theboldandthebeautiful

You know, there is a common problem among writers of serials and series, whether they be writers for television, film, comic books, books or magazines.  That problem is allowing your audience to disconnect from your hero and/or heroine.

That’s my problem.

I do not see Brooke as a heroine.  I do not see Ridge as a hero.

Brooke is nothing but a cheap little Valley Girl who has slept and married her way through an entire family and yet it is never called what it really is: incest.  She betrayed her daughter by sleeping with her son in law and conceiving a child with him.  She betrayed her son by always choosing Ridge over him.  He was always second place and knew it.

Ridge is a pampered, spoiled, self-involved, self-serving rich kid who never grew up.  He never matured and he never learned to see life the way it really is.  He still believes the world and all that is in it revolves around him.

I don’t know why I’ve watched the show for all these years.  Maybe because it played during my lunch break when I was in college.  Maybe because it is sandwiched between two excellent soaps: As the World Turns and The Young and the Restless.  Maybe because I loved Sally Spectra and her antics.  Maybe because I loved Macy and Thorne together.  Maybe because I loved Darla and Thorne together even more.  Maybe because I loved Massimo.

I stopped connecting with Ridge and Brooke back in 1988.  If that’s all they’re going to keep doing, maybe it is time for me to stop watching.

Ashley Abbott was just a passing diversion for Ridge. I was quite excited to find that she and Rick had a thing in Paris. I thought that was just brilliant writing and was dying to see Rick and Ashley pair up. Unfortunately, like all the other women on The Bold and the Beautiful, Ashley was written in as mating stock for Ridge. She and Ridge started dating while he was on the rebound from Brooke. (Brooke had left him in Australia and jumped on Nick as soon as she got off the airplane and that did a job on Ridge’s fragile ego.)

Enter Ashley Abbot. The character of Ashley Abbott originated on The Bold and The Beautiful’s sister show, The Young and the Restless. Ashley had a long history on The Young and the Restless, beginning in 1982. She was a key player in The Young and the Restless for quite some time but was dropped for a while due to budgetary concerns. Then she was picked up on contract by The Bold and the Beautiful. I had high hopes for her stay on The Bold and The Beautiful as they are always in need of quality actors vs. models hoping to break into acting. But, like my dream of Brooke and Ridge falling off a cliff and dying instantly, it wasn’t to be.

Everybody got into the act this time to try to keep Brooke away from Nick so that Taylor could finally be happy. I had high hopes at this point. I began to wonder if the writers were really going to finally let Taylor be happy after over twenty years of grief. For a time it looked like they might actually do it. Much time was spent on Nick’s profession of love and commitment to Taylor.
(”Commitment” being another abused word by the Bold and Beautiful writers.) So Brooke was out in the cold like a cat in heat. Nick wouldn’t have her and Ridge’s ego was too bruised to consider taking her back. What’s a bimbo from the Valley to do?

When Stephanie asked Brooke for her help in putting an end to the relationship between Rick and Phoebe, Brooke refused and the war was on again. While Brooke, Ridge, Rick and Phoebe were on a business trip in Australia, Ridge walked in on Rick and Phoebe and lost his mind. He punched Rick, Phoebe bolted. It was drama, drama everywhere. When Brooke got off the plane, she went straight to Nick’s house, walked up to the bedroom like she owned it and threw herself on Nick.
Not at Nick, on Nick.
This was just a matter of hours after she heard the news that Nick and Taylor were engaged.

There was a momentary truce for Stephanie and Brooke when they went to Big Bear for a weekend with Eric and Ridge. Stephanie and Eric enjoyed a night of passion while Brooke and Ridge got locked out of the cabin and found themselves in the unenviable positions of peeping Toms. During their weekend together, Brooke told Stephanie that she knew that Stephanie really loved her and they shared a hug. Just when we thought the decades long feud was at an end, Stephanie found out that Rick, Eric and Brooke’s son, was dating Phoebe, Ridge and Taylor’s daughter and Eric’s granddaughter.

Once again, Eric was pissed at Stephanie. He encouraged her to leave town and visit her mother for a while so he could cool off so she did. Meanwhile, Eric was enjoying life in Los Angeles with Pam keeping house for him and Jackie sniffing around for a booty call. Jackie was foiled by Pam, who had her own fantasies about Eric. Stephanie eventually returned and Eric was happy to see her and work on their marriage. All wasn’t wonderful for Stephanie though.
Unbeknownst to her, Eric had invited her sister and mother to stay in L.A. They were more than happy to stay and finally enjoy the high life.

As was expected, Stephanie set out to get Nick to give her back the company Eric had so quickly given away. When Nick refused, Stephanie and Ridge dug into Jackie’s past and discovered that she had prostituted herself to sailors in order to support herself and her young son, Nick. Captain Kramer, a man who had befriended a young Nick while he was enjoying Jackie’s services was brought into town. Stephanie set it up so that Captain Kramer walked Donna down the runway at the Forrester fashion show. Once on the runway, Kramer was outed publicly for being one of Jackie’s johns.

Stephanie’s mother, Ann, denied having known about any abused and refused to hear Stephanie speak ill of her deceased husband. Pam, on the other hand, corroborated Stephanie’s claims and helped to put the pressure on Ann. Stephanie had tried to get some closure and got as close to it as she could. She returned to Los Angeles convinced that writing off her mother was the best thing to do. When Ann and Pam showed up at the Forrester home for Christmas, Alexandria, Thorne’s daughter, reached out to Ann and Stephanie managed to find the strength to forgive her mother and welcome her and her sister into the family.

The next chapter of the show had Stephanie seeking therapy for why she was so controlling and overbearing. Eric had had it with her and put her up to it or else he’d leave her. Therapy sessions with Taylor revealed that Stephanie had been abused by her father, who was also
very demanding and overbearing. After confessing to her family that her mother wasn’t dead, as she had claimed for over thirty years, Stephanie took a trip to Chicago to confront her mother and find out why her mother had never tried to stop the abuse. Stephanie’s return to her family in Chicago brought Ann, Stephanie’s mother, and Pam, Stephanie’s sister, into the story.