ABC; Monty Brinton/CBS
Mother Loads: GH’s Sasha (Sofia Mattsson) and Y&R’s Billy (Jason Thompson, with Jess Walton as Jill) felt the burn of mama drama.
There’s a lot of drama being mined between parents and kids, and most of it involves betrayal.
Abandoning your child is a biggie and General Hospital’s Sasha was not going to let Holly off the hook for it. When Sidwell kidnapped Sasha to get his diamonds back from Holly, she wished him luck getting anything from her thieving mom.
Sasha (to Sidwell): “The biggest con Holly ever ran was pretending to be a mother.”
Surprisingly, Holly gave up the diamonds to save Sasha. Robert, Holly and Sasha gathered in Brennan’s office after the explosive denouement, where Sasha assumed the stones must have been fake. Nope!
Holly: “There’s nothing more important to me than you.”
Since when?! Sasha was on the right track, though, because Holly was soon looking to fence the remaining stolen diamond and skip town. Who better to turn to than her long-time romantic rival?
Anna: “Have you come to confess to one of your many crimes?”
Holly: “You’re adorable. Never change.”
Roping Anna into the retconned Scorpio family was smart, because if Anna buys it, we might buy it. GH played fast and loose with the Robert/Anna/Holly timeline but revealing Sasha as Robert and Holly’s daughter anchored Sasha with a core family, broke up her sweet-but-boring romance with Cody, and propelled her to a misguided one-night stand with her ex, Michael, which will likely produce a baby — and you can’t say that’s not dramatic.
Holly won’t be around for that, though. True to form, she abandoned Sasha again and said good-bye via phone message.
Holly: “I’m leaving to keep you safe. Try and find a way to get to know Robert.”
Sasha might have been able to do that if Holly hadn’t taken her new dad with her. Robert showed up on the tarmac (where Brennan had arranged a plane to Lisbon for Holly to protect her from the “crime syndicate” after her) and announced he was going with her. Sorry, Sasha! The good news is Mommy and Daddy are back together. The bad news is it’s in Lisbon. Talk about duplicity…
Nina and Willow are another fraught mother and daughter. They’re sleeping with the same man — unbeknownst to Willow, who will see it as 1) a betrayal and 2) gross.
Nina (to Ava): “It started as hate sex and then I found about this thing Drew was having with Willow, so I started sleeping with him to distract him from her. It was not a great plan.”
Or a believable one. Nina’s gone off the rails since her marriage to Sonny ended so she can’t be a voice of reason for Willow who just boffed Drew — her husband’s uncle — on the floor of the children’s playroom. Contrast that with Sonny’s loyalty to his selfish daughter Kristina (“I’ll be there, no questions asked”) and Jason’s promise to Danny that he’ll have his back re: Danny’s future home (“No matter what, you’ve got me”). It’s funny that the mobsters are stepping up in the parental department while some mothers are not. It’s even funnier that the Quartermaine house has become PC’s premiere daycare. Who’d have thought Sam’s kids would wind up there with Dante’s mother, or that the errant Jason would be willing to raise Danny?
Alexis: “Jason is not prepared to raise a teenager.”
Olivia: “Who is?”
She’s on it. I smell a custody battle with some pretty unfit parents jockeying for those kids. Monica might need to add another wing — along with a new rug for that playroom.
When push came to shove between Ridge’s daughter and his eight-time wife, Brooke, on Bold and Beautiful, Steffy demanded he choose.
Steffy: “It’s her or me!”
Ridge backed Steffy while Brooke sided with her daughter, Hope, over the lingerie mishap. But curiously, Brooke chose to confront Steffy’s mother, Taylor, more harshly than Ridge (who was actually involved in Hope’s firing).
Brooke: “I’m not going to let Steffy’s bias against my daughter end her career. I have serious concerns about Steffy.”
Taylor: “Save your concern for Hope.”
My concern is for Steffy’s mental health — she’s been stuck on a loop for weeks.
Steffy: “I cannot watch Hope make play after play for my husband. Hope has been disrespecting me, going after my husband, I wish she would find another man and not go after my husband. I told Hope to stay away from my husband. Hope wants my husband.”
How many times can B&B fit “my husband” into each episode? Don’t answer that.
Days of Our Lives is using EJ’s long history of cheating and bad behavior to inform his son Johnny’s similar antics. “DiMera men are passionate,” offered EJ during a discussion about Johnny cheating on Chanel. Is that a defense?
The show also exchanged Xander’s lunatic, criminal mother for Philip’s lunatic, criminal mother — which at least gives us more classic lines.
Kate: “What the hell are you doing in my son’s room?”
Vivian: “You mean my son.”
Ah, the perils of the stolen embryo. This set-up has the potential to mine drama and humor — like when Philip asked Viv to leave so he could get dressed.
Vivian: “Oh, please. I carried you in my womb until you emerged naked and glorious.”
Philip: “That’s an image I request you never reference again.”
Ha!
For double dealing, you can’t beat Young and Restless’s Diane Jenkins firing her own son from Jabot, which was his family company. He tried to move on but…
Victor: “Your mother wants you to fail at Glissade.”
Kyle: “I will fight her with everything I have.”
Clearly something was up with Jack and Diane “splitting,” but she really sold it to Victor.
Diane: “I have no choice but to sue Glissade for stealing my idea.”
Victor: “You do that, and you commit professional suicide.”
Diane: “Fire Kyle and turn Glissade over to me.”
That’s harsh. And where do we file Phyllis’s defense of her son, even if it’s hurting his case?
Phyllis: “I’m gonna gaslight Sharon. I will always fight for my son.”
Daniel: “You’re making things worse.”
Okay, that’s not helpful. Phyllis’s rival, Christine, defending Daniel is a fun wrinkle, as is Christine believing Phyllis’s theory that Sharon killed Heather.
Christine (to Daniel): “She acts like a guilty person. I know I can’t take a vibe to court, but when you add that to the fact that Sharon was the last person who saw her alive, Phyllis might have it right this time.”
If she lives…
For theatrics, Victor urging Jill to run her son out of Chancellor so he could buy it was next level.
Victor: “What surprises me is a woman of your business savvy can think Billy Boy can run a company of Chancellor’s size. He has failed at every business venture he has ever undertaken.”
Jill: “You have forgotten about the many blunders Adam has made over the years and the countless times your children have tried to push you out.”
Victor and Jill did raise some lemons, but at least she admits it.
Jill: “You will no longer be running things.”
Billy: “What?”
Drama!
Hey. It’s only my opinion.
