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Message: <blockquote data-quote="James from London" data-source="post: 5748" data-attributes="member: 22">09/Feb/82: FLAMINGO ROAD: The Explosion v. 10/Feb/82: DYNASTY: The Hearing v. 11/Feb/82: KNOTS LANDING: Possibilities v. 12/Feb/82: DALLAS: Anniversary v. 12/Feb/82: FALCON CREST: For Love or MoneyThis week's FLAMINGO ROAD begins with characters reacting to Skipper's anti-gambling editorial in The Clarion. Michael Tyrone, worried that the bad publicity will jeopardise his gaming bill, is far from pleased. There's a certain irony to the future Richard Channing having to battle a newspaper. Meanwhile, on DYNASTY, Blake Carrington has the opposite problem. Having lobbied for a senate investigation into Logan Rhinewood - the man he believes has blinded him - he is hugely frustrated to learn that the subsequent committee hearing will be closed to the press.I've never understood the precise nature of this hearing, but it seems to be a grander, more bad-tempered variation on the one that delved into JR's involvement in the Asian revolution at the end of last season's DALLAS. Weirdly, this hearing is chaired by DALLAS's Harve Smithfield. Perhaps he was still smarting from the ticking off he received from Miss Ellie three weeks ago when he accepted an afternoon's work on the Ewings' rival show.Back on F'LINGO RD, Richard Channing - I mean, Michael Tyrone - threatens to withdraw his business from Truro County unless Sheriff Titus can find a way to silence The Clarion. Titus's solution is simple - he pays someone to blow up the newspaper office. As with DYNASTY's equivalent explosion three weeks ago, a main character is blinded. Unlike Blake Carrington, however, currently suffering "hysterical blindness caused by a terrible shock", Skipper Weldon's injuries are unequivocally physical - he is diagnosed with "severe eye damage". (Still, compared to Titus's last unintentional victim, Skipper's fiancee, who burnt to death when he set the mill on fire in the pilot episode, Skipper himself got off pretty easy.)"You're on your own for the first time. You're not used to it," Clayton tells Sue Ellen in this week's DALLAS, but his words are equally applicable to Karen in KNOTS LANDING. "I'm alone, but not single," is how she weepily (but amusingly) describes herself as she struggles to come to terms with the idea of dating again. Following the triple whammy of "The Rose and the Briar", "The Three Sisters" and "Power Play", this week's KNOTS feels at first like a bit of an anti-climax, but gradually develops into a sweet and interesting, if low-key, episode. Ginger's burning desire to become a singer (encouraged by Digger Barnes's former nephew Jimmy, now an up and coming record producer) comes out of nowhere, but shows a freshly assertive and stubborn side to her character (as well as a surprisingly attacking singing style reminiscent of her real life boyfriend Warren Zevon). Just like Chase on FALCON CREST a few weeks ago, Kenny isn't happy with his wife's newfound ambition, but his attempts to reach an end-of-episode compromise the way Giobertis did prove unsuccessful.Over on DALLAS, Bobby has the same dilemma in reverse, in that he's trying to encourage his wife back to work (as part of his ongoing efforts to prevent Pam discovering Christopher's true parentage). "There are places where women can bring their children to work," Liz Craig informs him. The recording studio where Ginger sings her heart out is one, the aerobics studio Bobby purchases for Pam is another. Following Karen at Knots Landing Motors, this makes Pam Soap Land's second "instant businesswoman" of the season.A red sports car features prominently in both KNOTS and FALCON CREST this week. In KNOTS, it's the vehicle of choice for Karen's suitor Charles and an indication to the neighbours of what a good catch he is. (Abby refers to him as "the dashing man in the sports car".) It also prompts the most touching line of the episode: "Don't let him drive too fast," pleads Michael quietly, just before Karen and Charles leave on a date. FALCON CREST, meanwhile, opens with Lance driving his red Corvette very fast, a relatively unfazed Angela in the passenger seat. He is driving the same car when he accidentally runs a young cyclist, Lori, off the road and promptly falls in love with her. Lori's bike-riding symbolises the freedom Lance can never have unless he breaks free of Falcon Crest and the lifestyle that goes with it, which is represented by the Corvette.This episode also serves as our introduction to vineyardist Carlo Agretti. Angela calmly informs Lance that he is to marry Carlo's daughter Melissa in order to form an alliance between their two families. This kind of arrangement is nothing new in Soap Land: the unions of Lucy and Kit in DALLAS, Fallon and Jeff in DYNASTY and Constance and Field in FLAMINGO ROAD were all regarded as mergers made in Heaven by their respective families. In each of those cases, however, some consideration was given to the bride and groom's happiness. Not so here: Angela is as indifferent to the way Lance feels about Melissa as she is to his newfound love for Lori. (Lance and Lori's hopes of a future together in "For Love or Money" last about as long as Cliff and Sue Ellen's in the DALLAS Season 1 episode of the same name.)Disability, an uncommon subject in a place as glamorous as Soap Land, crops up throughout this week's episodes. FLAMINGO ROAD and DYNASTY each now features a blind man, while FALCON CREST's central guest character, Elizabeth Bradbury, has spent the last four decades in a wheelchair, the victim of a hit and run accident when she was eighteen. "I think the rest of us are just crippled in other ways," says Julia darkly. Eventually, we learn that it was Angela "and her deadly blue convertible" that were responsible for crippling Elizabeth. There is no explanation given for the accident and Angela expresses no remorse. Interestingly, it's the lack of detail that makes the revelation so powerful. All we know is that Angela's crime went undetected, that her brother Jason abandoned Elizabeth, his childhood sweetheart, in her hour of need and that he never forgave himself.The final scene in three of this week's soaps revolves around an inanimate object: a letter in DYNASTY, a videotape in DALLAS and a tape recording in FALCON CREST. Alexis and Angela each use the object to distort the truth in the hopes of destroying a relationship, while JR deploys his to rekindle one. "Why do so many frustrated wives end up in bed with their shrinks? Ask your wife," says the anonymous letter Alexis has Fallon read to her father. "Who in hell needs Chase Gioberti? … I don't have a son," states Jason Gioberti on the tape Angela plays for Chase. "From Austin, we have Sue Ellen Shepard - twenty years old, five-foot seven-and-a-half inches," announces the host of the 1967 Miss Texas beauty contest on the video JR shows to his ex-wife before moving in for the kiss. Romantic as he is in this scene, JR still finds time for a little relationship-wrecking this week, as he arranges for Donna to find Ray in bed with another woman. Meanwhile, Evelyn Michaelson's lie that she and Mitch are sleeping together sends Lucy scuttling into the arms of Roger Larsen. By contrast, Abby's designs on Gary are put on hold in this week's KNOTS. In fact, they never even appear in the same scene.The friction between Chase and Angela moves up a notch at the end of this week's FALCON CREST. "You win at any cost, don't you?" says Chase after Angela has played the tape of his father to him. Angela responds by reciting details about Maggie's childhood. The shocking realisation then dawns on Chase: "My God, you've started a file on my wife!" It's a terrific moment.Echoes of earlier works reverberate throughout this week's Soap Land. FALCON CREST contains traces of Edgar Allen Poe (Chase discovers a walled up room containing books full of his father's tormented writings) and WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE? (Angela cripples a woman in a car accident, then allows suspicion to fall on her mentally unstable sibling). On DYNASTY, Alexis and Sammy Jo's chance encounter at the furriers could be a scene from George Cukor's 1939 picture THE WOMEN, and while the episode's climax may lack logic, (why do Alexis and Fallon go to the trouble of sending a missive in ransom-note lettering to a blind man? And why does Fallon think that informing Blake of his wife's supposed infidelity will break up her relationship with Nick?) the sheer melodrama of its execution - the long anguished walk Fallon takes up to her father's room, the moment when Blake regains his sight and sees the letter in his hand - evokes those delirious Douglas Sirk pictures of the late 40s, in particular MAGNIFICENT OBSESSION - which just happened to star one Angela Channing as a woman blinded after being hit by a car ...And this week's Soap Land Top 5 are …1 (3) FALCON CREST2 (2) DALLAS3 (1) DYNASTY4 (4) FLAMINGO ROAD5 (-) KNOTS LANDING</blockquote>

Verification: What month follows July?