AMC:

I may get all kinds of rotten tomatoes thrown at me for this, but I'm actually on Kendall's side.

*ducks*

Come on now, hear me out! Yeah, Kendall's been uber-focused on Spike and his sudden deafness, but I'm really believing it's not because she expects perfection from her son, or that she will love him any less because he is deaf now. I believed - from the start - that her behavior had more to do with guilt and some major Post-Partum disjointedness than any desire to have perfect children. I mean, yes... we all want our children to be 100%, healthy, happy and well-adjusted, I think that's what Kendall wants, too.

I firmly believe all her "craziness" regarding Spike comes from a deep, deep-seated sense of guilt and a sense that she somehow failed Spike. That sense was confirmed on Friday's ep, when she told Zach that she keeps hurting Spike. He was understandably taken aback, as the WTF look on his face attested. She went on to explain that SHE let Greenlee take Spike and he got hurt. She left his hospital room to take a walk and Greenlee got to him again. No matter what anybody says, she feels responsible for what happened to her son and - combined with all the post-partum bounce back and roiling of emotions and hormones, it's a wonder she's not completely bouncing off the walls right now.

She feels helpless as well as guilty. She can't do ANYTHING for Ian, which only compounds that sense of helplessness, so she focuses on something she feels she CAN do; try to find a cure for something she believes is her fault: a "cure" for Spike's deafness. No, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense from the outside, but where Kendall is right now? I think it makes perfect sense to her. The capper for me was at the end of Friday's episode, when Kendall was staring longingly at the new mom holding her baby in her arms. There are times when Kendall can really get to me and this was one of them. When she told that woman that she didn't have her baby and asked if she could hold hers? God, I was aching for her so much it was killin' me!

That said? It's time to move things along. It need not be dragged out ad-nauseum, to the point where people just don't care anymore. I'm hoping that when they find her in that poor woman's room, that they recognize how much Kendall is truly hurting and that they get her the help she needs. Where the hell did Erica go, all of a sudden? Her daughter's baby is still in trouble, not to mention Kendall herself, and she's nowhere to be found? WTF?! And she was doing so well with the mom stuff for a while.

Now, all of this is not to say that Zach doesn't also need help. The poor man has been through hell and now it's going to get even worse - what with Kendall breaking down before his very eyes. He has had so much to deal with that he's bound to breakdown right alongside his wife if they don't catch a break soon.

Onto something really annoying... Ava Benton. Do I really need to explain why? I was willing to give this sister-sister act a chance, but Ava is such a poorly conceived, badly written caricature that I just can't. I don't feel sorry for her, I'm not rooting for her, I'm just sick of her. Maybe it's all the overblown hype about Britney, Paris, Lindsay, et al, but I'm tired of seeing young women who think that fame (or infamy?) is the end all be all of existence. Not fame because of their talent, but because their lives are completely trashed. Ava is SEEKING this? Why? She wants to be loved for herself, who doesn't? But, she's seen how Lily is loved beyond all due madness, why isn't that kind of adoration good enough for her? The kind of love and adoration Lily enjoys is REAL, what Ava is apparently looking for has nothing to do with reality. It's empty, it's hollow, it's meaningless. If it weren't, then the Paris', Britney's, and Lindsay's would all be so much more well adjusted and happy than they are. Please, please, please... stop the Ava madness. If I want to see a young woman headed for a train wreck, all I have to do is open the newspaper or log onto the internet - AMC is supposed to be an ESCAPE! Word to TPTB? Ava is FF material and always will be as long as she's written this way.

OLTL:

I wanted to go on and on about the wonderfulness of seeing beloved old favorites returning to the OLTL fold, but I noticed how many others were covering that and thought I'd spare you too much more of it. Suffice it to say, as rushed as Asa's funeral was, (and it was) it really WAS so wonderful to see old faves return.

Most notable, Nathan Fillion. What a really, really great guy, coming back like that and paying tribute to the show that essentially got him started. His scenes with Erika Slezak were heartwarming and felt very real. Even my daughter commented that they seemed to genuinely like each other and that when Viki told Joey how much she missed him and how she thought about him all the time? It was as though Erika were also talking to Nathan. Very nice.

I was also struck by how nice it was to see the Buch-sibs bonding together after the service. Natalie and Jess were actually tolerable in those scenes! (YAAAY!) And though Nathan had never worked with either woman before, or Dan Gauthier, it sure felt like they had. And the crown jewel in that scene? Viki and Clint standing in the doorway, watching their children together for the first time in YEARS. Brought a smile to my face and a tear to my eyes. Nicely done.

Also nicely done, as mentioned in numerous other columns? Bob Woods performance was of the AWESOME!! He really knocked this one out of the park, didn't he? Shows you (*cough-the-powers-that-be-cough*) what an old vet can do when given a chance to shine, eh? That was the Bo Buchanan of old. If he doesn't get an Emmy nod for that scene, then the fix really IS in.

Know who else was killing me? Nigel. From the very first moment when he discovered Asa's body, you could see the grief in every line of his body. He didn't just sit down in that chair when it hit him, he virtually folded with grief, causing me to immediately tear up - and I didn't even LIKE Asa! Then, when Max arrived and Renee rushed into his arms? *melt, melt, melt* Nice touch there, remembering the bond between those two. Renee always did love Max like a son, and it was nice to see them pay tribute to that connection. And hasn't Max just gotten better with time? He still exudes masculinity and charm and sex appeal just by walking into a room. Love that he still has that Max-twinkle in his eye - as though he's just on the verge of doing something very naughty. LOVE him and miss him desperately! It was also nice to see them stay true to character when Alex Olanov walked in. The expression on Renee's face was PRICELESS and spot on.

All in all, what TPTB did give us, although lacking in length... (seriously, only TWO days devoted to a major player like Asa Buchanan?!) . it certainly wasn't lacking in emotion. Well done. And... I have to get this out there: MAX, COME HOME!!!!

GH:

Okay, you probably already have some idea what's coming... (Am I really that predictable?) Sam, Sam, Sam...

*shakes head*

I have been perusing numerous soap boards these past few weeks and I've been hearing a lot of Sam fans lamenting over how the writers have utterly destroyed the character of Sam McCall - as in changed her into a completely different human being. So, in the interest of fair-play and objectivity, I went back through the You Tube snippets of days past to refresh my memory about who and what Sam was when she first appeared on our screens. Now, I may get a lot of hate-mail for this, but...

Sam hasn't really changed from who she was back then!

*bobs, weaves, dodges rotten fruit*

Seriously. And I'm not slamming the woman. She was a con, through-and-through, right out of the gate. She cared for no one but herself, and it was clear to see how she had transformed herself into the type of woman Jax would find interesting. Let us not forget that she did everything in her power to keep Jax from reaching his dying father and then showed little-to-no remorse when she succeeded. (Not that I believe she WANTED Jax's father to die, just that it was no skin off her nose when he did.) That was no different than what she is doing to Lucky right now. She is transforming herself into the woman he needs her to be - the woman who is needy and hurt and desperately in need of his heroism. Lucky needs to feel like he's a hero, Sam is giving him a chance to be her rescuer. He wants to hear that he is good and oh-so-undeserving of the betrayal Lizzeh heaped upon him, and that he is in no way at fault for her sleeping with Jason that fateful night. Sam is giving him that and... she is operating in EXACTLY the manner that Amelia said she does with all of her cons. She makes herself into whatever the mark needs/wants her to be. Amelia may be bitter, but it doesn't mean she's wrong about who and what Sam is.

I'm also starting to believe that it's possible Sam never really loved Jason after all. Maybe she did love him, as much as she was capable of loving someone, but I don't believe, for one moment, that you can love someone as deeply as she claimed to love Jason, and then turn around and do the things to them (or the people they care about) that she has done to Jason. The Jakenapping was unforgivable enough, but to go even further now and terrorize a mother (no matter how much you hate her) and her two INNOCENT CHILDREN? Then to laugh about it later on with your hirelings about how scared said mother was and how great it was that she "bought it"? That's beyond reprehensible. That's out-and-out evil. What really scares me? Is that SOME (not all) Sam fans are actually cheering her on! One fanatic even remarked that it was perfectly acceptable for Sam to do that, "because that's what you do when you're in love. You get payback." Now, even though I'm fairly sure the person who made that remark was only thirteen years old, that doesn't give me any comfort. For someone - anyone - to actually believe that what Sam is doing is any indication of the way REAL love works? Well, let's just say I'm more than a little disturbed, frightened, and sad that that could be the case. At any rate, whatever is going on with KeMo and her contract, things don't look too hopeful for Sam. Word has it that, even with Jason threatening to kill her if she doesn't stop messing with Lizzeh, she is going to continue to mess up Lizzeh's life in numerous imaginable and unimaginable ways for the foreseeable future. Word also has it that she will, in fact, end up dead (as in presumed dead) but, is that at her own hands, or someone else's?

Onto Lucky... I pounced fairly vigorously on him last time, but it bears repeating: Lucky, you are a colossal ass! One minute you're up Lizzeh's arse about wanting her to fight for you and your marriage and the next you're all up in Sam's thong, and checking out her tonsils with your tongue. And people call Lizzeh the hypocrite? Speaking of Lizzeh, It was nice to see her finally get her panties in a wad enough to actually verbally smack Lucky down, when he followed her to the hospital to wank on about how unfair it was for her to be upset that he would be acting as Sam's bodyguard. (Not that her words actually hit the mark, cause we all know the light's on but Lucky's not home!) She said what I have been saying for months - despite the fact that she is wrong, wrong, wrong, ever to have kept the Jake-truth from him, and the NOP, and to have ever remarried him in the first place, the difference between her lies and his actions? She did what she did out of a (WAY-misguided) sense of protection - for him and her boys - not herself. Lucky can NOT claim the same about his own misdeeds.

Maxie. *sigh*

There are times when I get a kick out of the girl. Really. Sometimes she just cuts through all the bull and manages to tell it like it is. Other times, I think she just gets off on being the biggest bitch she can be. Why? I dunno. Yeah, she's had a rough life, but she's not alone. She's not unloved. So why does she take SO much pleasure in ripping people to shreds - even those who have never done anything to her! (Like Spinelli!) She's like Ric in a sense, that even when she has it so good - as in a great guy like Coop - that's still not good enough. (Ric had it great twice before: when he was with Lizzeh and then when he was with Alexis.) Ric blew it big time, and Maxie's doing the same thing. And. I'm sorry Lu-gan fans, but I want Logan far, far, FAR away from Lulu. I wanted that the minute he made that skanky bet with Maxie and I want it even more now. I don't care that he's actually fallen for her. If he really loved and RESPECTED her, he would have told her the Maxie-truth and let the chips fall where they may. Lulu would have blamed Maxie, I'm sure, and not walked away from Logan in the end. There's nothing romantic about that story whatsoever. I hope Luke comes back SOON and beats that punk to a pulp for trifling with his daughter. (I know, I know, it won't happen.)

Trevor Lansing. Hmmm... This could be either really, really good, or really, really bad. Clearly, we're supposed to hate him just because he's Sonny's enemy. I "hate" him because of the choice he forced upon Sonny's mama, oh-so-long-ago, and because he made Ric grow up to be such a pathetic, needy mess. But, I was intrigued by that last comment he made to Sonny at the end of Friday's show. "Are you still a MAD DOG?!" Made me wonder if he was just messing with Sonny's head or if he really sees Sonny that way (and has since he was a mere five-year-old). I'm guessing that Trevor is just twisted - especially given that he made Adele (Sonny and Ric's mom) even consider choosing between her two children. Trevor is clearly meant to be the evil. I'm just hoping that this storyline serves to give Ric more depth. More layers. He's too one-dimensional in his Sonny obsession and has needed to be fleshed out for years. Here's hoping we get that with the arrival of his evil Daddy.

That's all for now, my friends. Belly up to the bar and have a drink or three on me!

CC