When I first heard that The Young and the Restless had hired Emmy winner Roger Howarth, I was stoked. There’s literally nothing the guy can’t do, from moving One Life to Live viewers past the heinous crime Todd committed against Marty to convincing General Hospital fans that psycho Franco was Elizabeth’s Mr. Right. But then it came out that the soap-hopper wasn’t just playing Sienna’s husband Mitch on Young & Restless, Mitch is also really Sharon’s back-from-the-dead rapist, Matt Clark.
I’m a lot less stoked now.
Why Start Off a Fan Fave With Three Strikes Already Against Him?
I’m mystified, too. Why would the show recruit an A-lister like Howarth and then saddle him with a character who’s too villainous to ever be redeemed? It’s not like any of us are going to cheer for Matt to live happily ever after with Sienna. We want him behind bars 10 times over. Once everyone else finds out about Mitch’s secret identity, who would even want to be in the same room as him?
The fact that Howarth is playing vindictive Matt points to another problem the show has had the last few years: Whenever things get dull, it just dusts off another antagonist from the past (except for some reason for this one) or makes up a new creep. By and large, these baddies always seem to be aimed at Sharon, too.
Young & Restless sprung Cameron from prison and had him immediately begin tormenting the object of his obsession again. The show reintroduced Ian and made up a sister for loco Eve Howard to mess with Sharon’s meds and chain her in a freezing sewer. Then somehow the daytime drama twisted up Sharon and Phyllis in cuckoo Martin’s bizarre psychological experiment.
Is that just Sharon’s storyline now? She’s only ever killing time between lunatics before returning to the frontburner when someone’s on hand to kidnap her?
Lamenting What Could Have Been
I have no doubt that Howarth is going to give a tremendous performance. He always does. But Matt skews awfully closely to the original version of One Life to Live
rapist Todd to possibly feel like a fresh challenge for the versatile actor. And given the big problem Young & Restless is having with its male characters — read all about that here — it could have really used Howarth and a Mitch who isn’t Matt to shake up the status quo.
For his part, Howarth is delighted. Having worked with headwriter/executive producer Josh Griffith on One Life to Live, the vet tells Soap Opera Digest, “I trust [him] completely.” We want to do the same, but… Matt never paid for what he did to Sharon (and Amy and Tricia). We can’t imagine any scenario in which the serial rapist has any long-term future in Genoa City (or L.A. or anywhere).
What are your thoughts? Psyched that Matt Clark is about to embark on a new reign of terror? Or would you prefer that the show tell us a truly new story?
On your way to the comments, check out the below photo gallery that counts down Young & Restless’ all-time greatest characters.
