Ashland and Victoria’s Soapy Wedding Channelled Old-School Young & Restless — and a Looming Threat Leaves Us Poised for a Murder Mystery

Credit: Howard Wise/JPI

There is so much to unpack with Young & Restless’ wedding this week. Let’s get right to it…

The Wedding

Yes, the wedding took forever. More than one viewer posted the “It’s been 84 years…” meme. Yet, I can understand why they dragged it out over two weeks given the detail (and undoubtedly the expense) that went into the sets for the Tuscan palazzo. They were gorgeous and gave a feel of old school Young & Restless for a change. Though I’m not always a fan of musical performances in my daytime drama, Leslie and Tessa fitted the occasion to a tee. Amazing. Despite the slow roll out, I enjoyed the wedding on the whole. It was soapy, with underlying tension and intrigue… and of course, the romance. Victoria and Ashland’s stolen moments and nuptials were ‘love in the afternoon’ perfection. Let’s break it down:

The Confrontations
Billy ended up with egg on his face, and honestly, it was weird that he was even allowed to stay in the first place. But Victoria putting him on blast made for an excellent confrontation scene, even if her memory about how well she handled Billy and Lily getting together was a little suspect after the fact. Victor’s run-ins with Billy were good too, as they did their smirky tit-for-tat thing.

More: Photos: Victoria and Ashland’s wedding album

Gnarly Nick
One aspect of the wedding I wasn’t feeling throughout was Nick having his panties in a twist. His entire storyline right now feels contrived and out of character, from the issues with Phyllis to the falling out with Victoria. Nick is a huge softie, there’s no way he would have remained prickly in the face of his sister’s very obvious happiness.

More: How tragedy led Mishael Morgan to Y&R

NuNoah
Um, NuNoah is fine… and the casting is spot on. As with NuFaith, Rory Gibson made the transition seamless. That said, there are a couple of issues with the character. One, he is still being written a little dry. If they don’t loosen him up his storylines aren’t going to fly any better than the last Noah. Two, his first significant interaction didn’t make sense. Mooning over Tessa? That immediately felt off. Noah was hurt and humiliated by her and was not much of a fan when he moved away. Worse, it seemed like they were going for renewed romantic interest on his part, which shouldn’t be on the table given that Tessa has stated that she’s gay. It might have been a better choice for him to fall in love at first sight with Sally, which his family would hate, and which would create believable character-driven drama.

More: Michael Mealor and Hunter King talk Skyle return

Summer and Kyle
It was amazing that they included Summer and Kyle, even if we didn’t get to see their wedding, but after a while it began to seem like they’d just brought them back to react to Sally. With that said, it was all worth it for the Ashland and Harrison hug felt ’round the world. With Noah back on the canvas, I’d love to see “Skyle” come back as well. Summer and Noah’s catch up chat was one of the many unexpected and genuinely enjoyable scenes we were treated to during wedding week.

Imagine if Noah was pissed Victoria had Tessa at the wedding after she played him and Summer was mad she had on a dress by Sally….I would have loved to see Noah and Summer talking ish at the wedding…like families do 😂😂#YR

— KDRINFJ (@KDRINFJ) October 14, 2021

The Dress
It was oversold in the lead-up to the reveal and it was oversold after the reveal. Victoria looked absolutely gorgeous, but with all the hype leading up to the wedding gown Sally had designed for her, it was a letdown to see that it looked like someone had pinned a plain satin tablecloth on her. That said, the back of the dress was just beautiful.

The back of the dress though. ✨ pic.twitter.com/kqVAtdG4XZ

— Tara (@girl_gonerad) October 14, 2021

The back of the dress is the best part. #YR

— Soap Operas Forever ❤ (Fire Brad Bell and Josh G) (@GenoaCityLove) October 14, 2021

It was borderline funny hearing all the ladies at the wedding gushing over that dress when, arguably, most of them were in gowns that were more “stunning.” Yes, “stunning” was the word of the day. The writers misplaced their thesaurus, clearly. If you drank every time someone used that word to describe the dress you’d have been blind drunk. With all of that said, I loved that it was a win for Sally, and that she got a hug from Victoria, and won Adam’s admiration. It’s been a minute since things went her way.

When everyone’s dresses look better than the bride’s but the show is pushing hard to make Fetch happen.#YR pic.twitter.com/MBAGk5W3HS

— RoxyB 🎃 (@FoxRoxB) October 14, 2021

The Follow-Up

Initially, it was puzzling that they chose not to do a Friday cliffhanger with Ashland and Victoria — as in a “will they or won’t they get married” thing — but in a twist, although they overcame all the opposition and tied the knot, the threat (being Gaines and his information) wasn’t eliminated, but instead morphed. If he couldn’t ruin Ashland’s personal happiness, he’d hit him professionally. Naturally, Billy was on the frontlines of this. Having goaded the goon and brought him over to Italy, he then found himself in the position of having to decide whether or not Chance Comm would break the story that would hurt Victoria’s company, knowing it was going to come out regardless.

So, as predicted, Billy’s plot to protect Victoria backfired spectacularly. What will happen next? I feel it’s more likely he’ll act to try and keep the story from coming out than to run it, which brings us to Gaines. With Ashland, Victoria, Victor, Adam, Nick, and Billy all involved in trying to keep him quiet it seemed they might be setting up a whodunit… and with the latest threat, he could still turn up dead. Which would make everyone in the villa who wanted to permanently shut him up a suspect!

Mariah
One last thing to address — Mariah cut Tessa off on the phone, and was unwilling to talk to her, yet she was back to work and chatting away with Kevin. This does not bode well for their relationship and had a vibe of sub-consciously punishing Tessa for not wanting to carry their baby. Self-destruct mode: On!

More: Photos: Soaps’ best costumes and disguises

This is just my opinion. Feel free to join the conversation below, but first, don’t miss our beautiful new gallery devoted to Summer’s life and loves, which you can see below!