It suits you: Beyond the Gates Two Scoops for the week of March 24, 2025

Antes were upped this past week on Beyond the Gates

Are y'all ready to go beyond the gates? This past week Dani needed more than a spoonful of sugar to help Chelsea's career change go down, Martin officially won the Worst Husband of the Year Award, and Naomi both pissed off and impressed her pop by filing suit against his law firm. And, we got the first indicators that Joey Armstrong's influence reached far past his casino. Put down the rigged playing cards and let's find out what happened inside and outside the gates of Fairmont Crest!

Supermodel...of the world!

Well, I thought Chelsea would never open her mouth. When she and her fictional counterparts opened the GATES a month ago, the young model was already freaking out about how to tell “manager mom” that she wanted out so she could design purses and such. This fifth week of the show started with more of the same: she just couldn't make her announcement to Dani, because who knew how Dani would react.

To be fair to Chelsea, that wasn't an invalid concern. Though, while we'd already learned that Dani was just volatile and that's how she rolled, it's not like she pulled up with fists and backhands and golf clubs and guns until recently. I will give Chelsea points for feeling like she would take Dani's last vestige of normalcy – and Dani's last connection to the modeling world – by folding up the runway...

...but I was still ready for Chelsea to s**t or get off the pot already. (You have never heard that phrase until you've heard it in my mom's thick Dutch accent; RIP.) Obvi Kat's pep talks weren't cutting it, so Chels hit up another family member – Miss Lady Anita. And gram was super chill. Basically, she was like, “Girl, just tell Dani already and if she blows up, the fam will peel her off the ceiling.”

Not for nothin', Naomi came to Gram-nita for advice as well – she needed someone to give her permission to charge ahead with her lawsuit against Bill's firm, necessitated by handsy harasser Mike. Amazingly, Naomi didn't seek Anita out; it took hubby Jacob to point her in the right direction. The groovy granny also gave Naomi the green light. Yeah, Bill would be upset – so what? Naomi was a Dupree woman! And by now, you know what that means. If you don't...you need to be watching!

Powerhouse Anita hasn't had her own story yet – her thing has been reacting to the drama caused by her family – though we did get the first hints of what such a story might be like. Anita liked to keep herself busy with charities and benefits, as we saw, but twice she stared longingly at the photo of herself rocking a stage back in the day. Yep. Anita wants to start performing again! She just hasn't fully acknowledged it yet.

Or did she? Naomi got her own personal side gig as Anita's beatbox after Anita announced she'd been following rap and could hit the M-I-C as well or better than today's hip-hop artists. And you know what? She did! I mean, it wasn't without a slight element of cringe, as Chelsea and Kat might say – a 60+ woman busting rhymes? But Tamara Tunie brought so much fun to it – and rhythm – that maybe we will in fact see an Anita Dupree feature on a record sometime soon!

Will Dani buy it, or will she be too blitzed to even know when it drops? Because the only drops she paid attention to this past week were drops of vodka – first in her morning OJ at the country club. She ordered it, not expecting to run into Grampa Vernon, but by that point, Dani was so focused on her upcoming meeting with fashion show planners that she left the table before her beverage even arrived.

Clearly of the “waste not want not” generation, Vernon availed himself of Dani's orange juice and found out it was 90 proof. He didn't say a word, but he did look worried after Dani gleefully came back and chugged from the glass. It looked like she poured it into a fancier decanter because by the time she was laughing with the event planners, she was sippin' and havin' a blast.

Chelsea joined the pow-wow, yet, unlike her mom, she looked ready to hurl. But credit where credit is due – when finally alone with Dani, Chelsea went for it and admitted she wanted to quit modeling in favor of creating a clothing line with Kat. And Dani was okay with it! Well, she was hurt that Chelsea hadn't opened up before because she'd been afraid Dani would fall apart – but Dani recognized that, when she was 17, she'd left for New York against her parents' wishes, so it was only natural for Chelsea to strike out on her own as well.

We'll never know if the show of support was only the vodka talking, but we do know that Dani went home and told her vintage magazine cover that she wished she could warn her what was coming, knocking back the booze like it was Kool-Aid. Nicole came by and witnessed this but didn't say word one about Dani's drinking, either. I wonder if she and Vernon will compare notes on this later?

Nicole did say something that damn near had me cheering. Listening to Dani recount how much she'd given up for Bill, and how much she wanted Bill back no matter how terrible he had been to her, Nicole said that Dani was codependent. Oh, hell yeah! I mean, Dani is, for sure (I should know; I held the world title in codependency throughout the '90s and early aughts), but it was just so refreshing to hear the word used on a soap.

Look at the examples! On shows current and long gone, canvases are almost entirely populated with people doing unhealthy things for love. Sure, we want to be entertained, and feel superior to these folks acting a fool every day, but what message does that send to audiences? Hell, part of what I learned about how not to have a relationship came from soaps! So to see this pattern addressed on any soap? I'm here for it. Good on you, Nicole!

Sister Shrink also noted that one way codependency expresses itself is in withdrawal symptoms from the love object, just like a substance addict without their fix. Dani couldn't deny that one. Though Dani's an addict in another way, it seems; she's just still functioning, mostly. As I said in my last column, she passed out drunk twice in the span of a week. That's not just enjoying a cocktail after work, and I think Dani is on a long trip to the bottom that she'll have to hit before she's ready to go clean.

Just go back and hit 'em up style

It was a rare scene that saw Jacob and Hayley interact – the last time they really did was at the Hamiltons' target practice wedding. But Hayley spotted Jacob and approached him with the idea of helping her put Bill and Naomi's father-daughter sitch back together. Jacob, as Naomi's husband, provided an answer that was basically of the “hell no” variety. But it was clever of Hayley to try.

Having had her talks with Jacob and Anita, Naomi met with the three women accusing Mike of sexual harassment, and they'd thought things over. “Just forget we ever asked,” one of them said regarding the suit. That sounded very much like something a victim of such an offense might say, at least to me. But Naomi pumped them up. She was ready to go for it, and all she needed was their express permission!

Permission was given, and while Naomi was taking care of the particulars, Mike was proving the women's point by telling dirty jokes to Bill and Tomás at the office – and annoying Bill by again talking about how hot Hayley was. Bill even threatened Mike, and eventually, Mike slinked out of the office. I would say it's an open-and-shut case. This is the guy who griped about mandatory HR seminars. He missed the old days!

Bill didn't think the motion was so decisive, however, when he was served with it. He had thought Naomi had come by to mend fences, but nay; she was there to burn them down. Bill pooh-poohed Naomi's case, calling it frivolous, and he attempted to shake Naomi's resolve by insisting she was trying to punish him professionally for dumping Dani for Hayley since Naomi couldn't punish Bill personally.

Naomi stood her ground, though, and when she told Bill she'd see him in court and left, Bill was as proud of her as he was irritated with her. Mr. Hamilton told Hayley about how he and Naomi used to try hypothetical cases together and that he had passed on his legal acumen to her. He wasn't worried about any trial. Since he'd taught Naomi everything, he knew how to circumvent her.

Interesting, because Naomi basically said the same thing in reverse: She knew what Bill's process was, so she'd be able to stay ahead of it. I do hope this goes to court and that we get lots of juicy scenes from the stand. It should be fun getting a chance to see both Bill and Naomi in their element; so far, we have only watched Bill get rid of a case in the first week. Plus, the women Naomi is representing do deserve justice. Especially now.

Bill and Hayley had a separate scene later that I'm still trying to figure out the purpose of. Hayley arrived at the firm after hours, since Bill wasn't answering her texts, only to find a strange woman hugging him. Hayley hid out and heard them talk about how no one could find out they'd been together, with the woman adding that she loved lying to her husband. Hayley was not happy.

It wasn't direct in the episode, but you may recall early on that Dani warned Hayley that Bill was likely to do the same thing to Hayley that he had done to her – cheat. It was what Bill did; the past was prologue. That convo seemed to be grinding in Hayley's gears as she slowly but surely brought up the interaction she had witnessed. Bill explained that he was working an angle with the woman so he could represent her husband in a divorce case and defeat the woman with info he'd gotten from her that night.

I admit, I tend to believe Bill here, but leopards and spots, you know. We haven't really seen Bill be much of a cad yet, but we've sure heard about him having been one enough. So I suppose it's inevitable that Hayley might have herself a karmic problem down the line, as Dani predicted. I'll also admit that I'd rather hate to see that happen. I like Bill and Hayley together! So far, anyway.

Glam slam

At Casa Dupree, Anita met with Jacob's father, the chief of police, to talk about her working with the precinct's Fallen Officer Fund. Only glitch – our chief's name. It's Elon. I don't know why GATES went with that; the moniker would already have been tone deaf by the time final versions of the scripts were delivered to the actors. I hate to be so petty as to whine about a character's name, but...just really not a good idea right now.

Anyway, Jacob had already talked to his dad about having sourpuss Marcel as a partner. So wasn't Jacob surprised when Marcel showed up all sweetness and light, bringing Jacob a coffee in direct opposition to Marcel ordering Jacob to bring him some when they met. Jacob naturally smelled a rat and a few dozen other kinds of rodents. Marcel tried to act like he had just been hazing Jacob before, but Jacob called BS.

What looked like a simple personality conflict got a lot more complicated, real quick. Elon and Marcel discoursed privately, and the reason Marcel had been nicer was because there were certain questions Elon wasn't going to be able to answer if Marcel kept riling Jacob up. Then, over at the casino, boss man Joey took a call...from Marcel! “Handle it,” Joey barked when Marcel complained about taking a payment in broad daylight, which Jacob had seen.

Rut-ro! Joey is paying Marcel! And, if Elon is protecting Marcel, then Elon is controlled by Joey as well. This is some straight up GH stuff happening here, LOL. (Not that it's surprising; show creator and head writer Michele Val Jean worked on both GH and Port Charles, as did her co-writer, Robert Guza.) And if Sonny Corinthos rules that soapy mob, Joey Armstrong seems ready to sweep this fictional D.C. with his own crime org.

Joey's main target, at the moment, seems to be dopey doc and gambling addict Doug McBride. As you know if you've been following, Joey paid off Doug's debts at the casino and Doug has been trying to win enough to square things. But Joey, for reasons unknown just yet, wants to bankrupt Doug so he can get Doug to do...whatever it is he wants Doug to do.

Joey, in his funky floral shirts that I definitely want copies of, took two more Operation Doug steps this week. For his opening act, he approached Vanessa at Orphey Gene's. She was wary of this handsome stranger at first until he revealed that he wanted to hire her as a realtor so he could get a fancy, accessible house for his ailing mom. This got Van right in the feels, and she was all in on helping.

Vanessa got it somewhere else regarding Joey as well, because it seems that so far, she's never met a man she didn't like. Joey had said before that he knows how to read people and use details about them against them, so surely he took note of her breathing getting heavier. For Joey's second trick, he later approached the McBrides at Uptown, where Vanessa was ready to chuck her rare night out with Doug in the recycling bin.

If Doug hadn't been uncomfortable with Joey's appearance before, he was after Vanessa offered for Joey to join them. He politely declined but dropped the code word about “someone getting lucky” to entice Doug – suddenly, Doug's free night became one he needed to spend “at the hospital.” But not before the doc and realtor got into a bit of an argument about their brief table guest.

Doug brought up Joey's reputation but didn't spell it out for Vanessa, who said she'd also heard some things but couldn't confirm one way or the other. As I said, Joey is working to make Doug his bitch. But how will Vanessa turn out to be part of his plan? It's kinda brilliant to rope her into this – and it seems more is coming, as she perused the casino's social media account once Doug took off.

Oh, yeah – and Vanessa boinked Diego again, too. The personal trainer did his second impression of a green-eyed monster, this time torqued that Vanessa had been undressing Joey with her eyes. (Imagine if Joey gets Van into bed!) The cheating wife again reminded Diego that she could do whoever – er, whatever she wanted. Cue up said boink. I wonder if Doug will even care that Vanessa's been unfaithful when he finds out?

Jerk out

Martin, Martin, Martin, Martin. What is one to do with you? This man is a d**k deluxe, and I hate to say that about one of my brethren. To sum it up, this week alone Smitty learned that his hubs wanted to run for president but hadn't bothered to share it with him – then Smitty found out that he had been offered a reporting job only for Martin to tell the interested party that Smitty wasn't interested!

Control queen much, Martin? It's so great to have a married gay couple on a soap, and one that isn't treated any differently than any straight couple on the canvas; the Richardson-Smiths are just there. But I am already about ready for Smitty to leave Martin's ass. Blocking the flow of information about his own aspirations and then purposely getting in the way of Smitty reaching his own? Not cool, Martin...not cool!

They managed to talk it out, and while they did agree to communicate more and make it more of a point to connect with their kids, Smitty did have to wonder if Martin had any more secrets he was hiding. Of course, we know he does. We've seen Martin have nightmares about some dark event that's so serious Anita and Vernon are terrified a presidential campaign will throw a huge spotlight on it.

The Duprees also mentioned that someone they didn't trust was in on the secret as well. This tracks with Bill implying as much before his wedding, but not with Vernon and Anita making their family go to that wedding so Bill wouldn't find out what Martin was hiding. Shall we just chalk that up to first week storyline jitters? Anyway, this week Martin's dreams were followed by a murky but very much waking flashback.

Something about red lights...some kind of destruction...a body, maybe? I'm guessing it has to do with someone's death, and that Bill helped “make it go away” when he was still Mr. Dani and called upon to do such things. I do like that the show is making a slow tease of Martin's secret, doling out new clues now and again and not rushing through to the reveal. Slightly maddening, but definitely old-school pacing, and it's got me thirsty.

A lesser mystery got some sunlight this week, however, in the form of Tyrell coming home with a big gash on his face and bruising under his eye. With Samantha first lying that Tyrell had already gone to bed, and then Ty and Sam unable to get the details of his apparent bike wipeout straight, the helices of Smitty's investigative journalism DNA were spinning like a carousel ride.

Neither Smitty nor Martin could make headway with the kids, though, and Martin landed on the circumstance that he thought had taken place – Tyrell got bullied because he has two gay dads. And, Martin added, one of those dads is a politician. But Tyrell upended my conclusion by telling Samantha that some kid had grabbed his phone at school, taken a pic of Tyrell changing in the locker room, and sent it to some hot girl.

Hot girl's jock boyfriend saw it, thought Tyrell was busting a move, and clocked him one. That's actually a very au courant, very youth-oriented story. But...it doesn't quite have the higher stakes that getting beaten up for not having straight parents would have had. Outside of Martin or Smitty pissing off the jock's parents and suffering similar consequences to what I mentioned, I'm not sure where this can go. Though I'm glad we found out what's going on with Tyrell. Unless...maybe Tyrell fed his sib a line and there's still more to his story yet!

We don't have to take our clothes off

Eva is sweet with the Richardsons, catty with Kat, and quasi-subservient with Leslie, but when it comes to Tomás, she is a straight-up hawk tuah. She saw Tomás at the hospital and pretended to hurt herself by bumping into a cart to get his attention. Succeeding, she sexily asked for the lawyer's number in case she wanted to sue. In this department, Eva has inherited mama Leslie's lack of subtlety.

I guess I have to be fair and say that Eva started flirting with Tomás before she knew Kat was going out with him, but it certainly hasn't slowed her down knowing her under-wraps half-sister got there first. And for Tomás's part...he really isn't doing anything to discourage Eva. Yet he's in there telling Kat he's cool with her being a virgin. So, which is it? Could it actually be both? Tomás did tell Eva that he didn't know what he and Kat were.

I've brought this up before, but Kat and Eva feel to me like they're being primed to not just have the same father. My soap crystal ball says they're going to be mortal enemies. And I half wonder if Eva is going to find out somehow that Kat is saving herself and then give Tomás what he's not getting. I think Tomás better pick a side, though, and quick. He can't not see that Eva is coming on like a freight train with no brakes.

That's an apt way to describe Leslie, too, who added yet another alter ego to her growing list: the strawberry-blonde, closely shorn “Anna.” That's four identities now, along with first name Dana, middle name Leslie, and suicidal banquet worker “Sherry," I'm lovin' it like McDonald's, but if Leslie adds any more personas she's gonna need her own phone book.

Anyway, for a woman who wants to destroy Ted's life by announcing that she had a child by him that he ignored, Leslie sure likes to make people suspicious. As “Anna”, she approached Kat, claimed Eva was a mutual acquaintance, and implored Kat to be nice to Eva. As you can imagine, that didn't sit well with Kat. Isn't it something that Kat is basically pretty chill with everyone except Eva?

She must know on some level that Eva is her half-sis. Because she really hasn't had any tangible reason to be wary of Eva beyond seeing Eva open Nicole's desk drawer one time – well, no reason until now, anyway. But I'll get to that. Ted saw the in-disguise Leslie chatting up Kat and laid low until he could confront his ex in private. And, like their previous flare-up, Leslie taunted Ted so much that if he doesn't know by now she's actively plotting against him, his brain's made out of the plastic he uses on his patients.

Leslie spat that she had aborted the baby Ted had impregnated her with, just like he had demanded. Why even volunteer that? In fact, if Leslie wants the full bang for the buck she discussed with Eva, why engage Ted in conversation at all – or get around family members and risk Ted showing up to meet them? I'm surprised Leslie hasn't “run across” Martin yet. Leslie should have bounced, even if Ted did want answers.

She also shouldn't have tried to get $50,000 more out of him – unless it's a way of making him think she's been dealt with, only to torpedo his life anyway. I'm just trying to figure out why Leslie is taking so many chances. At this point, Ted may well just hire a P.I. to tail Leslie; he already asked Nicole never to leave him once his convo with Leslie was through.

And Nicole dropped a little bomb of her own, quiet as it was. She mentioned that when she was fixated on her dream of having another baby – Kat – Ted seemed like he was having second thoughts. This must be the period when Ted was straying with Leslie. After all, Kat and Eva are very close in age. Circling back to the two, Kat took a more proactive stride toward catching Eva in her assumed wrongdoing.

Kat set up a security camera in Nicole's office, then e-mailed Eva from Nicole's account and asked Eva to log Nicole's computer out of its hospital account. A bit of a stretch, but it was nice to see Kat acting and not talking. It was also funny when Kat was so busy watching the live feed from the camera on her phone that she barely paid attention to her parents at the outing that she herself had set up with them.

I'm not certain why Kat didn't just record the footage and skim through it when she got home. Being able to show her parents that Eva had rummaged through the office would have been enough on its own, wouldn't it? But I guess Kat wanted to catch Eva live on stage. Kat saw Eva crack open a file from Nicole's cabinet and demanded they go home immediately, leaving her parents flummoxed. (Love that word.)

What, is Uptown right next door to the Richardsons' house? Did Kat really think that Eva would still be there by the time mom and dad and daughter got home? For that matter, why is Nicole keeping a record of “Sherry” when “Sherry” isn't even a patient? It must be hundreds of pages long, too, because Eva was still reading when Kat burst through the front door, though Eva, having noticed the camera, did manage to cover her tracks and hide before being discovered.

Kat had been having trouble with a low battery. Yet her phone couldn't have been dead, because Eva snagged it and did something to it – I assume she deleted the cam footage. Because when Kat tried to show it to her parents...well, Kat just sighed. So the file must be gone. Or her phone was dead? I'm not sure. But I am sure that in the week's last minutes, Eva ramped the game up but hard.

Taking a drink of hard liquor – which we hadn't seen her do before – Eva declared, “Hairdresser: 1 – bougie bitch from inside the gates: 0.” L to the O to the L! But there was something more wicked in the way Eva grinned that Kat hadn't seen her “smoke” yet. It was something else new to Eva – for us, anyway. Could it be that, at least where Kat is concerned, Eva is as bad as Leslie? (BTW, is Laura still in the hospital? Surely she'll be back from her 6-8 week broken leg recovery soon!)

How did this week of GATES strike you, Scoopers? Does Naomi stand a chance against her pop in court? Did you agree with Nicole that Dani is codependent? Should Martin start looking for another husband? What do you think Martin's secret is? And do Kat and Eva seem to you like they're building up a rivalry for the ages? Check your coat at Soap Central's country club and spend some time in the comments section below!

Until next we meet, my soapy reader, live your life beyond!

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