Episode 101 Morals

In plain English, these are the morals from Episode 101:

Did Michael's words to Phyllis come across correctly?

When Michael mentioned his client was Mrs. Victor Newman, alarm bells went off in my mind. What a stupid way of titling people anyway, but on a soap one might as well make the best of the pain that comes of ambiguity--so I tried to illustrate that here.

Will Jill come across something of value to Esther?

I keep expecting one of Jill or Esther to see that they're more alike than different and exploit it somehow to create an alliance. I wasn't around at the time of Jill's employment with Katherine, but my sense is that Esther must feel pretty much now like Jill did then--like she's getting the short end of the stick. And either she should be smart enough to mention to Jill that she could be a useful ally, or Jill should be smart enough to realize she could enlist Esther. But Katherine's got enough power on her side already. Anyway, I decided to try it another way than the show's been going. What else is Another Way Out for, after all?

Will Sharon become cross over Grace's latest ploy?

I was thinking things have been going well the last few weeks and then boom--last Friday's episode with the completely unbelievable timeline. We have Cole calling the office and Victoria's secretary just sitting there as if it's mid-day telling him she's not around. At the same time we have Grace working late and calling Nick back in. Then finally, to add insult to injury, Nick comes back home after leaving in the middle of one dinner and suggests another dinner (hot dogs and hamburgers).

And I won't even get into the idea of eating and swimming at the same time--something I was raised never to do because of fear of getting cramps and drowning.

Also, Grace seems to have lost her drive lately. She used to be more pro-actively conniving. Lately on the show she's just pouty all the time like Ashley, waiting for something to fall in her lap and willing to do nothing to help it. So I thought I'd help her out here by reactivating a small bit of her spine. Nick's gonna have some serious explaining to do in the morning!

Will Victoria's kid come into the world blessed by the cross?

Ever since I worked out the numbers on a divorce, I don't understand how Neil can make this offer he's made to Victoria. And now he also wants her to move in with him? On the show, it's as if he forgot he has a wife. Even Malcolm introduced Neil to the model recently as "unattached". Uh, to paraphrase the recent Hertz advertising campaign: "There's `unattached' and there's `not exactly'." And Neil is definitely the latter.

On the other hand, if Dru died, everything would work out for Neil. It's on days like this that I'm sad that Y&R tries to paint so many people as "basically good". I have on past occasions pushed for Keith Dennison to be a racist--not because I have anything against any particular race, but because it would be good to have some conflict and angst on the show. And I want Michael to still have his evil side (e.g., causing Danny's mugging). And here it'd be great if Neil was driven by ambition and really was after Victoria for her money. Would he kill his wife just to make the chance? That'd be more interesting than this nonsense that's going on with someone we're supposed to believe is ever-so-honorable only he just happened to "forget" he was married and that this might be an impediment to remarrying. Yeah, right.

And then the idea of pulling a Y&R (recycling a plotline) was just too irresistable, with Cole asking Ashley if he could do like Victor had done. I mean, gee--the "oops, I changed my mind and decided to stay with this person I said I was only going to be with for a short time" plot might have been a good plot the first time. But then it was re-tried immediately with Ryan and Trisha. (Why can Y&R never settle for just doing a good idea once?) I mean, as long as we're recycling it for them, might as well get as much mileage out of it as possible, right? So I used it again.

That's all for Episode 101's morals. Don't miss Episode 102 and its morals!
If you missed any older episodes, see the index.