As Jack started his ‘Road to Redemption,’ he traveled first to Philadelphia and then to South Carolina. In Philly he ran into Dr. Ben, who has given up medicine to run a food bank. The old friends chatted, then Ben called Carly because he felt something was wrong with Jack. Meanwhile Jack ended up on a rooftop with a Ben Franklin impersonator who had ironically stolen some Benjamins. 

After it was over and Jack saved Ben—I mean Irving, it was on to South Carolina, where he found Mike Kasnoff. Jack hoped Mike might be able to aide in Katie’s sad journey through her grief. But Jack and viewers were stunned to learn Mike was married to Anna, and they had a baby daughter, Caroline, apparently named after her home state. Mike had lost his construction business, and was in danger of losing his home, after suffering an accident that left him partially disabled. 

In a storyline twist that left me with some appreciation for the writers’ nod to Mike’s history, we learned that Mike had a racecar he was secretly planning to drive in a race, hoping to earn a big payoff and stave off foreclosure. Now if the writers had named his car Ludybelle II, I would have lauded them even more, but I’m happy they just remembered that Mike was introduced as a racecar driver when he first came to Oakdale. Jack sensed that Mike would have trouble driving due to his medical problems, and slugged Mike (maybe not the best thing to do to a man with a disability), stole his jumpsuit, and entered the race in his place. 

Carly showed up in time to learn about the Kasnoff family and witness the race with them, which Jack won (of course) and immediately turned over the entire purse to Mike (again, of course). Jack then drove into the sunset—okay, it wasn’t the sunset, but still. He called Margo to get a lead on the whereabouts of Simon, another of Katie’s old flames. 

Hence my disappointment; this was the end of Ben’s and Mike’s return. They were just cameos to move the story along. Why, instead of the constant parade of newbies and stunt casting, can’t these two guys come back to Oakdale? Surely there are hungry people in town that Ben could feed, and Mike could buy Katie’s old cottage for his family to move into. I would rather have them return than see more mediocre-talent newbies get forced on us, or see more temporary stunt casting bring on quickie stories that are here and gone and no one cares.  Audrey, Ralph, and Maeve took up a sizeable chunk of screen time over the past 2 months, but they are now gone for good. Anyone remember Zac and Zoe? I didn’t think so.

Seeing this Mike instead of the faux Mike we saw last year brought back sweet memories of that wild January a few years ago when we saw Mike and Katie naked in the shower and then also naked on the bed surrounded by softly glowing candles. That was pushing the envelope! And Oakdale could use Ben, Jessica (also a one day cameo last month) and some more African Americans, since they are current a one-color town. Jade has pretty much disappeared, as has Derek.  She didn’t even show up at her uncle’s ‘funeral’ last month. Is it too much to hope that either or both of these two could return on a permanent basis?

But overall, I did enjoy Jack’s journeys, even with the cheesy and hard to believe little details. Carly, Rosanna, Craig, and Margo all seemed to make the jump to hyperspace when traveling from Oakdale to Philadelphia. What airline has daily multiple nonstop flights between these two cities—there seemed to be a flight leaving every half hour? And that racetrack in South Carolina was pretty quiet for a big race; the audience seemed to cheer on cue, while the 5 cars on the tiny track were not breaking any speed records. My husband, a race aficionado himself, happened to be home when I watched the tape of that show, and he asked if the race was to see who could go the slowest. 

This week also saw the arrival of Tom Pelphrey as Mick Dante. As much as fans were anxiously awaiting his arrival, his storyline so far is laughably lame. Ali ran into him in the hospital basement (which looked more like the basement in my house than one in a large metropolitan building) and a few minutes after he grabbed her, she offered to introduce him to Bob Hughes, and also her sister and brother-in-law. When Mick did finally meet the Ryans, he whipped a small potted plant out of his pocket and put some rejuvenating liquid on it. He walks around with a plant in his pocket, in the hopes of meeting someone who will fund his ‘research’?? Yeah, right. Didn’t we do a rejuvenation storyline a few years ago, when Barbara, Emily, and Carly were kidnapped by some crazy doctor who promised eternal youth? Why didn’t Emily remember that when she was listening to Mick’s spiel?

Now if anyone would have asked me, I would have cast Tom as Duke Kramer, or perhaps MJ Snyder if Duke is too old a character for him. This would have connected him to the Snyders or Margo and the Hughes family, and he could have at least mentioned his father, John Dixon. But instead he is, at this point, a complete stranger to Oakdale. Now since the name Dante is so devilish, I’m going out on a limb here and say he’s connected to the closest thing Oakdale has to a devil, James Stenbeck. Yeah, I know, he’s dead, A-GAIN, but that has never stopped him before. The fact that Mick just happened to run into a person who could connect him to Paul Ryan was just too coincidental to me. Call me suspicious, but I think Mick is a buddy of James-the-definitely-undead.

Viewer Lorie wrote in, “I'm interested in Helen Wagner (Nancy Hughes). She had her 90th birthday in 09/2008 and C. Goutman said something to the effect that although they missed her actual birthday, they would do some kind of celebration story for her character of Nancy, possibly around the holidays 2008. Well it is now a year later and we've still not had any birthday or other celebratory/retrospective story for Nancy! Is Goutman going to wait until Helen Wagner passes away and then have some kind of lame funeral for Nancy Hughes or what? I understand that her real life husband passed away this summer and she's probably showing her age physically and mentally, but I would really like to see Helen and Nancy celebrated on the show…Why wasn't Emma at Brad's funeral? Why was his and Jack's mother Dolores not even mentioned? At Holden's premature funeral Aaron mentioned why Caleb couldn't be there and it was great to see Seth, but why didn't anyone ask about his wife Angel (who was also Holden's wife at one time)? I didn't even hear Iva or Ellie's names mentioned. I love Lucinda and would like to see more of her and Lisa and Emma….Bob and Kim both had health crises and none of their off-screen children were mentioned, i.e., Franny, Sabrina, Chris, Andy Dixon?  I don't want ATWT to end up gone like GL, but they need to use the ATWT vets.” 

ATWT going the way of GL is on everyone’s mind right now, and sometimes it seems as if TPTB almost want the show to fail! But I do have some good news for you, Lorie, my esteemed editor has learned that Helen Wagner will be appearing on the show later this month! You are right that EP Chris Goutman promised some celebration for her, yet we have only seen her once in the past year, last spring when she was helping Casey with his community service. Also, when I talked to different actors last spring at the fan lunch, they indicated that she is not in the best of health, usually stays seated during her scenes, and struggles to give the professional performance she has been known for since the very first day of ATWT. Soaps are of necessity a fast paced business now a days, and they have little time for error or stopping to redo a scene, and my sources said she had a hard time maintaining the pace the show sets. However, I feel that the woman is an icon of the show, and she should be allowed to work as often as she wants! I certainly hope TPTB do NOT wait to honor her until it is too late! They could do a weeklong tribute of memories of her as the matriarch of the Hughes family, and gift us viewers with a ton of vintage clips as she, Bob, or Tom reminisce during a family get together. As for who did and did not show up at Brad’s or Holden’s funeral, as always it’s about money. And yes, even if they could not pay actors, they could have at least mentioned the characters’ names. Angel, Iva, Ellie, Emma, Lisa, Franny, Sabrina, Chris, or Andy could have been mentioned as being at the farm or home without showing them, just to let us know that they are still a part of the family.

And I heard from an old friend, Jason, whom I met at the fan event almost 4 years ago, who said, “Vets, vets, vets! Gimme the vets! Both my partner and I are in our 30s, so relatively young, :-)  But we would so prefer a meaty story for Lisa, Bob, Kim, Lucinda, Emma, Tom, Margo or Barbara over Liberty, Hunter, or any newbie. One small thing in regards to current column:  I think Eduardo was Damian's cousin, not uncle. The ages of the actors would make more sense for uncle/nephew, but I believe they were cousins.” 

Jason, I’m looking forward to seeing you again in April! And you are right, Damian and Eduardo were cousins. I don’t know why I thought they were uncle and nephew, maybe I was subconsciously wishing that Lisa was more closely connected to him!

And finally, the GL parade is continuing, with the announcement that Daniel Cosgrove, ex-Bill Lewis III, will be coming to ATWT in an as yet unannounced role. No word yet on when he will start, but I would guess around the first of the year. If the show hasn’t decided what role he will play, maybe there’s hope for MJ Snyder or Duke Kramer yet!