Year of Suck Soap in Review: 2012

2012 will go down as the year we got our show back, y’all. I’ll be honest, I’d just about given up hope. Especially after the train wreck straight into a turd pile that was 2011.

The last 12 months may not have been completely perfect in Port Charles, but they were still pretty effing amazing. Let’s relive the wonder and the WTF together, shall we?

General Hospital 2012

CARLY: A new year, new beginnings!
SONNY: Nope, everyone in town is still yelling at you about keeping your hopes that Jax is alive a secret from me, the man who recently tried to murder him.
CARLY: Damn it.

JASON: Sorry, Michael. Didn’t see you standing there in the road due to my Franco-rage blackout.
MICHAEL: Jason, you’ve raised and protected me all my life, and even sent yourself to prison for me. But you didn’t immediately tell me that my mom thinks Jax is alive. Which means you’re the worst person ever and I hate you, I hate you, I hate you!
JASON: Wow. We really did raise you into an insufferable brat, didn’t we?

PATRICK: I don’t want to be overly dramatic… but if Jason gets so much as a hangnail, his brain will explode.
JASON: No stress. Gotcha. I just need to kill the guy who raped my wife first.
FRANCO: But if you kill me, then you’ll never know the HORRIBLE TRUTH about– *gurgles*
JASON: I’m okay with that. Now, no more stress forever!
SAM: Guess what? I’m pregnant!

MONICA: Elizabeth, in my official capacity as your boss, I think it’s only fair I tell you your performance review this year will state that you’re a baby-killing, husband-stealing trollop.
ROBIN: Wow, it’s a shame to see Monica lose her grip like that. Ah, well. Say, Elizabeth, small favor to ask: after I leave my husband and daughter without a word to go die alone, would you mind terribly stepping in as their new wife and mother?
ELIZABETH: Yeah, this is too bonkers even for me. I think I’ll just go lay on a gurney and stare at the ceiling with my not-therapist/maybe boyfriend for a while.

LADY IN WHITE: I don’t know my real name! But you can call me Cassandra. Because my therapist thought naming me after one of the most tragic figures in literature might help me with my tendencies toward Gothic melodrama.
ETHAN: How’s that working out for you?
CASSANDRA: Prithee, my lord? I could not hear you over the sound of my white gown billowing mournfully as I looked out over the parapet onto the misty moor.
ETHAN: We’re… on an island.
CASSANDRA: Silence! I must away into the tunnels!
ETHAN: Oh, yeah. She’s into me.

Thanks, show.

It’s kind of amazing that this writing team made a holiday episode centered around the death of both a legendary character and a beloved actor and still managed to make it more uplifting than last year’s offering. (Hey, nothing says Thanksgiving like a hit man flipping tables in a rage over his wife’s maybe rape, am I right?)

Needless to say… this was better. And not just because we got flashbacks! And Ned! Although that certainly helped:

TRACY: He was the glue that held the family together. What’s to become of us?
NED: We’re Quartermaines. We’ll survive. We always do.
TRACY: Without daddy?
NED: We’ve got you. You, the toughest Q of ’em all.

Because I am a gigantic dork, this is the point in the proceedings at which I flapped my hand tearfully at the screen and and warbled, “Oh, Ned, I’m so happy to see you!”

(Seriously, I have no idea how many hoops were involved in getting Wally Kurth enough time off from his Days schedule to make this appearance, but I want to sincerely thank everyone who made it happen. Because Tracy needed him. And so did I.)

I hope you’re all stocked up on tissues.

I’m sure that with all of tomorrow’s returns, I’ll have a lot to say. But today — as I’m sure you’re aware if you are a human who watches this show and possesses a soul — was effing gut-wrenching, and I don’t have it in me to respond with more than this:

RIP, EDWARD QUARTERMAINE

Does it even need to be said that AJ’s speech about how he’d finally turned his life around or Michael finally telling Edward he loved him was heartbreaking today? Or that just looking at Jane Elliot’s face was almost more than I could take?

(His last word was “Lila,” guys. I can’t even– Sorry. Gonna have to go cry more now.)

Oh, damn it all.

Hey, remember the other day when everything was all sparkly wonderful and I said I’d be happy even if these were the last Liason scenes we ever got? And then they went and gave us more and they were also wonderful? And then she thought she was about to die, so Liz was finally honest about all her Jason feels, and that was kind of awesome too:

STEVE: I mean Jason did save your life. Maybe what you’re feeling is gratitude.
ELIZABETH: He’s saved my life before, and I’ve saved his. We have a lot of history.
STEVE: That’s one way of putting it.
ELIZABETH: I’m not talking just about Jake. This goes years back. When I was grieving for Lucky, Jason was the only person I could talk to. He was the only one who listened to me without trying to fix things or diminish how I felt. It’s always been like that. We go in and out of each other lives… and my feelings for him never really go away.

What an accurate yet concise summary of their entire relationship! And of the unsatisfied frustrations of every Liason fan!

So, yeah. I should have known all this goodness was too good to be true. Because the last couple days were a total reverse course back into Guza-type Ladies Love Cool Jason/Liz Has Lost Her Damn Mind crap. And I am annoyed. But hey — hot kissage!

OH MY HEART.

If there’s an award for quietly breaking my heart, Jason Thompson and John Ingle double teamed to win it today:

EMMA: Daddy?
PATRICK: Yes, baby?
EMMA: If we don’t get better, will we get to see Mommy?
PATRICK: I really hope so.

OH MY GOD, THAT CHILD. AND HER FREAKING KOALA. Patrick’s face throughout that entire scene just killed me. But that was nothing to seeing Edward’s shaky thumbs up gesture as Emma received the only dose of the cure.

I knew John Ingle was ill, but seeing him look and sound so frail was still shocking. It’s likely this was his last appearance on the show, and if that turns out to be true, then extra kudos to the writing team for finding a way to work around the actor’s clearly weakened condition to give him a last scene worthy of the character’s long history on the show.

Farewell, John Ingle. You will be missed.

Honoring Edward’s affection for Robin was a lovely way to say goodbye. And seeing one last “I love you” between him and Tracy? Yeah, I’m kind of blubbering right now just thinking about it.

Sadness. In picture form.

I’ve been trying to compose a post about Robin’s funeral for days now, but it’s hard to type while CRYING HYSTERICALLY. And hard to be coherent when all I really want to do is point at pictures of Jason Thompson and flail.

I mean, look at this:

*FLAILS*

So anyway, I’m just going to use this post to document all the moments that broke me the most. You know… for posterity. And further crying.

OFFICIAL TOP TEN HEART-BREAKIEST PARTS OF ROBIN’S FUNERAL

What’s worse than being in the mob?

Corporate America! Family manipulation! Hating Sonny!

(In other words, being a Quartermaine, silly.)

After watching Michael be kidnapped as a child, shoot his father’s girlfriend, get shot in the head and put in a coma for a year, axe-murder his step mother, and get raped in prison — all under Sonny’s parental watch — are we really going to listen to him explaining how being involved with the Quartermaines is the most awful thing that could happen to this kid? Michael’s… well, ENTIRE LIFE hasn’t made you rethink this position, Sonny? Seriously? STFU.

Does anyone really give a rats ass about this possible impending mob war and all the people involved? I think that we’d all be lucky if they just went ahead and killed each other already. (Sadly, yes, even Johnny.)

Fortunately, in other news, while we were both AWOL this month, Garin Wolf gave a really promising interview that has me looking forward to July 25th with a white hot passion. I know I’m most likely setting myself up for disappointment, but nothing can be as boring, recycled and just plain awful as what Guza has been shoving at us lately. Can it?

Some choice quotes:

We gather together… for a pretty decent episode, actually.

Now that the turkey and pie coma has subsided and I’ve had time to get caught up on the last week of episodes, the spirit of the season behooves me to give some thanks:

Mainly, thank you to whatever inspired the show to take a break from gloom and doom and Balkan and Brenda (much as I hate to say it — still love you, B!) for a mostly joyous holiday episode centered on love and family:

Also, thank you to whichever intern has been Googling show history and remembering petty details like… Jason and Robin know each other! Molly has a father in L.A! Michael is a Quartermaine! Mac and Alexis’ kids are busybody matchmakers! And Thanksgiving in Port Charles should always end with pizza at the Q’s.

Somebody break this down for me, please…

Hey, remember how hung up I used to get on petty little details like Scotty prosecuting his own son’s murder case?

HAHAHA! Now I realize how hopelessly naive that was. Because the only thing more annoying than the writers acting like the concept of conflict of interest doesn’t exist is the writers: 1) acknowledging it, and then, 2) COMPLETELY IGNORING IT ANYWAY.

In other words: this bullshit with Claire is fast reaching a whole other level of stupidity.

So help me out here, readers. I am given to understand that Claire has officially registered a conflict of interest in regard to Sonny. I know this, despite trying my hardest to watch as little of her scenes as possible, because it’s been repeated by virtually EVERY CHARACTER ON THE SHOW ad nauseam for weeks.

(I mean, clearly, the writers haven’t actually forgotten that piece of their own recent history, because THEY are the ones who keep bringing it up.)

And yet! Somehow, at the same time, we’re meant to believe that there is literally NO ONE ELSE who could handle this amazingly incriminating evidence which just fell out of the sky, and that somehow makes it okay for Claire to know about details of the case being built against her boyfriend and also, to officially question him. What, did Port Charles fire all their other prosecutors when Claire came to town? Seriously?

YUP, STILL PRETTY.

…what, were you expecting insightful commentary or something? I need to savor this, people! It’s likely the last time I’ll see these two touching for years.

Oh, fine.

Random Thoughts About Yesterday’s Episode: