Deep Soap: The Good And The Bad

Fathers And Long Lost Sons

The farther The Bold & The Beautiful strays from the never ending Ridge, Brooke and Taylor triangle, the more that I enjoy it. I like the way that Brad Bell chose to introduce Marcus’s father, Justin Barber. I am thrilled that Justin is a powerful executive who can go toe to toe with the Forresters. I feared that Justin would turn out to be “street.” Thankfully, that unfortunate trend in soap writing for African American characters has finally died. His basketball scholarship was mildly cliched — couldn’t it have been something unexpected like fencing? Or academics? But teenage Donna would definitely have wanted to date the jock. I also liked that Donna hid her pregnancy for noble reasons and that Justin agreed that she did the right thing by putting their child up for adoption. While there are teen parents who go on to be great successes, it is unlikely that Justin would have ended up as Bill Spencer’s head of M&A if he had given up that scholarship to raise his child.

Soaps have a tendency to demonize adoption. (Why soap adoptive parents go through all the trouble of adopting a child only to neglect and abuse him is something I have never understood.) While Marcus has alluded to his adoptive parents as merely providing for him rather than loving him, that has so far just been a little backstory to explain why he wanted to find his biological parents. The storyline is also moving quickly. Instead of months of Justin wondering what Donna is hiding from him followed by months of Marcus being confused about why Justin is taking such a interest in him, everyone has figured things out right away. Justin immediately suspected Marcus was his child. Marcus saw Donna hugging an African American man who looked old enough to be his father and jumped to the logical conclusion.

Donna and Justin already have better chemistry than Donna and Eric. When they are together, Donna seems like a three dimensional person instead of a stereotypical gold digger. It will be interesting to see whether being a Forrester means more to Donna than getting a second chance with her first love. I cannot imagine why anyone other than Stephanie would choose Eric over Justin, but Jackie seems to be the only woman on this show not in the Forrester thrall.

Aaron D. Spears is a charismatic edition to the cast. He occasionally has the newbie’s tendency to make each line of dialogue as intense as possible, but his talent is evident. I am waiting to see when the significance of Justin’s last name being Barber is revealed. Given the number of Y&R and B&B crossovers, Justin Barber must be related to Genoa City’s Olivia and Dru. Will Dru pop up in Los Angeles? Will Lily model for Forrester? Will Olivia get a storyline? I am intrigued and hope the show continues to focus on the non-Forresters. They’re the most interesting people in Los Angeles.

Evil Minus The Plan

Now that Patty’s reign of terror on The Young & The Restless is over — at least temporarily — I am still unsure what Victor’s end game was. He gave her a new face and made sure she was hired at Jabot. I assumed that at some point viewers would learn what Victor’s goal was. My guesses were that he was using Patty to help him take over Jabot or bankrupt the company. If Victor’s goal was to make Jack fall in love with the woman who shot him, well, that would be pretty lame revenge. Jack would be disturbed when he found out, but so what? He’s dated plenty of other crazy women. Based on the dialogue, Victor had not thought beyond getting her hired at Jabot and seducing Jack. Other characters accused him of wanting Patty to kill Jack, but there was never any hint of that in his scenes with Patty. If Victor wanted Jack dead, why not just hire a hit man? As much as Victor and Jack hate each other, I have never gotten the sense that either truly wants to murder his nemesis. Sure, Jack might leave Victor lying on the ground when he had a heart attack, but that is a lot different then pre-meditated violence. As annoying as it is that Victor always comes up on top, at least his plans have always been well thought out. This one seems like he, and the writers, were making it up as they went along.

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