Daytime Soap Opera
Actor Of The Week

Action! (General Hospital)

The long wait for things to ramp up in the cold fusion tale is finally over on GH, and they chose an appropriate time of year for fireworks galore. Action isn’t generally my thing, and I’m especially wary of it in this genre where they’re so unfortunately hampered by budgets, but General Hospital really was exciting and impressive with how they managed to pull off one high-octane sequence after another this week. There was so, so much going on. Brennan nearly dying with Nina showing up just in time. Ethan shot and Ava struggling without the skills to tend to him. Danny and Charlotte doing the teenage Scooby gang thing in a very violent adult situation. Obrecht playing out that classic action pic scenario of choosing the right wire to cut. That little girl we used to see dressed up as a corn cob every Halloween, Joss, looking pretty convincing handling a gun while her mom, Carly, still thinks Joss needs saving. Cassius showing some humanity as he backed off on kidnapping his faux-son and fully jumped on board with the good guys. There were quality quieter moments like Anna and Felicia’s friendship and the attempt to cheer James up now that he thinks he’s lost his dad again, that in contrast to the more bombastic stuff like the arrival of John Oliver’s WSB boss in a helicopter, a turn from the comedian that refreshingly did not feel like an attempt to mock soap opera acting, he did his character’s thing, and he did it well and with respect. I thought BTG had the director Emmy all sewn up a couple weeks ago with their tornado, but with these episodes GH declared themselves serious contenders, and not only in that category, but for the overall title of best drama, too.