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I’ve been meandering through all of the GH websites, ABC soap websites and their message boards and I have to tell you, I’m a bit disturbed. I’ve read statements about Ric and how great he is and frankly, I can’t find one single redeeming quality about the character. It’s kind of like the Todd Manning thing all over again. He’s a hero to so many fans and though the ACTOR is excellent, the character himself is a psychopathic criminal. Ric on GH? Same concept, different show. Ric came into PC barely showing his horns. He pretended to be nice, befriended Carly and was blatantly obvious with his obsession with Sonny. He courted Sonny and his family in an effort to get close to them. Carly fell for it but no one else did. And she soon figured him out. He lied to anyone that would listen, pretended to be trustworthy when he wasn’t and he manipulated people to do what he wanted. All for the sake of revenge on Sonny, when frankly, he didn’t have the whole story. Soon enough his true colors started to show and instead of toning it down, he intensified his actions and became an even sicker version of himself. Not only has Ric lied and manipulated, he’s blackmailed, he’s murdered, taken advantage of a woman and framed people for crimes they did not commit. What’s to like about this guy? No, Ric did not rape Carly but the mental abuse he put her through about the whole “night of mad sex” was just as bad. Putting any person through such angst isn’t even worthy of a slug. Adding fuel to the fire, Ric has teamed up with Faith, a woman on the wrong side of the edge of reason in an effort to pay back Sonny for ‘taking away the family he could have had’. Together they have been responsible for murder and attempted murder. Ric slept with Faith out of lust, but was ‘in love’ with Liz. Okay, could this have been a mistake made by a distraught man who was just dumped by the love of his life? I doubt it. Ric doesn’t think on those terms. He doesn’t do anything without a reward for himself whether it’s an immediate reward or one for later on down the road. All of his actions have a perceived positive reaction, in his eyes. He doesn’t think anything he does is wrong, nor does he have any regrets for his actions. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary: psychopath: n : a mentally ill or unstable person; esp : one who has not lost contact with reality but who engages in abnormally aggressive and seriously irresponsible behavior with little or no feeling of guilt. BINGO! Paste a picture of Ric right next to that definition baby because that’s our man! Some of the messages on the message boards I’ve read think Liz and Ric are a great couple. They see sparks. Perhaps it’s not really sparks but flames shooting out of his red horns? Seriously though, how anyone can see them as a good couple is beyond me. Consider a few points: Ric has told Liz nothing but lies (something she hates more than anything); Ric hasn’t told her one iota about his history or who he really is (well, he finally did, but only because he had to and it’s not as much as someone ‘in love’ would normally reveal); Ric slept with someone else (yes, they were “broken up” but don’t you think if he really loved her he could have waited say, maybe 5 minutes or so?); Ric is blackmailing someone else into marrying him; HELLO!!! Need I say more? Oh, wait. I forgot, he’s murdered someone and is framing someone else and he’s manipulated a woman into thinking they had sex and she could have been carrying his baby. What an honorable man, don’t you think? Certainly the kind of guy my daddy would want me to marry! Granted, we’re soon to find out the two have procreated. Lovely. A beautiful little Liz-child with horns. Rumors have it that the baby will not make it and I’m hoping that’s true. Now don’t get your undies all in a bundle about me “wanting a baby to die”. Remember, this is a FICTIONAL BABY and in no way, shape or form would I EVER want a REAL LIVE baby to die. But the FICTIONAL character Liz deserves better. She’s gotten the shaft lately in the love department and deserves a break. They do elope and I’m sure Liz will put all of her effort into it before she finally realizes that Lucky pretending to love her was better than Ric the Psychopath as a husband. I’m confident this relationship is doomed and I’m thankful for that. This leaves Liz open to either nunuLucky (who is HOT!) or Jason, who’s current relationship has been given the death penalty due to all it’s intense happiness. Liz, YOU GO GIRL! Opps, sorry. I seem to have gotten a bit off track, so back to Ric. Here’s my question…Is Ric redeemable? Can he become a decent character, have a relationship with Sonny (spoilers say he wants to), truly love a woman, be a good father to a baby he might have with whomever and use that Harvard Law Degree for something useful? Honestly, I’m not sure. My friend Kathy emailed me a Guza quote from SOW. He said the following about Ric: "There will always be this conflict within Sonny about his conflict with Ric. It gives you acres of story to make Ric a long-range villain, which doesn't seem to exist anymore....that happens on this show. They come and they get thrown off a balcony, or they get killed and it turns into a whodunit. This an an unfortunate pattern on daytime. But we've got to have villains we don't burn off, because they're usually the most popular characters on this show....I intend to make him so hated that just the sight of him on your screen makes you want to throw a brickthrough your TV." ( Guza) In my book, he’s gone too far already and I don’t think I’m capable of putting his evilness aside and chumming up to him. There have been other characters that have done nasty things and they’ve come back from it. They’ve been redeemed. Some, like AJ, have been redeemed of stupidity (he finally experienced true love with Courtney) to then let their idiocy show once again (can you say “stalking”?) and are waiting in the wings for another redemption. Then there’s Carly, one who’s been redeemed of many ill reputes. She stole her biological mother’s husband, lied about the father of her baby, gave her husband up to the feds, faked her own death and helped fake his death (for his own safety, or course!) and she’s starting to be LIKED by other characters on the show. So sure, anything’s possible, I guess. But in my book, Ric has surpassed the limits of redemption. His actions show that he is truly evil and frankly, I can’t conjure up a storyline that allows for redemption. Besides, based on what Guza has stated, it looks like Ric is going to be pretty high up on the evil scale so it’s unlikely he will be redeemed. Do I think he’ll be one of those characters I love to hate? I’m not sure. There’s a fine line between loving to hate someone and getting that creepy feeling about a character. Okay, okay, I know there are people out there, Ric the character fans, reading this and saying, “WHAT ABOUT SONNY AND JASON?!! THEY ARE HORRIBLE MOB MEN!” That could be true. But most of what Jason and Sonny have done has only been “implied”. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I can’t think of one actual murder committed by Jason that was anything more than assumed or implied. Call Sonny and Jason “Criminals with hearts’. That, Ric is not. Sonny, on the other hand has done some not nice things, or at least he’s had his ‘men’ do them. Honestly, I’m on the fence about Sonny. I’m still not sure if Sonny is truly redeemable but I do like that he is fiercely protective of those he loves. Heck, he has to be, most of them die around him! Don’t get me wrong, I like Rick Hearst. I think he’s a great actor and he’s more than pleasurable eye candy! Especially shirtless! He’s doing an amazing job playing this horrendous person and I sincerely hope the Guza finds a way to keep him around, slightly nasty but with a good heart instead of pure evil. |
