The WrecK Center: GL - Tuesday - In Which GL Gives Avril Lavigne $$ To Pay For The Electricity

Down on Main Street Springfield, shit be poppin'! Brang yo frenz, we got blue Kool-Aid.

Yeah, so seriously - that "Main Street" place which is one of like GL's six remaining sets? It looks like Studio 54, and Zoom and MTV's The Grind (with Eric Nies!) all got together and had a fucked-up, drug-fueled threesome, and then nine months later, Main Street Springfield was their mutant two headed baby. It is, as Al Pacino says in Heat, a "post dead-tech" monstrosity of a "hip" set. It's just so bizarre, I expect to see Muppets stroll through. Yet everybody, from any age group or social class on the show just hangs out there. Everyday. All the time. Fine, whatever.

all up in ur house killin u wit ur table leg

The last time I regularly knew anything about GL, there were few universal truths of the show, few core tenets that still stood the test of time, things that said to you..."this, this my friend is The Guiding Light." Fewer still remain to this day, but there was one constant then that has outlasted all the cast and character upheaval of the past decade, and that is this: Beth Raines Is Still One Crazy Fucked-Up Bitch. She is the whiter Mariah Carey. Test her and she will beat you to death with a table leg. She's in love with everyone, anyone. She will fuck anything. (So will Olivia Spencer, apparently, but that's a story for another time.) Both of the guys in "The Four Musketeers." Edmund. Phillip again. Anthony Addabbo, you know, Jim, killed by bad Christmas tree lighting. And that guy I think she met on a desert island, was that her? And Jeffrey, did she fuck his dirty ass? And now Alan Spaulding. In love with Alan Spaulding. After all these years, she's gone back to another abusive daddy figure just like her own insane rapist father, James 'The Dick In Independence Day" Rebhorn. Frankly it makes a kind of perverse sense, and I have come to love Beth Chamberlin's perpetually teeter-tottering, on the edge soapy performances as the character. She is eternally mentally ill, used and abused, and yet still intensely naive. Gee, could Alan be fucking around on me? Could he be manipulating me in some way? Let me go bond with Rick at the same time! It's nice to see Rick with screen time and all, I appreciate their bond still and the way it's gotten all twisted in this love thing when she used to be Phillip's 80s Twoo Wuvv, but she's just gonna fuck Rick over again like she fucks over every man who treats her right, or you know, reasonably right. I admire them attemping to put on some new pathetic iteration of the Bauer barbeque though, seeing as he's almost the only old blood Bauer left on the show, I think. It's gonna be him, Beth, some streamers, and some cardboard standees of Grant Aleksander and Peter Simon. "Great party, huh, guys? Haha! Oh, Phillip, you dog! Dad, stop drinking! Those rascals!"

I've seen him before, but seeing him in full live motion makes me crown John Driscoll (Coop Bradshaw) another Human Masterwork. I mean, damn. Hot as shit, probably gay judging by his ease playing gay on that cancelled show with Christian Campbell (yeah, that's my whole flimsy gay criteria right there) , and a great actor. Good Lord. Finally, a son worthy of the great Fiona Hutchison. He is really cute with Ashlee too. There's a man for her! Come on, GL. Of course, when the show is inevitably cancelled I would love to see OLTL snatch up for Joey Buchanan. He's perfect for the role, sensitive, beautiful, amazing body. Don't give me that "too young" shit. Bruce Michael Hall was "too young" despite being the actual age of Joey! It would not be a problem at all. Come, John Driscoll. Come to Llanview. And my bed. My inflatable bed that I bought at Linens & Things. After which point I would have absolutely no idea what to do with you.

The highlights of the party for SuDaisy's return to the Cooper homestead included Pubeface Ortega flipping out because Harley dared, dared to call him "a diabetic." OMG! OMG Harley WTF???!!!11 Like she called attention to him having an STD or being a fucking leper, for Christ's sake. At least his pointless mother had the good sense to check him. Loved Harley's snippy line to Dylan about Natalia: "You wanna go out on another date with her? Please?" But really, this whole Dylan/Harley/Gus/Natalia is just lame and forced. OMG THE FAMILY PORTRAIT SHOWS US PAIRED OFF IN OUR ORIGINAL GROUPINGS THE SYMBOLISM!!!111eleven Stoopid.

Billy Lewis = Andy Capp

By far the centerpiece of the party scenes however was Jordan Clarke as Billy Lewis. I ain't trying to mock Jordan Clarke, okay, I'm not. He's overcome addiction, he should be very proud. And Billy's a very treasured core character, I know that. I'm just saying, Billy comes off like he is old and crazy, constantly drunk, or just plain high all the time. He embodies the phrase "DOMDOMDIDDAAAYYYY!!" I don't know half of what the fuck he was doing today (poor Natalia and her obvious repulsion) but it's like they even write for him as though he has some kind of congenital dementia now. Like calling Dylan with that random shit, that was in the script? Is Billy supposed to be crazy? Hilarious, though. Like a jolly little drunken troll who has a secret treasure he will give you if you play with him. Minutes, sheer minutes of entertainment.

So, Doris Wolfe, I call her District Attorney Titties Surprise. Because they are always out and fierce, seriously, popping everywhere. In which case it should perhaps be "Non-Surprise" at this point. But, you know, great actress, fun character, my problem is I feel I've seen her so many times before. God knows Alan's been with these kind of women many times before. And then there's, you know, Gloria Fisher on Y&R and so many others. But Orlagh Cassidy does a fine job. The character just seems a bit of a cartoon.

I would be remiss without mentioning that in today's (well, Tuesday's) show GL advanced its pop culture credentials and "hipness" all the way to 2002 by playing Avril fucking Lavigne and "Complicated" at the end of the episode. You know, just in case you hadn't gotten enough in every ad, movie or TV promo in the last four years! We'd finally put it past us, just like the WWII internment camps, and then GL brings it rushing back by inelegantly trying to score hip points. And it just didn't fit and was awkward as shit. Especially with the PORTRAIT SYMBOLISM. And sorry, but I can't take adults like Beth Ehlers, Ricky Paull Goldin or Ron Raines seriously when their silent emotional moments are set to Avril fucking Lavigne.

Today's classic GL YouTube moments are twofold: The first has some scenes from the classic 1992(?) "blackout" sweeps event, featuring Sherry Stringfield as Blake. I believe this was where "Bloss" was born, but I could be wrong. I also believe this was in Nancy Curlee and Steve Demorest's heyday as part of the head writing team and I've never seen GL better. Granted, I don't watch much GL, but they were amazing. The second clip is also Curlee/Demorest(/Reilly?) , and it is one of my favorite scenes ever, Maureen Bauer's bonechilling speech to Ed before her untimely death at the hands of Jill Farren Phelps. JFP gave GL an impossible situation, but as you shall see, they made it work. That speech about what their daughter can believe stays with me still.