A word of warning. My musings are suffering from the old be careful what you wish for syndrome. Serves me right. For weeks and weeks and weeks I bitched and complained about Port Charles’ overgrowth of vampires and their dark mission(s). How all the show seemed to do was morph from device to device, how we needed more emotional depth, more humanity, more relationship driven plot lines.  Where’s the balance. Always, over and over again, where’s the balance. Like a broken record. 

Well, that old saying has come back to haunt me. The dark missions are gone. The heavy emphasis on vampires and slayers and what drives them are gone. The moody, edgy sets and lighting are gone. The creation of the new world is complete.  And I’m still not happy. And I miss Ian Buchanan.

True to form PORT CHARLES teased us with a week or two of promising drama, surprised us with a successful turnaround of well paced, well conceived, well written episodes that hinted at deeper emotional conflict and were worthy of our lofty opinion of the uniqueness of the show and the characters and then…

Yawn. Nothing and I mean nada, rien, floated my boat this week. How could it, with no real substance, no real affecting depth it was more of the same dialogue, same problems, same arguments, same conflict we’ve been watching for months, just minus the theatrics. At least last week I had the Ring to get under my skin. It was a new and different irritation which I’m sure was as transparent as my gentle, tongue in cheek scolds, but it did pique my interest, possibilities for this character could blossom. This week – nothing. No passionate response one way or the other.  Normal.  As in normal, boring, typical soap opera fare. Even the games little boys play have lost their appeal.

I know there can be a balance (yeah, back to that) between exciting drama and same old same old. We’ve seen it many times in PORT CHARLES - we saw it the whole first week of THE GIFT.  I guess I’ve simply come to expect more than this week’s drivel of Rafe and Alison trying to be normal again (as if Rafe could ever be a normal soap character, as if any of us would ever want him to be for that matter), of Caleb’s anything but powerful persona these days, vampire or otherwise (even his wicked little remark about being too lenient on these mortals didn’t strike that delicious sense of anticipation it always used to), of Rafe and Caleb’s empty jabs at each other, of Livvie and Alison’s persistent whining, of Ian’s little look into the future and that triangle that’s still trying to form around him, Lucy and Kevin. I did get a twinge of nostalgia for the old Lucy and Kevin but it was sad really, all that seemed so long ago.  Its all just, ah, too, ah, frustratingly normal.

The best thing I have to say about this whole week is that the actors all look wonderfully rested. No dark circles, no one looks like their dragging their feet.The shooting schedule had obviously taken its toll physically, for a while no one could hide how tired they were onscreen. I don’t know if they all got a little break at the end of DESIRE to catch their breath, if the weather changed and they moved out of the winter funk (don’t laugh please, we do have winter in SoCal, even if it is basically just a state of mind) or if they were all just as happy as we were to move on out of the dark.

My apologies – my musings are ping ponging back and forth between one personality and another.  Make up my mind - do you want supernatural tinged plots with the emphasis on supernatural or do you want traditional stories and relationships with supernatural in the background.  I want both of course (but at this point I’d take anything that had any passion to it).  One means excitement and over the top drama, the other, at least this week, means boring, apathetic soap opera drivel.  I want that middle ground.  I want different and mind blowing, but I still want romance and light. 

Right now I’d settle for a week of romantic build up from any couple on the canvas - instead of Rafe and Alison constantly arguing over Caleb and how he’s ruining their relationship, sex for sex’s sake from Caleb and Livvie (which is not exactly a bad thing, but with these two its gotten very old, its their answer to everything) or sputtering sparks from Chris and Liz that had potential but doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. Candlelight, roaring fires, sweet nothings whispered in ears, even a stereotypical cut to a charging train or waves washing up on the beach – some sort of life connection, spiritual connection, or emotional connection would be a welcome relief.  And it’s long overdue. And 10 minutes at the end of a Friday episode doesn’t qualify.   Isn’t there a holiday coming up or some event somewhere in the world our characters can use as cause to celebrate?

File this one under weekly plot twist that made no sense, or character of the week suffering from a worse case of I can’t make up my mind than I am  -  first Alison likes Caleb, befriends him, whines at Rafe to get along with him.  Then she hates Caleb, berating Rafe for doing exactly what she asked him to in the first place – get along.  All this after she put Rafe on the spot herself.  Talk about ping ponging – you’re damned if you do, you’re damned if you don’t.  Force Rafe to deny who he is for the thousandth time, then bring the vampire to the slayer and get upset at the result.  Give those writers a round of applause.

Or maybe I’m just in a bad mood because with each passing episode I’m reminded of how fast the time goes. How each day we get closer and closer to something I’d prefer not to dwell on - when we’ll all be forced to wave goodbye to our beloved Port Charles. 

Or maybe this week the show was just off its mark for me.

Hey, it happens.   

 

...until we muse again Port Charles Fans









*** Please note the views expressed here are those of the author and not the site.