The thing I love about soaps is their ability to make you believe in the impossible, albeit often against your better judgment.  Such is the case of Todd’s miraculous brought back from the brink of death, Marcy’s about face desire to foster a child when she hasn’t even had time to get her wedding dress back from the cleaners, and Natalie’s star struck belief that John can truly open up and freely love for the first time in his brooding life.  Ahh… to dream the impossible dream, if only for an hour… I know it keeps me hooked on fantasy gratification, but the fact that the past couple weeks have sucked my husband back into OLTL viewing?  Well, that’s just proof that even the frustration of having to watch Paige Miller writhe around helplessly and incoherently can’t kill the intensity of the storylines currently carrying the show.

For starters, Todd’s dead man walking scenes were poignantly and artistically filmed.  I cried, okay?  Watching Todd say goodbye to Starr, his breakdown as he clung to Evangeline in those last moments before the guard wrenched her away, and his dogged refusal to relent and forgive Blair even in those last moments(!)… Wow.  I was blown away by the stretches of emotion that Trevor St. John displayed.  He managed to convey the vulnerability, nerves, and shaking despair of a man facing impending death, all without seeming hokey or contrived.  I was disappointed in the scenes outside of the jail, however.  Starr’s confrontation with Spencer and her quotes to the journalist were silly and insulting to watch.  Starr is such a little spitfire that surely better dialogue would have made that scene work… instead, it fell flat.  Still, watching Todd’s wrongful execution and the (of course!) last minute entrance of name clearing evidence in the form of Margaret Cochran was the stuff soaps are made of… over the top, heart wrenching, and heavy on the dramatic pause.  

As for Todd’s messengers of release, I’ve enjoyed watching Natalie and John reunite on more equal footing (of sorts, considering her current injury). Natalie is so willing to believe in what she’s hoped for, against the nature of the beast—she knows that loving John has always been a long shot, but that’s part of what makes it attractive to her.  The idea of winning his heart, of really belonging to him and him to her… well, you can see it written all over her face.  Watching their body language as they lay in bed, post-coitus, you could see John’s struggle to be within the moment that Natalie embraced so languorously and catlike, satisfied.  He wants this to be happiness, he wants to feel what he thinks he should feel, and in the next scenes you can see him trying, but can John really reach beyond his normal parameters and actually (gulp) maintain a commitment to another person?  Natalie was palpable with joy when he agreed for her to accompany him to his father’s grave…but how can this be, as Roxie so aptly coined, Johnnie Darko (loved the reference!)?  Against all odds I want to believe that Michael Easton isn’t leaving the role… against all odds I want to believe that the writers might actually continue to develop this character into the full bodied (ahem) role that it could be… The most astounding thing is how much of a grown woman Natalie Buchanan has come to be in the past few weeks.  Yeah, I’m tired of seeing her hobbling around with her post tornado leg injury, but that annoyance aside, she has really shone as an adult counterpart to John McBain. 

The other McBain brother, however, perplexes me.  Marcie and Michael were married what, like three days ago?  Okay, maybe it’s been a week.  Or two.  But the fact of the matter is, this couple is BORING.  How can that be?  I loved Marcie with Al, and I love Michael or Marcie individually… but together they just seem so… rushed.  Their timing is always a little off, and it feels forced, fast and annoyingly tame.  There is no passion, no sultriness to them, and it kind of fizzles out when they are expected to carry a scene together.  I truly enjoy Michael McBain’s character, particularly when he is interacting with his brother or Spencer.  He was entertaining as the jealous ex when Marcie was seeing Hugh.  Speaking of Hugh, I liked Marcie’s character much better when she was commiserating with him than when she’s schmoozing on Michael.  I want to like them, truly I do… but this storyline about Tommy is just more than I can take.  I find it impossible to believe that before the ink has dried on their marriage certificate two newlyweds want to jump into fostering a baby.  One would think they would spend at least one night alone together before signing up for parenthood, especially considering that Marcie was only recently having a conniption over the idea of having kids right away.  Still, who doesn’t think that Tommy is little lost Todd, Jr.?  I guess the writers needed some way of working him into the story… but I just hope it improves as more details are revealed.  (Just on a totally unrelated note:  I adore Kathy Brier’s hair lately… she looks good, even if there’s nothing else enjoyable about this plotline!) 

Like any good soap villain, Dr. Spencer Truman is playing true to form with his out loud ramblings about his misdeeds.  His icy confrontation (in which he conveniently waved around highly sensitive, falsified documents covered in his fingerprints) with a half drugged Paige made me wish that Bo had hastily wired her before leaving her hospital room.  Spencer’s repeated taunting of Todd is too classic… and his placid denial of all charges almost makes him seem as if he believes his own spin.  Perhaps, in a soap imitating life imitating soaps, Truman is caught up in the most impossible dream: he seems to believe that Blair’s promise to do anything for him if he will only save Todd will somehow be his ticket into possessing her forever.  

Which brings us to the current crux of the show:  how will Spencer Truman be brought to his knees?  Rumors abound but the fact remains that Spencer’s tangled web is about to come undone.  Will we discover Paige’s son’s identity (and whether or not he is really Spencer’s son)? Will David rat out his brother in exchange for clemency?  My vote is still that Spencer is Asa’s long lost bastard son and somehow that will be part of his redemption (if he gets redemption and not a swift character kick to the curb).  I don’t know how these stories will play out, but I for one am eager to see the impossible become an actual entity in the form of a real and hopefully satisfying ending to the current storyline. 

By Amber Barton