Well, SOMEONE should celebrate Emma's birthday...

Is it too much to ask the headwriter of General Hospital to give one tiny bit of lipservice to anything non-mobular or that has any hint of normalcy on the show? I mean, really.

Most first time parents talk about or plan their baby's first birthday, especially one that's somewhat of a miracle herself. Most first time parents talk about who to invite, where to have it, whether to bake or buy a cake, have balloons and decorations, and what special toy to give the baby. These are heartwarming and light moments that the audience expects and wants, especially given the adorableness of Emma, as a perfect counterbalance to the darkness of General Hospital these days....

We could pretend that this happened, because it would happen on Y&R [which is doing twice as well as GH thankyouverymuch]....but it didn't.

Instead the Corinthos family is front and center, on showcase, with all of its twisted logic, interactions and history.

And in its own twisted way, the headwriter has written what the audience has asked for....

You want cast integration?

Fine. There's all of Port Charles, including Robin and Patrick, witnessing and reacting to yet another one of Sonny's violence-ridden fetes.

You want nods to history?

Here you go! How about another pregnant Carly getting threatened to be shot in the head (wink!) and look here's the 1st version of Carly delivering the 4th version of Carly's child (nudge!)

You want family moments rife with words of wisdom and positive affirmation?

He's listening! There's Sonny telling Michael "you did good" after killing Claudia. Like father, like son. Total Kodak moment. :sniff:






More Quartermaine airtime, you say?

Well, there's [the once powerful ELQ executive] Tracy [acting barmaid] at the Haunted Star, but she's still scheming and giving pithy remarks...it's just to the Spencer brood. That Tracy.

Enduring Couples?

It's a bit unconventional, but never fear, Sonny and Jason will be together 4Evah!

With so much airtime given to the Corinthos family and its ancillary characters, the supporting storylines are always given short shrift. The supporting storylines get dropped (HIV aspect), or dragged out to the characters' detriment (PPD), or are a rehash of prior storylines (Leyla/Lisa), or are ridiculous (suing for fetus visitation/blog wars/Emma in a tree), or the characters get watered down (Patrick), or written with sexism (Robin's insecurities), or out of character (Robin cheating), or are written without much family interaction (Scorpios, Drakes, Quartermaines, Cassadines), or much cast interaction (the famous Guza bubble).

Yet, when you watch other top rated shows that have over-the-top-suspend-your-belief writing, like the mob-ridden General Hospital, they resonate with the audience because they intermix moments of vulnerability and normalcy. They also intertwine their storylines, one has to watch storyline A in order to understand what's happening storyline C, and storyline B is influenced by storyline C, etc

Perhaps to some, seeing the celebration of Emma's birthday is insignificant, but there is importance to the happy moments in life, aren't there? Those are the moments that one reflects on in the end... And there's a reason why audiences remember the Asian quarter reunion, Anna and Robin's reunion, the meeting of Robert and Robin, the silly Quartermaine Thanksgivings.... can people remember the demise of the mob characters over the years?

(screencap credit to brilliant soapdish anon)