I thought I would get a jump on 2006 by sharpening my Two Scoops skewer and examining the best of the worst of B&B in 2005. Oh my...this could be a LONG list. But I am hopeful that after constructing this monumental list, the BEST of the year (appearing New Years Monday), will be that much sweeter! Ok now...on with the negativity!!!! YAY!!! I'll do this 'David Letterman Style' and give you my Top Ten..
10) The Return from the Dead explanation given for Taylor's return. Ugh... exactly how many times can a character come back from the dead? This is the second time now and the whole 'fake dummy in the casket' nonsense, combined with the fake signature at the hospital angle, made this the single dumbest way to explain a resurrection I have ever seen. We saw the body. We heard the monitor in her room give us the long death beep. We buried her and that was it. Another actress gone over asking for more money. Then...POW!!! Prince Omar was dusted off to help explain the deep conspiracy that included kidnapping her and taking her to the desert to recover while her family thought she has died. Couldn't there have been a better story than that? How about Sheila masterminding the whole thing to make sure she got the ultimate revenge on the Forresters? Hey, she's back on Y&R...could happen, huh???
9) The Teen Runway Battle from Hell. Ridge decided, in his infinite fatherly wisdom, that the only way to reel in Thomas' and his need to protect the barely virtuous Gabby was to do one of these ridiculous 'stitch-off's' with the Thomas either getting his freedom or having to give her up and go to college. Poor dumb Uncle Thorne was willing to take a chance that the pubescent balls of hormones could actually produce something worth wearing and he was wrong. Ridge won and Tommy's street corner rags proved to be the ruination of Spectra (that and Sally's alleged poor spending habits). Chalk up another victory for the Wooden One and another example of a show that has lost it's way.
8) Too Many Nick-Bridget Wedding Attempts. I mean COME ON!! I would think that once you hit the hat trick of failed attempts to get through a wedding ceremony you would get the hint that maybe the union is DOOMED! But no!! We have to make sure these two get married no matter what. Oh Lord, when it finally happened on the Shady Marlin, Nick looked so happy that I thought he would harpoon himself right there. Never should have happened. Never. I'd rather have a root canal than see these two in the same scene.
7) Ridge's One Night Try-Out for Brooke and Taylor. The nerve of him to expect both women to 'audition' to have a place in his life!!! What kind of a pig is he??? A legend in his own mind. He finally figured out that his plan to help him decide had backfired and it alienated Brooke even more. Two words for the worst male character in daytime...Boo Hoo. Another example of woman-hating writing from Brad and his Merry Band of Amateurs.
6) Stephanie's Fake Heart Attack. Just another sick and sad attempt to control Number One Son's life. How low do you have to go to bribe a recurring character into keeping your secret and then have the nerve to turn on HIM when the truth comes out? For all the Stephanie fans out there that have hung their collective hats on the notion that she is head and shoulders ABOVE Brooke as a character should have choked on this storyline. This was a classic Brooke-like stunt in my opinion (at least the Brooke of several years ago) and it just makes Stephanie look nuts. Maybe she is but this whole story just seemed to be too much. And poor Dr. Mark...throw him a bone for a few episodes and have it be for this?
5) The Fateful Mineshaft Kiss. There are so many adjectives I could use to describe just how BAD this story was. If the writers wanted Bridget and Nick to be together that bad, write it some other way...not clouded by some silly revenge plot by Amber to catch Ridge and Bridget kissing to get back at him for breaking up her and Thomas. But it happened...Nick was so distraught that he fell in love with her even more deeply and the rest, they say, is a nightmare. Silly, silly, silly. I think someone in the writers 'war room' was hitting the bottle or something when they came up with that one.
4) The Brooke-Nick-Bridget triangle. Brooke triangle stories keep coming back around here like a bad rash. Now she got to compete with her daughter and unlike the Deacon fiasco, Brooke had no child to give her any kind of advantage. In the end, she 'sacrificed' a life of eternal love with Nick so that her daughter could be happy and have her baby's father held hostage right by her side. Now we get weekly obsessive fantasy daydreams from her about what 'could have been' as if that makes it all somehow easier to watch. The mental infidelity is wearing thin and so are the constant sax-laden musical accompaniments that follow. The whole thing is sick anyway...Nick has loved and/or slept with Bridget's mom and half-sister Felicia and now she wants to be the next Forrester woman in line to be done by the fine captain? Can't she find anyone else in LA to whine to? At least Brooke did NOT do the deed with Nick on the Marlin and there are no more unplanned pregnancies in her future (I type that with two fingers crossed!!). No more romance triangles with Brooke!!! I can't take it anymore!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
3) The Remarriage of Eric and Brooke. This was apparently to appease whiny little Bridget that Brooke did not want Nick anymore. Ok, and I'm the Queen of England. Talk about a writing corps that couldn't decide how to write themselves out of the corner they were stuck in!! Hmmm...ok guys, what do we do now? We have Brooke and Nick totally obsessed and so many fans are ready for them to get together...OH WAIT!!! Lets screw all that up and make Eric and Brooke so something crazy like get married to prove she's over Nick...yeah, Bridget is that stupid!!! I'm guessing but I'll bet it went down something like that. Then to add insult to injury, they never did the deed and Eric ended up looking like an oversexed geezer lusting after Brooke. It was demeaning and just sad to watch. I have not been a big fan of Eric in the last few years but to watch that was downright painful.
2) Gabby's Immigration Saga. Weak and a terrible example of stereotype-laden writing. Why was this whole thing even necessary? Her character did not last 7 or 8 months if that and now she's gone and Thomas seems gone too. As an illegal alien she could not stay in the country and go to college unless the horn-dog Thomas married her. Of course they ended up consummating the charade of a marriage and sucked Taylor into covering for them. The old 'fallen condom' gave them away when one of the bratty Doublemint Twins found it and ratted him out. Snooze.....It all would never have ended up so neat and tidy at all (Taylor's 'call' to the INS to straighten it all out...RIGHT) and honestly I found her character to be eternally annoying anyway. This storyline proves one thing for sure...B&B should never try another 'teen saga' ever again. They always fall flat with the fans and leave everyone just scratching their heads wondering why it was there in the first place.
1) Bridget Big 'TEST' a.k.a...the Abortion Lie. Sick, sick, sick. I can't believe Brad Bell ever put his rubber stamp on such a terrible piece of writing. No matter what people may think of Nick and his waffling between Brooke and Bridget, NOTHING he did this year warranted that cruel lie out of Malibu Barbie's mouth. Using that story as a test to see if Nick would run back to Brooke? Are you kidding? Didn't that blonde brain surgeon ever think tat maybe a stunt like that would do JUST THAT???? What kind of a moron do you have to be to know that lie would cause more harm than good in the long run? It's insulting to the viewers and just a sick piece of childish writing that all at B&B should be ashamed of. That is a lightening rod subject in the culture we live in and to present it as part of a lie to punish a man for loving someone else is absurd. I truly believe that was the low point of the show and signaled a point of no return for me with regards to Bridget's character. I will never find her watchable again. She is a manipulative little brat that should be on recurring status even as I write this. Yep...making another female look psycho. It's becoming par for the course. This also seemed to turn off many die hard fans...and not just turned off from Bridget's character but the show in general. Good job, guys.
I hope you enjoyed this trip down memory lane, folks. I know it was a bumpy one but fear not...next week we will take the high road and look at the top ten things that went right this past year. Yes, there are ten things, I promise. I will be full of positivism and compliments to help ring in the New Year.
I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday over the weekend and as with this week, next weekend's column will actually post Monday as I will be recovering from celebrating the New Year. Be safe this New Years and have a glass of the bubbly for me!!
