A very restless New Year

Did Nikki "spike" all the water in town, because a number of Genoa City citizens seem to be feeling extra restless! Phyllis and her children are all embroiled in individual love triangles; Claire's depression has caused her to push away her newfound parents, Cole and Victoria; and Sharon visited a dreamscape filled with her past loves to figure out her current love life in a holiday-themed episode. Join our Two Scoops columnist as he breaks down the first week of the new year on Y&R.

Happy New Year and a warm welcome to 2024, Two Scoopers! It was a short week on Y&R due to the holiday on Monday and the "very special Sharon episode" on Friday, but there is still plenty to unpack as we look back on the first week of the new year in Genoa City.

For starters, Nikki is doing her best to try to stay on the wagon in the new year and not let her drinking get the best of her. She even went to another Alcoholics Anonymous meeting and managed to avoid taking a sip of the water that she spiked with her flask just before Nate showed up at Society and stopped her. Unfortunately, judging by the "next week on Y&R..." promo at the end of Friday's episode, it doesn't look like that staying sober will be a New Year's resolution that she keeps going for much longer!

But it's no surprise that Nikki is having a hard time coping with her alcoholism after the reign of terror that Jordan unleashed on her and her family during the last few months of 2023. I still think there has got to be more of a connection between Jordan and Nikki personally, but I'm not sure that Colleen Zenk is tapped for any additional episodes beyond the "final showdown" that her character, Jordan, had with Nikki and Claire over the holidays, so maybe there really is nothing more to it. Jordan has been apprehended and will likely stay behind bars for a very long time, so it may be the last we see of Jordan for a while.

As much as I loved having Collen Zenk as part of the cast and enjoyed the devious Jordan, it's probably a good thing that the Newmans are given a little bit of a break from her plots and schemes (even if it would have been more fun to have her around longer). They will have their hands plenty full trying to clear some of the wreckage that Jordan made of their lives! I'm sure it has got to be difficult for Nikki to reconcile that Claire is her granddaughter after the hell Claire just put her through, which is likely contributing to her desire for a drink. But Nikki's battle with alcoholism may just be the start of the Newmans' woes in 2024.

Sure, Claire had a change of heart about ruining the Newmans' lives once she learned the truth about how Jordan had deceived her into targeting them, but she still has a long road to recovery ahead of her. The mental abuse and brainwashing that Jordan subjected Claire to over the years are not just going to go away overnight, so I am glad the show is highlighting the impact that those years of abuse had on Claire. As much as I would love for Victoria, Claire, and Cole to become a happy family instantly, it wouldn't be healthy for any of them to try to gloss over the pain they've all been through.

I'm actually really looking forward to seeing how Claire begins to settle in as a Newman in the new year! Sure, Claire told Victoria to leave the mental hospital and not to come back, but I think we all know that Victoria is not going to do that. The scenes that they shared this week were turbulent, but even though it may not seem like it, their conversation was actually a good first attempt at building a bridge between them. Hopefully, after Victoria gives her some space, they can eventually meet in the middle somewhere and start to form a bond.

It's heartbreaking that this mother and daughter were separated from one another at birth due to outside forces they couldn't control. Claire is going to need some extra time to grapple with the gravity of what Jordan did to her, but I think she will ultimately come around and find a spot of her own to nestle within the Newman family. Wouldn't it be great if she and Adam bonded, and Claire even helped to bring Adam and Victoria closer together as siblings? I'm sure it will be a twisted and dramatic journey on the way to get these characters to that point, but I do hope we get there. Claire could be a great catalyst to shake up the Newman family for the better!

Speaking of Adam, I am glad the Newmans finally clued him in to what they've all been dealing with. I can't believe how far removed both he and Abby have been from all the trauma that has been inflicted on their family since Thanksgiving. I haven't a clue what is going on with Abby, but it has at least been nice to see Adam have the least amount of drama going on for a change -- he even had a happy New Year with Sally! It was a nice touch that they were highlighted as the happy couple on the show amongst all the other turmoil going on. After the year or two they have had in their on-again, off-again relationship, they deserve to relish these exciting stages of their reunion. I've been invested in these two for a long time, so it's nice to have some payoff after suffering through their tumultuous storyline.

One couple I'm not so invested in, though, is Heather and Daniel. Is anyone invested in Heather and Daniel as a couple? I've got to be honest, I don't remember ever being a huge fan of their coupling back when they got together (so much so that I had forgotten they were even together when they returned to the show last year with their relationship in shambles), but I suppose they have a certain spark. And Heather certainly seems to want to reignite that spark after planting a kiss on Daniel on New Year's Eve. Those of you that checked out our "Worst of the Restless in 2023" column last week already know the storyline that I would rather see Heather get involved in, but this storyline with Daniel is a good reintroduction to the character for fans of the show who haven't been watching quite as long.

I'm a longtime fan of Daniel and Lily as a couple, though, so I think they will always be endgame for me in regard to their romantic couplings. I get that Christel Khalil is out on maternity leave and Daniel still needs a storyline, so this seems like an obvious pivot for the writers to take (for now), but I hope Lily still has a relationship to come back to when she returns from spending time with her daughter in California. I want to see Lily really come into her own in 2024 when she returns to both Daniel and Chancellor-Winters. Sure, some good drama with Heather will be a bit of fun upon her return, but I hope this triangle she's in with Daniel will be a short-lived storyline this year.

And Lily had better get back to town soon, because Lucy is certainly doing everything she can to push her father's romantic interests back toward Heather. Will she be able to set a "parent trap" for Daniel and Heather and get them back together before Lily returns? Lucy hasn't gone to the dark side or become an evil genius yet, thankfully, but that doesn't mean her small "nudges" to get Heather and Daniel back together will have any less of an impact (especially in Lily's absence).

I'm at least glad that Heather and Daniel are aware of Lucy's "scheming" to push them back together, but it doesn't help that neither of them is exactly discouraging her from her antics. Daniel not only needs to make it clear to Heather that he is only interested in Lily, but he also needs to make it clear to Lucy. Summer and Danny hit the proverbial nail on the head when they both told Daniel that he needs to set a clear boundary for Heather and make sure she knows he is committed to his relationship with Lily -- if that is, indeed, what he really wants. There were certainly a few moments this week that even Daniel himself seemed to be wondering if he might want a second chance with Heather instead of Lily.

Danny and Summer may not be the best ones to give romantic advice to Daniel, though, since they are both in the midst of their own love triangles. To Danny's credit, though, he did somewhat fend off Phyllis' advances (eventually), and he insisted that he was committed to seeing where things went with Christine (the same thing he is encouraging Daniel to do with Heather and Lily). However, he also gave Phyllis just enough of an inkling that he could maybe be interested in her if Christine weren't in the picture -- and if you give Phyllis an inch, we all know she will take it a mile! Just as Phyllis was encouraging Summer to go after Chance because his relationship with Sharon isn't "official" yet, she seems determined to continue to pursue Danny, since he and Christine aren't official yet, either. And since she may get the opportunity to stomp out "the Bug" in the process of falling in love again, that likely makes pursuing Danny even more enticing to her.

Summer is planning to "go for it" with Chance now, too, after she talked herself into doing so following her chats with Phyllis and Daniel. But are Summer and Chance even a couple that we want? Sharon and Chance haven't been super exciting, but Summer and Chance aren't exactly giving me "supercouple" vibes, either. I think the real problem is that the writers don't know what to do with Chance. It seems like they are just throwing stuff at his character and seeing what sticks. I'm willing to give a chance to Summer and Chance as a couple, but I hope the writers have something interesting for their characters to do other than just hold hands and go to concerts together.

Summer doesn't know it yet, but she will at least have a lot less competition for Chance's affection, since the week ended with Sharon breaking things off with Chance. I can't really say that I am surprised by this, but I never really cared enough about them as a couple in the first place. No need to feign surprise now that their relationship is over if the writers couldn't get me to feel something for them to begin with. On paper, it should have been a good pairing. I like Sharon and I like Chance -- and I even like them in scenes together -- but the spark was just not catching fire. To be fair, I don't think that was the fault of either actor. I think the writers just needed something for these two to do and didn't bother to give them a storyline that would make us care about them or root for them. Here's hoping they do better justice to Summer and Chance (especially since they were married in the fantasy that Sharon had).

I'm not sure how I feel about the "very special episode" concerning Sharon's love life yet. I'm sure I've mentioned this before, but I am not a big fan of "fantasy sequences" -- particularly ones that take up the entire episode. I do love that they used a whole episode to showcase the talent that is Sharon Case, though, even if the episode felt a little messy to me. But maybe that was the point? Maybe Sharon felt like she was getting caught up in a mess of her own making when she was forced to confront how seriously (or not seriously) she wanted to take things with Chance, so her psyche reflected that in her "dreamscape"? I'm probably putting more thought into it than the writers did, but let's go with that!

After nearly a year of being on the backburner (aside from the too-short Cameron storyline), it was definitely Sharon's time to take the spotlight. And it was interesting to see how torn Sharon is regarding her romantic life. Who could blame her, after all she's been through? Throughout the episode, I was trying to determine if the writers were going to drop some clues regarding what they have planned next for her romantically in the new year. Were they hinting at possibly putting her back with Billy? Or should we expect Nick and her to find their way back to one another again?

It's hard to say, and I'm not even sure the writers know what they want to do with her romantically yet, but it was refreshing to see her take control of the situation by the end of the episode. It was a smart move for her to end things with Chance so that she could focus on herself and on the company she acquired from Cameron. She definitely has enough going on in her life without romance, so I can certainly understand why now would be a good time for her to take a step back and give her heart a rest for a bit.

And speaking of giving things a rest for a bit, I'm about to do the same because those are all my thoughts about this past week on Y&R. Don't forget to hit the Comments (here on the site and on social media posts throughout the week) to share your thoughts and opinions about the new year (so far), too!

Until next time,Vance

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