Credit: Howard Wise/JPI (3); CBS Screenshot (3)
I’m not sure which battle was more heated — the one between Bold & Beautiful‘s Steffy and Hope, or the war that their sparring reignited between their mutual fans! It was an intense week with some great performances — especially from Annika Noelle, Jacqueline MacInnes Wood and Matthew Atkinson — as well as some absolutely infuriating moments. And we’re gonna talk about it all…
Fight Club
One of the things I loved about this week’s episodes is that despite the real battle being between Steffy and Hope, the two women shared almost no screen time until week’s end. Instead, the writers used one of their favorite tactics — two sets of characters having basically the same conversation — to fuel the fire. Regular readers will know that I absolutely despise this particular type of writing… usually. But here it worked.
Why? Because despite the entire show revolving around the one storyline, there were two really strong conversations unfolding. In the main office, you had Steffy, Ridge and Brooke. Across the hall in the design studio, Hope was pleading her case to Thomas. Both scenarios were intense, but in completely different ways.
And did anyone else feel as if this week’s scripts were much, much stronger than those we usually get? There was far less reliance on the repetition of one or two key phrases. (Although I lost count of how many times Ridge referred to Thomas as “my boy,” which got super annoying as the days went on!)
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Alternative Facts
Noelle did a fantastic job of letting us see Hope’s growing frustration. Every time someone basically sang the chorus of “Love and Marriage” to her — as in “You can’t have one without the other” — Hope clearly wanted to bang her head into the nearest wall. Meanwhile, Wood’s Steffy was never more her grandmother’s namesake. How could any longtime viewer hear Steffy declare, “Hope is following in her mother’s footsteps, and I’m not going to allow it! It’s unacceptable!” and not picture Stephanie whispering into her ear?
I was fascinated by the false narrative that Steffy was creating in which she conflated Brooke and Hope’s history. For example, this particular exchange between Ridge’s daughter and his ex:
BROOKE: And this scenario that you’ve created in your head, about how Hope is a tramp and how she chews up men and spits them out, just like her mother…
STEFFY: Where’s the lie?
The thing is… it’s simply not true. One of the strong narratives this show has relied on for years is the irony that Hope/Liam/Steffy spent a decade recreating the Brooke/Ridge/Taylor story, but with the perceived good girl/bad girl roles reversed where the mothers and daughters were concerned. As several readers pointed out on Twitter (never X) this week, Steffy is the one who has had to have two separate paternity tests run. To quote Steffy… “Where’s the lie?”
But I 100 percent understood where Steffy was coming from. Why? Because, to continue the Steffy/Stephanie analogy to its uncomfortable but inescapable conclusion, Steffy is essentially doing with her brother exactly what Stephanie did with her favorite son, Ridge. Each of the women has been overprotective in a way that’s borderline icky and psychologically fascinating.
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That’s Just Ridge Being Ridge
I don’t even know what we’re supposed to think about Ridge at this point. As Steffy read Brooke for filth, he just stood there. Even after Brooke asked if he was really going to let Steffy talk to her in that manner, his “defense” of her was weak at best.
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I wish either Brooke or Ridge had pointed out to Steffy that they’ve been reunited for months and are very much in love and yet haven’t dashed down the aisle. Or that when Thomas declared he still loved Hope but it was too painful, she’d responded with, “Why? What exactly is painful? You have absolutely everything you want except a ring on my finger, and even that could come with time.”
Child’s Play
Then in came Douglas to twist the knife a little deeper into Hope’s heart. I absolutely adore Henry Joseph Samiri, who just delivers every single time. And man, is Douglas proving to be a good little manipulator.
I’m not even sure if he’s aware of it, but that moment when Douglas said Hope wasn’t his mom, Caroline was? I gasped. Better still, he followed it up by basically threatening to go back to court in order to get his way. Well played kiddo. Well played. You’re going to do just fine in this viper’s nest you call a family!
Sending Thomas off the canvas was a brilliant move. Yes, it happened far too quickly for my taste — I mean, who just walks out of the office, onto a jet and leaves their entire life behind? — but it cranks things between Steffy and Hope up to a 10. Yes, we’ve played this dynamic in the past, but this time around, Hope seems ready to raise hell and fight fire with fire. Me? I’m totally here for it.
Stop The Insanity
I don’t care how many times Zende gets misty-eyed while thinking about Luna.
I don’t care how often they tell us that he’s had feelings for her from the moment they first crossed paths.
The truth is that Zende saw Luna as someone he could use and manipulate in order to punish RJ for being the “favored” child. And frankly, Zende was more interesting when they gave him that edge. They easily could have taken the mints — special or otherwise — out of this story and instead played Luna genuinely bonding with Zende, with both of them knowing they weren’t born into this world of privilege.
But no. He slept with a woman he knew wasn’t interested in him when she was drugged. That is the beginning and end where the facts of this story are concerned, and absolutely nothing is going to change that. Period.
Random Thoughts
• I wonder what Paris is up to these days?
• It was kinda weird that there was basically no mention of Sheila all week. I know this show loves to tell one story at a time, but how about at least addressing the (dead) elephant in the room? How hard would it have been for Hope to say, “Hey, Steffy? How about worrying your unraveling husband instead of my personal life?” But never fear, we’re about to dive deep into the Sheila mess again next week…
• Anybody else think it’s ridiculous that Steffy has killed Sheila, Thomas has been dumped and skipped town, yet Taylor is nowhere to be seen? Heck, they could have taken this opportunity to say Taylor was joining Thomas overseas — just like she did when Steffy left last year — and then, upon his inevitable return, explain that she’d found peace and happiness in Paris and planned to stay there for a while.
We’re only three months into 2024, and already we’ve suffered a year’s worth of heartbreaking losses. Below, we take a moment to reflect on the talented soap folks who’ve passed away during the first few months of the year.
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