Melrose Place - Marinades, Hooker Business & a Courtyard Pool

So I was at the therapist's office the other day. We say, we all boosed amongst us, and I was like talking to her about like wanting to live in the moment more and not being so afraid all the time and blah blah blah. And I don't know why I mentioned she's she's clearly younger than me, which I don't hold against her because she's a very good therapist.

Sheldon's in it. The first stage manager to say, bazinga.

It's amazing. Hey on Paul in America and this is that aged well, yesterday's pop culture.

Today it's January. It's a new year.

It's twenty twenty five, baby, that's.

Right, And for January twenty twenty five, we're doing nighttime soaps.

They're steamy, they're sexy, they make no fucking sense.

They have casts that are no fewer than seventeen people at any given taken and.

All of them are blondes, all of them. It's for you. Daphne's gonna go. We see you girls.

There's one brunette and she's either she's either the smart one or like the unattractive one, yeah, or.

Usually both or usually both. Yeah. Yeah, she's the villain. Maybe I don't sometimes something, yeah, a Redheads villain if you're the Brenda, for example, and then a two and oh you're you're you're the lead, but also kind of the villain.

Of the show. Before we get to today's nighttime soap Erica, we do have a couple of five star Apple podcast reviews. Shall I read?

Sure?

All right? So this is from Kathia eighty and they write love it. I've said it before, and I feel the need to say it again in such a stressful time. What are you talking about?

I don't know what you're talking about. I feel great. Yeah, nothing, nothing terrible is happening.

It is so fun to listen to the movie recaps and laugh along. I thoroughly enjoyed Drop Dead, Fred and Mermaids. Thank you for doing the Urbs. It's one of my favorites. Suggestion. One of my favorite lesser known and reviewed movies Welcome Home Roxy Carmichael.

Ooh, okay, this is at least the second review we've read that's done, that's requested. Welcome Home Roxy Car Michel is someone a writer joint? Yes, it is Jeff Daniels when on a writer. I saw it when I was a kid. I kind of remember liking this movie. I think I think we should do Welcome Home Rocks the Car Michael.

I wonder if I may have actually seen it. I'd like the vaguest memories.

I feel like it should have been a hit, but that that title hamstrung it. Sure like no one wanted to see it.

Well, as soon as you find out that Winona Ryder is not playing Roxy Carmichael, You're like, what the fuck are we doing?

Why? But what why do you lie to me? Shall I read our second review?

Please do?

Second review comes from thank you five.

Thank you five, Thank you five, Thank you theater kids.

The theater kid. This the theater kid. Love this show. I haven't left this hard in my car ever. Well, you've never committed vehicular homicide.

Remember Erica. Not everyone thinks that's hysterical.

It's hilarious of the time. This funny and informative show about pop culture hits and missus is amazing. Such a pick me up. I highly recommend the episode on Casper had me in tears. I kind of remember. There's a lot of splooge jokes.

There was a lot of splooge jokes. There was there was a perennial that age. Well favorite Kathy Moriarty scream speaking all of her lines.

To a poor Eric Idol.

Eric Idol, Yeah, I can't remember his lawyers that the characters name he was are lawyer liar.

Amazing?

All right, So, Kathia eighty, thank you five. Thank you so much for these reviews. If you would like aid that, hwell, topeag go ahead and contact us. I will send it off for you right away, Erica, what is our inaugural nighttime soap that we're kicking off January with?

We're kicking it off with a bang, y'all. Today, we're covering an episode of melrose Place.

So this was requested by Robin Don, Jan Miggey, Shannon Luis, Aurelian Camille, Kevin, Mike, William, Vanessa and Adam so. Melrose Place was a primetime soap and part of the Beverly Hills nine two one zero Expanded.

Universe created by Darren Stott.

I didn't know that there was a Beverly Hills nine two universe until extend Universe, until I started researching the show.

Oh yeah, wait a minute, aside, I guess because stuff span spun off from melrose Place, but nothing else. I'll ink nothing else spun off of nine two and oh did they? Or did California Dreams spin off from nine o two?

And oh?

California Dreams was another one in this era that had Jamie Walters in it, and I had such a crush and had that song how Do You Talk to an Angel? Which I could sing today to this day. Every lyric, every goddamn lyric, but I think that might have also been a spinoff of nine to two. And oh, don't quote me on that exit thing, but I do remember it's Grant Show. Is the connective tissue between this show and.

Because Kelly had a crush on Grant Show, Jake.

Yeah, I think they may have maybe dated, which would have been less than kosher given Kelly was underage. But whatever, moving on.

We didn't really worry about that this time. So Melrose Place aired from nineteen ninety two to nineteen ninety nine. We will be discussing season two, episode twenty eight, entitled the Bitches Back.

Okay, there were thirty one episodes in season two. They were banging this shit out yep like it was a fucking fact, Like it was a tears and slap factory.

Like tears and slap factory.

I cannot believe the amount of episodes that we used to watch on television. Yeah, if I watch a show that has more than six episodes, now, I'm like, oh, we get a whole eight episodes of this.

I know. Yeah, it's really more of a tears and slap and sex.

Factory, tears slaps and sex slap and tickle slap and Tickle and Tears Factory.

Okay, so this episode was written by Frank South. It stars Josie Bissett, Thomas Calabro, Doug Savant, Grant Show, Andrew Schue, Courtney Thorne Smith, Daphne's A Niga, Heather Locklear, Laura Layton, and Marsha Cross.

The Great Marshacross, Truly, Truly, the Great the Great marsh Across. Like so fucking goodness, we'll get to it.

Yeah.

Heather Tylo was originally cast in melrose Place, but was fired by producer Aaron Spelling prior to filming because she was pregnant.

Future Paul Here, listen, I'm here to say that that actress's name was Hunter Tylo, not Heather Tylo. That's on me. Read the whole thing. Didn't get that right. I don't know what to tell you. I was drunk. Hunter Tylo is that person's name.

Tylo suit Spelling for discrimination and one four point eight million work. The case was very important in establishing performers' rights to work while pregnant. I have to admit I've, prior to reading this, I've never heard of Heather Tylo.

She was a daytime soap actress. Apparently, and I think this was her big break and then it didn't happen.

Oh bummer, bummer, bummer. I do love when pregnant women are on TV shows and they just have them holding bags of groceries for a whole year. I know, we're standing behind a wall.

We're not writing this in, we're not doing that. I just thought that was really interesting because we're going to get into the show. The show is very silly.

Oh my god, so silly.

These nighttime soaps are kind of like groundbreaking lots of times in their ways, and it's kind of interesting.

This one, uh, which surprised me the most about Melrose Place, because I have not seen it in a long time, is how cheap it looks like it really. I mean, you can tell they're cranking out thirty one episodes at a time, and like the costumes are just whatever the fuck people had laying around, frankly, and the sets look like it looked like a high school production of a team. Like, it's just so cheap looking.

I was so surprised, totally, it like extremely unexpectedly cheap looking. And I don't even mean that as an insult, It just I wasn't expecting.

It I wasn't expected, and well I think too, because again TV has changed and so more money is being put into it, and it's the cheapest, cheapest show you watch now does not look as cheap as melrose Place, which, to be clear, was a humongous, giant hit. So it's not like it's not like they were doing this like as a cheap as a passion project.

It's cheap.

No money was being put into this.

All right, Erica. So melrose Place season two has an eighty percent critical rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

That's so that's surprising, Paul.

It is.

That's very surprising.

It is because you know, we still have nighttime soaps now, we do like like they still have like it. I mean, I don't think they've had a really big hit in a while, but like I think of like Revenge.

Oh I loved Revenge.

Like the first season of Revenge was so fun, and yeah, that show.

Got bonkers raise anatomy. Like the whole Shonda universe. Those are all night time soaps and they're exceless scandal.

Yeah, they're fantastic and as bonkers as they got. Nothing like this. This is truly like a step between those Shonda shows and like Days of Our Lives, like you.

Can see bonkers.

It's insane what happens in this episode, you guys. I'm fine with the eighty percent critical rating. I don't think it holds up now, but I can understand that. I don't think it looked cheap in the eighties. I don't think anyone would like it, or in the nineties. I mean, I don't think it would have. People would not have looked at it and been like, that's not what TV looks like.

You know, Yes, I so I was recently watching just like an episode of My so called life randomly, and like that looked better than this show. Like that looks cinematic.

But they only did sixteen episodes, to be clear, to.

Be clear, they had Yeah, they use their money more wisely. It's just shocking like this. There's just such an old timiness to the way this is filmed. It's filmed like a regular soap opera. I think that's what it is. So it's got like regular soap opera, like running on the Fly. It's cheap. It's like they're doing this really quick. They're putting upsets and taking them down really fast.

Like I was just surprisedes all like totally all right, Erica, when did you first see Melrose Place?

I watched it from the beginning, poll, I didn't stick with it. I like a knife time soap, but I bail very early on. I've never completed a knife time soap. Okay, I've never ever completed I've watched the first two seasons of Everything, of This, of Nanta to Andero, of Revenge, of Gossip Girl, of the oc of Grey's Anatomy, Like I will watch the first two seasons of anything, and in the minute it starts to like there's a tipping point where it's like, Okay, I have to bail now because the last.

Passing underneath the show is that a shark? Okay out the.

Last one I remember watching that. I was like, I really had high hopes for it. I was like, I'm going to watch the shit out of this. I'm going to watch this to the end. And I bailed literally after two seasons. Was Riverdale? Okay, that's the last one I could remember watching. Okay, how about.

You, I've never seen melrose Place.

That was your first episode ever of melrose.

First episode Holy Shure of mel I was absolutely not have been allowed to watch this in nineteen ninety two.

Absolutely in the first season, Michael's a nice guy, and then they just decided, I guess the actor was like, can you do something fun with me because I'm so boring on this show? And they're like, done, done?

What was that you said?

Great, we're turning you into the worst person. The first season of Melrose Place, Michael and Josie Bissett are married and they just are just like the boring couple. Yeah in the show.

Yeah, So I was watching this. I did a lot of research while doing it, trying to understand, like these relationships and all of the insanity that has gone on in the in the fifty episode that these characters have existed on this on this television show. I enjoyed it as like an insane forty five minutes. It's really very, very entertaining. The acting is there's one person I know we agree on, one person, who Marshacross, who.

Is unimpeachable so fucking good.

I'm like, maybe she should have an oscar, Like I'm not like if she's making this seem so real, natural and natural and no one else and like some of the some of the actors really have very little to do in this episode, so I don't feel.

Qualified to like Daphne's Nigga has nothing to do.

Yeah, I'm like she might. She also maybe is an incredible actress. I can't tell based on this because she has two scenes and she's just tasked to like look concerned.

Josie Bassett has like one scene.

Yeah, but like Marcia Cross makes this shit work.

She's so good. You're absolutely right. Actually, her career should have taken like a turn at some point, Like I know she she was like the queen of nighttime soaps for a while, but like she is, she really should have like jumped into movies one point and come yeah yeah, and had like a more The word I want to say is dignified. That's not fair, It's not fair. But a more dignified career is what I want to say. And you know what, I can't think of a better way to say it.

Right now. It's early, y'all, it's the morning. Uh okay, Erica. The tagline from melrose Place was lying, cheating, stealing, seduction, betrayal, jealousy, greed, murder, It's just another day at melrose Place.

No. The saurus Thesaurus the saurus, seduction, betrayal, murder, It's just another day at Melrose Place. Boom, you get three, you get three, you have to pick three. You cannot you cannot be redundant.

Can I's a question since you've seen the show. I thought melrose Place was the street. Is melrose Place actually the name of their.

Apartment apartment complex they all live in.

Oh they live at Melrose Place?

Yeah?

Oh interesting?

Yeah, yeah, I guess it's on Melrose I've never really thought about it, but yeah, it's so when they're they actually will be like, I'm going back to Melrose Place like blah blah blah.

Yeah. Do you want to read the iTunes synopsis for the Bitch Is Back?

Sure?

I'm a bitch. I'm a bitch. I'm a bitch, and I'm back.

Michael is astonished when Kimberly pays him a late night visit. She reveals that she was in a coma for months and that her mother claimed she had died to keep Michael away from her. A lot of other stuff happens, Yeah, none of it matters the.

Fact that this actually does ruin. Like the beginning of this episode, when I tell you this happens in the first ten minutes in this episode. Yeah, and you have another thirty to go. Yeah, we are climbing up a hill. Erica, do you have an actual synopsis for this episode of melrose Place?

That guy?

Oh? Yeah, ah yeah, him, him.

We're doing all this for him, for him. That guy.

This one, we're.

Lying, cheating, murdering, betraying for that guy.

This guy. Okay, okay, okay, no judgment, I mean a little Judgment's fine.

He's fine, but he's fine looking, I guess. But that guy, that guy, Okay, the amount of ass this man gets on this show. He gets more asked than like Grant show does I think? And I'm like, but I don't understand. He gets way more asked. Andrews Shoe, who's legit hot?

All right, everyone, so stick around. We're gonna play some commercials. If don't want to hear commercials, you can go to our Patreon, Patreon dot com, slash do age Weel podcast. You sign up for any paid tier and you get ad free episodes. If you don't want to do that, that's cool too. You can just sit down here, listen to a couple of commercials, and then we will come back and we will take you through season two, episode twenty eight of melrose Place, entitled the Bitch Is It Back?

And We're Back.

We open with a ninety second opening credit sequence.

They had a lot of real estate back in the day, so much real estate they had thirty one episodes to write one season alone.

Like Jesus, there's I mean, someone is absolutely wailing on the saxophone. We eventually get to melrose Place. We pan up to the door. There's a very kind of sad looking pool in the courtyard at Melrose Place.

Okay, that's the other thing when I remember watching this the first time and that it seems so sexy. There was like a pool in the courtyard and they could watch each other swim, and like it was. I can't tell you enough how sad this set looks down, how depressing. Also like like some of these people make a good amount of money, and I'm like, you could do better than this place. Yeah, you could definitely live in a better part of la if you wanted to.

One hundred percent. We go into the apartment of the affiance to Billy Campbell played by Andrew Shoe incredibly like nineties hot. It's like that long face.

I kind him very attractive.

Yeah, I'm knowing.

Get it to Andrew Shoe Yeah. Yeah.

And Alison Parker played by Courtney thorn Smith. It is morning. Bill is still in bed. Alison brushes her hair in the bathroom mirror and a thought occurs to her. She heads back into bed and she crawls up next to Billy. She kisses him on the shoulder. She wakes him up and she initiates a bone sash and he says that he thought she wanted to wait until they're married. Now before we even get going. I want everyone to understand,

Married, just to make it fun on the wedding night, make it special.

And I'm not sorry if you did it and you're offended, Like, look.

If you need to, if you need to hold off for six months to make it quote unquote special, you're not thinking outside the box.

That's right.

There are other things you can do to make it special and different on your wedding night if you want to. I don't be gross. I know what you're all thinking of talking about, and I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about another thing.

I am talking about very calmly. If we're not going to have sex before marriage, let's sit in these two armchairs across room for each other and absolutely go to town on ourselves while we're watching.

Oh that is romantic. That's so sweet. I'm picturing like, I know you don't like sexophone of fireplaces, but how do you feel about masturbating in front of a fireplace.

I'm more okay with that because it's only one person's body heat.

I feel like that. I feel like there's they're sitting in like leather settee is next to a fireplace masturbating. Yeah, mutually masturbating.

Hopefully with a towel down, just we don't want to ruin the leather. Yeah, you know sweet, So.

That's not what I was thinking of. But i you know what. I like that that's where your mind went. Can we talk for a quick second about those the opening credit sequence?

Oh please?

And how unbelieved it is a a fondue pot of velvet to chase the cheesiest fucking thing.

I think you're calling it a cheese product, just to be.

Clear, But she's a pr product. It is it is. It is a heartbreaking ninety seconds of actors like doing a random activity like catching a frisbee and then turning to a camera and smiling.

I feel like it's literally what the Saturday Live credits are making fun of.

It is so hard to watch, It is so embarrassing to watch.

All Right, So Billy says, I thought you want to wait until we're married, And she says, the nightmares have stopped. Erica, you watch the show. Do you remember what Allison's nightmares are about?

Is this the building exploding? I remember the building buildings later, the building explode. Okay, so that hasn't happened yet.

No, Okay, this is these nightmares are about. It's seating a plot that will ultimately stop Billy and Allison's wedding before it can happen, which is that Allison was sexually molested by her father growing up, and she starts having nightmares about it and remembers it on her wedding day when her father hugs her.

Oh no, that's intense.

That's too much.

That's a lot.

That's a lot evil twins murder, No problem, that shit is too real.

It's too real. Yeah, oh weird. Okay, that seeds a lot of what's happening in this episode with her with that, like her wedding planner being like, your dad wants you to have the best wedding ever.

So Alison is tired of dwelling in the past, even though at this point she doesn't know that what that passage she's dwelling it is. And they bone down.

Okay, cool question. They live right in front of that pool. Does their house smell like chlorine? They must all those ground floor apartments just reek of chlorine.

Or possibly urine, depending on who's been in the pool most recently.

I feel like these people don't urinate in the pool. These people haven't had anything to eat or drink in days.

Grant show only urinates.

Doug Savant because he will never get a love interest. Is the only one who eats on this show. Ever, we cut to a beach house in La because Michael lived in melrose Place but also owns a Malibu beach house. Why do you live in melrose Place?

How much money do you have?

You have money, just live in your Malibu beach house. We cut to the beach house where married couple married. At this point, doctor Michael Mancini, Thomas Collaboro just pulling like you would not believe on the show, kicking ass. Well done, Thomas Collabroo. The poor man's Michael. Imperially, it's true everyone's but he like like he turns his face a certain way, and I'm like, Christopher, is that you?

We are pictured, by the way, the picture you're painting is like this beautiful like beach house. It's really not like attractive, like it's the beach is it's kind of a gray day and there's like La sprawl is very visible in the background. Like it's not a beautiful picturesque beach house.

I don't know. I think I think it's just nineties attractive. It's the best they could do. It's beg It's so funny because there are no fewer than like three beach scenes in this episode, and they clearly just got a shitty week where it just was like gray and overcast all week. There's I'm just gonna spoil it now. There's a scene later where there's this photographer taking photos and you a photo shoot on the beach and someone's like, we're losing the light and I'm like, there is no light. No,

For good? What the hook business like?

It's the most casual fucking thing in the world to say I think we can get out of the hooker business for good, this time to.

Her husband, who does not react at all.

I actually say that's quite progressive for him to be like, girl, do you do you stay in the hooker business? Don't stay in the hooker business. I'm good either way. I actually was like, really impressed with that.

Less impressive when you remember the backstory of this marriage, which I will fill you in on in Justice.

I did not remember, and I was like, okay, so I remember sort of these two being married. Okay, I guess this is happening. So she's like, I want to get out of the hooker business and just be your wife, which sounds regressive, but honestly, I would rather just be a rich guy's wife than fuck a bunch of random's. So yeah, well done for you. Sydney. Michael is thrilled. He's he wants that little trad wife he's always dreamed of.

What a dream, What a dream?

And he hugs her and kisses her. She says, I'm gonna just do one more party tonight, and that's it.

The number of scenes they don't show in this episode. This is check off hooker party.

It does not come.

It does we do not orgasm, It does not throw down the tarp.

We never see it.

It doesn't deliver the fifty gallon drum of lube.

To the point where I was like, is she a madam? Like it seems so nonplussed, Like so he's She's like, I'll just have one more party at a hotel tonight, and then that's it. He's like, cool, excellent, wonderful love that for everyone in this room. What is happening?

What a great beach day, What a.

Great beach day we're having. And then they both throw their mugs on the beach and make out, like what the fuck is happening? So they're kissing, and the camera swirls around them and a piano softly plays in the background, and then a figure catches Michael's eye, a tall woman on the on the deck of their house. Yes, in the distance, a portentous note sounds in the soundtrack, and the figure is walking out onto the front porch in a satin negligee. Yep, he blinks and she's gone. It's a ghost.

A ghost.

It would have been more It would have actually made more sense if this was a ghost. Ghost makes sense. What happens makes less sense than that.

This figure has the powers of Michael Myers from Halloween, in the sense that this person can teleport.

Can just fucking disappear at will.

Yeah, okay, So let me give you the backstory on this marriage.

I don't want any honestly, I'm good. I'm good. The audience probably needs something.

But let me tell you something you want it. So the show. When the show started, as you said, Michael was married to Jane. That's Josie Bissett. Will meet her later. During the course of the first season, he has an affair with doctor Kimberly Shaw we will also meet her later. Breaks up his marriage. He gets engaged to Kimberly. He's drunk driving one night, gets into a car accident. Kimberly dies.

So did he have an affair with Sidney also while he was married to Jane? Oh? I remember it wrong. I remembered him having an affair with Sydney while he was like while she was living with them.

I believe that had a very contentious relationship. There was a lot of sexual tension.

Got it okay?

All right? So okay, So she blackmails him into marrying her. Throughout their whole courtship. It's very it's very difficult. Right. They go on their honeymoon camping trip where I believe he tries to kill her twice.

But it just doesn't take.

It just doesn't take.

You know what, He's used to saving lives, not taking them. He doesn't know what he's doing.

He's apparently, from what I read, about to push her off a cliff when he realizes that he actually loves her tool And that happened two episodes ago. They have not had a long and happy marriage. In case anyone's wondering.

This is the happiest these two ever have been or ever will be again. Yep, she shouldn't get out of that hooker business. So fast, Not so fast, Not so fast girl.

All right. So we cut to Michael at the hospital and his friend and coworker Matt Fielding played by Doug Savant.

Another resident of Melrose playing Ye the.

Gay one, so the one who will have nothing to do in this episode.

Yeah, I remember an old SNL sketch where they made fun of him. Yeah, well we were making fun of mel Respis was when Heather Lockley was on on SNL. And I can't remember who plays this character. I think it's David's paid. He just like walks out and goes and I'm the gay one and then just leaves you.

So Michael is rattled, and he says he's seeing Kimberly everywhere. So this figure that he saw on the porch he's identifying as Kimberly, his fiancee who died in the drunk driving accident of which he was guilty. He's worried. He's cracking up. He wonders if Kimberly could still be alive. But Matta shreson, he's just tired. After all. Michael and Sidney had a quote unquote fairly exhausting courtship, which I've

Attempts and so much blackmail, so much blackmail. I love how he's like, I think I'm seeing ghosts, and the other for the friends, like it's just stress. Yeah, that's what he's not. Yes, ending I'm guess hand you. By the way, if you were like, I'm seeing ghosts, I'd be like, tell me every thing. Yeah, I mean I would think you were crazy.

Don't.

Don't get me wrong, I would think you were an idiot. But I would yes, and a shit out of that.

You would report me to my husband behind my back like a real friend.

Like a real friend, I wouldn't to your face be like, you are stressed out. You need to you need to take some clonapin and chill.

You would be like, tell me who the ghost is, what's their backstory? Why have they not left this plane?

How naked are they? Meanwhile in crossover land, because we are. It's only the second season in Melrose's Place, and already Aaron Spelling's like, I got a third show. I got a third show, cooking another hit. It's called Models Inc.

It was not a hit.

It was not a hit. Hang on, guys, I gotta look something up.

It's not trying to catch your phone.

Okay, we're back, Paul, and I looked something up. I was wrong. California Dreams is not the name of the show I was thinking of. It was The Heights. And it was not a spinoff of nine O two one zero. Jamie Walters was just in both shows, and can you believe it? He just didn't have the range for me to remember that it was two different characters completely. So Models In is the only spin off of Melrose Place. Yes,

And we're back, and we're back.

So okay. Photographer Joe Reynolds, played by Daphne Zunega aka Princess Vespa from Spaceballs, sets up a shoot with Sarah, a model from the.

Model Zing.

Here's where we're setting up our third TV show. Joe gets Sarah and the other models into these I mean, like gross, Laura Ashley, like the nineties were sexless.

We have come down really hard on Beige on this podcast in the nineties, but if these are the colors the nineties has to offer.

Bea up, baby, go back to beaje, bea up.

This is off. The front of this woman's dress looks like a lace apron.

It's a pastel lavender.

Like compound wife dress.

Chloral, Yeah, it's the I mean, this is a gorgeous woman, gorgeous, and they are making her look so depressing, like she's about to churn some butter. That's what she's here for.

She is. She is an actress who is so gorgeous that she was cast as the lead in a TV show about.

Models, models in This is the lead of Models, Inc.

That's how good looking this woman is.

So okay, So Sarah is just dressing in these nasty asque like potato sacks that they're putting her in. But she shines. She's got it. She's a star. Unfortunately, who should appear midshoot. But Amanda Woodward Heather Locklear.

Walking on the beach in a pair of pumps. I'm like, how are you even doing that?

How are you doing that? She does it so well you would not even know. You have not even noticed. She is stomping on those heels. Look, she's not the greatest actress ever, But fucking Heather Locklear is a star, is just a star. She angrily informs Joe that D and D, the advertising agency that she and Courtney Thorne Smith work at, would never never use Models Inc. To cast their shootes. This is the last time I let you cast a shoot by yourself, Joe. You ignorant sluts,

This is Los Angeles, there's it's famously sprawling.

You kids, many nooks and crannies from which to hide from your colleagues. Don't live in the same apartment complex. Yeah, I think these who even dated the same guy. I think Grant Show was with Joe for a minute, or he was with Heather Locklear. So She's like, we never use Models Inc. You have to fire that girl. And then Joe's like, but she's wonderful, she's got it, she's a star. Why should I fire her? Doesn't make any sense.

Out, get out.

And then the girl's like but why, and she's like, you went to the wrong agency.

How just how it works.

That's how everything works. That's how modeling works, that's how TV works. This is how beaches work. Yep.

After a long day of work, Billy returns home to find Allison on the phone with her wealthy parents, who, it turns out good news, want to help them pay for their upcoming wedding. Unfortunately, Allison's parents are not in La so instead they've hired a quote unquote Beverly Hill's wedding planner to take care of everything.

Oh what a dream, What a dream?

Alison asks Billy if that would be okay, After all, the bride's family is supposed to pay, and Billy says all right. And then rather than eating their clams and cream sauce, well, is that what she's making? Or clams in the linguinilauce.

Or something not look good? It's so funny because she's Cordy Thorne Smith has clearly never cooked anything in her entire life. She's just like poking at it with a spoon, and Billy comes in and he's like, smells amazing, and I'm like, she did not cook that, Billy, she did not cook. She poured that from a can into the pan and was inserted poking.

At a spoon. They make out on the kitchen counter.

What does Billy do for a living? Do you know? I don't know either.

I just imagining that my feeling it's could be one of those business business business, business business.

Because there's something so unserious about Andrew Shoe that I just cannot imagine him in an office setting.

He seems like an eighteen year old.

She's also a frat boy at all times, like a very nice frat boy, to be clear. He seems like a like a lovely person like the character I don't even know. I don't know anything about Andrew's you but super into soccer.

But he was he was the husband of the woman who had on Morning TV, who had that affair. He was that he was the husband who got left. Amy was married to Andrew Shoe and then had an affair with her.

Coworker scanniness scandero. I know he he left acting to get into like major league soccer because he's as like a manager or something, because he's he was going to be a soccer player, but then decided it the last minute when he was a teenager to turn to acting. And then I guess he was like, oops, I would have actually been a much better soccer player than.

My sister is much better at this than me.

Yeah, so now he went back to soccer. That's all I know about him. That's actually a lot more than I would have thought when I started talking that. When I started that sentence, I was like, I don't know anything about Andrew Shoe except his blood type, his social Security number, where he lives, what his ex wife is doing, where.

That mole on his body is.

Check that out, clearly, I know, Like that all came from the back of my brain. There are other more salient facts that I have forgotten.

That's where algebra's supposed to be.

That's where like my social Security number is, and instead it's like, oh, were you looking for this? All I have here is Andrew Sho's life that night while Sydney is off doing quote unquote hooker stuff. Don't worry about it.

You guys, don't worry about it.

At her party, I cannot stress enough how little the show gives a shit that she is a prostitute. It is absolutely excellent that the show could not care less. Michael lies in bed reading and then thunder crashes. He here's the door open and close. He goes Sydney, Sidney. He is in Janeare. He is just like this actor is like I am in my gothic era. This is what I'm doing. He is fully acting like he is in Janeare. He walks slowly in the pitch dark living room.

The party was a real flopping.

The party was a real bummer man lightning crashes, illuminating the figure of his presumed dead ex fiance, doctor Kimberly Shaw, played by the luminous and Amazing and too good for this world Marcia Cross.

Uh huh.

He turns on the lights and Kimberly in tones, nice to see you. Again, Michael, She's alive.

He's alive. I want I want everyone to know that this show is so confident in itself. This is not a commercial break. They don't like see her editing cut to commercial. They just keep going. That is incredible. So Michael pretty wildly underreacts to someone he thought was dead appearing in his living room. He doesn't scream shit, holy shit, none of that.

Does it throw something at her to see if it falls goes through her. That's what the first thing I would do if it was a ghost of someone I loved, like my mother or something, I'd be like, I'd just throw something at the torso to see if it went through.

He asks, is it really you? And Kimberly asks, do you want to touch me to see if I'm real? She walks towards him, and she holds up her hands and they clasp hands. She tells him that she was in a coma for months and that her mother reported her dead because she was trying to protect Kimberly from Michael.

Marsha Cross is so fucking just so good. She says this insane nonsense and it works. She just makes it work, and I can't. Paul was doing the gesture. I cannot tell you, guys enough, how fucking weird. She holds up her hands like two high fives, and Michael like they do that thing where they're they caress high fives for a moment.

They hop palm each other.

They hop on each other's palms and then like lays their hands together. But they're both like like doing the thriller dance at each other. And they were just standing there while Marsha cross dead eyes. Look this man looks this man in the face and is like I was in a coma for four months and my mother kept me hidden from you, even though you are a doctor, and like presumably no people in the medical profession who can tell you whether or not I am dead. We

It's true.

I know a lot of people think I am because I'm so smart and I'm so good at doctor stuff. It's like her being good with hook her stuff. I'm really good at doctor stuff. I'm gonna quit the doctor stuff actually to do this podcasting thing, full.

Full time, full time. It pays better, all right. So Michael says if he had known, he would have been there for her, and Kimberly tells him, it's all right. I'm fine. Good news.

They're still clasping hands, you guys, it's so weird.

Lightning crashes. And he says he's sorry for his mistakes, and she kisses him, and she shows him her engagement ring and says, I still have this, and that means I still have you.

Him that guy. You came back from the dead for that guy.

This seems like an easy exit strategy, are you Frankly.

This is an amazing way to just like moon walk out of his legs and find someone better.

No picture her doing the Drew Barrymore thing. Charlie's angels and he says he has to tell her something, but she brings her hand to her head as if she's in pain, and she says, not now, I have to go. Like she came back to her, she came back from the dead, but she is booked and busy.

Also she's like she's like hold clutching her head like ouch, and both doctors. I cannot stress enough how both of these people are doctors, and he's not, like, what's going on with your head? Do I need to examine your head that you're clutching?

Came in for three minutes and it's like I have to go know where is she going.

At eleven pm? How does she get into the house? Do they not lock their door? Where is in Los Angeles? I've always heard that at Los Angeles it was kind of a dodgy place. You might want to lock your doors.

So he protests, but she says that she has a big day at the hospital tomorrow. What now you might think that she has to go to the hospital to be tree.

Surgery for follow up, for some kind of therapy for these jolting head gnes. She's having.

No it's Kimberly's first day back at work tomorrow.

They're colleagues. If a colleague of mine died in a car accident and then showed up four months later and got rehired, and turns out they weren't dead, they were in a coma and their mother lied to everyone about it to keep them away from my job, and then people at my job saw them, there would be confirmation. How does Michael not know any of this? There is no one at the hospital talk to Michael. Is Michael the ghost?

Maybe Michael's a ghost.

Michael's a ghost, and only Dougs a man can see him.

That's it, that makes sense. So she says she has a big day at the hospital tomorrow, she'll see him there. And she turns around and she's like high heels and it is a downpour thunder outside. She has a trench coat just you know how they just drape them over your shoulders, so it's not like attached in any way. And she starts walking towards a glass door, like leaning out onto the porch.

She thinks she was gonna go through the door. One hundred thought she was gonna walk through. I knew she was, because I knew she was not a ghost, but like I still didn't. I couldn't help it. I was like, she's gonna walk through that door. She's gonna walk through the door.

So it cuts away before she can get to the before she can get to the door, and we just see Michael's face and the lightning and thunder crashes again as he watches her walk away. At no point is he like, but I have.

Questions, Wait, you're going back to work. Are you, okay, do you have the cognitive skills to doctor people? The next morning, Sydney kisses Michael awake. How Michael fell asleep after that? I don't know. I don't know. Not enough volume in the world. Nope, Michael is still overcome from the events of the prior evening. Sydney is trying to have a little, a little afternoon delight but in the morning, and Michael's like, wait, wait, what's the word morning glory?

Not now, Not now, Sydney, I could not get hard if my ex ex fiancee, I mean no, my ex fiancee did not walk in.

Here, not walking here last night. How was your sex stuff last night? How was your hooker stuff? Did the hooker stuff go well?

How many men did you sleep with last night? Tell me graphically, in detail, tell me everything.

About the hooker stuff you did last night. And he's like, I gotta go to work, and he gets out of bed, and Sydney looks upset. The amount of upset she looks is so ridiculous. Given like, yeah, you woke him up from a dead sleep. He is canonically a doctor. Yeah, Like he has to go to work and he's like, I gotta go to work, and she's like, he didn't want to fuck me. What happened? What's going on? Is it is dead ex fiancee.

Also, if she's not a madam, how much sex did she have last night that she wants to have sex again?

You know what, she's a workaholic, Paul. She brings it home, she brings out. She's not one of those. She's not a work life balanced type. That's why she has to quit it all together. Cold turkey on the hooker staff. Michael's about to get more sex than he could possibly handle. We cut to D and D, which is an advertising agency in this universe and not Dungeons and Dragons.

I wish it was both.

I wish it was both. That is how that is how little like Aaron Spelling knows about anything in the world other than soap operas. He named something D and D and had no idea that he was accidentally name means it's something D and D. Amanda is called into a meeting with her boss, who is wearing an unforgivably ugly tie I would have taken I could, I would not have been able to meet with that person until I took a pair of scissors and just cut the tie off at the neck and be like, you can't

This is a personal boundary.

She gets chewed out for her vendetta against Models Inc. Turns out it's not company policy, it's Amanda Woodward policy. He tells her that she has to apologize to the Models Inc. Own or not just apologize. I want you to grovel because you have cost us potentially the ability to work with this up and coming, super strong agency forever.

So at the hospital, Kimberly and Michael meet at the lockers as they get ready for their day. Look, not everyone at the hospital knew Kimberly was back. How is she just walking through the halls of the hospital and like the nurses.

Aren't like, oh my god, she's alive.

Michael tells her that he got married to Sydney, and he's even honest about why. He says she she blackmailed me into it. Doesn't tell her why how she blackmailed him into it, but does tell her she blackmailed me. Kimberly slams the locker door and tells him it doesn't matter why, You'll just have to get rid of her, and she kisses him and smiles.

Him him that guy, mars Cross.

I'm so sorry. I know you're not in your greatest mind right now, but have you seen you?

You're gonna fight another girl for that guy? Yeah, just let her have him? Yeah, that guy? All right. We cut to Billy and Allison. They're so boring and they're meeting their wedding planner, Sheila, played by Susan Lee.

Hoffman, who almost single handedly rescues this entire plot line. Almost This is a fantastic performance.

Look, I don't mean to be mean, but I'm about to be so mean. Yeah, Courtney Thorn Smith and Andrew Schue are a black hole of charisma. Mean does that mean?

I mean? It wasn't nice?

Needs to have You have to pair these two people with better, more charismatic actors. You cannot put these two together as a couple on this show. It does not work. They are they are so boring together. They have absolutely no chemistry between the true of them, and like they're they're terrible they're just terrible together.

I was, having not watched other episodes of this show. I had the same reaction of view as being like this, these two are quite boring.

These like the long like star cross lovers of the show. Yeah, they meet in the first episode and they're like the they're the people that we're supposed to be like so thrilled when they get together at the end, and think these actors are They're not good. They're not good actors and they cannot make this work.

I was just I was presuming that, Like I'm like, this is a bad episode for them because they're like they're not having any of the fun crazy stuff. Like they are a little boring in this episode, somewhat on purpose because they're bouncing off this great wedding planner performance and like there's plenty going on and the other storylines.

So chackle of charisma. Okay, both of these actors look maybe another episode, I'm just remembering it wrong. But I just they're so boring. So Sheila the wedding planner is overbearing. She shows no actual interest in what Billy and Allison wants. She's she keeps saying, we have two days. I've never been married, Paul, you have, Yeah, let's let's discuss wedding

They're at this restaurant and it's it's the restaurant. She's chosen to do the food and she's like, well, what do you think of the food here? And she's like, you must like it, Michael, and he goes, yeah, it was good.

Meaty, meaty, meaty. There.

Really, what a compliment.

The writers don't like this. This these actors, they're just not giving them. Doug's event has two seconds in the show, and he makes them sing like Doug spant however that's his name, is pronounced like. He's really funny, Like you. You are the other comedic relief on this in this episode. You've got to be funnier than this. You totally step it up.

So Michael heads home in the middle of the day because doctors don't need to be at the hospital all the time when they're working.

Doctoring is notoriously an easy job.

Yep, he finds Sidney eating lunch at the kitchen counter. She has a buffet.

Shot an enormous like like punch bowl full of tuna salad. It's like, what is happening?

You're making it for one open one can of tuna?

Why did you put four cans of tuna into this fucking bowl?

Michael? Now, I can't stress enough. Before this, like Michael and Sidney seemed happy on the beach, and then he.

Saw Kimberly excited. Yeah, she's gonna make his dreams come true.

He's gonna be just a doctor's wife who's there to take care of him Kimberly. Appea, He's taken aback by Kimberly's appearance. He doesn't. I mean, he's happy that she's not dead, but he's not like fully on board. He's confused, understandably, so he comes in and he breaks up with Sidney with glee.

The cruelest fucking thing he can way he can.

He tells her to get out of his house, and Sydney tries to protest. She even brings up you know I can make things go bad for you. Remember how we got together in the first place. I blackmailed you into marrying me and he's unmoved. He tells her to pack her bags and she loses it. She yells, he's going to prison where he's going to be the wife. How do you like that?

Okay, look, the joke doesn't age well. Yeah, but this actress really nails it. She nails it.

Michael smirks, he's unconcerned, and Sydney grabs her person storms out of the beach house.

He's skipping. He is so happy, Yeah, to break up with this woman that he was madly in love with twenty four hours ago.

Yep.

We cut back to billionaire Sheila to the home of their fashion designer friend Jane Josie Bissett, who's another full character on this show. Don't worry about it. She's making Allison's really truly hideous wedding dress.

So I was okay, I was like, this looks really ugly, and then I was.

Like, it's nineties ugly, and you look at what Josie Bissett is wearing and you're like, oh, I see, I get it.

But I looked up the actual wedding episode because I was like, because they have this big bow that's just sitting on the on the top of the neck of the dress form. I'm like, is that supposed to go in her hair? It's not. It goes on her ass, which is somewhat better. But I only saw the top of the dress. It wasn't hideous. It was like it was like a rhinestone bustier. Not my taste, but not like not like the toilet paper roll dress from Golden Girls, right, Like.

That's truly the pinnacle of bad wedding dresses.

That's the pinnacle of bed everything.

So okay, So this didn't have like epaulets. I swear to god I saw epilet.

I'm not certain it's actually the same dress.

Okay, that makes a lot a lot of sense. That makes a lot of sense, got it? Okay, So Sheila compliments Jane on her work. Jane's like thrilled. I'm so happy to make the dress to these two people that I love and live twenty feet away from.

And it's also like, potentially, Jane is a fashion designer and it's potentially a really good connection for her if this wedding planner is someone who might like refer clients to her in the future.

As soon as it go outside, Sheila's like, yuck, right, that dress? Am I right? You guys? That was gross And she says to Alison the line you said your dress was white, that was practically eggshell?

Are you are? Actress is leaning in so much and it's so good.

She has her five minutes Paul, Yeah, and she has her one seat more one episode star from this she got to do in nineteen ninety three. Allison's like, I like the dress. I picked out that dress. I'd helped her design it. And she's like, oh, okay, then well, if she's your friend and you want to use it, that's fine. But then she bulldozes them about tuxes. She's like, Billy, meet me at ARMANI tomorrow. I'm sharp and he's like, oh, but I don't want to wear them. She's like, you

We cut to d and d Amanda is pacing nervously waiting to be called into the meeting with models. Inc. Okay, so this is this is just a dumb staging thing. But like she's pacing outside of this one office, there's a guy in the office that like stands up. He's like he's like in a cubicle, he's facing a wall.

Whatever, You're right, that makes no sense. Why why did they do that?

So we cut to the Model's Inc. Meeting where Hillary Michael's played by Linda Gray, the Dallas alum, who is excellent.

I have to say I saw her name pop up in the credits at the beginning of the episode, and I was, like, Linda Gray is in this episode of Meloe's plays.

Yeah. Yeah. First of all, let me tell let's start here. I love a business meeting where the most important person is sitting on the conference table, fully facing away from everybody.

Else's the vill tearing out the window.

And just dictating what's going on exactly how all business meetings have ever been happened? Anyway, Hillary is refusing any apologies. She's insisting that she wants the person responsible, and Amanda enters and the two women meet eyes and Hillary is surprised and she says Amanda, and Amanda says, hello, mother, done dun dum.

This is a commercial break, right, let's get a commercial break. That's a good that's a good commercial break. We cut to after the meeting as Amanda and Hillary leave the Dungeons and Dragon offices.

They've defeated they've defeated the the Orc King, and they're headed back to the Keep.

They've defeated the Demi Gorgon. Hillary tries to make small talk, but Amanda is not interested. She says she may have to do business with her mother, but she wants no further relationship, not after Hillary left Amanda and her father years ago. Hillary protests, you don't know the whole story. Does anyone ever know any of the whole stories? But you don't know the whole story. What's the whole story? I left? Oh? You know what? You did know those that was it?

You know what?

I thought there was more story, but as I said it out loud, I left. Yeah, No, that was the whole story. You gotta telled it. I didn't want to be a mom. You were a terrible kid. Yeah, glad, I said that aloud. Amanda's like, I don't want to hear your whole story, and she cuts her off and leaves.

I wouldn't have left, but I actually really disliked you. You were the problem. We cut that.

Okay, okay, excited, I'm so excited to talk about this scene.

We cut back to the hospital. The setting for this scene is deranged, so we cut back the hospital. Standing in a line are doctor Michael Mancini, then Sidney, his soon to be.

Ex wife, he's a strange ext wife.

Then Matt Fielding Gay the gay. They're standing in line in like an examining room in the hospital. The door is wide open. Also in the room is a police detective just.

Our hands on hips being all detectivey.

He's interrogating Michael about accusations made by Sidney. This is exactly where police usually choose to discuss potential vehicular homicides.

Ha.

So Michael says that Sydney is crazy. He doesn't even know what she's talking about, and she's like, no, like I have proof, my sister will will testify, blah blah, and on cue Kimberly enters. She says Hi, they're sid and Sidney faints and then Kimberly dead pans. Finally, the reaction I've been looking for.

Amazing, amazing.

The reason Matt is in this scene is to catch Sydney when she faints.

His reaction shot is very good. Is very very good.

I mean, they paid Doug Savant for this episode, so they might as well have him come in for the sea.

Yeah. Look, if you have a comedic like assassin on your hands, like Doug Savant, you're using him basically Michael's then like, uh, there can't be a murder if there's no murder victim. Dun, dun, dun. We cut to Hillary knocking on Amanda's apartment door. Here's the problem with soap operas, too, is it like there's five plots in this episode and only one of them do I give a shit about? Yeah, And so every time they cut away and I look, this is Linda Gray that like, I'm all in on

Well, because everything else is cresting, right This is it's peaking. This storyline is peaking right now, everything else is building. So there's another I'm sure next episode it's gonna be Daphne's Aniga figuring out that model has been abused, and we're gonna a lot of drama that.

I mean, it has to be like a Linda Gray Heather Lockleyer food fight right at some point, like in a fancy restaurant somewhere like that has to have happened, So I get it. But that is my problem with soap operas, where I'm just like, just stick to the thing that's really interesting, you guys. Hillary knocks in Amanda's door. Amanda isn't there, but the door is answered by her boyfriend, Jake Hansen played by.

Grant Show, another person on the show.

Like legitimately thirty five minutes into this episode and he finally shows up. Yeah, Jake invites Hillary in, despite having at least some idea of the state of her relationship with Amanda. He's like, Oh, you're her a strange mother that she hates. Yeah, do you want to come in? To be clear, he does not live there. He is like making dinner for Amanda before Amanda gets home from work, because I.

Get marinating steaks because he's a man. That's all you can do.

Because apparently Jake doesn't have a job. I don't know what Jake does.

Here's the secret, kids. If you can marinate steaks, you can marinate literally anything else.

Wait, hang on to write this one down. What can you marinate chicken?

Yeah? Huh?

Can you marinate salmon? Can you marinate donkey? Could you marinate vegetables?

Yeah?

Hang on, guys, I have like fifteen more? And then I'm not I sweart. Can you marinate?

No?

Like, yeah, it's so well, it's anyway. So he's just visiting Amanda's house. She's she's given him a key to her house, and he's like, yeah, sure, Ald, invite your estrange mother right on in. Yeah, PSA for this episode. Don't do that.

Don't do that.

He offers her a glass of wine, and Hillary is overcome with pride for her daughter, who has made such an amazing life for herself. She's taken two steps into this woman's living room seeing furniture, Yeah, just basic furniture, and is like, oh my god, she made it. She survived.

But you know what, Lindic Gray makes it work. She does that woman knows her way around a soap opera script. Like, I feel like so many soap opera actors get a bad rapper or they don't get the respect they deserve because they are particularly on the daytime soap, so they're churning out five fucking episodes a week. Yeah, that is a work horse, Like you are learning lines and somehow getting through scenes like that's hard.

Scenes that were written fifteen minutes ago by exhausted writers who are like, I don't know, Yeah, just hit him across the face and walk away.

Yeah, make sure that you can cry and go do it like and there's they deserve their props.

It's true. That's why is when someone like Marcia Cross is like so good at it, it's like you are a genius actor. To make this seem natural. Hillary says she wants a chance to explain herself to Amanda, and Jake hugs Hillary because she's crying and he don't know what to do, so he kind of like hugs her and offers to talk to Amanda for her. He's like, let me be the bridge, let me fix this relationship

What exactly is going on with Grant Show's outfit.

The mom jeans? This is they have put him in a chastity belt in denim form. It is so hideous.

This is worse than the model stresses. I actually think the model stresses look better Grant Show. In the credits, Grant Show is shirtless. They know why Grant Show is there?

And or white tank top with a leather jacket like classic, classic handsome. I'm sitting on top of a motorcycle. It's his job, motorcycle.

I believe it's mechanic.

Is that his his job's his job is motorcycles.

Jobs, motorcycle. I said what I said?

I said what I said. Yeah, okay, that makes a little more sense then okay, you no, this outfit is it's just the most sexless thing I've ever seen a man wear.

It's like those eight that eighties wash of jeans or nineties washing jeans where it's like pale blue and then he has a shirt on that's almost the same color. It's not denim, but it's almost the same color. It's also quite baggy. I'm like, I know that's a good looking man, but I can't see past the the schmot that you have on him.

It's like he's on the news and they've blurred out his body. There is like it's not his face but his body. They're like, we cannot show you this man's body, and they blurred him out. It's because you can't see any any definition anything.

There's nothing that actually nude. And they added all his clothes posts.

It's that's grant show only works in the nude. It's the only way he can remember his lines correct, so they have to they have to add on the clothes afters in post, I.

Mean, get me a job on a Grand show show.

Right now, it's a Grand show show.

It's a Grand show show. We cut to Michael and Kimberly at dinner. Michael, who he must remember it has been freshly exonerated for a potential vehicular manslaughter due to his drunk driving, from which he has been emotionally suffering for I don't know, let's say six months. I have no idea what the time of the show is is.

Four months, she says it for four months.

He is sucking down drinks and wants to order another.

He's like, whoah, let's party a free.

Let's remember that while Kimberly did survive, she was still severely injured in a drunk driving accident that this man was responsible for. Kimberly stops him cold. This is where Marcia Cross is starting to come out right. She has no menus.

He has had at least two cocktails before they've even gotten a menu, not their food, a menu, and she's like, She tells the waiter She's like, menus now, and the waiter looks at Michael is like, sorry, what a bit right.

She holds the crown of her head again and she pulls out some pills and she explains that I have these for these headaches I've been getting.

Yeah again he is a doctor. Yeah, he asks, no question, no follow up. No, he's not like, what meds are you on? Like? Who prescribed him for you? How many do you take in a day? Exactly where in your head are these headaches coming from? Nothing, no interests at all in his girlfriend's well being. We cut back to Amanda. Amanda is chewing Jake out for his impertinence and getting involved in her relationship with her mother. She is not wrong, Jake says, look like it or not. She is your

Take off this blurring. I need to see his penis. I need to remember why he's here. We cut to Sydney. Remember Sydney when when we last saw her she was fainting into Matte Fielding's arm.

Well, she is. She in the hook her business.

She wasn't hooker business, but she left it for good, gotcha.

Yeah, she's carrying I hope she didn't burn any bridges the way out. I hope she didn't do a Yeah, I hope she didn't do a Jerry Maguire last night and leave the hotel room being like, fuck you, fuck you, You're cool. I'm taking the goldfish with me.

She's carrying a suitcase. She's walking up to Melrose Place and she knocks on Jane's door. Now, Erica do you know what these two characters are to each other?

Sisters?

These are sisters.

I did know that. I remember that these are sisters.

I did not know that until I looked it up. So these are two sisters. She knocks on Jane's door. Jane opens it. She is absolutely not interested in anything Sidney has to say. She very calmly tells her that blackmail just isn't a good building block for a relationship.

I just just remind people who don't remember, Jane was married to Michael before all of this went down with Kimberly and Sydney.

Yeah, Jane is the wife that Michael left for Kimberly. Jane is Sydney's sister. Sidney was married to Michael after she blackmailed him but accidentally killing Kimberly. Are we all together? There will be a test. Sidney tearfully asks if she can stay, and Jane says she'd rather set fire to herself.

Harsh, Love you, Jane, love you, love you to pieces Jane.

Sidney cries that she's having a nervous breakdown, and Jane says, and I wish you would have it someplace else and closes the door in her face.

So good. Yeah, I have to say, I don't remember Josie Beset much from this show, and I don't know that she worked too much after this, because I don't know what I've seen her in. Frank she's really good in this episode. She's very little to do, but she's very very good, and like, I think she's one of the better actors on this show.

Possibly, I mean this is my only Yeah, Like, she's good. In the scene, she has a very very good job of being funny, which is the job here.

Kind of a bitch, but funny, And then yeah, I think she's great. We cut to Billionaires I fell asleep, were they're debating on where they want to have their reception. Allison wants to make a decision before Shela has chance and bulldoze them to wherever she wants them to go. Right, this conversation is insane. Allison's like, what if we have it at like a fancy hotel and Billy's like okay, And she's like, well you don't like that, clearly because I just said okay, And he's like, I don't know.

Yeah.

There's a knock at the door and it's not Sheila the wedding planner, it's Jane. And Jane walks in upset and she's like, you know what, I really wish you had told me to my face you didn't like the wedding dress before you had that woman fire me. Yeah, and Allison's like, I never had anyone fire you, and I fully plan on wearing your dress, So what the

By the way, Jane, I was thinking, do you do table clothes at all? What bitch?

What a bitch? The wedding planner snaps that she's billing Alison's father for everything, and then they won't have enough money to get married in a bus station. What are you billing them for? Yeah, nothing has happened. You've worked with them for twenty four hours unless you charge two hundred thousand dollars an hour.

We cut to Amanda and Jake and they are having dinner with Hillary and her boyfriend Chaz.

Okay, so Amanda turned around on this right quick.

Yep. Jake got through to her. He said, you can't pick your parents.

He took his shirt off, and she was like, Okay, she's.

The only mother you'll ever have. So Hillary tries to make overtures towards peace with her daughter while Chaz attempts to play foot seats with Amanda under the table. Amanda tells her mother to keep a leash on her boyfriend, but does agree to stay at dinner. So this is just set up for wherever this is going.

I do love this scene because Aman is like, put a leisha on Chaz, and then Linda Gray says he won't speak for the rest of dinner, and the actor who plays Chaz just has to sit there and take it. I'm like, this is one.

This is interesting.

I want all of this. Give me more of this. Back at the Beach House, Michael and Kimberly have I can't believe you're not dead.

If you're wondering what that's like, it involves satin sheets and a lot of soft lighting, A.

Lot of soft lighting, satin sheets and.

Cowgirl, cowgirl, and there's a lot of that hair had a cowgirl a lot of having to like kind of take your hair and take it from one side of your head and brush it all the way over the other side of your head.

The Okay, I think most people who are listening to this know what episode we're talking about. Yeah, I'm gonna spoil something slightly real quick. No, you know what. I won't spoil anything because those of you who don't know, I don't want to spoil it. I'm just gonna tell you. There is Chekhov's hair pulling happening throughout the episode, where Marcia Cross continuously like like takes her hands and rubs

I'm fine with it.

I'm fine with it. Afterwards, after the sex, Kimberly excuses herself to the bathroom to take more of her pills for her headache. Oh, the pills don't seem to help. She keeps rubbing her temples and she's she's grimacing in pain, and she continues to make quiet exclamations and and clutch her head. And then suddenly she she does another thing with her hand where she's like, looks like she's just rubbing her hands through her hair and like moving her

End of show, end of episode. I mean, look made me want to hit play on the next one. I'll give it that.

I'll give it that. Yeah, this was a seminal moment in Melro's Place. People who watched Melroe's Place remember where they were the night they saw the rip wig. In retrospect, it's not that crazy, Like, yeah, the woman was in a car accident. Yeah, she's gonna have a vicious scar across her head. I don't know why it seemed. I guess because it was shocking. It was surprised. I don't know why in real time I was. I remember being like, oh my god, as though it was a bigger reveal than it actually is.

I wonder if it's something to do with with the actress appearing unattractive.

Perhaps something, But like plot wise, you would think the the reaction would you would think the reveal was like, that's not Kimberly, it's her evil twin or you know, like or like that's not Kimberly, it's it's Dug's event, you know what I.

Mean, Like, oh my god, what if they had done so he pulled off? It was Matt Matt Fielding.

It was Matt Fielding, and like in like emission impossible, like mask, Like that's the amount of reaction. I remember this getting of people gasping, and in retrospect, I'm shocked. That's her only scar, Like she doesn't have like a like.

Her face is pristine.

Her face is pristine. Her body we've seen a lot of her torso in that sex scene looks fine. Like she doesn't have like jagged scars all over her body. So anyway, I just want to point that out because when you rewatch this episode, you're like, oh well, yeah, oh yeah, of course.

Of course. Yeah. All right, So that is the end of the bitches. Back stick around. We'll be right back after these commercials to give you our random observations and final rankings.

And we're back. Paul, give me some random sexy observations about Melrose Place betray me.

My first one is so you know, there's a downpour in La on that first night, it's a downpour. Andrew shoe Billy gets home from work. He runs in, he takes his umbrella and just throws his umbrella on the living room floor. A right, and I'm like, leave it outside.

What are you doing, buddy, what are you doing? Like?

Close it outside, shake it off and bring it to the bathroom. Don't throw it on the carpet.

That's like a director's fault. Like even if the actor is too too dumb to know to do that, Like the director should be like, well, why don't you fold it and just put it next to the door. It's not what normal people would do, but at least it's the closer to what normal people would do. He threw it on the carpet, open, right, it was still open.

Yeah.

There was one line that had me cackling. And it's Kimberly and I think it's when Michael first sees her and she goes, rumors of my death, as they say, was premature. That's not the saying. That's not saying, you guys. She said it was such confidence. Rumors of my death, as they say, was premature. That's not that's a this bad grammar. B. That's not the saying.

I didn't.

Why are you saying it like that, you fucking weirdo? Is that one of the things you've forgotten during your coma? Is this very common expression?

They were greatly exaggerated, I think is the words you're look.

This very famous expression in American pop culture. Rumors of my death, as they say, was premature. They let her be a doctor, They let her doctor people. The next day.

They made it pretty clear that she is the most intelligent person on this show.

Yeah, she's under heavy sedation on whatever drug that is she is on. She does not understand words anymore. And yet she's like, let me fix that bone for you.

Yeah, okay, So Josie Bissett doesn't have a lot to do in this episode. Her first scene, and we've already made fun of the outfits that are putting around, particularly

Oh, I don't remember that.

Yeah, it's weird.

I did not notice that. To me. She has the Bridget Fonda haircut.

See what if the two sides of her head agreed with each other.

I do not remember. Okay, I believe you, but I think that's like just a mistake. They're just like quick, Josie, get on sets, like I'm not done, and they're like, we don't have time. We're losing We're losing the lights.

We're losing the light's like, it's a set, what are you talking about?

What if it's not a set? What if they just wandered into an apartment complex during the day and as people are coming home, they're like, shit, we gotta go home. Is my apartment complex? Melrose?

Please?

Maybe I just have one more And it's when Alison is asking Amanda, Alison and Amanda work together Alison. Amanda is Alison's boss on the show. Heather Locklear is in full bitch mode the entire episode. She starts at at ten, she ends it at nine, like she does not really climb down from bitch mode the whole episode. It is wonderful, and so Allison's like, Hey, Amanda, can I have two days off to plan my wedding? I literally have to have everything planned in the next forty eight hours to

Sir?

Like she's holding a cup of gruel in her hands, you can I have some more? I just I just need to plan my wedding. Can I can I not come to work tomorrow? I know I'm crucial to everything this company does, but I need I need forty eight hours to plan my life. And Amanda goes, Ugh, it's one day off or nothing, It's all you get. What is this company's policy on paid time off? Do they not have it? Does she not have a two week vacation she could take at some point during the year.

Either has days or she doesn't.

She either says her she doesn't. Is this indentured servitude? Did I miss a plot line? What is happening?

She also makes it some comment about like you don't really have a lot left after all your relation, your relationship, chip drama or something like that.

I'm like, wait, wasn't she assaulted? Like like it was? Didn't someone murder himself in front of her? I think you can have a little time off for that something.

I only have one more. I'm going to do this one in the form of a question for you. Okay, doctor Kimberly Shaw, Marsha Cross, our favorite characters.

Rumors of her death, as they say, are somewhat rumored to not be rumored, right, Yeah.

Everything we know about this woman. What drink do you think she's drinking at the restaurant with Michael.

Ooh fuck me. I only I remember his drink. I don't remember hers. Yeah, I'm gonna go with Pina Colada.

Okay, closer than I expected, because I would have said, like Martine, why.

I would have said wine, honestly, Martini, had I not known this show, I was watching.

Maybe a margarita. Nope, it's an orange slushy. What she is drinking an orange frozen drink out of a straw from like one of those like, like it almost looks like a milkshake container. It's so weird. It's like, why was it just have for drink water?

Just have a drink a glass of white wine? What are you doing? Like also like she's her whole thing is she has a headache. I don't think she should be drinking frozen drinks, not at all. They famously will give you headache. Yes, there's a whole thing about it. Oh my god, I have to go back and look at it. I missed it. Well, his drink, I remember, was also in like a fucking milkshake glass.

It's like a tropical They must be in some kind of tropical theme that.

You can't they weren't, but they weren't. The restaurant was basic, normal, average nothing restaurant. This is a place that serves steak and bad pasta. Yeah, that's what this place does. Like why are they both drinking fucking my ties at this restaurant? Paul? How are we gonna rank this episode of Melrose Place?

Uh? One to ten fun facts about Andrew Shoe.

Did you know he was born in Wilmington, Delaware. Fuck, I don't know where my keys are now.

It keeps crowding out other facts in your brain.

Yeah, and I'm like, hang on, hang on, hang on. My mother's birthday is Andrew Shoe played soccer in Zimbabwe?

Fuck?

He did? He played soccer in Zimbabwe. I know that now. I just know that it. Yeah, you know what it is. It's not that I'm remembering things about Andrew Shoes. Somehow they're coming in. They're coming in hot.

It's like he has like a direct line to your brain.

He heard me speaking about him from the ether. How about one to ten things you can marinate, Paul? Can you marinate a wrench?

You could?

Can you marinate a cat?

I would not recommend that.

Okay, they'll get very upset. He crossed that one off the list. I'm really glad. I asked first, ye, Fluffy, get out of.

The pot, Get out of the tupperware fluffers.

Get out of the tupperware fluffers. That's not for you. Don't track the vinegar on the counter being marinated. I don't know what your problem is.

What t Grant show shows, show shows.

I love watching a Grant show. Show me too, I go to Thailand to watch the shows one to ten wig rips, Yeah, iconic.

Iconic rips. I mean, honestly, why hasn't a we come off on RuPaul's drag race to reveal this makeup job?

Oh my god, that would be incredible.

What should happen?

That's really what should happen? That that queen would fucking rule that episode?

Uh huh exactly if they can, if they know the song and it's like, you know, you drive me crazy or something like that. Yeah, you're welcome, You're.

Well, Chavalore. Why haven't you done this? This is right up your fucking Allexy.

You should know this.

You ruined my life, Slasha Valor.

Teach the children? All right, do you want to go first? Or shall I go first?

You can go first on this one? How to rank this nonsense?

Right, Well, let's let's just go back to the rubric. Good female roles like an equal equal distribution of male female roles, if not, if not weighted towards female, I.

Would say, and the women are more interesting.

That's way more interesting. Marsha Across rules this episode.

Like an iron fish, like.

An empress, like so everything he does, So that's great, there's no diversity. There's no racial diversity.

Oh they have an Italian.

They have an Italian and the detective is black. Oh right, right, yeah, so that's the detective who interrogates his his his Italian.

Who is the Italian? Oh no, that's bad, Christoph, Christopher, stop killing girls, Christopher.

So I mean, with all of these people, you think they could have squeezed one person of color into the cast. There was a black woman in the first season, played by Vanessa Williams, but not that Vanessa Williams, the Vanessa Williams you don't think of when you hear the name Vanessa Williams. But she was written out in the first season. And I did that thing where you just go on IMDb and scroll down to see when I can find

You know what, though, Paul, there's so little diversity in Los Angeles.

That's true.

It's like they don't have anything but white people in last You're right, you're right.

Famously famously famously h And then we have the gay character Matt Fielding he has nothing to do in this episode, but he also famously had nothing to do in any episode.

Like he must at some point get a love interest.

I get he gets love interests, but I mean, I know this is not the producer's fault. Like they wanted to show him kissing somebody and like the network wouldn't allow it. Right, that kind of stuff happened. They did eventually like write the character off and then brought him back to kill him in a car accident, which I'm like, okay, you got we have to kill our gaze this much like we've already written him off the show. Dug Savant is already not collecting his paycheck. Like, give me a break.

I didn't watch Desperate Housewives. It's a big miss on my part. In terms of nighttime Soaks, did he play Marsha Cross's husband?

On played Lynnette? He played the felon. Oh, Huffman, That's literally the only thing I can think of.

So mean, that's so mean. She's an Academy Award winner.

Ball No, she did not win.

Oh she didn't win.

I should say she's done her time, she has paid her debt, and I honestly think she's fine.

It's fine, yeah, because he I do remember he was on Desperate Housewives and hopefully he got a lot more to do.

Yeah, he had. He was on Desperate Housewives for all twelve seasons or whatever that one ran. Okay, good, Desperate Housewives is fun. I wish we had just spoiler alert, we're not going to get to Desperate Housewives this month, and I wish, I wish we had time for it.

Honestly, the only problem with Desperate Housewives is it's too good. I don't know what there is to talk about because it's a comedy.

It's a comedy. But believe me, we would have.

A good time because no I get it. But like this show. The reason why this is so great is because it takes itself so seriously.

So I think the show literally but simply by including a gay character in nineteen ninety two, was fighting the good fight on that front, and to our eyes today it is laughable. And he is. He is sexless. He never gets main storylines. He's there, like, at best for comic relief, if not to like fix all the straight people.

If there is a little something to be said for and tell me if I'm wrong. The fact though, that he is a like just like a boring guy. Like, is that in a way somewhat progressive that he's not like, Hi, I'm the guy.

Oh, so he's not a clown.

He's not a clown, he's not Jack, I'm Will and Grace. He's just like a guy who works at the hospital, and that's all there is to him.

But I think that's no because because those are the two things that you could either be the clown or the normal guy. Yeah, the normal to bad word, the stereotypical like hetero, boring guy, boring, the path the guy who's passing, yeah, even though he's gay.

Well, because I I think I think I'm retconning this right. I don't think it's actually progressive. But I wonder if the like there were like gay kids perhaps who are like, yeah, i think I'm gonna be that guy. I think I'm going to work in a hospital and wear a tie and yeah and be super boring.

Look in nineteen ninety two, I think any representation was precious, like truly, so like for the again, I'm not really gonna I'm not gonna ding the show too hard. Also because I know based on stories that it wasn't the creative people's choices as to why this guy was being so sidelined. It was the suits and the executives show innocent. But as far as aging well, does not age well. He is one of the two tropes. It's not just the clown, it's the clown or the sexless one. He

Two, especially with a cast of thirty fucking they're.

So like if you go on Wikipedia, the people listed on this show, I'm not exactly, it's like thirty people that at some point, like if not a series regular, like a major recurring character that came back multiple times. I'm going to give it a five. I'm going to give it a five out of ten wig rips because I want to give it credit for the good female roles and it's attempts at gay representation. But I think the lack of racial diversity is pretty it's pretty damning

You think, especially I mean nineteen ninety two in La Yeah, I mean, I also don't want there to be people of color just so they can be like you know, talking about Rodney King, you know what I mean, Like, I don't want that, No, either. I want them to be terrible, just like the rest of the people on

Like and the Vanessa Williams you are thinking of when I say, Vanessa Williams did join that show in the later seasons and I like was on it for like three seasons or something.

Yeah, I U it is so white that one guy, the cop is black. Yeah, cops are always black on these shows. I don't know why. I don't know why they always ask black people to play cops on these shows. There is something to be said about creating television for women, and like, let's get real, soap operator for women, and

What kind of doctor is he? Do you know?

A doctor of love? What if he's like the fucking neurosurgeon at the hospital? Yeah, oh my god, my blood just crawled when you said that. So yeah, you know, there is a little bit of that which I push against when I encounter one of these shows. But people love them, like there's a reason there the nighttime soap opera has not gone away and will never go away. There's a reason Shonda Rhymes has fourteen houses. Yeah, is because not only does she know this genre, she made

Yeah, Well, and the production values on this one are they look silly to us.

Now, Oh my god, very silly.

And it's too recent for the production values I think to be completely forgiven. Like we're going to do an episode next week, a little teaser where the production values are also very low because it comes from earlier in time. It like doesn't bother me. It's just fun.

Well, and they're still better than this. Yeah, yeah, I think so too. Yeah, so I'm going to give it. Did I give it a four? Already? Did I say four? I'm gonna give it this one a four?

All right? Fair enough? Do you want to offer a palate cleanser?

Yeah, I mean I'm trying to think of what my favorite nighttime soap was that actually was a very good night time soap. I want to say Revenge. I remember really loving Revenge for season Revenge, But I don't think it was particularly diverse either, So if that's what we're digging this on, yeah, you know, like I don't think there was much much diversity in that either, and it was certainly a lot of girl on girl crime on that one. Yeah, this is a weird one. I'm going

I was just gonna say, Desperate Housewives. If you want to see Marsha Cross at like the height.

Of her powers, I kind of want to see Desperate Housewives now. I wish i'd see I've seen scenes here and there Instagram. Every once in a while will like show me a scene from desperat Usually it's an evil Longoria scene, and I'm like, she's fantastic.

The first season of Desperate Housewives is, from my memory, pretty great, like pretty pretty like fun and entertaining and bonkers of course, but like a lot of fun. I know it never quite achieves those heights again, but it also never was not entertaining, like it gave us Eva Longoria comedic torpedo evela.

It gave poor Duvant something to do, yes, exactly so like and Marshall Cross gets to have a lot of fun.

That'd be my palate cleanser. But I also I reacted better to this than you, like I I this is one that I'd be like, maybe I'll maybe I'll see what happened in the next episode after this one. I'm a little curious.

I'm curious to.

Why where this goes. So I also think, like Melrose Place is pretty fun because it's bonkers, and it's fun watching a bonkers.

It is one of the more bonkers. I don't remember nine to two and no getting this bonkers ever.

Yeah, yeah, all right, So that is the end of our show. Everyone listening can follow us on threads and on Instagram. We are phasing out Twitter, so if you only follow us there, pick another platform pretty soon because we're phasing out there for world reasons.

For reasons.

Yeah, Instagram is the only platform where we post our monthly theme, so if you want to request on those, you must, must, must follow us on Instagram. We have a tea public shop. We are on Spotify where you can comment on the episodes, and we would love it if you leave a five star review on Apple Podcasts

That Aged Well is produced and edited by Paul Kayola. We would like to thank Robin Don, Jan Mickey, Shannon Luis, Aurelian Camille, Kevin Mike, William Vanessa and Adam for reaching out and letting us know what you want to hear. If you want to have a say in the topics we discussed, you should join our patreon. Every patron gets to vote in an exclusive monthly poll to determine one of our subjects. This month, it's already been determined, but

Here we are we here on that age? Dwell to think? Cory is a cowboy. I love cowboys.

Mmm, cowboys delicious? They have spurs.

You know a cowboy should not have to tie his own lasso.

No, I would never poke at a cow poke.

You know what I love about cowboys? Eartha?

Hmm what Eartha?

Assless chap slicious?

You know when I love about cowboys? Eartha?

Do tell me, Eartha, what do you love about cowboys?

Ya is a stride a mustang?

A cowboys should never have to mount his own steed.

I love a good rodeo.

He should leave that for somebody else to do. So you listen, Corey, who is a cowboy.

Thank you for listening, cowboy Corey.

And remember don't scuff your own boots.

And always keep your cattle in stride.

And you never want a hat with less than ten gallons. Well that was sensual.

This room has a lot of Chanelle five in it right now, Yes, so much Chanelle five.

It's a cloud of it.

It's my eyes are burning. Are your eyes burning?

Well, it's actually my nostrils for me? Yeah? Ouch, But you know what, I'm hot.

I'm hot, I am hot. That was sexy.

I'm overwhelmed. Frankly, frankly, Erica, do you have any final thoughts on Melrose Place?

Billy, let's plan our wedding. It will be so fun. Want to make out on the counter now after eating clams.

We didn't even talk about her last dress, which is just like this bland denim maxie dress.

Oh my god, the outfits. No one comes out unscathed, no one. Hang on a second, Paul, I don't remember you wearing an eyepatch before. You're your evil twin soul. Oh