angie going to stay blind?  The strain of childbirth or the surge of hormones might magically fix her eyes.  Hey, it's Pine Valley -- it could happen!  In fact, maybe someone should just bonk her on the head and it will clear it right up, like slapping the side of a TV set in the olden days used to work when the horizontal hold ceased to hold.  She'd never see it coming, after all


Jack pulled some strings and now he and Erica can have that special vacation that she wanted; the one that has been booked for 2 years and they couldn't get previously.  Erica is thrilled.  Something tells me there's a prospective honeymoon couple on their FIRST wedding who is now bitterly disappointed that their own pre-booked dream honeymoon vacation has been scuttled at the last minute.

Robin "well, my goodness I'm wordy today" Coutellier

BC - Thu, 3/3/11

I'm pretty sure Zach DID use the word "Sweetheart", and more than once.  I'm pretty sure he used that term with Greenlee, albeit in a "bestie" kind of way.  I could be wrong, but really, they should have chosen a different word.  Tad, of course, uses that endearment a LOT.  Personally, the term "Darling" usually clangs for me, so something like that might have fit better as clanging for Kendall, or eve "Dear". Only one person has ever gotten away with using that with me and even then he was from Alabama and called me "Darlin'".  It seemed natural coming from him.  Other than that exception, whenever I hear the endearment of "darling", I always think of how overused it was in movies from the 1930s when most actresses tried to sound like they were upper-class.  Those affectations  seemed fake to me even when I was a child.

Did Madison find a new (and cheaper) OB/GYN or is she planning to continue to see the out-of-network one at astronomical rates?

Why does Emma keep calling Madison?  Does Madison have a cell phone number that's really easy for a child to memorize?  You'd think Emma would call RYAN.  I can understand how she might be confused about needing to memorize so many numbers, though (it's not like Annie's going to program speed dial on all the disposable phones, after all).  Poor Emma has had to memorize SOOOOO many numbers for the veritable tsunami of parental figures in her life.  She'd need a fat, small-print phone directory deposited on her doorstep once a year just for THEM.  

Why is there a picture of Jake on the mantelpiece, but no other family members, even though it's TAD AND KRYSTAL'S house?  I suppose I could fanwank it that since Amanda and Jake are living there temporarily, Amanda put it there, but that doesn't explain the lack of photos of the rest of household (like the CHILDREN, for instance).  Besides, wouldn't Amanda put TREVOR'S photo up?  Nah, I can't even fanwank it. The first thing I thought of when Cara went over to it was an episode of "King Of The Hill".  They showed the mantelpiece at Nancy and Dale's house.  There are photos of Nancy, Dale, Joseph and JOHN REDCORN (complete with long flowing hair wafting in the breeze) on the ends.    The long-running joke on the show is that John Redcorn, an extremely hunky Native American man, is the father of Dale and Nancy's son, Joseph; Joseph looks JUST like John Redcorn, and JR and Nancy had been having an affair for about 14 years. 

Robin "not that Jake looks anything like the luscious John Redcorn" Coutellier

BC - Tue, 3/1/11

Can it be?  Is Opal actually going to have an actual STORYLINE?  Oh PLEASE let it be so!

Who "accidentally" posts a video?  No one.

Do you think the story of Cara the little boy in the hospital giving her his pudding when she was a child was a nod to the actor who played Scott as a child?  Actually not her story, so much as Tad's reaction (That dog ... oldest trick in the book!"  The child Scott was played by Philip Amelio, who also happened to be in pudding snacks commercials sharing his pudding with little girls while "Let's Get It On" played in the background


Damn, I knew it was too good to be true to give Opal a storyline.  It's just an excuse to let Caleb know Erica was planning to quit.

Jack tells Erica he doesn't know if he can trust her anymore.  Really?  He's known her since the early 1980s and he's only just NOW coming to that conclusion?  Again?

That itty-bitty digital camera Tad had just looked so cute mounted on a tripod!  Cameras have come a LOONNG way in the last 150 or so years, haven't they?  If this photo op had been staged way back when 1) there would have to be a person behind it, not a timer, and 2) the camera would have been considerably bigger if only to accommodate the glass plates that were used as negatives.  As it was, when Tad's tiny camera was used, it looked like a shrunken head on top of that tripod.

Robin "say CHEESE!" Coutellier

BC - Mon, 1/31/11

OMG, Annie put a sharp, knife-like letter opener into her purse! Do you know what this MEANS? It will tear a hole in the purse lining!

I guess Ryan didn't learn anything from the time he and a couple of others pretended to hang Richie and it almost happened for real.

Kendall and Greeenlee have a day of beauty treatment ... in the Fusion main office area. GMAFB! I know for a fact that they have a lounging area; the viewers SAW it -- it's the one with a stripper pole.

So Ryan arranged to have the entire security camera system crash just before he brought David up to the roof and they had to reboot the whole system, so David doesn't have to worry about proving Ryan took him there. Wow, I guess that would have been a good time to steal a baby or drugs, or perhaps murder someone. Too bad video evidence of anything ELSE that might have happened why Ryan took David to the roof is now lost forever.

If Krystal was really concerned that Annie might go after eBabe, why didn't she just CALL her instead of rushing over to the Chandler home? Even way back before the time of cell phones we knew about them new-fangled thingamajigs called TELEPHONES. And we complained then because all the characters in town would go over to someone's house to tell them urgent news or give dire warnings for their safety instead of just calling them.

What shrink from a loony bin just drops in unannounced on a former patient (who is staying at a hotel, not her former place of residence that would be listed in their records) at the urging of someone else, especially without any backup? Then he gets back to that other person and says that, from what he saw, he IS concerned. Talk about HIPAA violations!

All things considered, shouldn't Jesse at least wheel David INSIDE the building, given that it's, you know, JANUARY, in PENNSYLVANIA, during HISTORICALLY bad weather and David is wearing nothing but two thin hospital gowns and a lap robe? The mean temperature in Philadelphia on 1/31/11 was 24 degrees.

Robin "just sayin'" Coutellier

BC - Fri, 1/28/11

On Friday's episode, Tad gives Jesse chocolates to give to Angie. They both promptly start eating the candy, with gusto, while they still talk. Ok, who at AMC got the sudden urge to show the cast chewing, swallowing and talking all of the sudden?

I can understand why Natalia and Brot used the hotel room the first time, but why are they using it again? Don't they both have their own places?

Okay, now I have to take AWAY props from the Props department; either the telephone handset that Greenlee is holding is WAY too big or she has a very tiny head.

OMG, I was just JOKING about where Jake was going to put his fingers -- now he's telling David that he's scheduled him for a colonoscopy (right after David says he can handle "a few jabs")

So not only does Cara have no idea how to apply eyeliner, but she's rude, too. She just goes up to Tad at Krystal's, plops herself down and starts talking, completely oblivious to the fact that Tad is sitting WITH someone (someone he's investigating for possibly stealing drugs from the hospital). Then she asks him if he's worked any good cases lately.

Fusion is seriously going to have an ad campaign glamorizing a woman carrying a GUN? What next, they create an applicator shaped like a gun? They should go to Cara to find out where she gets hers from, because I suspect she uses a bazooka for that.

Robin "will the gun shoot lipstick tubes shaped like bullets?" Coutellier

BC - Wed, 1/26/11

Cara said what she loved about Jake when they were in Doctors Without Borders was that he embraced the world and never ran from it. Hello? That's WHY he was in DWB -- he was running away from Pine Valley.

Tidbits:
When eBabe saw the missed call log on JAR's phone, the times Annie called (just on the one screen) were:

7:47p
7:48p
7:56p
8:03p
8:05p
8:09p
8:10p

So the question is: Why are the children at a party so late on a school night?

Tad tells Damon that he's the most wonderful surprise he ever got. I have to wonder if Kathy was thinking: "What am I, chopped liver?"

Robin "bye-bye, Finn; I hope we see more of you in the future" Coutellier

BC - Tue, 1/18/10

I don't think Alicia Minshew was mic'd properly today. She kept fading too quiet or too loud, no matter how much I adjusted the volume.

Jesse handcuffs David to his bed. Dr. Castillo asks what he's supposed to do if he needed to take him in for tests. Hint, Dr. Castillo: The bed has wheels.

TAN/OT: Imagine my horror/that-figures when I clicked on a link at CNN about a ripoff airline and saw the photo accompanying the article!

It DOES make me wonder if that's what Zach's plane looked like before it crashed into the ocean.

Robin "the airline is apparently as consistently irritating as one might expect, given its name" Coutellier

BC - Wed, 12/29/10

Oh PLEASE tell me that wobblycam/swingcam/jerkycam technique they used in the ER today is temporary!!! We've gone through this at various times in the past on AMC and it has NEVER been a good idea and it's never lasted. It's a particularly bad idea for ME because that kind of thing can trigger labrynthitis (aka vertigo). There are shows I've never watched for exactly that reason. Why would they do something that drives viewers away? It's supposed to make it look realistic, fast-paced and edgy I suppose, but here's what I think (aside from the physical effect it has on me): It makes it look amateurish. What, they can't afford to pay a competent cameraperson now? Why go high-tech high-def only to use low-tech camera gimmicks? The camera doesn't hold still for even a second. They should show Jake telling a nurse to get a meter and check the cameraperson's blood sugar, because he/she seems to have a case of the shakes. I thought it was ironic that while they were doing that Cara was blathering on about their past and her efforts to get rid of a headache.

Marissa tells Krystal that she's not going to get stuck in that mess again (with the Chandler men), but that she IS going to help Scott get out. So why was she acting like a giggly, lovestuck teenager earlier while she was on the phone with Scott?

JAR's visit to the prison simply to taunt Scott was just plain creepy.

I really liked Jake's line when he pointed out to Amanda that Annie does not have relationships, she has OBSESSIONS. Well said.

What I did NOT like was Jake broaching the subject to Amanda of having another baby, since it is an obvious reaction to having his ex-wife in town. How trite.

When Annie discovers that a bouquet of roses JAR bought are not meant for her, but Marissa, he tells her that when he gets HER flowers, it won't be an afterthought and it would be way more than just a dozen. Then he turns around and fills her room at the Yacht Club with flowers. And Annie FALLS for it, at least at first. In what way were those flowers not a calculating afterthought? Did I miss something and he had all the flowers done for Annie and Marissa was the afterthought since he was already ordering flowers? These people have the memories of fleas.

Robin "what, no Venus Fly-Trap?" Coutellier

BC - Tue, 12/22/10

JAR sent a sexy text message to Annie while they were at BJ's, and she zipped over to their trysting room at the Yacht Club. He followed shortly thereafter. Wouldn't he have had messages and phone calls about the SEC decision that should have gotten his attention? I guess he ignored everything but Annie. Tsk, tsk.

Ryan arranges for a doctor to give Madison a complete and thorough medical exam tomorrow morning (re her shoulder gunshot wound), without even asking Madison. The doctor then informs her of that fact and doesn't even stick around to find out if Madison will be there, let alone if Madison gave Ryan permission to speak for her in a medical capacity or otherwise. No HIPAA violations there, no sir.

Okay, Madison? Sweetie? Let's have a talk. Here's the thing -- the next time Ryan insists on getting all up in your business, and pleads with you to EXPLAIN how you are feeling about him breaking up with you, you need to kick/knee him in the nads, because telling him in no uncertain terms (and "what about stay out of my life" was unclear IS no uncertain terms, as was the earlier part when you told him to stay the f**k out of your life) . Of course, most of Ryan's body is made of titanium, so even that might not have any effect. He's been known to bounce off cliffs, after all. Hmmmm. Well, short of cyanide (which would probably only make him burp and smell like almonds), I guess there really isn't much you CAN do. Just know that we feel your pain and would like to punch him in the face and/or kick/knee him in the nads as much as (and probably more than) YOU do.

Have you ever had a boyfriend/lover dump YOU and then have him keep pestering you to let him know how you feel about it, no matter how many times you tell him to go away and that you are very, very hurt by him? Me neither. Try to be friends, yeah; stick around after you tell him he doesn't have to and, indeed, to stay away? Nope.

You know that door slam was edited in when JAR took Melissa's hand, because neither one of them jumped when it happened. They just turned their heads to look.

Is Spike going to run away to look for Daddy Zach?

Okay, Madison. Sweeeetieeee ... Here's the thing. STOP GOING TO CONFUSION! Hanging out in a place where you will be almost guaranteed to run into Greenlee and/or Ryan on a regular basis is injecting yourself into THEIR lives. What part of "get the f**k out of my life" did YOU not understand? What are you, a masochist?

The Pine Valley Bulletin missed a prime opportunity when they left off "... AGAIN" from their headline of:

WILL ERICA KANE BEGIN THE NEW YEAR IN PRISON?"

Robin "PA has a Three Strikes law; I think Erica may have or is about to exceed her quota of convictions" Coutellier

BC - Fri, 12/3/10

I notice they've stopped using the park for every other scene. Apparently they've finally had to concede that it's December and it gets COLD and/or overcast, even in California.

Does Erica have a special bank account just for criminal defense funds? My Mom always has a Christmas Club account every year and she has another one she uses just to put money aside for a chiropractor. I'm thinking Erica has a Get-Out/Keep-Out-Of-Prison account, perhaps at her local Wells Fargo. Oh what am I saying? It would be at the Pine Valley National Bank, of course.

Asher tells Bianca that her computer has frozen because her memory is overloaded. She apparently downloaded several hundred pictures. He says he told her to put them on an external hard drive. Uh, unless she has several hundred pictures OPENED at the same time, having several hundred photos residing on her hard drive isn't going to slow the computer down (let alone FREEZE it). If all of them are in the same folder, it might slow it down slightly to list them all.

Ah, I see they finally got a guard outside of David's room. He might have been there all along, but he sure as hell wasn't keeping anyone out.

Robin "he probably has a 'kick me' sign on his back & wonders why people keep putting their feet in his ass" Coutellier

BC - Tue-Thu, 11/9-11/10

Greenlee and Ryan decide (at first separately) to go after the sleazy guy who testified about losing his job. Greenlee says she should be the one to do it. Ryan says HE should be the one to do it. Greenlee: "Why? Because you're a man?" How about because THE JURY IS DELIBERATING IN YOUR MURDER TRIAL AND COULD COME BACK WITH A VERDICT AT ANY MOMENT SO YOU SHOULDN'T BE LEAVING TOWN, LET ALONE THE STATE. Just a thought.

There's no way in HELL a room that is THAT nice that's in a hotel does not have a keycard lock. No. Way.

Why did Greenlee pass out? Her head didn't even hit the gravel, and if it had -- it's GRAVEL, which at least has some give. What a wuss! She landed with her arm out for her head to conveniently land on, though, so a shoulder dislocation or rotator cuff tear wouldn't be out of the question. Ryan later said that she had the wind knocked out of her. No she didn't -- she would have been struggling for air if that were the case, rather than falling in a pretty pose and staying motionless in that position for quite some time.

Ryan proceeds to "lose" the phone he used to call Kendall. He does so by hitting it a few times with Greenlee's shoe, breaking the glass and plastic on it. I notice that he did not, however, remove the battery (although the battery compartment door had popped off). Idiot.

Robin "I hate Greenlee/Ryan-centric days" Coutellier

BC - Mon, 11/8/10

Greenlee is wearing really heavy, black makeup on her eyes. You'd think she'd want the jury to be seeing someone who looks at least non-threatening and confident in her own looks, not someone who looks like an ancient Egyptian siren open for business or someone who fell for looking through novelty binoculars. I'm tellin' ya, she has NO concept of the "natural look" cosmetic line that SHE spent so much time launching. She reminds me of someone I used to work with a long time ago. People made fun of her behind her back because she always looked like she slept without washing off the eyeliner and mascara and then just piled more on top of the leftovers the next day. Every now and then this "look" comes into fashion, and when it does, I always think the women succumbing to it look like they have dirty eyes.

Speaking of inappropriate appearances, that is an EXTREMELY inappropriate red dress Erica is almost wearing. I know the press conference was impromptu, but GEEZE, cover UP, woman! She's supposed to be running a corporation, not a Frederick's of Hollywood franchise! But nooooo, there she is, standing by Caleb's side (Caleb is covered from neck to toe) looking like she's about to make an appearance at the Playboy Club. Imagine she was wearing bunny ears on her head and a collar around her neck and you'll see what I mean.

I'm still confused about the sale of Cortlandt to Chandler. Yes, there was a dummy corporation in place to buy it, but Caleb WAS selling it. He didn't WANT to have anything to do with it, other than to sell it. There is, of course, the issue of Scott stealing the Cortlandt nanotech ideas, so that part is certainly an issue, but the fact that Caleb sold the company to an entity that then transferred the ownership to Chandler doesn't seem like a LEGAL swindle. Yes, the other "entity" was deliberately set up to buy the company for Chandler, so there is some fraud as far as intent goes, but unless Caleb had some specific legal reasons for not selling to them, I don't understand it. Caleb didn't want the Chandlers to get it because JAR and Adam Chandler are assholes, and Palmer never would have wanted Chandlers to own his company. Those aren't legal reasons to void a sale. The key is Scott's theft of technology, and that's what they should focus on.

If Caleb didn't know about the baby until Sonia went to the mine to tell him about it (at which time he delivered the baby), and he knew Sonia had been "stolen" by Adam, how would he have any authority to "give Asher away"? Wait he and Sonia were still married then, weren't they?

Robin "for a lawyer, he's not too bright" Coutellier

BC - Mon, 9/27/10

Why would Bianca hire Asher to teach Miranda to do computer stuff and leave her ALONE with him? She has no idea who Asher is. You'd think someone in her position would have a background check done on someone before giving him access to her child/children and unsupervised access to a computer with Cortlandt business files on its hard drive.

eBabe is going to sue for custody of AJ. Gee, what a surpri-- oh, I can't even type it ...

Obviously Erica is about to make a reappearance. I haven't look at her Twitters, but when they mentioned how many people follow her, I had to wonder how many of those followers (on their real-life Twitter account) are fake.

I suspect Ryan was talking on the phone to Jack about Greenlee's legal situation, since Jack and Erica are about to return to town anyway.

Robin "looking refreshed, I'm sure" Coutellier