DALLAS versus KNOTS LANDING versus the rest of them week by week

[Willie Oleson]

I wonder if that's because the rest of TV has caught up with it in the last seven or eight years.

I think so, yes. Modern viewers expect to be spoon-fed with non-stop plot twists.

I read one critique which seemed to find the idea that Rolling Stone would put a relatively unknown R&B (i.e, black) singer on its cover just as far-fetched

Did he do an R&B cover of Sometimes When We Touch?

 

[James from London]

04 Mar 13: DALLAS: The Furious and the Fast v. 21 Oct 15: EMPIRE: Be True v. 30 Mar 18: DYNASTY: Enter Alexis

A few weeks after EMPIRE paid homage to ‘80s Soap Land by naming Cookie’s new record label in honour of DYNASTY, New DYNASTY tips its hat to KNOTS LANDING when Paige — whoops, Alexis — suggests to Blake that Fallon might have been conceived “after that strip croquet game — you sure knew how to swing your mallet.” There’s an even more direct reference to KNOTS on DALLAS: “Uncle Gary, who the hell let you off the cul-de-sac?” John Ross asks by way of greeting when the family black sheep shows up at Ewing Enterprises. As if this were not nostalgia enough, Alexis and Krystle’s lily pond catfight from DYNASTY ’83 receives an almost shot for shot reconstruction on DYNASTY ’18, only this time it’s between Alexis and Fallon and there is some impressive underwater hair-pulling thrown in for good measure. Also, some infamous lines of Soap Land dialogue are repeated verbatim. “It’s good to see your father had your teeth fixed, if not your tongue,” New Alexis tells New Fallon at the start of New DYNASTY. “You’re my son, from tip to tail,” JR tells John Ross at the end of DALLAS.

In fact, this episode of DALLAS opens with John Ross standing in the exact position — in his office, looking out over the city — that he was in during the final shot of Season 1. Then, of course, the office was just an empty space and JR was standing beside him. As compensating for his absence, JR picks this very moment to call. “We finally did it — we won,” John Ross tells him. “I’m about to walk into my first board meeting as Head of Ewing Energies … I’m gonna hold off on telling them I’m giving you the corner office. I want you to be here to see the look on their faces when I do!” JR indicates his approval in some skilfully recycled footage from Season 1.

As John Ross and Sue Ellen, Bobby and Christopher, and Pamela all converge on the Ewing boardroom from different directions, the camera slows down as if to savour the moment, just as it did when Cookie, Andre, Hakeem and Anika made their way down the hallway towards the EMPIRE boardroom at the beginning of the season, certain they were mere seconds away from taking over the company. A supremely confident John Ross kicks off the meeting by addressing his cousin: “I know you and Bobby got your panties in a bunch over me and Mama taking control, but let’s try and keep it civil so we can try and get some business done.” But then, just as Cookie and co had the rug pulled out from under them, so John Ross and Sue Ellen have the smiles wiped off their faces when Christopher produces a document “enforcing my father and Uncle Gary’s mineral rights … There’ll be no more drilling on Southfork.” “… Until we get back controlling interest, you will not pump a drop of oil,” translates Bobby. Pamela points out that this could bankrupt the company. John Ross threatens to sell off Christopher’s methane patent in retaliation. “You can’t,” Christopher replies. “You don’t have majority unless Pamela votes with you. Otherwise, we’re deadlocked.”

Andre experiences a very similar trajectory to John Ross in the opening minutes of EMPIRE — the warm thrill of being welcomed back to the family company by his father followed by a rude awakening when Lucious, having appointed him President of Empire’s raw and raunchy subsidiary label Gutter Life, throws an equally raw and raunchy party to celebrate. This results in the newly devout Andre squirming uncomfortably as lap dancers bump and grind on top of him. “You’re testing me, that’s obvious,” Andre later tells his father. “I’m not testing you,” Lucious replies. “I’m just telling you the only commandments I want followed here are mine. Check your faith at the door, son.”

A speedway race where Christopher’s methane-fuelled car is set to compete against more conventionally powered vehicles becomes pivotal to the action on DALLAS. If Christopher’s car can beat the competition, he stands a better than good chance of winning both the city’s transportation contract and Pamela’s vote against John Ross. “Which is why I‘m gonna make sure that he loses,” John Ross explains to his mother.

There are appearances by two real-life celebrities this week, both of whom play a bigger role in the action than one usually expects from a cameoing guest star. On DALLAS, Ricky Rudd returns to drive Christopher’s car in the race. With so much at stake, John Ross bribes a mechanic with gambling debts to sabotage the engine. “Someone could get hurt,” Sue Ellen warns. Indeed, previous Soap Land examples of engine tinkering have resulted in Lance Cumson standing trial for attempted murder, Danny Sharpe ending up in a coma, Jamie Ewing exploding and, of course, Sid Fairgate dying on the operating table. But here, New DALLAS becomes the first soap to jeopardise the life of a real-life person.

The stakes aren’t quite as high on EMPIRE where Jamal is trying to decide whether or not to take Michael on the road with him. His father says no, but Actual Ne-Yo, with whom he is collaborating on a song, thinks otherwise: “If that dude is your serenity, if he’s the one, then he’s supposed to be there cos the road is hectic.”

Chase One, meanwhile, the pretentious Rolling Stone photographer from last week’s episode, agrees with Lucious. “Relationships are the death of creativity,” he declares before going on a rant against same-sex marriage: “The biggest advancement of gay rights in American history and it gets handed down from some archaic institution that doesn’t even believe in natural human desire … Why are we so keen on being locked down in these heteronormative shackles?” Over on DYNASTY, Steven tells Sam (Michael’s other self) that they should keep Soap Land’s first same-sex engagement quiet for the time being. “I want my family to celebrate our engagement, not forever associate it with my mother … Let’s hold off on telling people until she’s gone.” Back on EMPIRE, Jamal is offended at Chase’s drunken attempt to blow him in a club: “Even if I was attracted to you, which I’m not at all, I would never do that to Michael.” Michael has been rolling his eyes at Chase since he first appeared so it’s almost as much of a shock to us as it is to Jamal when he later walks in on Chase going down on Michael. (We are certainly a long way from Jack Coleman and Luke Fuller expressing their sexuality through the medium of brotherly hugs.) Conversely, the closest Sam comes to cheating on Steven this week is attempting to sneak a peek at Liam while he’s changing his shirt.

Last week’s big church service was Tom Carrington’s funeral on DYNASTY. This week’s is Andre’s baptism on EMPIRE. No-one anticipated Alexis’s arrival then and no-one expects Lucious to show up now, especially not after his response to Andre’s invitation: “You’re asking me to come and watch somebody dunk you in tap water and pretend that that’s gonna make all your sins go away? There is no God … You just need to man the hell up.” Inevitably, he changes his mind at the last minute. Just as DYNASTY had fun heralding Alexis’s arrival at the church with demonic symbolism (bells tolling, crucifixes rattling) so EMPIRE does with Lucious’s. “That devil walk in here, this whole place might catch fire,” says Cookie, commenting on the unlikeliness of Lucious setting foot in a church. Right on cue, the doors open and he appears. “Mention the Devil’s name and he will walk right in,” she mutters. “God help us all,” adds Jamal. “I think I seen some angels running for cover,” chips in Hakeem as Lucious takes a seat in their pew. “Oh, let me make space in case lightning strikes,” adds Cookie with faux politeness. DYNASTY keeps up the Alexis-as-Satan stuff at the start of this week’s episode. “They think she’s the Devil,” says Steven of the rest of his family. “I think anyone who put up with my father for that long deserves the benefit of the doubt.”

New Alexis proves a fascinating departure from what one might have expected of such an iconic character. Sure, Nicollette Sheridan effortlessly fulfils the requirements of the script, delivering a cartoonish Cruella de Vil-style caricature who delivers put-downs so witheringly they can make a crucifix spontaneously fall off a church wall, but she also brings an unexpected layer of vulnerability to the character. As with JR, Bobby, Sue Ellen and Cliff on New DALLAS, there is an inbuilt poignancy in seeing the perpetually twenty-something Paige Matheson suddenly a generation older than we remember her. Then there is her garishly tasteless wardrobe — loudly clashing patterns, an excess of leopard print, a leather dominatrix outfit doubling as casual daywear — which is far closer to Cookie Lyon than it is ‘80s Alexis. But whereas Cookie’s look is an extension of her defiantly unapologetic personality, Sheridan plays against her character’s wardrobe (much as Edie Falco did on THE SOPRANOS). One gets the feeling that Alexis believes herself to look as sexily elegant as she did when she was younger (when Sheridan was Paige) when really she looks like mutton dressed as lamb. This touching air of self-delusion recalls Blanche Dubois in A Streetcar Named Desire, or even Miss Havisham in Great Expectations — roles that have both been played in recent years by Gillian Anderson, who also shares with Alexis a kind of husky-voiced froideur that gives an impression of someone who has just been crying but is determined not to show it.

“What’s the quote — ‘Beware of ex-husbands bearing gifts’?” quipped Sue Ellen back in ’82. This week, she is taken aback when JR sends her “a handful of letters that I had sent him when we were courting. And a new one that I’m not opening.” She seems touched (“I can’t believe that he actually saved them all!”), but then decides that “he’s trying to manipulate me and I won’t let him do that.” Meanwhile, Cookie receives a somewhat less romantic gift from her ex: a box containing Vernon’s ashes. “You take him — I don’t want him!” she protests. “Oh hell no, I don’t want no snitch,” Lucious replies. “Why don’t you give him to your sister Carol? She used to like him.” “Everybody we know, people that helped build us up, ended up in boxes that you don’t even wanna claim,” sighs Cookie. But love letters and ashes are small potatoes compared to what Alexis receives in her ex-father-in-law’s will: the entire Carrington Estate, all three hundred and forty-one acres of it.

Both Emma Ryland and Fallon Carrington were raised by their fathers to believe that their mothers abandoned them. Following Emma’s recent discovery that Harris, in fact, stole her away from Ann, Alexis informs Fallon that Blake “practically banished me. He bribed a judge to take you out of my custody and then paid me off to stay away … Do you really think I left you behind willingly?” But how much of what Alexis says can be believed? She claims to be living the same kind of jet-set lifestyle that ‘80s Alexis and Anne Matheson did (“travelling Europe, Christmases in Acapulco”), but then Fallon discovers that she’s actually living in a squalid trailer. Again, the gap between the glamorous picture Alexis paints of her life and the actual reality makes her appear more pitiful than evil.

“My finances aren’t ideal,” Alexis concedes when she is cornered. Over on DALLAS, her former boss at Tidal Energy is in a similar predicament. “I’m strapped for cash,” Gary admits to Bobby during their first on-screen conversation for thirty-one years. When we last revisited any of the KNOTS gang, in Back to the Cul-de-sac, it rather felt as if they had been preserved in aspic since the end of the original series. That’s no longer the case, for the vicious circle of soap has continued to turn even when we weren’t watching: “Valene and I had a rough patch a year ago and I fell off the wagon,” Gary continues. “She couldn’t take it. She left me.” He has, however, retained his capacity for plain speaking. He’s as openly suspicious of Sue Ellen’s sudden interest in him (“Not that I don’t appreciate the attention, but you’ve never been this nice to me before”) as he was of Abby’s when they first started working together. That didn’t prevent him from falling under her spell, of course. For her part, it emerges in a deleted scene that Sue Ellen hasn’t lost her duplicitous streak either. “He was always the weakest link in the Ewing family,” she says of Gary to John Ross. “I watched JR manipulate him for years. I don’t see why I can’t do the same.”

Our final glimpse of Paige in Back to the Cul-de-sac was in a photo on Greg’s desk on which he had drawn a moustache and beard. Twenty-one years later, it’s her turn to get busy with the sharpie. When Fallon and Michael look around her trailer, they find a wedding picture of Cristal with added beard, moustache and a pair of horns (or they may be rabbit ears — it’s hard to say). “I may or may not have done the same thing,” Fallon admits.

Meanwhile, things come to a head in the Ryland household when Harris and Judith decide to whisk Emma back to London. “We need to get your life back on course,” Judith declares, meaning they want to keep her away from her mother. When Emma defies them and skips a riding lesson to visit Ann at Southfork, a frustrated Harris kicks over a chair in his daughter’s creepily doll-like bedroom. “Even as a boy, your temper got the best of you. NOW PICK THAT UP,” Judith commands and sulkily, he obeys. Adding to the weirdly upside down, David Lynch-meets-Alice in Wonderland vibe, Judith then gently reminds him that “you mustn’t lose control, Harris. I won’t let you lose our daughter.” Things get weirder still when Judith, acting like a jealous lover, demands to know what attracted Harris to Ann in the first place. “What was so bewitching about her? What was it about her that you couldn’t put out of your mind for all these years?” Finally, he lets his mother have it: “I loved her because she wasn’t you!” he snarls, pushing her against a wall.

Minor trend of the week: characters being immersed in water. There are three instances of this, all in very different circumstances. Whereas the tone of Fallon and Alexis’s pool fight is decidedly campy — the rest of the Carringtons watch from the balcony, champagne flutes in hand — Andre’s baptism is treated with due reverence on EMPIRE. Soap Land has never explored a character’s spirituality as fully as this before. (As mesmerising as Joshua’s sermons on KNOTS were, his faith existed primarily as something to be corrupted.) However, seeing his son placed under the water by the pastor triggers a traumatic childhood flashback for Lucious: his bipolar mother (Actual Kelly Rowland again) trying to drown him in a bathtub. It proves too much for him and he walks out of the church mid-ceremony, thereby tainting Andre’s sacred moment.

This week sees the first-ever round of Soap Land Dog Wars. Having been fired by Cookie last week, erstwhile assistant Porsha attempts to get back in her good books by turning up with Whoopty Woo, one of those little handbag pooches whom she insists will make an excellent guard dog (“She’s the baddest bitch in town!”). Cookie rolls her eyes before taking a liking to the little mutt. Alexis has a tiny dog of her own whom she has named Krystle despite it being a male. “Sometimes the name screams out at you,” she explains to a nonplussed Cristal. “He was a rescue, trashy little thing … a stinky little freeloader.” Alas, Krystle doesn’t survive to the end credits, thanks to Blake. “I’m sorry about your dog,” he tells Alexis coldly when she finds him in her trailer. “He ran right out when I opened the door. I hope the coyotes don’t get him.”

“Don’t mind me I’m just reminiscing. I have more memories here than anywhere else in the world,” Alexis tells Anders when he finds her in her former art studio on the Carrington grounds. This is a very different take on the equivalent encounter between ‘80s Alexis and Joseph. Where that scene was icily gothic, this one is surprisingly warm, even tender. “I always kicked myself after I left here for not fighting for this place … As a girl, nobody taught me to look out for me,” she admits, again sounding not unlike Anne Matheson when she first arrived in KNOTS — wistful, regretful and somewhat passive-aggressive. Curiously, she seems almost resigned to the idea of losing her newfound inheritance to her ex-husband: “You really think Blake’s gonna let any of this go? If he can take two children from a mother, how hard can a house be?” “We both know where my allegiance lies,” Anders reminds her politely when she asks for his assistance in fighting Blake — but that doesn’t stop him from helping her claim the art studio as her own.

Blake has Anders, JR has Bum and Lucious now has Thirsty (Vernon’s shabbier, shiftier replacement). They might have different job titles — private eye, majordomo, attorney — but each serves as a loyal sidekick who isn’t afraid to get his hands dirty on his employer’s behalf. “JR may be 7,000 miles away but when he says ‘jump,’ I say, ‘how high?’” Bum tells John Ross before supplying him with the dirt he needs to bribe Christopher’s mechanic. “Just trying to make the boss happy,” Thirsty explains as he requests Andre’s help in stealing music tracks from Cookie’s company. “I’d never do anything to hurt my mother and in the future, you can tell [Lucious] to tell me directly about our family affairs,” Andre replies coldly.

As she predicted, Alexis is cheated out of her inheritance — but not by Blake. Instead, Fallon boasts about paying off an anaesthesiologist to make it look as if Alexis had coerced Tom into signing the relevant codicil to his will while he was heavily sedated. “You’re too poor to prove it,” she gloats at her mother. So, after losing her inheritance and her dog, is New Alexis more sinned against than sinning? It’s hard to be certain at this point, but it’s an intriguing possibility that never really existed with her ‘80s equivalent. Rather than swear revenge the way Joan Collins’s Alexis would have, she adopts the Judith Ryland approach to parenting: “I am going to prove to you how much you are really loved, even if it kills you, Fallon, because I am your damn mother!”

While DYNASTY concludes on this unexpected declaration of parental love and EMPIRE with some out-of-nowhere violence (Hakeem is snatched off the street and forced into a van), DALLAS ends with a combination of both. Having failed to prevent Christopher from winning the race, John Ross sits alone in his office, brooding. When JR calls, he delivers the bad news, then braces himself for a telling off. To his surprise, it doesn’t come. “Don’t you worry, son,” JR assures him. “I’ve got a plan. It’s gonna be my masterpiece because you shouldn’t have to pay for my sins … Just remember, I’m proud of you. You’re my son, from tip to tail.” Touched, John Ross starts to thank him (“It means a whole lot for me to hear you say that”), but JR, hearing footsteps, has already removed the phone from his ear, a grave expression on his face. We cut back to John Ross as two gunshots ring out over the line. “JR?” he yells. “Hello? Dad! Dad!” The camera jumps back on every exclamation until we’re finally left with a wide shot of John Ross alone in the dark. The screen goes to black. He calls “Dad?” once more, softer this time, his voice echoing in the void.

And this week’s Top 3 are …

1 (1) DALLAS
2 (3) EMPIRE
3 (2) DYNASTY

 

[James from London]

11 Mar 13: DALLAS: J.R.'s Masterpiece v. 04 Nov 15: EMPIRE: A High Hope for a Low Heaven v. 06 Apr 18: DYNASTY: Don't Con a Con Artist

"It can't end here, not in this stinkin' mud hole,” protested JR when he and his brothers gave up the search for Jock in a South American jungle back in 1981. That line resonates throughout this week’s DALLAS as the Ewings struggle to comprehend how JR's own life could end in some cheap Mexican hotel room, apparently the result of a small scale robbery that could have happened to anyone. “What would JR possibly be doing here? He would never stay in a place like this,” protests Sue Ellen. “I don’t believe he was killed here,” insists Bobby. “What the hell was JR doing in Mexico?” asks John Ross.

Of course, the main similarity between the deaths of Jock and JR is that both were necessitated by the loss of the actors playing them. Whereas Jim Davis’s last screen appearance took place nine months before we learned of his character’s apparently fatal helicopter crash, Larry Hagman continued to appear on DALLAS until just a few seconds before JR’s demise. While Jock’s body was never found, leaving the possibility (explored five years later) that he might still be alive, the idea that JR might have faked his death is likewise mooted here, mostly by Bobby: “I’m not even sure he’s dead … There was no ID … Things with JR were almost never as they appeared to be.” However, neither viewers nor characters are left in any doubt when we see the family identify his body. This doesn’t take place in the hushed environment of a mortuary viewing room or even in the clinical surroundings of a hospital. Instead, the Ewings are shown into a dark, cramped room where corpses in blood-stained bodybags line the walls. As one of these bags is opened, Sue Ellen and John Ross immediately start to cry — she falls into Christopher’s arms while he turns to face the wall. Bobby, meanwhile, continues to stare down at his brother’s body, dry-eyed and grim-faced.

“Throughout my life,” he’ll say later in the episode, “it’s pretty much been easy for me to do good because I could always count on JR to do bad.” Here in the morgue, it feels as if he has already begun absorbing JR’s dark side into his own character, if only as a way of keeping him around. Back in ’81, before the Ewing brothers left for South America to looks for Jock, Miss Ellie entrusted Bobby with the task of keeping them united. Here, he’s the first to break rank and point the finger: “All right, John Ross, what do you know about this?” he snarls. "You brought Vicente and his thugs into our lives. What the hell have you brought into our lives this time?” Later in Dallas, he’s brusque when Gary offers his sympathies (“Yeah it’s a sad day. I got a lot to do”) and downright cold when Ray does the same (“I just keep thinking he’s gonna show up again.” “Well, he’s not.”) In other words, he treats them pretty much how JR did after he (Bobby) died. “I had one brother. Now he’s dead,” JR told Ray and Gary back then. And Bobby has never treated any of the women in his life as harshly, even cruelly, as he does Ann throughout this episode.

Before they can take JR’s body home to Dallas, the Ewings find themselves confronted by some decidedly KNOTSian red tape. “A physician authorised by the Secretary of Health must certify the death,” they are informed. “Then a Civil Registry judge will issue the death certificate … It could take several days.” It’s a relief, then, when Carlos Del Sol shows up. The father of the real Marta and an old friend of JR’s, he’s the C21st equivalent of Punk Anderson, the reassuringly familiar presence who welcomed Jock’s sons to the jungle base camp when they came looking for their daddy all those years ago. “You’re all going to go back to Dallas and leave everything in my hands,” he insists. “I give you my word, John Ross. My people will get to the bottom of this and I will personally escort your father home. I won’t leave his side until I deliver him home to you in Dallas.”

Sue Ellen has never been more multi-faceted than she is in this episode. No sooner have the family returned to Southfork than she resumes her plan to get Ewing Energies back from Bobby and Christopher. “I’m gonna keep working on Gary to get that oil turned back on,” she tells her on. “I don’t see why I should stop doing business just because JR’s gone.” John Ross is angered by her pragmatism. “Are you kidding me? My father’s barely cold and you’re already talking about going to seduce his brother? Could you at least pretend to mourn him for five minutes FOR MY SAKE!?” Later, at JR’s memorial service, her former rival Mandy Winger graciously concedes defeat: “You were the lucky one, Sue Ellen, because you made your peace with JR. I always envied how you got over him. To be honest, I don’t think I ever really did.” Even as she accepts this victory, Sue Ellen enviously eyes the glasses of bourbon and branch Mandy and Cally are toasting with. Is this really what success looks like? Realising she’s in trouble, she turns to fellow alcoholic Gary for support (“I have never wanted a drink more than I do right now,” she admits) while simultaneously continuing to manipulate him (”I wanna be honest with you tonight, Gary,” she coos). Later, alone in JR’s bedroom, she finally does what John Ross asked of her: she mourns his father. However, there’s only one way Sue Ellen knows how to truly mourn JR: she pours herself a glass of JR Ewing Bourbon, salutes their wedding photo, and takes just one drink in his honour. But once she’s swallowed it, the invisible cord connecting her to her sobriety is instantly severed and she has no choice but to go on drinking.

EMPIRE, meanwhile, picks up where last week’s episode left off with the Lyon family learning of Hakeem’s abduction. As Soap Land kidnappings go, it's a pretty conventional one (“a simple snatch-and-grab,” as Lucious puts it). His captors turn out to be the gang who have been harassing Cookie since her label set up shop on their block. An exchange is arranged — the thugs only ask for $40,000 — but Hakeem manages to give his abductors the slip on the way to the drop-off point. This is where the story really starts to get interesting. Instead of returning home, a beaten and bloodied Hakeem makes his way to Anika’s apartment. Having been rejected by the entire Lyon family, she is in a pretty dark place herself. (“I have nothing! I have no-one!” we hear her telling her mother on the phone.) She and Hakeem have urgent, traumatised sex almost right there on the doorstep. When he does eventually return to the bosom of his family, Hakeem is angry — less at the kidnappers than at his father. “What happened to you, son, is my worst nightmare,” Lucious tells him. “Tell yourself whatever you need so you can go to sleep but recognise: none of this would have gone down if I wasn’t your son. This is because of you and you,” he replies, pointing at both his parents. He refuses any offers of help or comfort. Throughout the ep, we see him screwing up in rehearsal, freezing on stage, smashing a mirror with his fist. He’s humiliated, emasculated, traumatised. Most Soap Land kidnap victims don’t exhibit such behaviour following their ordeal. Once they’ve been rescued or released, they’re pretty much OK. The exceptions are Lucy Ewing and Maggie Gioberti, both of whom eventually revealed they had been raped by their captor. Has something similar has happened to Hakeem or does his behaviour simply correspond with how anyone in the real world (as opposed to ‘80s Soap Land) might react to a kidnapping? “When the dudes pinned me up,” he finally admits, “I ain’t do nothing. I ain’t fight back. I wasn’t strong.” And that is reason enough for him to react the way he has.

Both JR’s memorial service on DALLAS and Steven and Sam’s engagement dinner on DYNASTY are disrupted by an inebriated character making an exhibition of himself. Cliff Barnes gatecrashes the former, behaving more like the volatile loudmouth of the original series than the eerily contained villain of the new one. “I came to pay my disrespects … I wish I had killed your father, but somebody beat me to it … Look who’s dancing on who’s grave now!” (As he is ejected from the room, we catch a glimpse of his former lover Mandy’s dismayed reaction and I notice that she’s wearing a cross. Could it be that, like Andre on EMPIRE, the original Valentine Girl has accepted Jesus Christ as her personal Lord and Saviour? For some reason, I quite like the idea.) Cliff’s outburst inspires some further badmouthing about the deceased. “JR was a selfish prick who died the way he deserved, in the armpit of the world!” declares a nameless drunk racist. John Ross is about to shut this guy up before Christopher steps in (“I got this, cousin”) and throws the first punch. A bunch of extras get involved and pretty soon it's a good old-fashioned DALLAS brawl. Meanwhile, DYNASTY takes a turn for the daft as Fallon decides the only way to get Alexis to come clean about her latest dastardly scheme (trying to frame Sam for shoplifting) is to spike her champagne flute with truth serum. Inevitably, the drinks get switched and it’s Sam who ends up losing his inhibitions and dancing on a table while singing ‘I Got Life’ from Hair. Melissa Agretti had a similar going-mad-and-climbing-on-a-table-during-a-formal-occasion incident on FALCON CREST which I hated because it was played for nonexistent laughs. This isn’t nearly so bad — the plot might be stupid, but the actors take it reasonably seriously and it’s actually quite funny, particularly when Sam loses his balance and falls over.

Whereas the punch-up on DALLAS serves to bring the Ewing cousins closer together (“That was awesome!” John Ross tells Christopher after the fight, smiling for the first time this episode), Sam’s wig-out on DYNASTY drives the Carrington kids further apart as Steven blames Fallon for the whole thing. While he accuses her of turning his engagement party “into the battleground for a family war that I’ve been trying to end from the beginning,” Christopher promises John Ross “we’re gonna find out who killed your father and when we do, we’ll avenge his death as brothers. Ewings take care of Ewings — always.” For once, John Ross doesn’t reject his cousin’s attempt to reclassify them as siblings. Instead, he nods in agreement. There’s more brotherly support when Andre and Jamal reach out to Hakeem following his ordeal on EMPIRE. “The three of us, we can’t be broken, not by thugs or kidnappers or anything else that comes at us,” Andre declares emphatically. “You know why? … Because we already beat the odds by surviving as the children of Lucious and Cookie Lyon.”

The term “junkyard dog” was heard in Soap Land for the first time two weeks ago. “You keep a junkyard dog like JR tied up long enough, he’s only gonna get meaner,” John Ross warned his uncle. It crops up thrice more this week. Like John Ross, Cliff uses it to refer to JR while talking to Bobby. “Since you lost your junkyard dog, there’s nothing keeping me from taking your family down!” he crows. Then, following Hakeem’s kidnapping on EMPIRE, Lucious warns Cookie that “there are two types of security in hip-hop. There’s the house dog and then there’s the junkyard dog and if you’re gonna make it in this game, you need both of them.” (I wasn't quite sure what he was talking about either.) Cookie later turns to Laz Delgado, ex-cop-turned-concert promoter, for security advice and he makes the unusual suggestion of putting Hakeem’s kidnappers on the payroll. “House dogs and junkyard dogs,” Cookie murmurs, recalling her earlier conversation with Lucious, before shooting the idea down: “I don’t want those wolves in my house.”

Three new relationships kick off this week. The sexiest is between John Ross and Emma on DALLAS. Having scarcely exchanged a word, but bound together by a combination of grief, lust and prescription medication, they have it off in the back of a car on the Southfork driveway while the rest of the family are inside the house. (There’s a desperation about their coupling similar to Hakeem and Anika’s.) The sweetest is between Fallon and Liam on DYNASTY. After four episodes of marriage, they finally kiss. “I’ve been wanting to do that since the day I met you,” Liam admits. The most shocking is between Cookie and Laz on EMPIRE. Her turning up at his door and asking him to “make me forget about everything” isn’t the shocking bit, nor is it him then taking her in his arms and laying her down on the nearest flat surface. The shocking bit is when Laz’s top comes off and we see he has the same tattoo on his back as Hakeem’s kidnappers!

For the past three weeks, each of the soaps has taken it in turn to stage a significant religious ceremony. Andre’s baptism on last week’s EMPIRE was preceded by Tom Carrington’s funeral on DYNASTY and is now followed by JR’s funeral on DALLAS. This time, rather than the inside of a church, the main event takes place in the family cemetery at Southfork. The cold, wintry environment is perfect. If the funeral is the highlight of a truly exceptional episode, then the highlight of the funeral itself is the eulogy Sue Ellen delivers at the gravesite. “When I was Miss Texas and I met JR,” she informs the various Ewings, Krebbs and Ramoses assembled, “I didn’t know what hit me. I fell in love — madly, passionately, hopelessly in love with the most infuriating, charming scoundrel I think I’ve ever known. It was enough to drive a girl to drink … I’m a bit drunk now.” This admission — which shows yet another side of Sue Ellen; she’s always hidden her drinking in the past — feels almost as devastating as JR’s death.

The closest the other soaps get to the loss of a loved one this week is the sudden illness of Michael Culhane’s father on DYNASTY. As far back as one can remember, the corridors of Soap Land Memorial Hospital have rung with the sound of rich men demanding that the best specialist surgeon in whichever field be flown in immediately to deal with the latest medical catastrophe. The inequities of such demands have invariably passed without comment — until now. “Fair or not, and it’s not, the Carringtons have access to the best medical care: better doctors, better hospitals,” Cristal tells Michael and his mother. “I reached out to the head of the hospital. She was at a conference in New York, but I sent CA’s jet for her and she reviewed your father’s records on the way back. The one per cent is good for some things, at least one per cent of the time.” So it is that they learn that Culhane Senior is suffering from acute lymphoblastic leukaemia. With delicious Soap Land irony, it later transpires that the Carrington name is responsible not only for this speedy diagnosis but also for making Michael’s father sick in the first place. “CA faced a scandal in Northeastern Georgia a few years back,” Anders reminds Blake. “If Culhane realises the connection between his father’s disease and what CA covered up, it might not be so easy to handle this time.” It doesn’t take Cristal long to find evidence of this Empire Valley-style cover-up and, in her self-appointed role of resident Carrington truth-teller, she heads straight to Soap Land Memorial to show it to Michael’s family — only to find Blake has gotten there first. “Honey, thank you for being here,” he says with a steely look in his eye. I like this newly gutsy, principled Cristal very much.

Back at JR’s gravesite, Sue Ellen reads from the letter she received from him in last week’s episode. “Old age has a way of humbling men,” it begins. He goes on to admit that he was never worthy of her and ends by asking, “When I get back to Dallas, will you have dinner with me?” “Yes, yes, JR. The answer is yes,” she sobs, crouching down to touch his casket. “You were the love my life,” she concludes. And with that, the never-ending, on-off, love-hate paradox that was JR and Sue Ellen’s relationship is finally resolved. However, another long-running, volatile Soap Land relationship is only just starting to be unpicked.

“The truth is she’s a big part of your life,” Anders tells Blake. He’s referring, of course, to Alexis. “While you work out what that means, I have to protect you and this family from your feud.” “I don’t need protection, not from my ex-wife, and certainly not from a member of my staff,” Blake snaps. “I’ll handle this myself … You’re fired!” Cristal is alarmed by her husband’s behaviour. “It scares me that you can be so unfeeling towards people who have been a vital part of your life and family,” she says. “All those years, I thought Anders was by my side,” Blake explains. “It turns out his loyalty still lies with Alexis.” “So that’s what this is about — her. Are you still in love with her, Blake?” she asks. “How can you ask me that?” he replies angrily. He’s less defensive when he apologises to Anders towards the end of the ep: “The truth is I’ve been a hypocrite, blaming you for being swayed by her when … I am too … She still has a pull.”

“I’m a bit drunk now,” Sue Ellen admits to her family on DALLAS. “I am a screwed-up person, Steven,” Alexis admits to her son on DYNASTY when he asks why she tried to frame his fiancé. “I was afraid Sam would take you away from me … and I don’t wanna lose another son. You’re not the firstborn Carrington, Steven.” She then tells him about his brother Adam and how she has spent all her money trying to find him. We can’t be sure if she’s as upset as she seems or just playing for sympathy, or some combination of the two. The scene ends with Steven promising to help her find Adam. There’s an even more unexpected revelation about a missing person in the penultimate scene of DALLAS. “For the last several months, [JR’s] been trying to find your mother,” Bum tells Christopher. He then hands him a file so he’ll “understand why it’s important for you to find your mama.” The race is on: who will be found first — Adam or Pam?

Minor trend of the week: cooks in the limelight. Now that Alexis is living in her old studio again, she has the Carrington servants waiting on her like she is still the lady of the Carrington Manor. Annoyed, Blake repurposes the dressing down his ‘80s counterpart gave the staff for disrespecting Krystle when they were first married. Back then, he chose to make an example of Leon, his gardener of ten years, by firing him (only for Joseph to rehire him later on in the ep). This time around, it’s Mrs Gunnerson, aka “the head of the kitchen whose several family members eat well at my expense”, who gets the chop (only for Anders to rehire her later on in the ep). This Mrs G is somewhat more severe-looking than the motherly ‘80s version. In the extended version of “JR’s Masterpiece” on the DALLAS DVD, all but one of the Ewing and Ramos family members get a turn at speaking at JR’s funeral. This includes Carmen the cook, mother of Drew and Elena. She tearfully reveals that, like Mrs Gunnerson’s family, her children similarly ate well at JR’s expense: “When my husband died and I thought I was going to lose my house … JR told me, ‘Carmen, you make the best mole in the country and I don’t want you making it for anybody else but the Ewings … Just move your whole damn family in.’” Who knew? (The one person who doesn’t speak at the grave is John Ross. But even though he remains silent throughout the funeral, his angry yet tearful presence is the most compelling of all.)

According to Sue Ellen, “JR always wanted everyone to get drunk at his funeral. He thought it would make everyone honest.” Larry Hagman, meanwhile, was once quoted as saying he wanted his remains “to be spread over a field and have marijuana and wheat planted, and harvest it in a couple of years and then have a big marijuana cake, enough for 200 to 300 people.” From a creative standpoint, Hagman’s passing has proven just as fertile as that field. Having already resulted in a deeply moving tribute to a legendary character, it now sets in motion a fantastically intriguing mystery story (variously known as “JR’s Masterpiece”, “Who Killed JR?” And “What the hell was JR doing in Mexico?”) that the writers have conjured out of nowhere (Hagman having died during the filming of the Vicente-at-Southfork episode that came just two weeks before this one) while making it seem as if it has been in the works for months. All we know so far is that it involves Pam, Cliff, Harris Ryland and a secret JR has posthumously passed on to Bobby via Bum.

The final scene of the episode has Bobby entering JR’s room and knocking back a couple of shots of bourbon, just as Sue Ellen did earlier. Then he sees his brother’s Stetson hanging off a chair. “I knew you’d have at least one more left up your sleeve, JR, and it’s a good one,” he chuckles. The symbolism of the hat resonates back to 1981. Shortly after Jock’s final appearance and just before Jim Davis’s death, Miss Ellie called JR from Paris where she and Jock had gone on their second honeymoon. Jock's Stetson was positioned on a table as a reminder of the character’s presence. When the scene cut back to JR on the other end of the line, his own hat was positioned in the same way. "I love you, brother," says Bobby as he finally starts to cry.

And the Top 3 are …

1 (1) DALLAS
2 (3) DYNASTY
3 (2) EMPIRE

 

[Willie Oleson]

Somehow I missed the most recent update!

 

[James from London]

Somehow I missed the most recent update!

I thought that maybe all that Breaking Bad you've been watching meant that your tastes had now progressed beyond the humble soap opera!

 

[James from London]

18 Mar 13: DALLAS: Ewings Unite! v. 11 Nov 15: EMPIRE: True Love Never v. 20 Apr 18: DYNASTY: Use or Be Used

Two weeks after Tom Carrington bequeathed the Carrington Manor to Alexis, a letter written by Miss Ellie shortly before her death, but “not to be opened until after JR’s passing”, leaves half of Southfork to John Ross. JR, meanwhile, leaves his share of the mineral rights to the oil under Southfork to his ex-wife and son. Bobby’s decision to allow drilling on the ranch to recommence means that the Ewings are all on the same side for once. Their main enemy is now Cliff. “We are up against a very dangerous man with a lot of money who will stop at nothing to destroy this family. The only hope we have of surviving is if we stick together,” Bobby declares.

While trying to conduct business, Christopher Ewing and Andre Lyon each find themselves in a sexually compromising position. First Christopher is warned by Alison Jones, the not unattractive city transportation official he’s been dealing with, that Barnes Global has undercut his bid to fuel the city’s fleet with methane. She has, however, arranged for her colleagues to see a demonstration of Christopher’s rig in action later that week. “I’m gonna need more than a week,” he protests. “That’s a big ask,” she purrs, putting her hand on top of his. “What can you offer me in exchange?” When Christopher pulls his hand away, indicating that he isn’t prepared to prostitute himself the way EMPIRE’s Anika and DYNASTY’s Jeff did earlier in the season, she turns chilly. “You have one week,” she snaps.

Over on EMPIRE, it’s Andre’s own father who tries to whore him out. “Freda Gatz has a small legal issue we need to take care of … a gang injunction,” he tells him. “Why don’t you go see your lady friend down in the mayor’s office?” “… That’s not a small issue, Pop,” Andre argues. “And you’re not a small man, son — I’m sure that’s why the deputy mayor likes doing business with you,” replies Lucious. Indeed, having sex on Deputy Mayor Alvarez's desk is nothing Andre hasn’t enjoyed in the past, but that was before he found the Lord.

Bobby’s response upon hearing that Cliff is trying to steal Christopher’s deal is interesting. “Since JR is dead, we have to find our own inner junkyard dog,” he tells John Ross and Christopher. In other words, they each have to tap into their own inner JR. This is a far cry from the Bobby who was so “sick and tired of this family devouring itself over money” when New DALLAS began. The advice Andre receives from his pastor is no less murky. “Would fulfilling your father’s venal task advance your larger task within Empire?” he asks. “Andre, God has chosen you to be His warrior. Sometimes warriors have to do things on the battlefield that would be repugnant in any other context.”

Both Christopher and Andre arrive at a compromise that allows them to keep their virtues intact while still channelling their inner junkyard dog. Well, strictly speaking, it’s John Ross who comes up with the plan whereby he sleeps with Alison instead of his cousin while Bum takes incriminating photographs of them wearing matching bathrobes. Christopher subsequently presents these pictures to Alison. “Once these hit the paper, you will get fired, certainly ruining any hopes of a political career,” he tells her. “This will destroy my husband!” she protests. Likewise, Andre, instead of doing the dirty with Deputy Mayor Alvarez, shows her recordings of their previous “closed-door bartering sessions.” She too has a marriage and a career to lose. “Kill the Barnes Global offer and stay out of my way,” Christopher tells Alison. ”Unless you want the mayor to get a full report on how you conduct your government business, have that gang injunction lifted by tomorrow,” Andre orders the Deputy Mayor.

Committing blackmail puts Andre and Christopher in contrasting moods. While Andre is so relieved he’s able to make love to his wife for the first time this season (“Oh baby, this is what I’ve been praying for!” Rhonda gasps), Christopher is ridden with guilt and proceeds to drown his sorrows in a scene remarkably similar to one in 1983 where Bobby likewise hit the booze after blackmailing a government official who was in cahoots with JR. Whereas Pam was appalled by Bobby’s actions then (“You’re not the man I married!” she yelled), Elena is simply disappointed by Christopher’s now. “You’re the most decent man I know and now you’re blackmailing people,” she tells him sadly.

As JR predicted before he died, Cliff Barnes moves to enlist Harris Ryland in his plan to bring down the Ewings. His reassuringly familiar rant about what was stolen from his family (“The Ewings drove my father to drink and left him penniless and broken … They stole his legacy and mine”) is echoed by Jeff Colby on DYNASTY (“Fallon Carrington didn’t just steal 25% of my company. She stole my family, my pride”). Cliff makes Harris an offer he can’t refuse: “Help me take down the Ewings and I will give you enough money to buy Ryland Transport right out from underneath your mother’s control.”

However, Judith Ryland is already one step ahead of her son. Following the bitter row between them in last week’s ep, she tells him she’s leaving for London: “I don’t know what I’ve done to earn your hatred, Harris, but I’ve decided it’s too painful to try to figure it out … The moment I step off the plane, I’m going to freeze all your bank accounts … I’m also removing you as the head of Ryland Transport.” “You can’t do that!” he shouts. “This is a family business and I am head of the family and since you are dead to me, you are no longer family,” she replies coldly. They struggle and she falls down a flight of stairs. It’s pure FALCON CREST Season 3.

This week’s episode of New DYNASTY is the best so far. It opens with Alexis exercising in the Carrington dining room while the rest of the family are attempting to eat breakfast. (“These floors are more shock-absorbent than the ones in the loft,” she explains.) From ‘Jump’ by the Pointer Sisters playing on a ghetto-blaster to Alexis’s pink and silver workout ensemble (leg-warmers included) to Fallon’s gag about her “retirement home revival of Flashdance”, the whole sequence is an enjoyable pastiche of the ‘80s fitness craze. But whereas no-one in the actual Soap Land ‘80s would have dreamt of saying anything negative about an older woman staying in shape, here it is depicted as both impressive (the admiring close-ups of Alexis’s toned body parts) and somewhat grotesque — Cristal recoiling from Alexis’s post-workout body odour; Steven declaring that he has "definitely lost my appetite.” Alexis herself, or Paige as she was back then, reacted to her own mother’s nude photoshoot with similar distaste in 1991. After listening to the family insults zinging back and forth, Liam tells Fallon that “breakfast in your house is a contact sport.”

The sporting metaphors continue on DALLAS and EMPIRE. “Were you ever a runner, Mr Ewing?” Alison Jones asks John Ross before they end up in bed together. “I get the sense you’re quick out the blocks, wanna go as fast as possible.” “I like to come out hard and power my way to that finish line,” he replies with a straight face. “I was like that when I was young,” she tells him. “Now I’m more of a distance woman …” and so on. On EMPIRE, Lucious climbs into the ring, literally and figuratively, with Jago, the head of a streaming service that he and Mimi want to merge with. “They say sparring partners make the best business partners,” Lucious says. “Imagine what you could do with Empire in your corner. Talking about a true heavyweight.” After he inadvertently knocks Jago out, they are obliged to continue their meeting at Jago’s hospital bedside. As they talk, Mimi surreptitiously increases Jago’s morphine supply until he’s so blissed out he agrees to the merger on Lucious’s terms — a plot point as silly as the truth serum story on last week’s DYNASTY.

While Emma teases Drew Ramos by pretending they’ve arranged a date that he has forgotten about on DALLAS (“You’re so cute when you’re freaked out”), Liam nervously asks Fallon for a date on DYNASTY: “Our fake marriage contract ends soon so before I turn back into a frog, I thought we could have a date.” “This is so last minute, I have nothing to wear,” mock-protests Drew. “I need a dress, I need shoes, I need a hero,” declares Fallon. Cut to one of those trying-on-outfits-in-front-of-the-mirror montages with Sam acting as her fashion adviser. “I look like Hilary Clinton dipped in Elton John,” she complains of a gold-sequinned pantsuit. In contrast to the dark gothic atmosphere of the Ryland house, Emma and Drew’s date is casual and fun. They ride his motorbike through the gates of Southfork (a unique shot which gave me a geeky thrill) and wind up in a park eating burgers and exchanging backstories. At the other end of the formality spectrum, Liam meticulously prepares a six-course dinner for him and Fallon. Of course, no Soap Land date would be complete without some parental interference. While Harris Ryland has henchman Roy Vickers spy on Emma and Drew, Alexis accidentally-on-purpose tells Fallon about Michael Culhane’s dying father — ignoring Michael’s specific request that Fallon not be informed. As a consequence, Fallon is too preoccupied to focus on her date with Liam and instead bails on him to go and visit Michael at Soap Land Memorial Hospital. As frustrating as this is for Liam, Harris Ryland has something much worse in mind for Drew. Cliff has already assigned Harris the task of finding someone to plant a bomb on Christopher's rig to coincide with the demonstration he has planned. Harris tells Roy Vickers to give the job to Drew: “I want him fully compromised.” Drew refuses to comply — until Roy threatens his sister (“Her death would be so tragic”).

There are a couple of great scenes between Sue Ellen and Gary this week. In the first, he tries to broach the subject of her alcohol problem and she simply denies she has one: “I had a moment of weakness when JR died, but I would hardly consider that drinking.” It feels like 1980 all over again. When he persists, she turns mean. “Poor sweet Gary,” she says mockingly, “I was playing you to get Bobby to turn that oil back on … but Bobby’s already done that so I don’t need you anymore.” When he still refuses to be put off, she takes the unprecedented step of calling Val in Knots Landing: “Gary’s here and he really misses you … I think you should come to Dallas and get him.” Then, safely alone, she pulls down the blinds of her office window, pours herself a large drink, winks conspiratorially at a picture of JR and knocks it back.

After Val realises she has been summoned to DALLAS under false pretences, she only sticks around for a scene and a half, but still finds time to barge into Sue Ellen’s office and unleash a barrage of insults that make Fallon’s abuse of Alexis on this week’s DYNASTY (“You’re about as transparent as a hooker’s negligee … I don’t need love advice from a woman who believes that ‘as long as we both shall live’ means until happy hour”) seem almost restrained by comparison: “Once a bitch always a bitch … You are just as sadistic as JR ever was … what a manipulative monster you are!” Had there been a pair of scissors on Sue Ellen’s desk, she probably would have threatened her with them the way she once did Jill Bennett.

Nothing Val accuses her ex-sister-in-law of here is untrue, and yet in her second scene with Gary (also his very last appearance), Sue Ellen manages to flip the whole situation around. He is still convinced she needs his help (“and, unlike my wife, I help people in trouble”) while she is still trying to get rid of him, but this time she tries a gentler approach. “Valene left you because she knew it was the only way to get you sober again and she was right,” she tells him. “She left you because she loves you. I know I need help, but I need to do it myself.” Her next words clearly refer to JR’s passing, but they also serve to assuage Gary’s feelings of resentment towards Val: “One day she may be gone and you don’t want to regret the loss of every moment you could have spent with her.” Gary is moved. “If you ever need anything, I’m just a phone call away,” he tells her. “I know that,” Sue Ellen assures him gratefully. And so, with Gary and Val getting back together, the KNOTS saga has come full circle. Sue Ellen Ewing providing KNOTS LANDING with its final moment of closure — who’d have thunk it? (And it's all so she can carry on drinking.)

Sue Ellen is not the only character to make an unlikely cupid for two estranged lovers this week. “Fallon loves you,” Alexis tells Michael outside the hospital where his father is dying. “Last time I checked, Fallon was married to Liam,” Michael points out. “She doesn’t love him. She loves you,” Alexis insists. Meanwhile, Fallon is talking to Michael’s mother upstairs. “I can see how hurt you were that you weren’t the first to know, but it isn’t about you right now,” Mrs Culhane tells her. It’s a strange thing: as soon as a character on screen articulates what the viewer is thinking at home — in this case, how relentlessly self-centred Fallon is — it takes the sting out of it and Fallon becomes an interesting, sympathetic character again.

As well as laying KNOTS LANDING to rest, this week’s DALLAS also reveals the fate of one of its most infamous villains. “Katherine’s dead,” Bobby says casually. This must rank as the most offhand retroactive demise of a Soap Land character since the news that Dex Dexter “didn’t fare all that well” in the DYNASTY reunion. Bobby also gives us some background on Barnes Global that makes it sounds like an exciting mashup of the three Wentworth businesses from the original DALLAS. He describes it as “a multi-billion dollar company” (like Wentworth Industries) that was “started by Cliff’s mother” (sort of like Barnes Wentworth) and later divided “between the three children - Pamela, Cliff and Katherine” (as was Wentworth Tool & Die). “If Pamela’s still alive, she could be a silent partner in Barnes Global,” he continues. “Maybe that’s why JR was looking for her — to help us take Cliff down.” “If my mother’s still alive, I’ll find her,” Christopher declares. Fighting talk — but Steven Carrington is quicker off the mark when it comes to looking for long lost relatives. In the opening scene of this week’s DYNASTY, he departs for El Paso in search of his brother Adam and by the end of the ep has an address for the sister of one of Adam’s suspected kidnappers.

At Fallon’s suggestion, she and Liam try another date — this time at La Perla, a glitzy fashion show/gala/launch thing. I’d never previously heard of La Perla but from the way the party is shot it's immediately apparent that, just like the Carousel Ball in DYNASTY ’83, this is a real event that the fictional characters have been inserted into. (Alexis, Sam and Jeff are also in attendance.) La Perla’s “creative director”, Julia Haart, gives off the same by now familiar “real-life person playing themselves” vibe as the sports luminaries who showed up to JR’s memorial service last week and the umpteen hip-hop artists who cameo on EMPIRE.

Real-life and fiction overlap so frequently on EMPIRE that I had to google Huey Jarvis, a Quincy Jones-style music impresario whom Lucious visits this week, to find out if he really exists or not. (He doesn’t.) Huey hosts the prestigious Living Room Sessions — a regular gathering in his home where a few select musical artists are invited to perform their latest work. Lucious has never received such an invitation but longs to. “Everybody who’s played one of your sessions in the last five years has walked on stage and accepted their award,” he tells him admiringly. Hoping for Huey’s approval, Lucious plays him the new track he’s been working on, but Huey remains politely unimpressed. “I’m still wanting to hear more,” he says, “feel more of that part of yourself that you keep locked up so tight … You got to dig deeper.”

Both Lucious and Alexis find themselves eclipsed by their children this week. After Jamal is invited to play at one of Huey’s Living Room Sessions, Lucious proudly embraces him, but when he’s left alone we see how gutted he is that it wasn’t him. Meanwhile, Julia Haart raves to Alexis about Fallon at La Perla: “Fallon is such a doll and literally the perfect face for my brand — a sexy, savvy, no-nonsense businesswoman.” “I thought that was me,” says Alexis. “She is you,” Julia assures her hastily.

Meanwhile, Liam does his best to avoid the popping flashbulbs on the red carpet. When someone in Soap Land is this publicity-shy, it means they’re either in the Witness Protection Programme (Nicholas Pearce on DALLAS, the Williams family on KNOTS) or have an even more complicated reason for hiding their true identity (Kim Novak on FALCON CREST). Sure enough, Julia Haart recognises Liam as writer Jack Lowden who "just received a seven-figure advance for a tell-all book about a wealthy dysfunctional family.” Fallon is crushed. “I’m still me, we can still be us,” Liam/Jack pleads, but she's not buying it. Last we see of Jack/Liam, he’s sitting glumly at a bus stop when a chauffeur-driven limousine pulls up. “The jet’s fuelled and waiting as per your instructions,” the driver tells him.

At JR’s funeral last week, Bobby said that it had always been easy to for him do good because he could always rely on his brother to do bad: “Now I have to figure out just what I’m supposed to do in this grand scheme of things.” This dilemma seems to apply to several DALLAS characters this week. Without JR to measure their morality against, no-one seems to know how far is too far anymore — Christopher blackmailing Alison, Sue Ellen manipulating Gary and Val, Drew planting a bomb … “I know I crossed a line here,” Christopher admits. “That’s what breaks my heart — you did it anyway,” Elena replies. Nor is he the only one. Roy Vickers is preparing to remotely detonate the bomb on Christopher’s rig when he sees something amiss on his computer screen. He calls Cliff to warn him: “We got a problem, sir. Your daughter’s on the rig.” Cliff hesitates. Then he asks if they can wait till she’s gone. Roy replies that everyone is about to leave together. “We need witnesses,” Cliff mutters. Another silence. We see his face twitching. “Just do it,” he says finally. “But, sir, she’s pregnant,” Roy protests. Cliff ignores him and hangs up, a haunted look in his eyes. Meanwhile, a tormented Drew waits back at the ranch, knowing what’s about to happen. Just before dialling the sequence of numbers that will set off the bomb, Roy takes the cross that’s on a chain around his neck and kisses it. The fact that all three men are aware of the gravity of what is about to happen and then allow it to happen anyway is what makes the sequence so powerful. As Elena says to Christopher, “That’s what breaks my heart — you did it anyway.”

Bereavement, drug addiction, mental illness, religious faith — all subjects that New DYNASTY has rolled its eyes at, made a few wisecracks about and then dismissed. Blake is hoping that the leukaemia epidemic Carrington Atlantic is responsible for can be forgotten about just as easily. Cristal, however, has other ideas. “Culhane’s father is the sixteenth adult in Clarke County to be diagnosed with cancer,” she tells him. “The science linking our chemical waste to those patients is weak,” he argues. “Because CA made it look weak,” she insists.

It’s striking that the most morally principled character in both DALLAS and DYNASTY is the female Mexican outsider — Elena and Cristal. While Elena chooses to remove herself from the corruption at the heart of her series (“Ewing Enterprises is a pit of snakes,” she tells Christopher. “You may be in so deep that you can’t see it, but … I will not be a part of this”), Cristal does not have that luxury. She’s enmeshed at CA and is part of the cover-up. “When I first started working at Carrington Atlantic in 2013, I killed a story about the Clarke County health crisis,” she admits to a company lawyer. “Even though you knew CA was responsible for making people sick?” the lawyer asks. “I was just trying to do my job,” she replies. At her urging, Blake agrees to accept “full responsibility for the environmental impact we’ve had on Clarke County”, but first the lawyer recommends “CA undertake a private environmental study … to determine exactly what chemicals are making people sick.” Cristal asks how long this will take. “A couple of years minimum,” comes the reply. Blake ‘reluctantly’ agrees. “The longer we wait, the more people die. We need to do the right thing!” Cristal insists. “And we will, just as soon as that study is concluded,” Blake replies smoothly. “You were never gonna go public, were you?” she realises. “You just wanted me to go on the record with you so you could blackmail me into silence.” Things turn even more sinister when she finds some shadowy X-FILES type figures in her office shredding her confidential files.

If Clarke County (the town contaminated by chemical waste from Carrington Atlantic’s power plant) is DYNASTY’s equivalent of Wesphall (the town poisoned by Galveston Industries’ toxic waste on KNOTS), then Cristal is Lila Maxwell, the company employee who tries to expose the truth. Whereas Lila was murdered before she could blow the whistle (or appear on screen), Cristal learns her fate in the darkest and best scene of New DYNASTY to date. Blake enters his study and fixes himself a drink before realising his wife is “waiting in the dark, drinking my scotch” while seated behind his desk. I realise this comparison is wildly overblown, but the way the scene is shot to emphasise the distance, both physical and emotional, between Blake and Cristal reminds me of an equivalent moment in Citizen Kane. “You think you’re so clever, so much smarter than everyone else, but tonight when you had those men destroy every shred of incriminating evidence, you made a big mistake,” she tells him. “Now there’s no record of you and I admitting personal culpability which means there’s nothing stopping me from going public with the epidemic.” “Then it’s a good thing I kept this,” he replies, producing a tape of her admitting to killing the story. “So if you ever do decide to make trouble for CA, you will be the first one they fit for an orange jumpsuit.” “… You’re not the man I married,” she says, quoting Pam Ewing in 1983. “Ever since Alexis invaded this house —“ “Don’t put this on Alexis,” he interrupts. “For all her faults, at least she understands the concept of family loyalty.” This leaves Cristal speechless. “The anger will pass,” he assures her condescendingly. “I’m not angry,” she replies, “I’m scared. Scared of you.” “Well, you should be,” he tells her.

(Just as she was for Krystle in Season 9 of ‘80s DYNASTY, Alexis a comparatively minor thorn in Cristal’s side. “Get the hell out of my house,” she snarls at her as they pass in the Carrington hallway while Cristal is on her way to deal with a more pressing matter.)

Blake Carrington and Cliff Barnes have us on the edge of our seats this week, waiting to see just how far they’ll go: Is Cliff really prepared to sacrifice his pregnant daughter to get revenge on the Ewings? Is Blake really prepared to frame his wife to cover up his crimes? The equivalent question on this week’s EMPIRE is: how far inside himself is Lucious prepared to dig in order to produce an emotionally authentic track? When Huey tells him to “dig deeper”, he’s repeating the same advice Lucious himself gave a singer in the very first scene of EMPIRE (“I need you to sing like you are going to die tomorrow, like this is the last song you will ever sing”), so the fact that he is now in the same position is obviously significant.

Lucious and Mimi celebrate their streaming deal with Jago by getting wasted and picking up a girl, April, in a club. They agree to share her and all wind up at Lucious’s place. This is the first ménage à trois we’ve come across in this thread — although, chronologically, John Ross, Pamela and Emma’s disastrous night together occurred two years before this one. While no-one ends up in a coma on this occasion, things nonetheless get very messy. The sexy fun is interrupted when Mimi gets a phone call, presumably from her girlfriend, that causes her to sob till her make up runs. Then the tattoo of a gun on April’s inner thigh triggers (no pun intended) yet another grim childhood flashback for Lucious, this time of his mother putting a revolver to her head. “Y’all might wanna get started without me. I’m gonna be a while,” he tells the ladies before rushing to his ensuite recording studio and finally giving the song he’s been working on all the emotion and urgency it needs. It’s a very watchable sequence and I get why it’s so important to Lucious; I’m just quite not sure why it’s supposed to matter to us. I mean, writing a song, however good, isn’t exactly blackmailing your wife into keeping quiet about an epidemic or blowing up your pregnant daughter.

It truly feels like both Blake and Cliff have crossed a line this week. In Soap Land, we’re used to characters getting in over their heads and making decisions that have disastrous consequences, but here, both men knew exactly what they were doing before they did it. Thrillingly, it’s hard to see how either of them can be redeemed now.

And this week’s Top 3 are …

1 (1) DALLAS
2 (2) DYNASTY
3 (3) EMPIRE

 

[Willie Oleson]

The advice Andre receives from his pastor is no less murky. “Would fulfilling your father’s venal task advance your larger task within Empire?” he asks.

What has Empire got to do with religion? Was this pastor blackmailed or threatened by Lucious in order to give Andre the "proper" advice?

“I need a dress, I need shoes, I need a hero,” declares Fallon.

What a funny and easily overlooked reference.

 

[James from London]

What has Empire got to do with religion?

Well, in a way, quite a lot, with Lucious casually referring to himself as a god all the time. But I think the larger task they're talking about is making Empire a more moral place and maybe even spreading the Lord's message through the records they put out.

Was this pastor blackmailed or threatened by Lucious in order to give Andre the "proper" advice?

Wow, I think you've just out-soaped a soap!

 

[Willie Oleson]

But I think the larger task they're talking about is making Empire a more moral place and maybe even spreading the Lord's message through the records they put out.

That makes sense.

How do you feel about religious Andre right now?
On the one hand I'm glad it wasn't just a one-episode gimmick but on the other hand I could also see myself getting a little restless with it.
It's one of those things that needs to be 100% believable and hardcore to have it successfully integrate with the rest of the story.
Not just some hindrance that, when push comes to shove, isn't going to hinder him anyway.
A big character adjustment like this, I feel, needs to have serious consequences (considering that we lost the semi-loose cannon-Andre).
How does all this look on-screen?

 

[James from London]

How do you feel about religious Andre right now?

It's a bit early to tell. He's still an interesting character. Between the pressures from his father, his religion and his bipolar condition, it feels something's eventually gonna snap. But EMPIRE in general isn't quite as exciting or dramatic as it was in its first season and at the start of this one. The stakes don't feel as big. Hopefully, it's only temporary.

 

[James from London]

25 Mar 13: DALLAS: Guilt & Innocence v. 18 Nov 15: EMPIRE: My Bad Parts v. 27 Apr 18: DYNASTY: A Line From the Past

Just as EMPIRE recently did with Hakeem’s kidnapping, DALLAS takes a familiar Soap Land incident — in this case, a miscarriage — and puts a C21st spin on it. Having been badly injured in the explosion on Christopher’s rig, pregnant Pamela is rushed to Soap Land Memorial Hospital where the family wait anxiously for news and mention is made of “the best neonatologist in the state.” So far, so traditional but instead of a simple “she lost the baby” followed by lots of tears, Pamela’s situation is more complicated and spans the entire episode. “The trauma from the explosion caused an abdominal aortic aneurysm,” her doctor explains. She needs surgery before the aneurysm ruptures or she will die. However, her blood pressure needs to stabilise first. When the doctor recommends terminating the pregnancy so she can operate safely, Pamela becomes hysterical. “You’re not killing my babies!” she cries. In the event, the operation goes ahead and is a success. “They all made it,” the family are informed. “The babies went through a lot of stress … but they’re all stable.” Everyone breathes a collective sigh of relief and so are completely unprepared when matters take a sudden turn for the worse in the final minute of the ep. Alerted by a “Code blue!”, Christopher and John Ross race to Pamela’s room to find her screaming and writhing in agony as doctors and nurses scramble to save the lives of her unborn twins. “Heart rate’s dropping on Baby A!” “Heart rate’s dropping on Baby B!” Everything goes slow motion as the chaos unfolds. We watch on monitors as the babies’ heart rates drop inexorably before stopping completely. This serves to make their deaths feel more tangibly tragic than the average Soap Land miscarriage (just as Hakeem’s post-traumatic reaction to his abduction made it seem more real than a regular TV kidnapping). The journey of the twins’ condition in this episode — from imminent danger to apparent safety to abrupt relapse and tragedy — mirrors what happened both to Cody LeFever’s unborn baby on last season’s BLOOD AND OIL (it survived her brutal attack but then died anyway) and Michael Culhane’s father on this week’s DYNASTY. “[Cristal] got my father onto this clinical trial and the doctors are optimistic,” a relieved Michael tells Fallon early on in the ep. “It’s the best news we got since he got sick!” Near the end of ep, Cristal finds him slumped in shock outside his father’s room. “My dad passed away,” he tells her. “He had a weak immune system because of the drugs. He got an infection.”

Alongside the exploding Ewings, Judith Ryland is admitted to Soap Land Memorial with a broken leg following her did-she-fall-or-was-she-pushed tumble down the stairs last week. As a result, almost the entire episode takes place in the hospital, providing ample opportunity for various Rylands and Ewings to run into one another. (This medical spin on the “When Storylines Collide” convention is strongly reminiscent of the opening episode of ‘80s DYNASTY’s third season where Blake Carrington and Cecil Colby were simultaneously admitted to Soap Land Memorial following entirely separate life-threatening incidents.)

The Ryland power games continue as soon as Judith regains consciousness until, just one week after Liam Ridley/Jack Lowden flew out of New DYNASTY, a sedated Judith exits Soap Land via a private ambulance. “Where are you taking me?” she woozily asks one of her attending medics. “To the rehab facility, Mrs Ryland — remember?” one of them replies before exchanging an evil look with her colleague who is busy injecting Judith’s IV with something sinister-looking. If last week’s fall down the stairs had echoes of FALCON CREST Season 3, then this scene hearkens back even further, to Michael Tyrone-era FLAMINGO ROAD.

Fortunately, both Liam and Judith will return, but in the meantime, we have some fresh faces to replace them, all of whom have ties to the existing characters’ pasts. The most famous of these is Lee Majors who plays Ken Richards on DALLAS. Ken is an old boyfriend of Sue Ellen’s from her Miss Texas days who lost her to JR — a bionic Clint Ogden if you will. As good as it is to see Steve Austin, the highlight of this week’s DALLAS is undoubtedly the return of Afton Cooper, in her new role of Pamela’s clucky mother. She’s more eccentric than we remember, like a cross between Lilimae Clements and Dolly Parton but with a sharper tongue than either. She insists on serenading her bedridden daughter with a verse or two of ‘Mockingbird’, has little good to say about either Cliff (“a mean drunk”) or Christopher (“I know the explosion was your fault … just stay away”) and seems quite taken with John Ross. “You’re even more handsome than your father and, I’m guessing, smarter — nicer too. Still a touch of the devil,” she notes appreciatively. Neither Bobby nor Sue Ellen has much time for her, the latter referring to her as “that social climber”. Over on EMPIRE, Cookie seems to feel the same way about her previously unmentioned sister Candace who pops up unexpectedly. “If seventeen years of prison has taught you anything,” Candace tells her sniffily, “it’s definitely how to dress like a monkey and talk like a pimp.” “You know I never did like your fake ass, Candace — looking down your nose at me like you ain’t from the same hood I’m from, married to your white man,” Cookie replies. Candace (who insists on calling Cookie by her real name of Loretha) brings news of their other sister, Carol, who has abandoned her kids and is “on a bender”. (In other relapse news, Sue Ellen is still secretly drinking, but manages to both flirt and talk business with Ken Richards at the same time. After all these years, DALLAS has finally realised the value of making Sue Ellen a functioning alcoholic.) There’s more long-lost relative action on DYNASTY where Anders reveals to Sam that he was once married and has a daughter, Kirby, living in Australia. Sam is as shocked by this news as viewers of ‘80s DYNASTY were when they realised the original Joseph (“the impotent voyeur”) likewise had a family: “Whoa — you were married?? I had always pictured you like a nun, but instead of Jesus you’d sworn yourself to the Carringtons.” We get to hear Kirby’s Aussie accent for ourselves when a tipsily sentimental Anders phones her for the first time in years before losing his nerve and hanging up.

Afton and Kirby aren’t the only famous names from ‘80s Soap Land to resurface this week. Bobby also receives news of Pam (or “Christopher’s mother,” as he describes her to Ann to help differentiate her from New Pamela). According to a detective's report, she was last seen entering Abu Dhabi in 1989. “I thought you were done with her, Bobby,” says Ann nervously. “So did I, Annie,” he replies. Back on DYNASTY, Soap Land’s other missing person appears on Steven’s motel room doorstep. “Adam?” Steven asks in surprise. And why stop at one long-lost Carrington when you can have two? Throughout this week’s DYNASTY, Alexis has a series of soft-focus flashbacks to 2007 (not quite as evocative as those KNOTS flashbacks to ’68 in which she played her own mother) which build up to her telling Jeff Colby that he’s “one of them — you’re a Carrington, Jeff.” While such an outlandish announcement is always fun to hear in Soap Land, this one might have had more impact if Jeff was a better-developed character, instead of just being rich, black and vengeful.

After Fallon learns that Cristal has taken an interest in Michael’s father's condition, her suspicions are aroused and it doesn’t take long for her to find out about the Clarke County cover-up. Gratifyingly, she takes the situation seriously and even sides with Cristal against her father. However, when the story becomes about her stealing the evidence Blake is holding over Cristal, it loses its gravitas and turns into just another hi-jinks caper about secret combinations and Fallon hiding under a desk. Things get interesting again when someone leaks the cover-up to the press. Blake, Cristal and Fallon all suspect each other, but eventually, Alexis reveals that she was responsible.

To varying degrees, the Carringtons, Lyons and Ewings all come under public scrutiny this week. For the Lyons, the publicity is entirely self-generated. “Sometimes the only way to get someone’s attention is to hit them in the head with a sledgehammer,” Lucious tells Becky before declaring war on his youngest son in a room full of blogging, tweeting clubbers: “I got a message I want to send to Hakeem — it’s uncut, it’s raw!” he announces as he introduces his protege Freda to perform a diss track in which she claims that Hakeem is, among other things, “Daddy’s little girl.” As Lucious intended, the song goes viral and Hakeem is furious. He vows to “show the world who the real Lyon is” by challenging Freda to a rap battle. The winner takes the Lyon surname.

Meanwhile, Jamal has the chance at fronting an ad campaign for Pepsi (yes, Actual Pepsi), provided he can come up with the right song. As Actual Pepsi is actually involved, this opportunity is presented as the Greatest Thing Ever. Problems arise when Cookie and Lucious each come up with a great song idea — how can Jamal choose one parent over the other? Answer: he can’t. Instead, he attempts to amalgamate both ideas into one super-song. Cookie and Lucious are both against the idea and argue loudly (and amusingly) in front of a room of session musicians before, inevitably, Jamal gets his way and the super-song wins him the campaign.

Hakeem and Freda’s rap battle is the centrepiece of the episode. Freda spits the best rhymes, but Hakeem’s showmanship ultimately wins over the crowd, who whip him up into such a frenzy that he takes his mic stand to a neon sign bearing his name and smashes the word “Lyon” to bits. “I’m dropping my last name. From here on out, I go by Hakeem,” he declares. A Soap Land son renouncing his father’s name — the closest thing to a precedent I can think of is ‘80s Jeff Colby almost allowing Blake to adopt him.

Although Hakeem’s outburst is exciting, and Lucious and Cookie’s sparring is always entertaining, I worry that all this family feuding in an open arena comes at a price. If everyone’s free to say whatever they like wherever they like to whomever they like, there’s an inevitable loss of dramatic tension. All these gestures are so BIG, so public, I’m not sure where the characters can go from here but over the same ground. Perhaps this is the paradox at the heart of EMPIRE — the world’s first hip-hop soap opera. Unlike the other big Soap Land businesses, hip-hop is performative. The Lyons are in the fame game. For the family to acquire and maintain their wealth and power, they must both cultivate publicity and display themselves “authentically” though their music, i.e., sing and rap their “truth” to the audience. But if all the Lyon conflicts are playing out in public, they don’t have anything left to hide — and secrets are a crucial Soap Land ingredient.

It feels a little weird to use New DYNASTY as an example of restraint, but the press conference Blake calls to address CA’s current scandal illustrates how much more interesting it can be when characters don’t throw their inhibitions to the wind and say whatever they’re thinking. With Cristal by his side, Blake (without actually admitting liability for the epidemic), announces that “Carrington Atlantic is moving full speed towards clean energy” and that he has chosen his daughter “to spearhead this initiative.” This is news to Fallon, and when he beckons her to join him and Cristal in front of the cameras, she has no choice but to comply. Michael watching the press conference on a hospital TV adds an extra dimension to the scene. “Come on, Fallon,” he mutters, willing her to speak out against her father. She doesn’t. Instead, Blake takes her by surprise again by announcing that she is Carrington Atlantic’s new COO. Cristal, he explains, “will be stepping down from day-to-day operations indefinitely to focus on family.” Cristal is as stunned as her step-daughter, but instead of smashing a neon sign with a mic stand, she is obliged to join Blake and Fallon for a group hug. Only later, in the privacy of her office, does she turn on Fallon, accusing her of scheming “to get the COO job you wanted from the moment I met you … To think that I was naive enough to believe you, to think that you would actually stand up to your father!” “ What did you want me to do,” Fallon asks, “scream bloody murder in the middle of a press conference?” That’s probably what Hakeem would have done.

The C21st Ewings don’t seem to have the same media profile as either the Lyons or the Carringtons. Following the rig explosion, they do, however, come under scrutiny from Tesha, a Texas environmental health-and-safety watchdog thingy. A jobsworth representative visits the family at the hospital to inform them that Christopher’s negligence may have caused the explosion and they could be facing some heavy fines. The family close ranks against this outsider (“We are praying that my son’s babies don’t die and you pressure us? … Get the hell out of here!” snarls Bobby), but as soon he’s gone, John Ross turns on his cousin: “That explosion could have killed Pamela, it could have killed your babies!” Sue Ellen later points out to John Ross that “Ewing Energies is our shared liability.” In other words, if one Ewing goes down, they all go down together.

Last season, Pamela found out she pregnant in the same Soap Land week that Cody miscarried on BLOOD AND OIL. Now, the loss of Pamela’s babies coincides with Anika discovering she is with child on EMPIRE. While the Lyon family wash their dirty linen onstage and in the media, Anika still has both a public and private persona and as such is currently the most interesting character in the series. When we first see her this week, she is alone in her bathroom, clearly distraught (i.e., wearing no makeup) while holding a pregnancy test in one hand and a kitchen knife in the other. Later on, she runs into the show’s other expectant mother, Andre’s wife Rhonda. Rhonda pretends not to notice she has been crying and invites her for a soul-cleanser smoothie. (No, nor me.) During their girly chat, Rhonda raves about being pregnant: “It’s honestly the happiest I’ve ever been.” Anika doesn’t let on about her own condition, but her ears prick up when Rhonda says that “babies are like Kryptonite for Lucious … After being completely iced by him for years, this pregnancy has changed everything.” By the time Anika visits Hakeem at his apartment, she is back to her usual poised and sexy self. She’s about to tell him her news when he drops a bombshell of his own: “Here’s the thing — I think I’m in love … I know it sound crazy, but I ain’t never feel this way in my life.” The object of his adoration is sweet virginal Laura, the newest member of the girl group he’s managing. “I still think you’re dope,” he assures Anika. “We still homies, right?” She’s all smiles and acts like everything’s cool.

While all three shows have a shock ending — the loss of Pamela’s babies on DALLAS, Jeff turning out to be a Carrington on DYNASTY — the most unexpected of all is on EMPIRE. Following his rap battle victory party, Hakeem puts sweet little Laura in a cab and tells her to get home safe. He fails to notice that the cab driver is Anika, wearing a blonde Katherine Wentworth-style wig. “Buckle up,” she tells Laura. That's one I did not see coming.

And this week’s Top 3 are … this was an especially tricky one. This week's DALLAS was great, but not as exciting as usual (situating nearly all of the ep in Soap Land Memorial resulted in a slight drop of momentum) while DYNASTY felt a bit anti-climactic after the thrills of last week’s ep. I really enjoyed EMPIRE as I was watching it, but writing about it has made me like it a little less. Hmmm …

1 (1) DALLAS (cos Afton)
2 (3) EMPIRE
3 (2) DYNASTY

 

[Willie Oleson]

this one might have had more impact if Jeff was a better-developed character

I think the 1980s soaps told it as "where you live is what you are", and that's how 1980s Jeff became a Carrington eventhough he wasn't.

they must both cultivate publicity and display themselves “authentically” though their music, i.e., sing and rap their “truth” to the audience. But if all the Lyon conflicts are playing out in public, they don’t have anything left to hide — and secrets are a crucial Soap Land ingredient.

I can imagine how Andre's meltdown(s) would seem less exciting in season 2 (but hopefully not!)

as he introduces his protege Freda to perform a diss track in which she claims that Hakeem is, among other things, “Daddy’s little girl.”

First there was the soap bitch-slap....now there's the soap bitch-rap!

Only later, in the privacy of her office, does she turn on Fallon, accusing her of scheming “to get the COO job you wanted from the moment I met you

NuDynasty finally realized that Cristal needs to be properly tormented, and that's when the conflicts become more interesting.

Texas environmental health-and-safety watchdog thingy

Like Cliff's former OMD (Odious Manoeuvres in the Dallas) office?

He fails to notice that the cab driver is Anika, wearing a blonde Katherine Wentworth-style wig.

And that's what the future looks like, after Dallas has versused its last episode...

 

[James from London]

First there was the soap bitch-slap....now there's the soap bitch-rap!

Ha!

NuDynasty finally realized that Cristal needs to be properly tormented, and that's when the conflicts become more interesting.

I think giving her a strong sense of morality really helped as well. She's sort of become who Pam was supposed to be in early DALLAS, but never quite was, i.e., somebody inside the family who is willing to challenge their corruption.

Like Cliff's former OMD (Odious Manoeuvres in the Dallas) office?

Haha!

And that's what the future looks like, after Dallas has versused its last episode...

Sad but true.

 

[James from London]

01 Apr 13: DALLAS: Let Me In v. 25 Nov 15: EMPIRE: Sinned Against v. 04 May 18: DYNASTY: Trashy Little Tramp

Print media has a revival in this week’s Soap Land as a guilt-ridden Drew Ramos pores over the front page of the Dallas Register (“EXPLOSION DESTROYS EWING RIG”) and DYNASTY opens with a montage of various newspapers being delivered: Blake receives the Global News Flash (“CARRINGTON ATLANTIC IN CRISIS”), Fallon the Downtown Viewer (“BLAKE CARRINGTON HIRES DAUGHTER”) and Michael the Atlanta Mirror News (“CA ADDRESSES CLARK COUNTY SCANDAL”).

While Carrington Atlantic is guilty of a cover-up, Ewing Enterprises is the victim of one. Despite Ken Richards telling Sue Ellen last week that TESHA’s initial investigation into the explosion indicated sabotage, the official ruling declares the Ewings guilty of negligence and they are issued a billion-dollar fine. This prompts some first-class swearing from the family — a “This is bullshit!” from John Ross, and one “Shove it up your ass!” each from Bobby and Christopher.

While the Ewings urgently need to prove that Cliff was responsible for the explosion, Fallon looks for evidence that Blake was responsible for the Clarke County epidemic. In both cases, the answer may lie with a mentally vulnerable female character. On DALLAS, that means Pamela, who is grief-stricken since losing her babies. “If anyone can get close to Cliff, it's her. She can look at his schedule see where he's been,” Christopher suggests to John Ross. On DYNASTY, it means sanatarium inmate Claudia Blaisdel, widow of Matthew who, Cristal assures Fallon, “knew where all the bodies were buried … He knew everything.”

Despite John Ross’s misgivings about approaching Pamela (“How do you think we should pitch this — ’Hey, Pamela, we think your dad's the one who blew up the rig and killed your babies. And by the way, can you check some dates for us?’”), he nonetheless goes to see her and finds her in a bad way (i.e., not wearing any makeup, which is never a healthy sign in Soap Land). While his concern for her is genuine — when he tells her he “ain’t going anywhere till I know that you’re OK,” he means it — it doesn’t prevent him copying her father’s computer files when her back is turned. Fallon is more upfront when she visits Claudia: “Hey, Crazy, remember me? … I’m here for intel on my father.” When Claudia assures her she has access to the relevant information, Fallon makes her a proposition: “You provide me with the location of those files and I will spring you from this joint in twenty-four hours.”

Claudia’s situation is oddly similar to that of Amanda Ewing, Jock’s first wife whom the Ewing brothers visited in ’85, also in a mental hospital, hoping to find the evidence that would prove who really owned Ewing Oil. But whereas Bobby had to pretend to be Amanda’s dead husband to get through to her, Claudia’s dead husband turns out not to be dead after all. Look! I can see him talking to Claudia in the final scene! Hi, Matthew!

EMPIRE has its own unstable female character, Anika. Like Claudia, she is pregnant and, like Pamela, she is first shown huddled on the floor of her apartment not wearing any makeup. While there’s no direct follow up to the shock ending of last week’s ep where she disguised herself as Laura’s blonde-haired cab driver, we get to see her trying on various psycho-bitch personas for size. Alone in her bedroom, we see her defacing magazine pictures of Hakeem and Laura together. Later, when she’s back to looking a million dollars, she gatecrashes a party of Hakeem’s and plays the conventional Soap Land bitch, calling Laura “some Nuyorican wannabe from the South Bronx” before informing Hakeem that “your Jenny from the Block jump-off lives in a hovel with seven brothers and sisters. You could do so much better, baby.” Later still, she shows up at Hakeem’s apartment and insists they are meant to be together: “Stop fighting it, Hakeem! It is so clear that you love me.” By now, he has completely lost patience with her. “You will never be a Lyon,” he tells her firmly. “You will never be one of us — EVER!” While part of me is kind of disappointed that they’ve turned someone as multi-faceted as Anika into a full-blown nut-job, a bigger part of me just really wants to see What Happens Next.

Ken Richards on DALLAS and Laz Delgado on EMPIRE are both hanging out with the wrong crowds. While Ken is being blackmailed over a past indiscretion that sounds remarkably similar to what's currently happening on DYNASTY (“that tech company dumping all those toxic chemicals into that river — you turned a blind eye and no-one was the wiser”) into keeping quiet about TESHA’s conspiracy against the Ewings, Laz is a reluctant part of a scam to rip off Lyon Dynasty. After Lucious exposes Laz, Cookie pulls a gun on him. Meanwhile, Sue Ellen fixes Ken with her angriest glare. Both men plead for understanding. “Sue Ellen, you must know that I’m not jerking your family around,” Ken insists. “Cookie, listen to me. When this started, it was just a gig. I had no idea I was gonna fall in love with you … I was trying to fix this,” pleads Laz. When he finishes speaking, Cookie hands the gun she’s been holding to Lucious and then leaves him to do whatever he’s gonna do to Laz. Back on DALLAS, Sue Ellen, lets Ken have it with both barrels (metaphorically speaking): “What you’re doing now — covering up what really happened on our rig — is wrong. It’s morally and ethically wrong, and you know it. Understand me, Ken — when the Ewings unite, nothing can stop us. So you’re either on our side or you’re among the casualties — after we have taken down everyone who has screwed us.”

Following her confrontation with Ken, Sue Ellen sees Emma flirting with an older man at a bar. “I think she was high,” she later tells Ann. Over on EMPIRE, Cookie and Candace see that their sister Carol is most definitely high when they finally track her down to a crack den in Philadelphia. The first thing Carol does when she sees them is puke all over Candace’s fancy shoes — which is exactly what a drunken Jeff Colby did to Sam’s diamanté-encrusted loafers on DYNASTY two weeks ago.

Following Alexis’s “You’re a Carrington, Jeff” bombshell last week, Jeff and Monica turn to their maternal grandmother for confirmation. After some reluctance, she admits that their mother, Millie, was indeed the result of her affair with Tom Carrington. By chance, the original ‘80s Millie, aka Dominique Devereaux, gets a shout out on this week’s EMPIRE when Cookie loses patience with Candace’s airs and graces: “Would you stop acting like Diahann Carroll, heffa? You ain't been living in the suburbs with that white man all your life!”

While Hakeem is shocked to learn that his mother’s lover was part of the gang who kidnapped him a few weeks ago, Blake takes one look at the young man Alexis introduces as their kidnapped son and rejects him as a fraud. “When Adam was taken from us,” he confides to son-in-law-to-be Sam, “the kidnappers cut off one of his fingers. I told the police but I wanted to save Alexis the horror.” Harris Ryland stops short of dismembering Drew Ramos but nonetheless has him knocked unconscious and dumped in the trunk of a car. He then drives Emma to a parking garage where he turns on the headlights of his SUV to reveal Drew, beaten and bloodied on the ground in front of them. “This is what happens when you go looking for trouble, honey,” he tells her.

Despite Blake’s rejection, Adam (or is it Hank?) insists on throwing Steven and Sam a bachelor party. This leads to some tiresome stereotyping as Sam first sulkily assumes the party will be too gay (“I’m not interested in a straight man’s idea of what gay men think is fun — we’ll end up covered in glitter and drag queens”) before complaining that it isn’t gay enough (“I wanted bad and bougie, not sad and douchey,” he says looking around the honky-tonk bar where the party is being held). At this point, I found myself siding with the anonymous homophobic loudmouth (a possible cousin of the anonymous racist drunk at JR’s memorial service) who snarls at Sam, “It ain’t Pride week and your rainbow is showing. You and the gays might wanna take off.” This turns into a crucial plot point as Adam/Hank, coming to Sam’s defence, gets into a brawl with the loudmouth, during which his prosthetic finger goes flying through the air. This is all the proof Blake needs that Hank is Adam after all.

A couple of weeks ago, it felt like everyone in Soap Land was calling each other junkyard dogs. Now the insult du jour is "whistle-blower". “I will go into your offices tomorrow and I will tell everybody that you are a whistle-blower and a liar!” Christopher threatens Ken Richards on DALLAS. “He’s a classic whistle-blower. He’s gotta go,” declares Blake, referring to Michael Culhane who has just taken a job at Carrington Atlantic. While Blake fires Michael, Ken Richards is forced to resign from TESHA by Sam McConaughey, the crooked new Governor of Texas. As a parting gesture, Ken sends Sue Ellen evidence of a link between Shaughnessy and Harris Ryland. “The governor is in his pocket,” Bobby realises. “We’re in a stickier web than we realised,” Sue Ellen adds.

Everyone is on the move. With the fickleness of Angela Channing, Lucious has decided that Andre, the son he disowned at the start of the season, is his golden boy once again and so buys him and Rhonda a six-bedroom mansion in Long Island as a thank-you for giving him a grandchild: “Because of y’all, the Lyon legacy is gonna live on … My grandson is so fortunate and blessed having you as his father. I’m through testing you, Dre.” Meanwhile, John Ross takes advantage of his recent inheritance from Miss Ellie and moves back to Southfork as its half-owner: “The whole family under the same roof again, just like old times,” he remarks. “Not everyone wants to live under this roof their entire life,” counters Cristal, explaining to Alexis why she bought a condo as a wedding present for Steven and Sam, but it’s a lie — she bought it on the advice of a divorce lawyer who is secretly counselling her on how best to get away from Blake.

Like Ewing Enterprises and Carrington Atlantic, Empire is looking suddenly vulnerable. Lucious’s determination to acquire Slipstream (“I want us to be the dominant force in music streaming long before my grandson is potty-trained!”) means he needs to raise some capital. When Andre suggests leveraging some of the company’s other assets, Lucious initially vetoes the idea (“The moment you start selling off pieces of Empire, we’re no longer an empire”). But that’s before Lee Daniels, EMPIRE’s co-creator, makes a cameo appearance as himself directing Jamal’s Pepsi video (which is the equivalent of David Jacobs guesting on DALLAS to direct Sue Ellen’s movie about JR). “You represent the past; this kid [Jamal], he’s the future,” Daniels tells Lucious. This taps into Lucious’s fear of obsolescence and he immediately changes his mind. “Do it,” he instructs Andre, “sell everything, leverage whatever we have to, just get me Swiftstream … Sometimes in order to win the game you gotta be willing to sacrifice.” Meanwhile, the Ewings’ financiers are getting nervous. “If your fine doesn’t go away,” their banker tells them, “your debt-to-asset ratio will turn upside down. That’s a sinking ship we don’t wanna be on board.” Thankfully, the Ewings have the oil from Southfork to fall back on. “We’re sitting on a two billion barrel reserve. As long as we continue to pump oil, we can stay afloat,” states John Ross confidently. But then TESHA buys the land the Ewings have been using to slant drill onto Southfork. On ‘80s DALLAS, the implications of this would have to be spelt out to Sue Ellen, but now she’s the one doing the spelling out: “If we can’t pump oil, we can’t pay the fine or the bank.” “This is what they’ve been building towards, Cliff and Ryland,” Christopher realises. “They wanna see us lose everything!” Meanwhile, Blake chooses to fight Carrington Atlantic’s current crisis through the medium of public relations. That means reinforcing the idea that “CA is a family company with solid family values.” “‘Make Carrington Great Again’ — should we cap off our outfits with a red hat?” retorts Fallon. DYNASTY is big on the contemporary references this week. While Jeff and Monica’s grandmother remarks that “this whole #MeToo thing would have never flown in the ‘70s at Carrington Atlantic,” Fallon even brings herself to say the ’T’ word. “This family has more secrets than a Trump mistress,” she quips.

While the Ewings continue to unite against their common enemies, the Carringtons experience an unusually sweet moment of togetherness as an emotional Blake welcomes Adam to the family. It’s the last thing Fallon, who has secretly been plotting her father’s downfall throughout the ep, was expecting. “My dad has tear ducts after all,” she marvels to co-conspirator Michael. “If I go through with this, my relationship with him will never be the same, and my family is in an oddly great place right now and if I move on our plan, that all ends.” But go through with it she does. Calling a secret meeting of the Carrington Atlantic board, she uses the evidence she obtained from Claudia as proof that “my father is no longer fit to run this company … It’s time to vote Blake Carrington out and name me as your new CEO.” (Wait, I thought she already was CEO. Oh no, she's COO. Turns out there’s a difference between the two. I don’t think there were any COOs in ‘80s Soap Land.)

John Ross’s return to Southfork and Blake’s acceptance of Adam lead to two similarly reflective scenes. While John Ross enters JR’s bedroom to find Bobby looking a black and white photo of JR with John Ross as a little kid (a very convincing photoshop of Larry Hagman and baby Josh Henderson), Alexis enters the Carrington study to find Blake looking at a black and white photo of himself and Alexis with their newborn son Adam. “Last time you moved in here,” Bobby recalls, turning to his nephew, “I said some pretty harsh things to you. I said family meant nothing to you.” “And I said that it does, we’re just on two different sides of it,” John Ross replies solemnly. “You remember the day Adam was born?” Blake asks Alexis. “Every minute of it,” she replies. “We had everything — a beautiful son, a new family. I was in love with both my boys. When we lost Adam, it ruined our marriage, didn’t it?” “Mama gave you half of Southfork. Welcome home, John Ross,” says Bobby. The scene ends with a handshake and an unspoken agreement between the two men to start over. Alexis has something similar in mind for her and Blake. “I know we can’t go back in time, but maybe, maybe we could go forward?” she suggests. “Please stop,” he says gently. “Things are going well with Cristal again … and I want my marriage to work.” “Sweet, ignorant Blake,” she replies (echoing Sue Ellen’s similarly ironic “Poor, sweet Gary” from a few weeks ago). “Your precious wife Cristal is cheating on you. I saw it with my own eyes. She was with a man at a condo in Brookhaven and it’s time to face the fact that you married a whore with decent cheekbones.”

When confronted by Blake, Cristal admits she’s planning to leave him. “You’re not going anywhere,” he informs her. “I stood in front of the press and I told them that you were stepping down to focus on your family. Now how would I look if my wife suddenly filed for a divorce? … If they think I was lying about my wife, they’ll think I was lying about Clarke County … so you are staying in this marriage whether you want to or not.” When she protests, he lists the dirt he has on her: “grand theft, attempted murder and the whole identity fraud thing. Did you think you were the only one planning for this day?” A man blackmailing his wife into staying married to him — this has the same soap noir vibe as some of JR and Sue Ellen’s early scenes.

There are two unexpected Soap Land kisses this week. At the end of EMPIRE, Jamal kisses a girl (fictional pop star Skye Summers played by real-life pop star Alicia Keys) and quite likes it. This is slightly reminiscent of the first episode-ending smooch between ‘80s Steven and Claudia, only not quite as exciting. (Also, Steven and Claudia were doing the dishes rather than duetting on a song about racial empowerment.) The other surprise kiss recalls the moment Tommy Sutter planted a smacker on his sister Rebecca’s mouth in the antepenultimate episode of DALLAS’s first season. How our minds reeled in the brief moment before Tommy’s next line of dialogue explained everything: “Man, are you so deep in this lie that you still think we’re brother and sister?” Now, in the penultimate episode of DYNASTY’s first season, our minds reel again when Adam Carrington kisses his mother passionately — but again, the next line explains everything. “Sorry to spoil your little Oedipus complex,” Alexis tells him, “but pretending to be your mother is no aphrodisiac.” Yep, it seems that Hank is a lover/accomplice enlisted by Alexis (just as Tommy was by Pamela Rebecca) to help infiltrate a rich family and pull off an outrageous scam. Whereas Tommy had to sacrifice two years of his short life to the DALLAS scam, Hank has had to chop off one of his fingers for this one. “This damn thing itches,” he complains. “Quit being such a baby,” Alexis replies.

While Bobby lets Sue Ellen in on JR’s masterplan (“JR knew that Cliff and Harris would join forces and come after us. That’s why he wanted us to … take them down once and for all. Barnes Global financial history, Ryland’s trucking in Mexico, Christopher’s mother’s whereabouts — somehow it’s all connected”), Alexis drops some hints about her own “billion-dollar plan” to Hank/Adam: “Jeff Colby and his sister are the other shiny facets of our multi-pronged plan” — for Jeff and Monica, as Tom Carrington’s grandchildren, are entitled to a slice of Carrington Atlantic. ”Together, you’ll have close to controlling interest,” Alexis explains to Adam/Hank. “Blake’s not gonna hand over the reigns to CA so I’m gonna have to take them before he drives that company into the ground.” Not if Fallon gets there first.

And this week’s Top 3 are …

1 (3) DYNASTY
2 (1) DALLAS
3 (2) EMPIRE

 

[Willie Oleson]

1 (3) DYNASTY

Congratulations, Hank & Alexis!

David Jacobs guesting on DALLAS to direct Sue Ellen’s movie

This is new to me!

 

[James from London]

08 Apr 13: DALLAS: A Call to Arms v. 02 Dec 15: EMPIRE: Et tu, Brute? v. 11 May 18: DYNASTY: Dead Scratch

Each of this week’s soap includes a game-changing board meeting, a dramatic entrance and a shock announcement — but not necessarily in that order.

The most dramatic of the dramatic entrances occurs on EMPIRE. After Lucious publicly announces that “Empire has acquired Swiftstream, the fastest and largest music streaming service in the universe”, he invites his “business partner-in-crime” Mimi Whiteman to join him onstage. She, in turn, pays tribute to someone who has been alluded to, but never before seen on screen: “I truly believe that I would not be alive today if it were not for this woman. She is my reason to live … my be-all and end-all, my lovely wife, Mrs Camilla Marks Whiteman!” As Camilla makes her way to the stage, Lucious’s smile vanishes as he realises this is the same Camilla who was sleeping with Hakeem in Season 1 before he (Lucious) banished her to England. Yes, Naomi Campbell is back! “Remember me, Lucious?” she asks sweetly before taking her place alongside Mimi.

The first boardroom meeting of the week is at Ewing Energies. The family are dismayed when their banker tells them he’s sold their loan. “You sold it to whom?” demands Christopher. Right on cue, in walks Cliff Barnes. “Love a good fire sale,” he quips. “Ewing Energies is in technical default of the loan so I don’t have any choice but to call in the loan in its entirety — now.”

The second and third board meetings are called by Empire’s Mimi and Carrington Atlantic’s Fallon who each voice their lack of confidence in the current CEO. “He seems to think he can get away with anything — extortion, violence, murder. Empire’s a public company, not his plaything anymore,” says Mimi of Lucious. “Firing an employee for being a so-called whistle-blower, mishandling the Clarke County crisis and then trying to cover it up by buying off the victims … Time’s up, Daddy,” Fallon tells Blake. Both women propose that a vote be taken and they be made the new CEO.

Then come the angry responses. “You son of a bitch!” Christopher Ewing snarls at his uncle. “This ain’t ever gonna fly, Barnes,” adds John Ross. “This is absurd,” protests Blake. “You’re listening to a child who’s been COO for a week!” As for Lucious, he is stunned into silence by a video Mimi secretly recorded of him saying, “To hell with the damn board! … I’ll be damned if I’m gonna ask the board of directors for permission to move my pieces on my chessboard!”

As Cliff tells the Ewings that “unless you can get your hands on $200,000,000 within the next twenty-four hours, I will own you,” Mimi suggests the Empire board “convene for an emergency vote tonight at 9.00 pm.” While the Lyons scramble to lobby board members before their deadline, the Ewings need to get Pamela onside before theirs. That means telling her the truth about Cliff. “She’s barely accepted the fact that her babies are gone,” John Ross protests. “If we tell her her father’s behind the explosion, she might break.” Nevertheless, he delivers the news to her personally, only for her to accuse him of “trying to manipulate me — like you always do, like we always do.” “I swear to you I’m telling the truth,” he insists. “You’ve never told the truth in your life!” she snaps back.

Unlike Lucious and the Ewings, Blake isn’t given the chance to mount a defence. The CA board vote him out there and then, replacing him with Fallon. But before she can savour her victory, it’s time for another dramatic entrance as Jeff and Monica Colby march into the CA boardroom and declare, “We’re Carringtons and we’re here for what’s ours!” As Tom Carrington’s grandchildren, Jeff explains, they intend to “liquidate the company, get our money and bury the Carrington name once and for all. Our lawyers’ll be in touch.”

Like Camilla on EMPIRE and Cliff on DALLAS, Liam Ridley returns to DYNASTY this week for the first time since he was exposed as Jack Lowden, clandestine biographer of the rich and dysfunctional. Actually, he and Cliff have only been gone for three episodes apiece but so much has happened it feels longer. Camilla, meanwhile, hasn’t been seen for the best part of a season. All three have some explaining to do. As Cliff apologises to his daughter for not visiting her in the hospital (“You can yell at me all you want,” he tells her. “I messed up … I’m your father and I love you”), one is reminded of the loveably sheepish, hand-flappy Cliff who would grovel to his sister whenever he screwed up on ‘80s DALLAS, only now it’s just an act to hide the cold calculating Cliff that lies beneath the surface.

Neither Camilla nor Liam are welcomed back with open arms by their former lovers. “You took my father’s money and you bounced,” Hakeem tells Camilla. “You just waltz back in here with your mediocre jokes and what, I’m expected to forgive you?” Fallon asks Liam. “I did not take Lucious’s dirty bribe … he’s a filthy liar,” Camilla protests. “I never wrote about you, Fallon. You would know that if you bothered to read my manuscript … the one I gave your mother,” Liam insists. Hakeem and Fallon then realise they have been deceived by their respective parents: Lucious lied to Hakeem about Camilla and Alexis deliberately withheld Liam’s manuscript from Fallon.

As Tom Carrington’s (albeit fake) grandson, Hank/Adam is also granted a share of Carrington Atlantic alongside Steven, Fallon, Jeff and Monica. Meanwhile, a subplot involving Cookie visiting her former cellmates in prison means that she is unable to make the emergency board meeting at Empire, and so she gives Hakeem her proxy to vote on her behalf. As a result, Hank and Hakeem’s votes are now pivotal to the future of their respective companies. Alexis and Cookie urge them both to side with their fathers (or fake father, in Hank’s case). “Lyon Dynasty is our company,” Cookie tells Hakeem, “but Empire is our legacy and anybody who tries to steal that from us is our enemy.” “We stand to make a helluva lot more money in the long run so I need you to vote against the sale,” explains Alexis to a slightly confused Hank, whose IQ has plummeted amusingly between episodes. However, other voices are also trying to influence Hank and Hakeem's decisions. “Hank, this deal would put billions, with a B, in each of our pockets,” Jeff tells his newly acquired fake cousin. “You’ve never known what it’s like to have money — I mean real money.” “I still believe in you,” Camilla assures her former toyboy. “You have to trust and believe me. I can take you to the next level, Hakeem, if you’re ready to go there.” As she speaks, her hand travels towards his crotch.

While the rest of the Empire board wait anxiously for Hakeem to say yay or nay, he flashes back over both his season-long feud with his father and his affair with Camilla. Returning to the present, he sees Camilla through the boardroom window, silently urging him to vote against Lucious. Cookie arrives just in time to grasp what’s happening. “Hakeem, no!” she shouts. But it’s too late — Hakeem votes against his family. His father and brothers are stunned. Cookie turns to Camilla and spits in her face. The announcement is made — “Lucious Lyon, the board has voted to remove you as chairman and CEO of Empire Enterprises” — but the surprises aren’t over yet. “Now that the vote has been cast, I have another announcement to make,” Mimi declares. “As the new chairman of this board, I am turning over my proxy to my wife … She’ll be in charge of the day-to-day while I’m … undergoing chemo and radiation.” Yes, Naomi Campbell is now in control of Empire!!

Back on DYNASTY, Hank chooses a quick profit over faux-family loyalty and votes to sell Carrington Atlantic. While Jeff doesn’t have a shock announcement to match Mimi’s, he does deliver a surprise apology: “Before today, all I inherited were lies that shaped almost every choice I made. I’m sorry I took that out on you, Fallon.” It’s a bit like the moment in ‘80s DALLAS when Cliff apologised to Miss Ellie for the Barnes/Ewing feud.

While Blake angrily hurls a glass in Hank’s direction (“Were all my children born traitors!?”), Lucious goes one better by shooting up his study with a rifle and calling his children “lousy ungrateful sons of bitches!” “I spent my whole life preserving our family’s empire. You’ve been CEO for less than twenty-four hours and you already lost it all,” Blake tells Fallon bitterly. “All those years selling CDs out the back of a car, selling keys, moving bodies, the enormity of damage I’ve done to my soul — for what??” Lucious asks Cookie while crying angry tears. “You sacrificed seventeen years — for what??”

Back on DALLAS, a desperate John Ross makes one last attempt to convince Pamela of the truth about Cliff: “You ask your father one question — why the hell would he want a company with a billion-dollar fine and technology that is not only worthless but unsafe? … He knows Christopher’s technology isn’t to blame for the explosion and there’s only one way that he could know that — because he was behind it.” Sure enough, Cliff starts crowing to Pamela about the fortune they stand to make on Christopher’s technology. To make matters worse, he then reasons that “the babies would have tied you to the Ewings forever. Maybe it’s a blessing in disguise.” Pamela says nothing but is horrified.

This leads to a swoon-worthy climax at Southfork where John Ross is looking broodily out at the rain and sees a devastated Pamela standing there, soaking wet. “You were right,” she cries. “My father killed my babies.” This recalls one of the very best scenes in FALCON CREST, which also took place between two star-cross'd lovers in a rainstorm when a heavily pregnant Melissa showed up on Cole’s doorstep and collapsed in his arms. Before Pamela has a chance to do the same, John Ross sweeps her off her feet and carries her inside the house. After they’ve made love, she lies in his arms and vows revenge against her father: “I wanna hurt him as much as he’s hurt me.” Meanwhile, Cookie holds Lucious as he threatens to kill their youngest son. “I want him dead,” he sobs.

Just as last week’s DYNASTY ended with the surprise return of the previously dead Matthew Blaisdel, this week’s DALLAS concludes with the tantalising prospect of another resurrection as it emerges that somebody with Pam’s handwriting has an active bank account in Switzerland. “Christopher, your mother’s alive!” gasps Elena.

Minor theme of the week #1: Gay men and the women they sleep with. “She fixed you!” says Lucious joyfully when he correctly guesses that something intimate has occurred between Jamal and Alicia Keys. Alicia Keys, however, understands that Jamal is still gay: “I know you wouldn’t feel about a woman the way you felt about, um, tell me his name again?” “Michael,” he replies wistfully. “No, I wouldn’t.” Michael, of course, is also Sam on DYNASTY whom Steven is about to marry when Melissa Daniels, the senator’s wife he was obliged to sleep with earlier in the season for reasons that now escape me, informs him that she is carrying his child. “I don’t expect you to call all this off,” she assures him. “Let’s talk after.”

The last third of New DYNASTY’s Season 1 finale feels like a mashup of some of Soap Land’s Greatest Hits, with a fresh twist or two thrown in along the way. After Hank votes to sell Carrington Atlantic, he and Alexis get into an argument that plays like a funny version of Tommy Sutter and Pamela’s last fight on New DALLAS. (“I cut off my finger for you!” “Half a finger!”) That scene ended in violence and gunfire and so does this one, but not before Cristal walks in to find Hank planting a kiss on his fake mother’s lips. “I guess incest runs in the family,” she remarks. “Get out, Hank, your mommy and I need to talk.” Cristal then proceeds to list some of Alexis’s many wrongdoings in much the way Sue Ellen did JR’s in the Season 2 finale of ‘80s DALLAS. “You drove Gary away. And now Bobby. You tried to bribe Valene. You cheated your friends. You’ve done everything in your power to get what you wanted,” Sue Ellen said then. “You tried to drive a wedge between Steven and Sam. You did your best to destroy my marriage with Blake. You even pitted your own children against each other … You’ve done nothing but tear this family apart since the day you arrived,” Cristal says now. JR responded by questioning his wife’s sanity (“I honestly think you’ve lost your reason“) and Alexis does the same. “Honestly, I think you need to be medicated,” she tells Cristal. “The truth is, Alexis,” Cristal shoots back, “I’m a much better mother to your children than you ever were!” And then, underscored by Pat Benatar’s ‘We Belong’ (a song covered by Cathy Geary on KNOTS LANDING) and intercut with Steven and Sam’s wedding ceremony, it begins — a recreation of Alexis and Krystle’s original 1982 catfight, with all the slapping, screaming, smashing, yanking, pulling, tearing and “you crazy bitch”ing one could ask for. But in this case, there are no clear victors. Cristal may win the physical fight, but is obliged to concede that her days as a Carrington are at an end: “My marriage to Blake may be over, but at least I’ll have the satisfaction of telling him what a monster you are before I go.” Alexis, however, denies her even this victory by locking her in the loft before she has a chance to tell Blake anything.

Minor theme of the week #2: Pregnant women who are violently unstable. On EMPIRE, Anika continues to keep her own condition a secret, but is barely able to contain her jealousy as Rhonda describes how excited Lucious is over her pregnancy: “I am telling you, he is just obsessed with this grandchild … He actually refers to him as ‘the heir’!” Back on DYNASTY, Matthew helps Claudia escape from the sanatarium. They then sneak into the Carrington Manor during the wedding preparations but soon get into an argument over Cristal: “Is that why you wanted to come here — so you could see her again?” asks Claudia angrily. “Oh my God! You sprung me from a loony bin so I could have your baby and you could raise it with her!” Over on EMPIRE, a shadowy intruder with an Anika-shaped hairstyle breaks into Andre and Rhonda’s swanky new mansion, creeps up behind Rhonda and pushes her down the swanky new staircase. It’s a genuinely shocking moment — a cross between Judith Ryland’s recent tumble and Cliff Barnes blowing up his grandkids. Back on DYNASTY, Claudia smashes her way into the loft where Alexis has imprisoned Cristal. She has a gun which she aims at Cristal. Matthew then appears and steps in front of it, but Claudia pulls the trigger anyway — at which point Matthew dissolves into thin air and we realise two things simultaneously: that he was a ghost/vision/hallucination all along, and that Cristal is standing there with a dirty great bullet hole in her stomach. At the same time, the rest of the Carringtons are having their wedding pictures taken in the room above while a mysterious someone sets the building on fire. As they try to escape, they realise they’re locked inside (it’s like a combination of both of ‘80s DYNASTY’s fiery season finales, but on a grander scale). Meanwhile, Cristal lies trapped in the loft, bleeding or suffocating or burning to death — or maybe all three.

And this week’s Top 3 are … very, very close ...

1 (3) EMPIRE
2 (2) DALLAS
3 (1) DYNASTY

 

[James from London]

08 Apr 13: DALLAS: Love and Family v. 30 Mar 16: EMPIRE: Death Will Have His Day v. 12 Oct 18: DYNASTY: Twenty-Three Skidoo

I didn't realise at the time, but the previous episode of EMPIRE was the mid-season finale — no wonder it was so exciting. This is another action-packed week with the Season 2 premiere of DYNASTY, the mid-season premiere of EMPIRE and the third to last episode of Season 2 of DALLAS.

When we left Ewing Enterprises and Empire, both companies were about to be taken over, by Cliff Barnes and Naomi Campbell respectively. At the end of this week’s DALLAS, Bobby calmly hands Cliff “the keys to the kingdom” and walks away. In total contrast, Lucious refuses to budge from his office ( “I ain’t going nowhere!" he says, slamming a gun down on his desk), until Naomi Campbell gets the cops involved.

Whereas the '80s soaps all waited until their final seasons to kill off their blonde heroines, New DYNASTY has shot dead Cristal— not a blonde but definitely the most heroic character on the series — after just one. Rather than exploring any sorrow and/or guilt Blake might feel over the death of the wife whom he treated so badly, the show takes a light-hearted approach to his grief, treating it almost as a comedy mid-life crisis. There are rumours of "Mr Carrington's mental breakdown and drug-fuelled Parisian bender" and when he returns home after a month spent travelling, he is sporting a big, fake-looking beard.

“Fathers and daughters — kind of a push/pull dynamic, isn’t it?" says Cliff Barnes to Harris Ryland on DALLAS. "I mean, you’re trying to get yours back in the fold and I’m trying to atone for my sins.” Blake also muses on the parent/child relationship: “I guess it goes with the territory of being a father — kids don’t appreciate their parents until they become one themselves.” But as far as Pamela Barnes and Fallon Carrington are concerned, it's their fathers who don't appreciate them. “I didn’t do all this — Christopher, Ewing Energies, the babies — for an heirloom," Pamela tells Cliff when he presents her with a pair of "exquisite" earrings that belonged to her Aunt Katherine. "If there’s one thing losing my babies taught me is that life is far too precious to continue trying to earn your love and respect. If I don’t have it by now then I guess I’m never gonna have it, am I?" “You have no idea what I have been through the last month," Fallon tells Blake during a party to celebrate Carrington Atlantic’s hundredth anniversary. "While you were off God-knows-where in some sort of childish fugue state, I had to be the adult around here, holding this family together." Whereas Pamela wants into her father's company ("I wanna be a partner in Barnes Global … … Give me my due … my Aunt Katherine’s shares”), Fallon, unexpectedly. wants out of hers. Yes, that's right — Fallon, whom we've been repeatedly told has been obsessed with business since she was a child, has undergone an abrupt 180 degree transformation between seasons. "For the first time in my life, I am actually happy and in love," she tells her father, "and I want out of CA. It has always been your company, not mine, and if you care about me at all, you would do this one thing [stay on at CA to ease the transition after it has been sold] for me.”)

While Cliff gives Pamela what she wants, not realising she's out to destroy him for killing her babies, Blake is affronted by Fallon's ingratitude: “I have spent my life doing things for you, not that you would notice!” “You’ve never done anything that hasn’t helped Blake Carrington!” “… I am still your father!” “Then act like one!” This culminates in Blake delivering a petulant, self-pitying speech to his party guests where he reveals that, unlike Bobby Ewing or Lucious Lyon, he no longer has any interest in the family company. "I’m getting the hell out," he announces. "The next chapter in my life is gonna be about me — Blake Time … I intend to spend every dime I have before they put me in the ground because you can’t take it with you and God knows, my spoiled children don’t need any more. So happy anniversary, everyone. Bite me!” Even though I'm not overly invested in New DYNASTY, I still found listening to this speech genuinely deflating. If the patriarch of the show no longer gives a damn about its premise, and his supposedly driven daughter doesn't either, then why am I even watching it anymore? Well, there's always Alexis, I suppose.

When we first see Alexis this season, she is sitting up in a hospital bed wearing the same kind of turban the original Alexis wore following her end-of -season fiery cliff-hanger back in '83 (only the C21st turban is bigger, just as the C21st fire was). She exaggerates the seriousness of her condition in much the same way JR did after he was shot by Sue Ellen in '88, but whereas JR was hoping to gain his family's sympathy, Alexis simply needs somewhere to stay, having lost her home in the fire. However, her nurse is no more impressed by her malingering than JR's doctor was by his. “You made a full recovery from your smoke inhalation two weeks ago," she informs her. "I think you’ve milked the Carrington tab long enough.”

Each of this week's episodes features a character confessing to a serious crime. The tone of each neatly illustrates the differences between the three series. The most moving is on DALLAS where Drew admits to his sister what we already know — that he blew the Ewing rig. Elena is appalled, even as he tries to explain why he did it. "They said they would kill you, Ellie … There was no way out. THERE WAS NO WAY OUT!” “… You have to turn yourself in," she insists. "You are the only credible link linking Ryland to the sabotage … Just don’t be stupid and run from this.” But alas, he does run, leaving behind a written confession. He's determined to rectify the situation by bringing the real baddies to justice, but there's an underlying feeling that his fate has already been sealed. “He can’t run from this,” Christopher tells Elena. "Sometimes people are lost souls. Your brother just happens to be one of them." This scenario is a great example of the way New DALLAS manages to sync the emotions of its characters, the mechanisms of its plotting and the drama of its situation so perfectly. On this show, character and plot are indivisible.

While the residents of Southfork are glued to the Dallas News ("The manhunt continues for Drew Ramos, a thirty-one year old Hispanic man and prime suspect in the Ewing Energies explosion …”), Alexis watches Channel 52 from her hospital bed (“The nationwide manhunt continues for Hank Sullivan, person of interest in Cristal Carrington’s homicide. Investigators on the case question whether the suspect acted alone ...”). Everyone is wondering where Drew is when Elena receives a secret call from him. Likewise, Alexis receives a private call from Hank, who proceeds to make the second Soap Land confession of the week. Whereas viewers were already in on Drew's guilty secret, Hank's confession resolves the cliffhanging whodunnit from the end of last season -- Who started the fire in the coach house? “You idiot," Alexis hisses at him. "What in the hell happened that night?” “I didn’t kill her," Hank insists, referring to Cristal, before adding almost as an afterthought, "I just torched the place." His explanation for starting the fire is a lot lamer than Drew's for planting the bomb. "You said to take care of it, Alexis.” "No!" Alexis replies. "| said watch her [Cristal] and make sure she keeps quiet." While Elena urges Drew to hand himself over to the authorities, Alexis instructs Hank to do the opposite: "You’re gonna have to stay in hiding until this blows over. They cannot find out we were working together.” Whereas Drew is determined to force a confession out of Harris's right hand man instead of turning himself in, Hank threatens to "tell the police everything, how we met, what our plan was. I could even take a DNA test to prove I’m not your son.“ "I’m gonna need money,” Drew tells Elena. “I want my money,” Hank tells Alexis. While Elena reluctantly agrees to help her brother, leading to much subterfuge on her part (switching phones, lying to Christopher, arranging phoney alibis), Alexis points out to Hank that she is not in a position to pay him anything since "you burnt down my home with everything in it!" “You get my money or I’m going to the cops. You have 38 hours,” he tells her. “You mean 48.” “I mean two days, starting now.” I’m not crazy about a lot of New DYNASTY’s attempts at comedy (for example, I really hate the scene where Alexis's wheelchair reverses into the table on which a decanter containing Cristal's ashes have been placed, with inevitable results), but the Alexis/Hank dynamic is really funny.

While Drew's confession is emotional and Hank's is comedic, Lucious’s in the final scene of this week’s EMPIRE is incredibly dramatic. Just as we knew Drew's dark secret beforehand so we also know Lucious's. In fact, we've known it since the series' very first episode. “You have any idea where you’re standing?" he asks Hakeem while holding a gun in his hand. They are standing in a dark and secluded spot under a bridge, trains rumbling overhead. There's a river and Hakeem is positioned with his back to it. "That’s the spot where my very best friend lost his life," Lucious continues. "He actually introduced me to your mama. He damn near raised y’all when I was on the road. He risked his life for me on more than one occasion and I risked mine for him — except one night when I shot him in the face … It was your Uncle Bunky. You see, that’s how much the Empire means to me and if you think you’re gonna become the CEO of my company, I will stop at nothing to take it back. Since you’re my baby boy, I got something for you.” He hands Hakeem his gun. “Now’s the time for you to decide how far you’re willing to go to have the Empire. You wanna be King? Kill your father and sit on his throne. It’s life or death so if you don’t shoot me right here, I promise you the next time I see you, I will do my best to take your life.” Hakeem points the gun at his father. “I know it’s hard, but do it. It’s OK,” Lucious urges him gently. He even turns his back to make it easier for him. He feels Hakeem press the gun against the back of his neck. “That’s my boy … Now pull the damn trigger.” Of course, Hakeem can't go through with it and lowers the gun. “I ain’t gotta do what you want,” he tells his father.

Both DALLAS and EMPIRE end with one character walking away from another, the one left behind calling out to the other's retreating back. “Good God, I can only imagine the look on JR’s face round about now!” crows Cliff after Bobby has ceded control of Ewing Enterprises and is headed towards the elevator. The camera has Bobby in the foreground with Cliff standing behind him so Cliff doesn't see Bobby smiling cryptically as he murmurs, “Me too” under his breath. Back on EMPIRE, the camera stays with Lucious as he shouts at his retreating son: “Watch your back, baby boy! I keep my promises!” A father trying to goad his own son into shooting him? It sounds preposterous and maybe it is, and who knows how Lucious's vow to kill his son could possibly pay off, but the scene is played with such conviction, and shot so atmospherically, that it's impossible not to be swept along by it. This is quintessential EMPIRE.

In amongst all the mayhem at the end of last season's DYNASTY, Anders' daughter Kirby arrived unannounced from Australia. A rebellious twenty-something estranged from one parent while being raised by the other on a different continent, she's the DYNASTY equivalent of DALLAS's Emma Ryland. Fearing she'll be suspected of starting the coach house fire (apparently, she has a history of that sort of thing), Anders keeps her out of sight of the Carringtons by booking her into a hotel. Meanwhile, Harris Ryland plays mind games with Emma, manipulating her into her thinking what's happened to Drew is her fault. “All this pain and suffering could have been avoided if you’d just done what I asked you to do," he tells her, "but you turned your back on me, started slumming it down at Southfork, hanging with a convicted criminal … the end result being … chaos … This happened because of you.” To get her back under his control, he supplies her with more of the pills she is addicted to. Drugs appear to be something else she and Kirby has in common, as Anders discovers when he stops by his daughter's hotel room to find a gang full of stoned young things in various states of undress. Kirby accuses him of choosing the Carringtons over her: "You’re not protecting me from them, you’re protecting them from me ... My own father doesn’t trust me!” “You’ve never given me reason to," he snaps back. "The reason I sent you away is because I thought you would be better off in Australia with your mother ... I still think that’s the case.” Emma is likewise angry with her mother for the years they spent apart. “You did downers, tranqs, anti-depressants … when you were … the same age as me," she reminds her. "You were so screwed up, you took me to the state fair in my stroller and then walked away. You threw me back to my father, to my grandmother, to all of their controlling, suffocating psychodrama. You escaped. You did four years. I did twenty, Ann.”

Minor theme of the week: maternal tough love. High on the pills supplied by her father, Emma overturns her car on her way back to Southfork. The sheriff explains to Ann and Bobby that he has no choice but to arrest her, but they can then post bail and take her home. “No," Ann replies. "Let her spend the night in jail." When Emma protests, she explains sternly, "We’re not bailing you out until you recognise you have a problem and agree to rehab.” Meanwhile, Cookie lets rip at Hakeem for casting the deciding vote against Lucious at the Empire board meeting. “Boy, you gave our business away to that half-lesbian bitch. You just threw away our legacy!” she yells, before telling him to take back his vote. When he refuses, she whacks him repeatedly with a broom. (“Take it back! Take it back! I will kill your ass!”) When the broom breaks, she carries on hitting him with her purse instead. It sounds funny, and it is, but at the same time, she is crying real tears. This is another example of EMPIRE's great strength as a soap. Even when the action teeters on the brink of New DYNASTY-style absurdity, the actors’ emotional conviction makes you believe that all this stuff, however nuts, really matters. And when they're given something really meaty to sink their teeth into, like Rhonda's miscarriage story, the series scale KNOTSian heights of emotional rawness.

Having been pushed down the stairs as part of the mid-season cliff-hanger, Rhonda lies on the floor, unable to move or call for help. Her face is full of cuts and her night-dress is soaked with blood. As Soap Land’s miscarriages go, we’re a long way from Pam Ewing perspiring prettily in soft focus after falling out of the hayloft in 'Barbecue'. Eventually, she manages to raises the alarm which leads to EMPIRE’s first trip to Soap Land Memorial Hospital. As is tradition, the family feuding continues in the hospital corridors. When a concerned Hakeem shows up, Cookie tells him to go: “Don’t nobody wanna see your ass right now. Get out of here!” But the way the whole family is shaken and upset is genuinely moving. Andre fallIng to the floor when he hears the bad news is reminiscent of Lilimae collapsing when she heard that Val's babies were stillborn. It all feels very raw and real.

“Maybe it’s a blessing in disguise,” Cliff Barnes suggested to Pamela last week, referring to the babies he destroyed. “Maybe everything happens for a reason,” Anika suggests to Rhonda when she visits her in the hospital, referring to the baby she has destroyed. (Rhonda has no memory of being pushed and assumes she fell down the stairs by accident.) “Maybe this baby is exactly what I need … to pull me out of this dark place,” suggests Sam on DYNASTY after learning about Steven’s baby-to-be. Anika delivers a devilishly soapy double-entendre when Rhonda confides that she's worried about being able to get pregnant again. “There’ll be another heir,” Anika assures her. “You really think so?” she asks hopefully. “I do. I really do,” Anika replies confidently.

While Bobby alludes cryptically to JR's master-plan to bring down Cliff ("If JR were here with us right now, he’d just smile and say, 'Let Barnes have his day. Let that bastard ... think he’s won. Let him be the architect of his own disaster'"), Cookie is already hatching a plan to get rid of Naomi Campbell: “I’m a-take Camilla out from the inside. I just gotta get back into Empire.” She does this by persuading Hakeem, in his new position of CEO, to buy Lyon Dynasty and make it a subsidiary of Empire. Camilla's against the idea (“It’s the biggest mistake you could make,” she warns him), but he overrules her — he wants his family all together again at Empire (minus his father, of course). In retrospect, giving Cookie and Hakeem their own label separate from Empire feels like a slight dramatic misstep because it split the show's focus between the two companies, so maybe the reason behind this whole take-over plot is to bring the Lyon family back under the same corporate roof. (I also wonder if Anika, rather than Camilla, was the originally choice to be Mimi's secret wife who takes over Empire. As Lucious's spurned mistress and former right-hand woman, she has both a stronger motive for revenge and a greater expertise in the music business than Camilla, and had already proved herself willing, albeit reluctantly, to bed down with Mimi. Somewhere along the line, however, the programme makers must have decided it would be more fun to turn her into a pregnant lunatic and get Naomi Campbell back on the show.)

There are two marriage proposals this week. While one is dripping in ambiguity, the other is surprising in its lack of cyncism. The first arises after Bobby learns that Cliff has given Pamela one third of Barnes Global. He then tells John Ross that the Ewings need Pamela’s shares to fight Cliff, “but I’m also not sure if I should ask you to do something about that. Do you love Pamela?” he asks him. John Ross dodges the question: “This isn’t about love, is it, Uncle Bobby? This is about our family, our survival.” This leads to a fantastic scene between John Ross and Pamela that is as much a game of cat and mouse as it is a not-in-so-many-words marriage proposal. “They say opposites attract, right?" he asks. "Well, that ain’t the case with us. You and I play the same game — we scheme, we seduce, we betray and we’ve done all the above to each other a few times over … Who’s to say it ain’t gonna happen again? Hell, who’s to say it ain’t happening right now? … Who am I really talking to here? I saw how well you flipped the switch on your father earlier. Who’s to say you ain’t gonna flip it on me again, especially now you know about JR’s plan to take your father down?” “My father killed my babies," Pamela reminds him angrily. "How could you possibly think I could ever side with him again?” “It ain’t your father that I’m worried about you burning," he replies. "It’s me. What’s to stop you siding with yourself now you’ve got a major claim in a multi-billion dollar business?” “… I give you my word,” she insists. “Well, actions speak louder than words, darlin’.” “What do you want me to do?” We don't get to hear John Ross's reply, but the next time we see them, they're at an altar, exchanging marriage vows. “Are you doing this because you love me or because you hate your father?” he asks. Now it's Pamela's turn to dodge the question. “I do,” she replies enigmatically.

By comparison, the second proposal is somewhat vanilla. Fallon has spent the between-season hiatus deciding that she loves Michael rather than Liam. Now, during a late night walk along a riverside illuminated by pretty lights, a setting reminiscent of the scene in '80s DYNASTY where Cecil suggested to Fallon marry his nephew Jeff, Michael gets down on one knee and asks her if she will “finally do me the honour of being my wife?" She immediately accepts. But inevitably, there is a complication. For reasons too convoluted to explain, Fallon is obliged to continue with her fake marriage to Liam until the sale of Carrington Atlantic to his (enjoyably creepy) Uncle Max is finalised.

In response to recent events, Cookie and Lucious have gone from enemies to allies once again — they even spend the night in the same bed, albeit fully clothed — in a way that feels so natural, it isn’t even commented upon. Also in response to recent events, Blake and Alexis find themselves in the same bedroom in the penultimate scene of this week's DYNASTY, but in less mutually supportive circumstances. Under pressure from Hank to come up with his money, Alexis is trying to break into Blake's personal safe when he walks in and catches her. He calls her a thirsty whore and asks how she dare come into his wife's room. "Her room?" replies Alexis indignantly. "I'm the one who picked this wallpaper, that bed ..." A row ensues, anger turns to passion and you can guess the rest. Blake and Alexis ending up in bed together feels kind of inevitable, but now that Blake doesn’t care about anything anymore, I'm unsure how seriously we should take anything he does.

From Kit Wainwaring’s engagement to Lucy Ewing to ‘80s Steven Carrington marrying Sammy Jo and Claudia, we’ve grown accustomed to Soap Land's gay men going to bed with women — after all, if they don’t, they’re not gonna get many storylines. However, no-one’s addressed this soap trope from a political perspective — until this week's EMPIRE. Jamieson Hinthrop is an influential marketing executive (sort of a publicist, only with more power) whom Jamal has recruited to manage his "brand". Jamieson is keen to champion Jamal as an out gay pop star and so isn't impressed to hear about his recent fling with Alicia Keys: “If the press gets it, you’re gonna give fuel to every politician that says being gay is a choice. They’re gonna look at Jamal Lyon and say, ‘Hey, the gay icon can choose to sleep with women whenever he wants.” “… Whose business is that?” Jamal asks. “There are ten countries in the world where being gay will get you executed," Jamieson replies before listing them all, from Afghanistan to Yemen. “But good luck with the music,” he adds sarcastically.

While Alexis greets the news that her gay son is an expectant father with scepticism (“I’ll tell you what’s unbelievable — the fact that a premenopausal woman got knocked up by a gay man she slept with once”), Cookie is worried that Jamal "messing around with girls" could jeopardise his chance of winning a prestigious ASA award. She's unimpressed by his assertions that “sexuality is fluid” and it "ain’t nobody’s business who I get down with.”' "Pick a damn team!" she snaps. "You one of them wishy-washy confused bisexuals now? ... Sounds like you all just wanna be freaky deaky!” This makes him laugh, which makes her laugh, and they have a nice moment, but then Cookie cuts to the chase: "Listen to me. You cannot piss people like Jamieson off if you wanna win an ASA award, OK? Awards are like politics, baby.” She then slaps his face, playfully but hard, and tells him to “get your gay back and get that ASA award. You need to become legendary!” Jamal's response is to write a song about having the freedom to love who you choose, which he performs on stage while dancing with both boys and girls. Jamieson in the audience, but from his inscrutable expression it's hard to say whether the song has resolved this particular storyline or complicated it even further.

There are a couple of tantalising throwbacks towards '80s DALLAS and DYNASTY towards the end of their C21st equivalents this week. First comes the thrillingly intriguing moment where Christopher is emailed an up-to-date photo of a woman at a bank in Zurich who may or not be the original Pam Ewing. “Is that her, Bobby?” asks Ann, anxiously. "It’s been twenty-four years since I’ve seen Pam and then it was after that car accident. She was so badly burned, covered with bandages. I can’t tell." Bobby replies, peering at the picture. (To be honest, the blurry image of a face obscured by a hat and dark glasses could belong to anybody.) Over on DYNASTY, a woman turns up at the Carrington Manor claiming to be the real Cristal Flores. Turns out there are several real Cristal Floreses, each claiming to have had their identities stolen by the now dead Mrs Blake Carrington and each demanding financial compensation. “Pay them what they want. Get them outta here,” says an indifferent Blake. The surrounding press coverage is followed avidly by yet another Cristal at her office desk. “You’re so obsessed with that family,” her colleague observes (which suggests the Carringtons have a public profile equivalent to the Kardashians — or, indeed, the Lyons). “I feel like I know them,” New New Cristal replies dreamily. “Maybe you should pretend to be the real Cristal Flores," the colleague jokes. "You already have half the name, Maybe you’ll meet Blake Carrington, fall in love and live happily ever after!” New New Cristal smiles enigmatically and the scene goes into slow motion as the camera pans down to the name tag on her shirt: Cristal Jennings! This reveal is deemed sufficiently significant that not only is it the final shot of the episode, but instead of the screen then going straight to black followed by the end credits as normal, the familiar "fountain effect" that traditionally heralds the opening credits appears instead, followed by the title of the show. Only then do we get the end credits. The implication seems to be that while this episode might be ending, the real story of New DYNASTY is only just beginning -- even though the name Jennings won't mean anything to New DYNASTY viewers, unless they're also devotees of the original series. Although New DYNASTY's first season was peppered with references to the original series, they were only noticeable if you were already aware of them. This is the first time the '80s version of the show has intruded into the actual storytelling of the new series. It feels incongruous and slightly surreal, a bit like Charlton Heston discovering the Statue of Liberty on the beach at the end of Planet of the Apes or Tom Baker appearing as the Curator in the 50th Anniversary episode of DOCTOR WHO.

And this week’s Top 3 are …

1 (2) DALLAS
2 (1) EMPIRE
3 (3) DYNASTY

 

[Willie Oleson]

“You get my money or I’m going to the cops. You have 38 hours,” he tells her.

Okay, that really is funny (but 84 hours woulda been funnier)

And when they're given something really meaty to sink their teeth into, like Rhonda's miscarriage story, the series scale KNOTSian heights of emotional rawness.

It's getting harder and harder to ignore the filmed version of EMPIRE.

Somewhere along the line, however, the programme makers must have decided it would be more fun to turn her into a pregnant lunatic

I see your point regarding motive and character, but I really like this:

Anika delivers a devilishly soapy double-entendre when Rhonda confides that she's worried about being able to get pregnant again. “There’ll be another heir,” Anika assures her.

But if there had been the opportunity to do both storylines for Anika.....(!)

John Ross dodges the question: “This isn’t about love, is it, Uncle Bobby? This is about our family, our survival.”

It always made me smile when he said "Uncle Bobby" (with that Southern twang).
Does Christopher have a Southern accent, I don't remember....
Not that it matters, there were also differences in speech in O.Dallas (Pam/Paaaaaam/Pehmela)

Survival of the family! Not much has changed since 1978.

Uncle Max

Yeah, that was quite the detour. I think he's sort of a Logan Rhinewood?

I'm unsure how seriously we should take anything he does.

But maybe Alexis will take it very seriously. (or she should).

the end result being … chaos

Haha.

While the residents of Southfork are glued to the Dallas News ("The manhunt continues for Drew Ramos, a thirty-one year old Hispanic man and prime suspect in the Ewing Energies explosion …”), Alexis watches Channel 52 from her hospital bed (“The nationwide manhunt continues for Hank Sullivan, person of interest in Cristal Carrington’s homicide. Investigators on the case question whether the suspect acted alone ...”)

for the versus!

New New Cristal smiles enigmatically and the scene goes into slow motion as the camera pans down to the name tag on her shirt: Cristal Jennings!

And how mind-boggling it could have been if Celia hadn't died (or at least, if that had been a surprise).

 

[James from London]

08 Apr 13: DALLAS: Guilt by Association v. 06 Apr 16: EMPIRE: A Rose by Any Other Name v. 19 Oct 18: DYNASTY: Ship of Vipers

During last week’s DYNASTY, the episode after his wedding to Steven, Sam learnt that his new husband is also an expectant father. At the beginning of this week’s DALLAS, the episode after his wedding to Pamela, John Ross finds compelling evidence that his new wife’s father murdered his own. The newlyweds are returning from their Vegas elopement — aboard Cliff Barnes' private jet, no less — when a sneaky peak at the flight tracker reveals that the jet was in Nuevo, Laredo on the night of JR’s death. “It was Cliff all along!” John Ross realises. Understandably, this causes a little tension between the newlyweds. “I married you, I love you, and now I worry that every time you look at me, you’re connecting me to what my father did,” Pamela says. “You are not responsible for anything he did,” John Ross assures his bride.

While Cliff celebrates his acquisition of Ewing Energies (“the ultimate payback for what Jock did to Digger all those years ago!”) by moving into Bobby's office and throwing his old furniture out on the street, Hakeem marks his ascension to CEO of Empire ("the dawn of a new empire here at Empire!") by replacing the picture of his father's face on the company logo with one of his own. Brilliantly, this also becomes the series’ new logo in the opening credits.

Behind the scenes, however, Hakeem, in a dizzying about-turn, starts plotting with his family to get rid of Camilla and Mimi. The plan is to trick Camilla into saying something on tape that proves “the way [they] stole our company is illegal." While Rhonda uses her new job working for Camilla's fashion range to eavesdrop on her phone conversations with Mimi, Cookie concentrates on keeping Empire running smoothly despite Camilla’s interferences. Similarly on DALLAS, the Ewings tackle the problem of getting rid of Cliff from a variety of angles. While Christopher travels to Zurich to obtain his mother’s shares of Barnes Global, all the while insisting to Elena that he has no personal interest in finding Pam ("The woman ceased to be my mother the day she abandoned me,” he maintains), Sue Ellen uses a combination of threats, blackmail and betrayal to neutralise the governor’s attempts to prevent them pumping oil out of Southfork, Emma pretends to turn against her mother to regain her father's trust then searches his house for incriminating evidence to use against him and Cliff, and an on-the-lam Drew makes good on his promise to bring Harris's henchman to justice. “Roy Vickers has been arrested for possession of narcotics,” he tells Bobby over the phone. "You should be able to leverage the charges against him to get what you need on Ryland.” John Ross, having already done his part by marrying Pamela for her shares of Barnes Global, is impatient for the family to move against Cliff, but in a powerful scene, Bobby insists that they still need to adhere to JR’s masterplan, even though he can’t yet tell John Ross what that plan is: "You have to trust me on this, John Ross. I have given you the benefit of the doubt after everything you’ve done. It’s your turn now ... We need to make sure that when we finally do have control of Barnes Global, there’s enough proof in place to implicate Cliff in the murder of JR." To that end, he asks his nephew to persuade Pamela to plant evidence in Cliff’s safety deposit box that "will help us tie him to the murder.” “You want me to frame my father?” Pamela asks. “For something that he did," John Ross replies. "You and I, we both deserve justice.”

Back on EMPIRE, Hakeem ends up going down the good old-fashioned sex tape route. He secretly records him and Camilla "doing the nasty", along with Camilla saying that she hopes Mimi will hurry up and die of cancer so that they can inherit her fortune, and then sends it to Mimi in New York. Pretty soon, word reaches Empire that Mimi has started selling her stock in the company — stock which Andre immediately starts buying. "Boy, you did it. We're free!" a delighted Cookie tells Hakeem.

Having sided with the Ewings against her father, Emma also agrees to go to rehab. Her rebellious counterpart on DYNASTY, Kirby, likewise turns over a new leaf this week. Having already shacked up with Jeff Colby, she spies an opportunity to ingratiate herself with his sister as she prepares to open her new nightspot, Club Colby. Monica hits a snag when a rival club nearby books real-life hip hop group Migos (how very EMPIRE of them) to appear on the same night as her opening. "This is not coincidence, it's sabotage!" she declares angrily. Kirby comes up with a wacky sitcom-style solution — sneaking into the rival club, she lets loose some live rats in the kitchen (you can almost hear the canned sitcom laughter) before anonymously tipping off the health inspector who promptly shuts the place down (cue more canned laughter).

Indeed, this week's DYNASTY is less of a continuing drama than it is a succession of unfunny comedy capers. The main focus of the episode is Blake’s determination to spend all his money before he dies so there'll be nothing left for his children to inherit. Even if one wanted to buy into this premise, there's nothing at stake dramatically. As Blake himself points out, if he succeeds in his goal, Fallon and Steven will still be unimaginably rich thanks to the sale of Carrington Atlantic, so who cares? He starts to replace the vintage cars he lost in the fire, but there's a particularly rare one he needs to complete his collection and Jeff Colby’s after it too. To decide which of them gets it, they race each other with toy cars. Unless the race is intended as an advert for the toy race track, which admittedly is pretty cool, I'm at a loss to see how this storyline is meant to be entertaining or interesting. Are we meant to genuinely care which billionaire gets to take home the prize? God knows, ‘80s DYNASTY was oft accused of obsessing over its rich characters to the exclusion of all else, but it never had a storyline where the outcome hinged on how many classic cars someone might end up owning. In the event, Jeff wins the car and Blake has to wear a 'Jeff Colby owns me' T-shirt. (Cue hysterical canned laughter, whoops and applause.)

While there's nothing at stake on DYNASTY, there's everything's at stake on DALLAS as the mystery that's been hovering over Soap Land for the past twenty-six years — the fate of Pam Ewing — is finally resolved (sort of). Christopher traces Pam to a big house in Zurich. The scene where he keeps watch on the house from his car, hoping to spot the mother he'd given up for dead, mirrors the scene from DALLAS, 1980 where Pam likewise sat outside a mansion in Houston, hoping to see the mother she’d similarly believed was dead. Instead of Pam, Christopher meets Dr Gordon, who introduces himself as her surgeon and husband. He then recounts the scene from DALLAS '88 where Cliff met Pam after her accident. Because Margaret Michaels played Pam in that one scene but never appeared again in the role (instead, she played her own lookalike two years later), the scene always kind of felt like an experiment that had failed, one that DALLAS itself would just as soon pretend never happened. However, the gravitas with which Dr Gordon describes the conversation that took place between Cliff and Pam then (“He asked her to come back to Dallas, to be with him and Bobby and you. She said no. She said that that part of her life had ended”), as well as Christopher’s devastation upon hearing about it, not only legitimises the earlier scene, it imbues it with an emotional significance that it didn’t have at the time. In other words, a scene from 1988 has retroactively become more powerful in 2013 than it was in 1988. The past and present also collide intriguingly towards the end of DYNASTY (the only scene in this week's ep that could be remotely described as intriguing) when New New Cristal comes face to face with Blake and introduces herself as "a friend of your late wife." To prove it, she shows him a locket containing a photo of the two New Cristals together. "I think she wanted me to come here and help you — and I think you can help me too," she adds mysteriously.

In this week's "Parents Who Interfere After Their Gay Son Sleeps With a Woman" section, Jamal is furious to learn that it was his father who told Jamieson (the influential publicist fella) about his fling with Alicia Keys. I assumed Lucious had done so because he was proud of his son finally behaving in a heteronormative way, but his true motive was far soapier — he did it to wreck Jamal's chance of winning an ASA award for Best Song — a category in which Lucious himself has also been nominated. "He's never won an ASA before. He wants it more than anything, even if it means sabotaging my chances," Jamal realises angrily. "He's foul on a whole other level and I'm getting him back this time!" Meanwhile, Alexis goes full sitcom in her attempts to prove that Melissa's pregnancy is a scam. “When she looks at Steven, she sees dimples and dollar signs. I have doubts she's pregnant with anything other than carbs,” she tells Sam. Together, they break into Melissa’s house to look for evidence of her charade. While Sam helps himself to the cold meats he finds in her refrigerator, the kind pregnant women specifically aren't supposed to eat, Alexis finds a fake pregnancy bump in the bedroom (cue more canned laughter). Jamal and Alexis each elect to confront Lucious and Melissa publicly. While Jamal performs a powerfully angry song in which he savages his father's reputation and reveals to the world that "Lucious Lyon ain't even his real name", Alexis barges into Melissa's pregnancy meditation class (cue more canned laughter), rips open her dress in order expose her fake pregnancy bump (even more canned laughter and whooping), but instead finds her real very pregnant stomach (laughter, whooping, applause, closing theme tune).

To entrap Roy Vickers, Drew tricked him into pursuing him in his truck while he (Drew) was on his motorbike. It was only after the police stopped Roy for speeding and found the drugs in his possession that Drew removed his helmet to reveal ... someone else entirely. Drew himself watched the whole thing unfold from a safe distance. Fallon pulls a similar switcheroo when Liam's creepy Uncle Max tells her he'll only go ahead with the deal to buy Carrington Atlantic if she goes to bed with him. So she hires a look-slightly-alike prostitute to take her place.

"Son, you’re still gonna have to turn yourself in," Bobby tells Drew when he calls to tip him off about Roy's arrest. Conversely, Alexis tells Hank to "lay low. You be quiet about our deal, or the two of us are gonna end up in jail." Whereas Drew's final words to Bobby are very poignant (“Thank you for everything you have done for my family. Please tell Christopher I’m sorry”), Alexis and Hank’s exchange is the one genuinely funny scene on this week's DYNASTY. She shows him a painting, explaining that it's an original Rembrandt which she’s giving it to him as collateral against the money she owes him. Hank is confused: he has no idea what either a Rembrandt or collateral is. He looks blankly at the painting before asking, "Do you have any bigger ones?"

All three shows end in death. On DALLAS, as a slow-motion Christopher chases after a woman in a wide-brimmed hat, spins her around, sees that she is not played by Victoria Principal and cries out, "Where’s my mother?!”, John Ross and Pamela are standing in a bank vault looking through the contents of Cliff's safety deposit box. “Oh my God," Pamela exclaims, holding a document. "It’s Pam Ewing’s death certificate. Christopher’s mother is dead.” Fallon, meanwhile, receives a call from the hooker substitute who tells her Max Van Kirk has just expired from a Cecil Colby-style heart attack. But far weirder than either of these bombshells is what happens at the end of EMPIRE. At first, I wasn't sure if I'd skipped ahead by accident and was watching the final scene of next week's ep — or maybe even next year's ep.

The scene starts with Naomi Campbell in a swanky New York apartment wiping her fingerprints off the taps of a sunken bath. There's a body under the water — we can't see the face, but we’re led to believe it belongs to Mimi. (I guess it was too much to expect the Oscar-winning Marisa Tomei to return just to play a wet corpse.) Lucious appears from nowhere, having filmed whatever's just happened on his phone. "You know, nobody's gonna believe she killed herself," he tells Camilla. "They might have, if I hadn't watched you pour that stuff in her drink … Was that cyanide or arsenic?" Pulling out a gun, he threatens to show the police the recording of “Mimi's last few precious moments” unless Camilla commits suicide right there and then. It's not quite Cliff saying, "I love you; kill yourself" to Frank, or even Jill Bennett forcing Val to take an overdose at gunpoint, but it’s still pretty twisted. He proceeds to paint a grim picture of what Camilla can look forward to in prison: "You gotta be constantly aware that somebody's gonna try to rape you or murder you, or just the general unsanitary conditions of the place … It'll be a whole lot easier and a whole lot less mess if you just take a swig of whatever that was that you made Mimi drink." Camilla begs Lucious to shoot her instead, just as Lucious asked Hakeem to shoot him at the end of last week’s EMPIRE. "After all the pain you caused my family, I don't owe you any favours,” he replies. “You gonna have to off yourself. Go ahead.” Eventually, she drinks the poison. "Rot in hell,” she says by way of a farewell.

And this week’s Top 3 are …

1 (1) DALLAS
2 (2) EMPIRE
3 (3) DYNASTY

Okay, that really is funny (but 84 hours woulda been funnier)

Thank God for Alexis and Hank at this point.

It's getting harder and harder to ignore the filmed version of EMPIRE.

I'd be fascinated to see what you make of it!

Does Christopher have a Southern accent, I don't remember....

He does, but he doesn't play on it the way John Ross does (and the way his daddy did).

for the versus!

Yeah, that was pretty cool:

 

[Willie Oleson]

The scene starts with Naomi Campbell in a swanky New York apartment wiping her fingerprints off the taps of a sunken bath (......) "Rot in hell,” she says by way of a farewell.

Oh, my! Empire is giving Dallas a run for its money.

Because Margaret Michaels played Pam in that one scene but never appeared again in the role (instead, she played her own lookalike two years later)

So....my crazy idea that Patricia's twin sister should have looked like Alison Carr actually happened in Dallas!