Thursday, July 09, 2009

Nuke Day: Zoom In As They Burn the Past to the Ground

Today's As the World Turns opened with a close up of Luke's hand on top of Noah's as they sat together at Java. Luke was asking Noah if he was sure that he was ready for the two of them to move in together, since the big day has finally arrived! I guess summer doesn't officially start in Oakdale until you've faced down the first psycho of the season?

Noah assured Luke that he was ready, but Luke persisted in pressing Noah to make sure that he was certain, that he didn't need more time to deal with the Colonel Mayer situation first. The scene turned downright cute when Noah asked if Luke had been watching Dr. Phil and Luke replied "No! No. A little bit." The two then joked around about how Luke would freak out if Noah actually admitted to having second thoughts.

Noah told Luke he was going to go back to his dorm room to get the rest of his stuff and asked him to meet him back at Java in an hour. Luke realized that their moving in together was actually going to happen and the two shared a really nice moment of happiness together, staring into each others eyes.

Sometimes, when I'm hating this show with a bitter passion, a moment like that makes me remember why I love Luke & Noah so much. If only they could deal with more realistic problems and issues! I know soaps are always going to be a bit over the top, and that's why I love them, but the trick to good soap stories has always been to ground things in as much reality as possible, to have characters face real life issues in addition to the occasional high drama story. That doesn't happen on this show. It's more like a bad parody of a soap opera, the sort of thing that non soap fans imagine all soaps to be.

After leaving Noah, Luke headed for the foundation office, where Damian and Lily were working, and hit them up for $500 so that he could pay the movers. Luke really is a trust fund baby, and neither Damian nor Lily batted an eye at the request before Lily handed over the cash.

When Luke left and Lily commented on how happy he seemed, Damian remarked that finding true love will have that effect. Lily marveled at how far Damian had come in accepting Luke's sexuality. Damian admitted that he still didn't fully understand it, but knowing Noah helped and the trick was to change with the times. Lily told Damian that she was really glad he'd come back into Luke's life.

Noah, meanwhile, was leaving his dorm room with a box when a random college guy stopped to say goodbye to him (they're just moving out of the dorms in July?) and rather oddly informed Noah that the top flap on the box he was carrying was open, as if Noah couldn't see that for himself. Apparently, though, he couldn't, because he thanked the helpful hunk and then set the box down to fix the flap.

While he was doing so he caught sight of Colonel Mayer's purple heart medal and had a little freak out before running off and leaving the box in the middle of the hall. This was followed by a scene where Lily and Damian discussed how young the guys were to be settling down and Lily noted that she felt okay about it because Noah was a rock, that he'd had to be with all he'd dealt with growing up with his father.

Luke waited impatiently at Java for all of ten seconds before he headed for Noah's dorm room and found it empty, with the box of Colonel Mayer's stuff abandoned in the hall. Noah going missing usually equals a kidnapping, of course, so Luke immediately called Lily and Damian.

Damian had the bright idea to check the abandoned army base where Colonel Mayer had been hiding out, and that was where Luke & Damian found Noah, who was having trouble dealing with sending his father to prison and with letting go of all the issues he had with dear old dad. Noah told Luke & Damian that the Colonel was always there, in his head, and Damian decided that he had the perfect solution for Noah.

The three of them (and Lily, whom Damian called to join them for no reason at all) headed to the Snyder pond, where they built a bonfire on a little raft and Noah let go of everything in true Viking fashion, throwing all of his father's stuff into the flames, including the movie he'd been making, and then setting it adrift.

As the guys watched Noah's daddy issues burn, Mayer wondered what he was going to do for his senior project now that he'd destroyed his film. This, of course, should lead nicely into the introduction of Noah's gay film school advisor.

So, the guys are finally going to be living together! I know I've said this more than once since the idea first came up last Spring, but we'd better actually get to see their apartment. It's never a good sign on a soap when a character doesn't actually have an onscreen residence.

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