Crossing that Bridge again

Brooke tried to build a Bridge. Katie tried to cause a Bridge collapse. And Quinn helped Bill turn up the heat to burn a Bridge! London, Brooklyn, or River Kwai, it's time to talk some Bridge with Two Scoops' Mike!

Has your week been bold and beautiful? Did you wear blinders to your wedding? Did you throw a fake even though the Super Bowl is over? Was your motto, "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but whips and chains excite me"? These and more situations faced the Forrester-Logan-Spencer clan this week!

February Sweeps continues, Scoopers! And how entertaining the show is when the high schoolers are running the playground instead of the kindergarteners. Liam, Hope, and Wyatt all had to sit in the corner, with "Hyatt" just playing a little kissy face and getting bitched out by Pam. It's awesome that she won't let Wyatt forget what he did to her Pillsbury Dough Boy! And wow, Liam is so much more interesting playing confidant to Bill and Katie (separately, of course) than he ever was waffling.

All the hoopla this week swirled around Ridge and Brooke's latest wedding -- their eighth, if I recall correctly. Or is that just the marriages that went through? Because Brooke and Ridge are original characters with a 27-year history, their ultimate union makes sense. Yet, this time, it doesn't work. And it's not because Ridge has a new face! I admit, that still makes Bridge a little hard to accept, but that's not the problem. The problem is the way this wedding -- and its ensuing conflict -- has been rushed together.

Ridge came home after a year for the express purpose of reclaiming his Logan. So far, so good. He found out Brooke got with Bill in his absence and got cold feet as a result. Check. He started hanging out with Katie and developed a new appreciation for his sometime sister-in-law. Double check. But then, when it looked like Ridge and Katie were going to do some kissin', she sent him back to Brooke, telling him to propose to her. And he did. Say what?

What is this, Steffy telling Liam to go marry Hope? That dorky plot "twist" only barely worked because of the drama of Steffy's infertility, but now the implication is that Katie is sacrificing her own happiness for the sake of her sister. You've got to be kidding. One play date in the park and a little poetry reading does not a romance make. I don't care how many flashbacks we get of it (five this week alone): Ridge and Katie have no relationship. Even favorite poet Shelley would be telling them to get a grip!

No, I think this Bridge/Kridge push-pull would have worked a lot better if it hadn't been given the heat-and-serve treatment all other B&B romances have gotten the past several years. Kridge has so much potential -- why not let it play out with a slow burn? And if Katie was just trying to block her burgeoning feelings for Ridge by pushing him back toward Brooke, why did Bridge have to hit the altar again so soon? Don't they have some reconnecting of their own to do first? Marriage is not the solution here.

No wonder Hope was so excited -- weddings are what she does! But having grownups Brooke, Ridge, and Katie act like junior counterparts Hope, Liam, and Steffy just cheapens the whole story. Maybe Ridge standing at the altar with Brooke is just old habit at this point, but if his faith in Brooke has been shaken and he's starting to have feelings for Katie, a wedding is the last place he should be. This is the same crap he pulled with Taylor all those years. His face might not be the same, but his behavior is!

Forgetting that this current Bridge has no foundation, giddy Donna, Hope, and Caroline helped Brooke plan yet another instant ceremony with some unexpected supporters. What is Aly even doing there? The older ladies all telling Aly to "dial down" her desire for a storybook romance ("Advice I never really followed," Brooke admitted) was great, but Aly doesn't even know these people; she grew up out of this circle! Yet she seems to know all about Bridge's legacy of love. She must read TMZ!

And Pam -- really? This is a woman who, a few years ago, made Stephanie's anti-Logan stance look like a lovefest, and now she's throwing her arms around Brooke. Yes, Stephanie -- who got a lot of welcomed mentions this week -- wanted everybody to get along, but Pam jumping on Brooke's bandwagon just doesn't seem right somehow. If Pam wanted to honor Stephanie's wish, maybe just baking a cake and sending it over would have been good enough.

Speaking of honor, Brooke had its matron all picked out, but Katie was getting an earful from Liam, of all people, about busting up her sister's wedding. It seems to me he's had a few of his own weddings busted up! Still, it was kind of neat that Liam was given something else to do besides waffle, showing his former stepmama some support. Is it just me, Scoopers, or is there some funky chemistry between Liam and Katie? He was looking pretty yummy this week; maybe some boo-hoo sex wouldn't be a bad idea!

Liam's words ringing in Katie's head, Brooke came over to ask Katie if she would stand up for her at the wedding...and Katie said no! You know, on one level, Brooke seems clueless to the resistance going on around her, and yet, she's not completely unmindful of it. She knows Ridge has been acting a little strange, and now Katie...put it together, girl, put it together. But after much ballyhooing from Brooke about reuniting the Logan family, Katie agreed to help Brooke become Bridge. Rut-ro.

Over at Forrester, other warmth was provided when Rick accepted a post as Ridge's best man. You know, I kind of liked it. I seem to recall Rick's biggest beef with Ridge was that Ridge constantly hurt Rick's mom with all the waffling, so this seems like a good enough reason to mend fences. Anything's better than throwing each other off of buildings. But having Carter officiate over every wedding just feels too convenient to me. Especially when I can't warm up to the guy.

Sorry, the boy's built like bricks, but he's dumb as them, too. Comparing his connection to Maya with Ridge and Brooke's epic romance? "I'm just enjoying being engaged," Maya said as she smiled. Do yourselves a favor, Scoopers: never get into a car with Carter, because he can't read signs. He also managed to incorporate the same Shelley poem everyone somehow knows, even Liam, who's more of a comic book guy. And Hope, really -- "Love is patient, love is kind"? Could you have picked a bigger wedding clich?

All the Stephanie love at the ceremony, especially as expressed by Eric, was a wonderful reminder of a much-missed character, and I do think that Stephanie would have approved of this latest Bridge crossing. After all, she green-lit their 2012 go-round just before she died. But then, amid Katie's heart scar (yay! Attention to detail!) and her flashbacks of Victoria Newman -- I mean childhood -- Katie dropped like a new Beyonc single as she watched Ridge trying to put a ring on it!

Katie insisted she didn't need to go to the hospital, but everyone called a halt to the nuptials, given Katie's previous history of heart attacks. I almost had one when Katie quietly told Ridge that she pooped out on purpose! Soo-wee! "I had to do something," Katie admitted, clearly having taken Liam's words, to, um, heart. Pretty clever, and a page out of Bill's book to boot -- not to mention Stephanie's. Katie knew no one would question her falling to the floor, since she's already done it so many times!

Though Dr. Patrick ruled out a heart attack (where were Drs. Meade and Caspary?), Katie was having a heart attack of a different kind, gushing to Ridge how he'd listened to her and confessing, "You make me feel like me." Ridge, who only moments before was set to marry Brooke, nuzzled up against Katie and told her she wasn't lost. Brooke will be, if she walks in and sees this exchange. Maybe she'll just be mad because she fainted for real when first trying to tell Katie about her and Bill!

And, oh, Bill. Ordinarily, Quinn would have been torqued that Donna kissed Eric, but Stephanie's portrait covered that territory for her. Yawn. The third time is not the charm with that overdone picture-falling gag. Anyway, Quinn did not have Eric on her mind, and who would, getting a glimpse of Bill's sweaty self. At first, I couldn't understand why Quinn was playing armchair psychiatrist for Bill; aside from stabbing him with his necklace, she's barely had anything to do with him since her arrival.

But the more I watched, the more I realized that Quinn crossing paths with Bill makes more sense than anything else she's done. Quinn came on all wussy, afraid that Wyatt would choose his newfound father over her. Then, suddenly, Quinn was dubbed "the new Sheila" as she plotted against Liam with emails, elevators, and ex-wives, for no reason except to make sure her son was getting some. There was no basis for Quinn's behavior, no roots. She was well on her way to becoming a cartoon.

Boy, did that change this week! It's pretty obvious now that Quinn's "major damage," as we used to say in the '80s, stems from her horrible treatment at the hands of Bill back in the day. You'd be scarred, too, if you got pregnant by the man you love only to have him give you money for an abortion! And you know how they always say there's a fine line between love and hate? Quinn actually got some much-needed depth to her character by showing us that she's straddling that line where Bill is concerned!

Dispensing with more literal bloodletting, Quinn instead slayed Bill with some hard truths, scoffing that "it's always about you" and that he considers the women he had children with disposable compared to Brooke. Ouch! And yet, while Quinn clearly enjoyed being in the catbird seat, she let some buried feelings slip when she likened Bill to a "one and only" and implied that she cared about him, though she didn't know why. Through Bill's hurting, drunken haze, Quinn's words were starting to sound pretty good.

They sounded good to me, too. We finally see that the reason Quinn works overtime to ensure Wyatt's happiness is because Bill snuffed out her own. And then, something amazing happened: Quill exploded! Bill and Quinn exchanged innuendos as she tried to put the soused Stallion in the stable, until deciding to play Lady Godiva instead. "You sexist pig," Quinn heaved. "You bitch," Bill huffed, taking Quinn on a lusty waltz around the room that's going to send Liam to Ikea to replace his breakables!

Poor Liam is also going to have to bleach his eyeballs out from witnessing a reenactment of his hated half-brother's conception. I always knew Bill was a freak! Though I wonder how he can "giddyap" after all that booze. Quinn and Bill's chemistry is like Buster Poindexter: hot hot hot! I hope we're going to see more than lamp-breaking and shirt-ripping, because we were promised 50 Shades of Gray, and right now, we're only up to about seven. Time for an S&M Monday!

Well, while I get my smelling salts, tell us what you think about all this. Share your comments with us on the Soap Central message boards or the comments section. Send e-mail or leave a voicemail! Or talk about it on Facebook below. Your comments could end up in a future column. Like these!

• "I don't care a whole lot who ends up with Ridge, although the fact that Katie and Ridge haven't even had a DATE makes me wonder about Katie's sanity. No one, and I mean no one, should get involved in the mess that is Brooke and Ridge...WOE to the person who tries to interfere with that...Katie had better be careful...the very fact that Brooke did not tear up [the papers returning control of Spencer and custody of Will back to Bill] but is keeping them locked away somewhere could spell very big trouble for Katie in the future!" -- Ellen

• "I'm sorry, but I am not feeling the new Ridge. Not that he doesn't have a certain swarthy sexiness...[but] what about the accent? He grew up in California, yo!...I also feel like he would be more comfortable in a dark corner of a mysterious dive bar with cigarette smoke swirling about him...or pummeling opponents into the ground in a violent rugby match. At Forrester drawing dresses? Not so much..." -- Jeannine

• "As much as I hate the persistent flashbacks, I'm looking forward to one: Katie stands at the altar watching Brooke marry the man she loves, she flashes back to standing at the altar, performing the marriage of Bridget to the man she loves (Nick, in case Bell has forgotten). They really do only have one playbook." -- Earl

• "What happened to the baby boy that Taylor had when she was married to Rick...and found out she was impregnated with one of Brooke's eggs? When she had the baby she couldn't deal with it so [she] gave the baby to Brooke to raise. Haven't heard anything about the little fellow since. He was younger than RJ." -- Katherine

• "Mike, Mike, Mike. RJ was born on June 22, 2004, so he is only 9. He'll be 10 later this year. Silly boy!" -- Rambo

True, Rambo: despite my tsking the show for not saying R.J. is ten, he truly is nine. Maybe I'm just not used to B&B letting kids age accurately: Hope's got over ten years on R.J. when she should only have two! And, on the subject of kids, Katherine, I'm pretty sure you meant to say that Taylor conceived Jack with Brooke's egg while married to Nick, not Rick. As for Jack's whereabouts? He was briefly seen in 2011 when Stephanie threw that intervention about Nick's cigars; at that time, Jack was living on the Shady Marlin II with his dad. So, presumably, when Nick set sail for parts unknown in early 2012, Jack went with him. The kid will probably come back sporting tattoos and smoking a pipe!

Now, let's anchor in a Points to Ponder port of call:

"There must be some virus going around," Pam commented in regard to the never-ending marriages and engagements happening around her. Girl, you said it... How did Ridge know that Carter officiates weddings? He wasn't there for Steffy's or Rick's. Did Steffy find time to tell Ridge about Carter in between all her grief about being infertile?... Liam suggested that Ridge wanted someone "dependable and loyal" like Katie. Um, Ridge pretty much had that with Taylor...

Ridge describing how Brooke acting from her heart makes her irresistible to all men and makes their defenses fall away not only speaks to his own tortured history with her, but explains why the long line behind him (Eric, Thorne, Deacon, Nick, Bill, etc.) toppled like dominoes. But where did Brooke get a wedding dress so fast? Is it another one of Eric's down-the-aisle specials done up in a day, and with a piece of R.J.'s baby blanket sewn in for good measure?

"Has she still not forgiven you?" Hope asked Brooke about Aunt Katie. Strange coming from Hope, considering four years ago she had to do the forgiving when her mom mask-boinked her man... The simple piano rendition of Here Comes the Bride was sweet, but who was playing it? You'd think Eric would have tickled the ivories, but he was parked next to Donna..."I'm jobless!" Bill slurred. Oh, come on. Katie only removed Bill as CEO; he was the one that turned his back on Spencer Publications. Like he needs a job anyway. The old Bill would have started up a new publishing conglomerate and blown Katie out of the water! After all, Katie makes decisions like promoting Liam to vice president, a cushy gig considering Liam's hardly ever in the office... And Quinn also seemed to have nothing better to do than keep Bill company. What happened to all the phantom employees at Quinn Artisan Jewelers who are supposedly depending on Quinn for their very survival?

Tracy will Scoop for you next week, covering Taylor's return (don't get too excited, guys: Taylor's only back for a while!), and my next "airdate" is March 3, which begins a month where Darla will get into the "spirit" of things. Keep watching, be alert, and most of all, be bold!

What are your thoughts on ? What did you think of this week's Two Scoops? We want to hear from you -- so drop your comments in the Comments section below, tweet about it on Twitter, share it on Facebook, or chat about it on our Message Boards.