Genoa City for the Week of February 16 – 20:

Things have certainly been hopping in Genoa City with several disasters occurring simultaneously. While it’s enough to keep viewers riveted to the screen in either delight or disbelief, it leaves one wondering where the soap will be when the dust settles. Something concerning that developed this week was a growing list of inexplicable occurrences and the worry of how they might ultimately be explained. A “Y&R” viewer on Twitter may have summed it up best with this tweet:

Jack suddenly ravishing Kelly in a storeroom? Mariah suddenly sticking up for her nemesis, Summer? Neil hovering over Hilary instead of madly searching for Lily, the daughter he dotes on? Sharon suddenly behaving scattered and unstable again after showing nothing but strength even in the face of the DNA swap reveal? Abby and Austin? Fen drugging the punch after totally going clean? The list goes on. Viewers are worried that the explanations for these plot points will be equally wacky. Be sure to let Soaps.com know if you’re loving or hating the February sweeps storylines, and tell us what you think is going on in the comment section. Thoughts:

Bang the billionaire.
As said in last week’s Restless Rant, there is nothing better than a story blowing up this big, and viewers seemed unanimously thrilled with Neil’s big reveals and the ensuing confrontation scenes on the plane. Some commented that Jill could have been a little less vocal considering she boinked Jack while married to John back in the day. Hypocritical? For sure, but some could say the same of Neil, who cheated with his brother’s wife and knocked her up. And that’s just one example of him cheating. Anywho, just as we began to wonder if Neil was packing a bomb in his briefcase, a storm brought the plane down in a freezing snow-laden forest. This put a bit of a damper on Neil’s revenge drama, but the issue certainly wasn’t dropped altogether. Neil and Devon almost seemed to compete over who would care for the trapped and injured Hilary. Neil was so intent, in fact, that he barely blinked an eye over Lily being missing, which didn’t ring true for viewers. Ultimately, Devon decided to ‘do penance’ as Jill called it, by striking out alone to get help, but self-sacrificing Neil beat him to it. On the whole, the reveal of Devon and Hilary’s affair has turned out to be fantastic entertainment featuring terrific performances. Vote in Soaps.com’s Y&R Poll: Will Lily forgive Cane?

A cover-up.
Essence of Ashley’s love potion came to mind when the hand was seen dumping the contents of a vile into the punch in the cabin. That was pretty much when the guessing began, as absolutely nothing after that point has made sense. Mariah sticking up for Summer? Courtney agreeing to a cover-up? Kevin admitting he’s the author of the fan fiction and the events at the cabin mirroring his story? Abby and Austin had a thing behind Summer’s back? Austin’s body gone missing? All questions, no answers. Theories abound on what is actually happening – an elaborate murder mystery set-up, or perhaps a dream or hallucination? Is Austin even really dead? Does Austin have a doppelganger? Sigh…