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THIS IS US: Randall Dismantled As Sterling K. Brown Delivers Masterful Performance

Courtesy/NBC

In yet another riveting performance by Sterling K. Brown, the highly-touted episode that aired on Tuesday’s night’s This Is Us, had his character of Randall in the spotlight again, as the first of the Big Three trilogy this season.  Next week, look for the installment to center on Justin Hartley’s Kevin.However, last night on the episode aptly titled, “Hello of a Week: Part One”, viewers followed what happened next to Randall following his return home after the stress of flying across the country to get a diagnosis for his ailing mother’s memory lapses (while keeping it from his siblings), and then winding up facing an intruder in the Pearson family home.After Randall offers the intruder money, the guy runs out of the home.

Next, the police come, and Randall installs surveillance cameras and security alarms throughout the house, which ends up being a continued tipping point in his mental state as he obsesses over keeping his family and his home safe, especially when the cops tells him that it is common for a thief to return,. It appears later in the episode he did when Beth’s earrings and Randall’s cufflinks are MIA.

Photo by: NBC

Throughout the episode, flashbacks to Randall’s childhood showed little Randall, unable to sleep and afraid of monsters, who then asks his dad, Jack to stay with him through the night.  Jack sleeps on the floor, but when Jack eventually gets up to go to his own bed, he tells Randall who comes running after him, “to be brave: and that he needs him to be the easiest child to care for since Kate and Kevin are handfuls.

This laid the foundation for how Randall deals with others, by not letting them know his inner most feelings.   The writers juxtapose Randall’s dreams throughout where he feels he can’t get out whether it be screaming through a locked window at his mother to get out of the storm, or watching some creepy guy touch Beth and he screams so loud, but you can’t hear him,

In addition, in flashbacks, we see how a college-aged Randall needing college-aged Beth to spend countless nights with him. At one point he tells her, “I just feel so helpless, like I have no control over anything,” especially following the death of his father Jack.  Beth says she can understand. She had bad dreams after her father passed away, but after she talked to a therapist she began to feel better.  In a key moment, Randall agrees to attend an grief group with her, but that plan goes awry when on the day they were heading to the grief counseling group, Randall’s family has an emergency and he could not go.

The theme of Randall seeking counseling surfaced later in the episode after Randall was struggling to hold it together as City Councilman at the Town Hall, which did not go unnoticed by Beth or by Malik’s dad, Darnell.

The next day, he tells Randall that he himself needed therapy and suggest he do that to.  Randall says all he needs is his runs around the city to help him clear his head.  But that takes another drastic turn when Randall comes upon a woman being beaten and proceeds to pounce on the aggressor.  Next, Randall with messed up arm from landing punches on the guy, ends up being touted as a hero for saving the woman’s life.  He is not comfortable with that and he begins to lose his grip.

In the culmination of the episode, locking himself in the bathroom in his home, Randall begins to cry and phones Kevin.  Thank God his brother answered, as he seems to be the only person Randall feels he can talk to, and has, through his life.  At the time of the call, Kevin is in bed with what looks to potentially be Sophie, because he was heading back to Pittsburgh for a funeral of one of her parents.  But is it Sophie, or another woman?

During their call, Randall begs Kevin just to talk, and to please  distract him. Kevin promises his brother, “I’m the guy that’s gonna get you through this,”   Will Kevin ultimately help Randall, or will what happens next become the huge rift that we know exists between the brothers in the flash-forward viewers learned about episodes ago?

This Is Us executive producers, Issac Aptaker, and Elizabeth Berger weighed-in on revisiting Randall’s anxiety and panic attacks with Entertaintment Weekly. This is something that was hot on all of our minds, because over the past year, a couple of the writers in our room had had people break into their homes when they were home,” shared Issac Aptaker.  “People would come in and we would see the impact that it has on you when someone invades your space like that — the aftermath and the fallout. So, as we were looking at what Randall’s season would look like, and what would be potentially the breaking point for him with all that’s been brewing this year, it was at the front of all of our minds at how upsetting something like that can be.”

“We’ve seen that Randall is someone that is so in touch with his feelings emotionally, and he is so willing to talk about everything, but there does seem to be this block with him when it comes to therapy, where he just does not want to engage,” says Elizabeth Berger. “That really fascinated all of us and got us thinking, “What’s that about? And how do we get him to a point where he has his back against the wall and has to move past coping mechanisms and keeping things just below the surface and finally deal with them?” And this felt like a really compelling way to go about that.”

When all was said and done, Sterling K. Brown delivered a nuanced and masterful performance as viewers watched Randall slowly but surely, struggling to cope with all the pressure, and horrific events that happened to him one after the other, as Randall’s anxiety and panic attacks were about to reach epic proportions.

So, what did you think of last night’s This Is Us? Sterling’s performance? Comment below.

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To me, Mr. Brown is one of the industry’s most overrated actors. He’s competent and obviously dedicated. But he telegraphs every emotion ahead of time so we know exactly which expression he’ll have (usually either bewilderment or confusion), just as he did in THE PEOPLE VS. O. J. SIMPSON. Whenever an episode focuses entirely on Randall, the show grinds to a very slow trot. It’s best when the adult siblings are interacting. That’s the show’s strength.

General Hospital

GENERAL HOSPITAL: Nina Confronts Ava for Sabotaging Her Relationship With Sonny and Signs the Divorce Papers

Looks like Nina (Cynthia Watros) and Ava (Maura West) are back to be each other’s sworn enemy number one. By the end of the Monday, April 22nd episode of General Hospital, the women know where they stand with each other after Nina goes in on Ava accusing her of wanting Sonny (Maurice Benard) all to herself, while her marriage has been on the rocks.

In story, at Nina’s office, Ava shows up to see Nina and says she is sorry about what happened with Sonny and that he reacted the way he did, acknowledging that is was over the top, even for Sonny. Ava says she’ll smooth things over, but Nina says she now understands how manipulative and transparent Ava really is.

Given their horrible history, Nina goes in on Ava and how she should never have trusted her. Nina wants to know how long has Ava had this agenda dating all the way back to telling Nina to turn Carly (Laura Wright) and Drew (Cameron Mathison) into the SEC. Ava says she never told her do to that, but Nina wants to know how long Ava has been playing her for a fool.

Courtesy/ABC

Ava says she moved in with Sonny to keep Avery safe and she wants to be on good terms with Avery’s father, Sonny. Nina thinks she likes being in Sonny’s inner circle. Ava tells Nina if she goes to him about her advising Nina to call the SEC on Carly and Drew, it won’t work.  Sonny still considers Nina a traitor and he will think she’s lying because she’s so desperate to win him back. Ava says if Nina would stop blaming everyone else that maybe Sonny would respect her.  Nina says “like he does you?” Ava says Sonny not only respects her, but he also counts on her.

From there, Ava launches into why she and Sonny understand each other, after all, Sonny is a powerful, turbulent, and sometimes violent man. She goes so far to say if Nina wanted someone to just sit by the fire with and play with their grandchildren, she’s got the wrong guy.  Ava then talks about Mike from Nixon Falls (Sonny with amnesia) and how Sonny hid the darkest parts of himself from Nina back then, whereas with Ava they are the same similar creatures, so he doesn’t have to hide anything.

Courtesy/ABC

Nina wants to know just what Ava wants with Sonny? What is her end game? Ava responds that they understand each other, in ways she can’t with Sonny. Nina tells Ava she can go ahead and have it all and signs Sonny’s divorce papers. Ava walks out with the documents, while Nina in tears at her desk, takes off her wedding rings and has her assistant come in so she can messenger the rings back to Sonny’s address.

The episode and these scenes featured great performances by Cynthia Watros and Maura West. You can check some of the scenes below.

Now, let us know, what is Ava’s next move? Is she going to become Mrs. Sonny Corinthos? Do you like Ava and Nina as enemies? Comment below.

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AEW

AEW Dynasty: Swerve Strickland Becomes AEW World Heavyweight Champion, Jack Perry Returns, Will Ospreay Retires Move After Scary Finish

There is no doubt now, who’s house it is in AEW? It’s “Swerve’s House” after his strong showing on Sunday nights AEW Dynasty pay-per-view. In the main event, Swerve Strickland captured the AEW World Heavyweight Championship defeating Samoa Joe in a career-defining moment.

Strickland becomes the first ever Black AEW World Heavyweight Champion in the organizations history.  And it was not loss on Strickland, who spoke about it in the post-Dynasty media scrum, but also knew the moment was upon him from the moment he was going to make his ring entrance in front of a sold-out crowd in St. Louis and those watching around the world on cable outlets or via Bleacher Report.

Swerve Strickland ring entrance showed that he was dressed to impress, in a mask and black and gold spandex attire. As fans caught on , Swerve was paying tribute to the character of Kilmonger, the antagonist of 2018’s Black Panther film from the Marvel Cinematic Universe. But that was not all, Prince Nana, Strickland’s manager/sidekick covered Strickland with a robe that belonged to Jimmy Rave. Rave was part of Ring of Honor during the company’s early days and was part of Nana’s stable The Embassy. He has three shots at the ROH title but never won the big prize.

Photo: AEW

AEW Dynasty had three major matches back-to-back to conclude the three hours show.  Strickland in the main event defeating Samoa Joe, and before that The Young Bucks (Matthew and Nicholas Jackson) vs. FTR (Cash Wheeler and Dax Harwood) for the AEW World Tag Team Championships in a brutal ladder match.

Courtesy/AEW

In the deciding moment of the match after Harwood goes to climb up the ladder to reach  for the titles, a masked man runs in and knocks over the ladder. It’s revealed to be none other than the previously suspended, Jack Perry (son of the late 90210 star, Luke Perry). Perry throws up the Elite symbol as security escorts him away. Nicholas Jackson looks pleased by the interference and uses it to take advantage and climb the ladder to get control of the title belts and The Young Bucks become the new AEW tag champs, once again.

The most highly-anticipated match of the night was between two of the greatest wrestlers to ever do it – Bryan Danielson and Will Ospreay and after more than a half-hour of back and forth with high flying moves, technical precision and punches and kicks, Ospreay was able to get the pin, but unfortunately in the last few minutes of the match, Danielson went down after Ospreay delivered the Storm Driver ’91 move. Next, the referee called for medical to check out Danielson, while Will was unaware of that and continued to finish the match.

Photo: AEW

At the post-Dynasty media scrum, an upset Ospreay began by addressing reporters and sharing, “I’m super glad that everybody enjoyed the match. A little bit of a dampener on how it’s all kind of the dust has settled now. I’ve reviewed the footage myself. Seeing Bryan got hurt on the Storm Driver, and I didn’t see the referee call for the doctor and I didn’t see it. So I want to apologize on that.So even though like 90% of the time that moves been absolutely fine, seeing the damage that it’s kind of done, I’m going to retire using the Storm Driver ’91. I don’t think it’s right for me to continue using it after seeing what it did to Bryan, someone that I’ve got huge amounts of respect for, this was kind of my dream match. This is something I’ve wanted since I was a kid. Although I’m happy when everyone enjoyed the match, I’m kind of disappointed in myself. So once again, I apologize to Bryan probably apologize to AEW medics, I apologize to Tony (Khan, CEO/GM AEW).

In one of the best matches in the card, and in the opening bout, for the AEW Continental Championship Match, “Rainmaker” Kazuchika Okada defeated “The Bastard” PAC to retain his title. Meanwhile, Willow Nightingale became the Women’s TBS Champion defeating Julia Hart, only to have Mercedes Mone come to the ring to challenge Willow at Double or Nothing in Vegas at the end of May.

So, what do you think of Swerve Strickland becoming AEW World Champ? Jack Perry’s return? Will Ospreay’s match-up with Bryan Danielson and its ending? Let us know in the comment section below.

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Recaps

THE BOLD AND THE BEAUTIFUL: Lauren Gives Deacon an Earful About Sugar

On Friday’s April 19th episode of The Bold and the Beautiful, Lauren (Tracey E. Bregman) and Deacon (Sean Kanan) make a stunning realization, and viewers of the CBS soap opera can also give themselves a round of applause for figuring out the mystery surrounding (Kimberlin Brown) Sheila’s ‘death’, or at least a part of it.

At Il Giardino, Lauren and Deacon are getting into a heated exchange over Sheila. Going over the events that transpired with Lauren, Deacon tells her what he saw in the crematorium when the sheet lifted up revealing that the deceased person had ten toes, not nine as Sheila had.

Then, Deacon asks a freaked out Lauren, what she knows about Sugar? He reveals, “Sheila was texting with her before she went to Steffy’s.” Deacon begs Lauren to tell him. Lauren says the Sugar she knows couldn’t possibly be texting Sheila or anyone else for that matter because she’s in jail.

Photo: JPI

A reluctant Lauren finally tells Deacon what she knows about the sordid backstory of Sheila and Sugar. Lauren begins, “Sheila met her in prison. She was her warden.” She then goes into how they resurfaced in Genoa City and how Sheila was locked up in a mental ward. Confused and trying to follow along, Deacon looks shocked.  That’s when Lauren says he will be blown away by the rest of the story.

As they sit, Lauren explains that all that time she thought it was Sheila who was locked up, she learned that it wasn’t her in the mental institution. That is when we are treated to a flashback. It was there that Sheila admits to Lauren that when she and Sugar escaped the prison, they fled to South America, where Sugar sacrificed her face. Sugar thought she was going in for a facelift, but Sheila was able to buy off corrupt doctors to have Sugar’s face altered to look exactly like Sheila.

Courtesy/CBS

Deacon gulps, “What are you telling me, Lauren?” Lauren says, “That there’s someone out there who looks exactly like Sheila. Someone with ten toes.” Vindicated, Deacon shouts, “I was right. It wasn’t Sheila who got cremated. She’s alive! My, God! Sheila’s alive!”

So, the search will be for Sheila starting with next week’s episodes of B&B. Do you think somehow Sheila will wind up in the orbit of Lauren if she has been in hiding since Steffy ‘killed” her in self-defense?  Is Sheila kidnapped somewhere? Share your thoughts via the comment section, but first, look at the set-up of Deacon learning about Sheila and Sugar’s past from Lauren.

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