Next on our countdown is General Hospital.
Let’s begin with the good. The #MeToo movement storyline addressed a relevant and timely topic. The umbrella story thankfully included two characters, that were unfortunately not given material worthy of them in 2018, Liz and Alexis. And General Hospital added in some good soapy drama when the bomb dropped in court that Griffin and Kiki had slept together. Nelle gas lighting Carly was equally entertaining. Chloe Lanier came alive and proved that she can rock a cray cray villain. How we wished General Hospital would have done more with her sooner. But we are thankful we got what we got. General Hospital brought Genie Francis back. THANK YOU.
We can most definitely say that General Hospital saved the best for last in 2018. The Ryan/Kevin/serial killer storyline has been good. It’s unlikely that General Hospital will take full advantage of the storyline and trim the cast fat that is so desperately needed. But we are getting good soap. Jon Lindstrom, Maura West, Genie Francis, have been f-a-b-u-l-o-u-s. And what a way to pay tribute to the 25th Anniversary of the original storyline. Although we were sorry to see Hayley Erin go General Hospital killing Kiki gave us a serial killer storyline with teeth (killing a major character) and gave us another occasion to witness the greatness of Maura West.
Now, for the not so good. We had another year with the same issues. There was nothing really new; bloated cast, unbalanced storytelling, too much focus on new created characters vs beloved vets, convoluted storytelling, storylines that appeared to be made up as the writers went along versus well thought out detailed storylines, rewritten history and rewritten recent history, too much exposition and not enough action (telling vs showing), non-cohesive storylines (we want stories with definitive beginnings, middles, endings with satisfying climaxes, payoff and residue), storylines being dropped/unresolved, etc. Below are our picks (just ours we are sure fans have some others lol) of the storylines this past year that best illuminates the issues with GH.
The second biggest fail of GH this year was the writing and all the airtime allotted to the recton son of Anna Devane and Cesar Faison. Anna would N-E-V-E-R have slept with Faison N-E-V-E-R. We could write forever on that subject but…..next. Months later we still grapple to find a benefit that was derived from Oscar all of a sudden having a brain tumor that his mother, Kim, knew for two years and didn’t tell him. We still don’t know who Andrew Cain is. This was a golden opportunity to develop a character worthy of Billy Miller’s talents but nope. How long will Dante just remain off camera working? Dante would never leave his family like that. Mike’s Alzheimer storyline started out very promising but then it became about the mob. And General Hospital is still a soap, right? Where is the romance? Where are the soapy love stories? The couples to root for?
And of course, the biggest fail for GH this year, might be in all The Final Four, is the triangle that wasn’t. And we still have no idea of why. Why. Why. Why. The teenagers and the newbie seasoned characters got a triangle but not Jason Sam and Drew. It boggles the soap mind how and why the writers elected not to do the remedial soap triangle trope. We can’t find one single solitary rhyme or reason. It was just a fail, fail an inexcusable fail. It was not fair to the fans of either couple, the characters or the show.
General Hospital has one of the best ensemble casts on TV period. And despite daytime’s shrinking budgets, the show’s production is still very good. The cast and the production made General Hospital worth watching this year. We give it a B- for 2018.
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