theboldandthebeautiful

So Ridge and Brooke drag a Justice of the Peace out to a rocky cliff for their surprise wedding.  (Witnesses aren’t necessary for those spur-of-the-moment California weddings.)There is plenty of handheld camera action and all the flashy outdoor camera work that The Bold and the Beautiful is trying to incorporate lately.  The waves crash on the rocks providing dramatic sound effects and visuals.

Then, just as Brooke is about to say “I do”, a huge wave sweeps up over the rock and washes both her and Ridge out to sea, leaving the Justice of the Peace standing there to watch them get pulled away by the unusually strong current.

Then everybody in Los Angeles mourns their loss for approximately twenty-four minutes and then we finally get some new storylines for those all-too-unused characters.

This just ratchets up the ick factor for me.  I was icked out when Bridget had the thing for Ridge.  I was icked out when Rick and Phoebe hooked up and I’m icked out now.Apparently we are phasing out Marcus and sticking to storylines involving only the pearly white Caucasian Forrester family.

I don’t like it.

There are a couple of reasons why I don’t like it.

1. Steffy had this supposedly fantastic love with Marcus.  There were poolside cabana scenes, scenes of them working together at Forrester and those of them attending family celebrations together.  It was interracial, mixed up the color palette and incorporated a new character.  It wasn’t the best storyline but it wasn’t icky.
2. By writing Rick the way they are, the writers are creating a man ho who is just like his mother, loving his way through entire families of women.  Think about it.  Brooke has been with Eric and his sons as well as one of those sons’ half brother by Massimo Marone.  She’s also been with her son-in-law, Deacon.  Rick has been (not in the biblical sense) with Phoebe, then biblically with Taylor and soon with Steffy.  Am I the only one picking up on any of this?

Thorne had some good storylines once upon a time.  He had a great love with Macy.Ah, those were the days…Sally was still around and Macy was a truly good person in a world of liars and cheats.  Thorne and Macy were a good couple.

Then there was Darla.  We all thought she was a superflake but Darla really became a great character.  We always liked her but we really came to love her, just as Thorne did and they were a fantastic couple.  They created a fantastic family and Darla even had the chutzpah to stand up to everybody else in the Forrester clan and see Thorne finally get the job he truly deserved as President of Forrester Creations.

Thorne is a good man.  Why are we wasting him on petty conspiracies to get his parents back together?

You can’t possibly tell me that ex party girl, Felicia, has totally settled down and embraced domestic bliss as a full-time mother.  We only see Dominick on holidays and special occasions but, after seeing him at Christmas, it has occurred to me that Felicia hasn’t had a storyline (or a lover) since Dante.  (Remember Antonio Sabato Jr.?)So how is it a hot, young, trust fund baby like Felicia is always alone?  How is it she has nothing better to concern herself with than whether or not her parents are doing it?

Come on.  It is high time we give Felicia, played by a real actress, a real storyline.

Will Bridget get a real storyline in 2009?And I don’t mean falling in love with another step brother or one of her mother’s castoffs.

When is Bridget going to get a hot doctor of her own that will worship her the way she should be?  That poor girl has had every one of her marriages ruined by a female family member betraying her with her husband.  That sort of track record (three marriages down) can really mess a girl up.

I would really like to see Ridge and Brooke fade to black in 2009 so that some other characters, like Bridget, might get their own real storyline.

“The Bold and the Beautiful has also recently adopted a new visual format to its episodes. Episodes now include trendier segment transitions, flashier production values, and, like Guiding Light, more outside filming.”

There is a phrase they use out west to describe something without substance: “All hat and no cattle”.

That is pretty much what I think of the new trendier visual format at The Bold and the Beautiful.  Yes, it is flashy and yes, they do those dramatic outdoor sequences with Ridge and Brooke but I’m still waiting for some quality writing to happen.

Frankly, that outdoor beach scene with Ridge and Brooke where he was standing atop a rock cliff overlooking the beach and she was riding along the beach on a cream colored horse was way over the top.  In short.  It sucked.

We expect this sort of thing from a Mexican telenovela but not from CBS.

I’m getting my spoon ready but I don’t think I’ll have to use it (to gouge my eyes out at the wedding).Ridge and Brooke are all hippity-hop about getting married after the fashion show but it will never happen.  Rick and Steffy will get caught consoling each other and the next thing you know, the war will be on and Ridge will be at Rick’s throat.

All this “it can’t ever happen again” stuff is just the writers’ sophomoric way of ratcheting up the tension for viewers.

Personally, I’d like to see some new characters come into play so that perhaps we could put aside all of these incestuous and eepy-creepy sexual relationships among family members.

Does anyone actually run that company?  Thorne used to be President at one time.  I think even Stephanie was President at one point.  Brooke was probably President at some point too.  Then Eric was CEO.  Ridge was CEO.  Rick was CEO.Every time there is an office change and a new President or CEO takes over, they rarely have the time to transition before somebody else gets shuffled into the job.

So here is my question:

Does anybody ever actually run Forrester Creations?

How do they know where they are going if nobody is ever in charge long enough to change the nameplate on the door?

Ridge setting boundaries for Rick is just ridiculous.  Why is it that Ridge gets to set boundaries for everyone in and out of his family, but nobody ever gets to set boundaries for him?  Why does Ridge get to run roughshod over everyone and nobody ever says a peep about it?  When did Ridge ever respect anyone’s marriage?  Remember when he slept with his father’s wife and they thought Bridget was Ridge’s child?  Of course, none of those Forrester kids have ever respected any marriage their father had that wasn’t with their mother.Back to my point.

Why is Ridge the prince of the family and every other kid in the family is secondary?  Thorne is Eric’s firstborn son and yet he is still working in some nondescript office without a nameplate.

Okay, why would Donna bring that bikini into Forrester Creations if it weren’t going to play heavily into the storyline?I’ve got a hunch that bikini will get picked up off the floor, from where she tossed it, and some model will come strutting out onto the runway with it during the big fashion show.

The press will go wild, orders will come rolling in for it and Donna will have to tell Eric that Pam made it.  Bammity-bam, the next thing you know, Pam has her own design office on the top floor and she’s filling special orders for the ultra retro, super hip, Forrester bikini.  These writers are nothing if not predictable.