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.)