1. Beth.

Ah, Beth. If you have ever followed Passions at all, you probably remember two things: Timmy the "living doll," and Sheridan in the pit. If you don't remember Sheridan in the pit, here's what you need to know. (This happened a few years ago.)

Our boring heroine Sheridan was held hostage in a pit throughout her pregnancy. The culprit was Beth, the psychotic ex-girlfriend of Sheridan's true love, Luis. There were a few things that made this storyline awesome: (1) Beth was psycho. (2) Beth had an equally psycho sidekick, a woman named Charlie who turned out to be a man and then ultimately turned out to be Sheridan's evil father. (3) Beth and Charlie would dress up as scary clowns to conceal their identities from Sheridan. (4) Beth lived in a house with her hysterically funny mother, Mrs. Wallace, and (5) Mrs. Wallace's live-in caregiver, a CHIMP named Precious. (The stated rationale was that the Wallaces couldn't afford a human caregiver. To improve matters, Precious was in love with Luis and would have on-screen fantasies about the two of them together.) (6) The whole time, Beth was faking her own pregnancy by Luis by strapping a sack of sugar under her shirt.

Amazingly, Beth got away with the whole thing, stealing Sheridan's baby and passing it off as her own. Years later, Sheridan and Luis finally figured it out, but Beth hit the road with baby Marty before she could be held accountable.

Now Beth has reappeared in Rome with Marty, and Luis is there looking for her! He thinks if he can find Marty, Sheridan will take him back. Right now she is married to (and pregnant by) some boring British guy named James or maybe Chris, whom she just married right before Luis came back from the dead.

All you really need to know about this storyline is that this week, Luis finally spotted Beth and Marty after a bunch of near misses, but they got away. Oh, and don't worry, Luis called up Interpol, and so they are on the case. But what I actually want to share is that Beth looks like Michael Jackson now.

You've been hit by a smooth criminal.

I don't know quite what happened here, but I'd say it's pretty unfortunate.

2. The Catacombs.

This is some weird shit, y'all. It's pretty much Grade-A Passions. (Actually it's Grade-A James E. Reilly -- the writer who used to work on Days and was responsible for things like Marlena being possessed by Satan.)

As you may or may not know, Whitney is now a nun, in penance for the fact that she had a baby by her half-brother Chad. Much more disgustingly, she and Chad slept together again after they found out they were siblings, because they are just THAT MUCH in love. (If you ask me, this is a dead giveaway that we will soon learn they aren't really related -- but for now, let's go with it.)

So Whitney was a nun, and that was boring -- until a faceless character I am calling EvilMonk appeared on the scene. I'm a bit fuzzy on the details, but basically, this guy convinced Whitney to undertake a super-secret mission on behalf of God. First, she would have to have her appearance totally altered, except she still looks exactly the same as before, only with different hair:

EvilMonk and the new, "unrecognizable" Whitney.

Then, she would have to sneak through some catacombs, break into the Pope's private quarters, and steal a chalice and give it to EvilMonk. Why? We don't know, but it's for God, so shut up. That's what this guy is telling Whitney, and she buys it. Meanwhile, he's also telling her that she can never see Chad again in any capacity or she will DIE.

Chad found out that Whitney was in trouble, and he went to Rome to look for her. They had a couple of near-misses in the catacombs, and at one point a tunnel caved in on Chad. Whitney wanted to save him, but the monk told her not to be distracted from her mission. She tried to save him anyway, saying she didn't care if she was killed for it. Because of her spirit of self-sacrifice, EvilMonk gave her a pass for her disobedience. In fact, he even told her that she was just like Abraham in the Old Testament, who was willing to sacrifice his beloved son Isaac just because God said so!

Whitney is just like this guy.

Actually, this is inaccurate. If Whitney were like Abraham, she would have been willing to kill Chad on God's say-so, and she wasn't. She was willing to die herself instead, which I guess makes her more like Jesus. (Except for the part where she had sex with her brother.) EvilMonk needs to brush up on his Bible stories.

Posted by on May 21, 2006 5:08 PM