On the Couch: Why GH’s Esme Prince Went Bad – Again

Esme Prince arrived on General Hospital as a bad girl who wanted Spencer. Or so we thought. It turned out that Esme was a bad girl who only wanted Spencer as a way to get Nikolas to screw up his marriage to Ava. Esme was actually a bad girl who was working for her biological father, Ryan, to manipulate his newest forever obsession, Ava.

On The Couch: Esme Prince

There was also her biological mother — who killed people with hooks. But two things mellowed Esme (Avery Kristen Pohl) out. The birth of her son, Ace. And, oh, yeah, getting amnesia. When Esme could no longer remember all the bad things she’d done, she became Good Esme. Well, she became Less Bad Esme. But then her memory came back. And Bad Esme was back (confirmed by her own mother here). But it’s not that simple. We put her on the couch to prove there was more going on here than just reverting to type.

No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

Esme was truly horrified when she learned all the horrible things she’d done before losing her memory. She also resolved to be a good mother to Ace. Those two things seemed to put her on the path of the straight and narrow. Well, at least the Less Bad and Narrow. Sure, Esme got her memory back. But she didn’t instantly turn to the dark side. That came later. When she lost her son.

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Hand Over

From the moment Ace was born, Spencer (Nicholas Alexander Chavez) has been obsessed with getting his little brother away from Esme. So when he had the chance to let Nikolas (Adam Huss) run off with the tot, he took it. And that’s when Esme learned a very valuable lesson.

The only way to stop folks from screwing you over is to screw them over first. If she’d embraced her dark side the minute she remembered it, she could have stuck Nik in jail for keeping her prisoner. Then he couldn’t have gotten Ace. Esme tried the good girl thing. It cost her her baby. So there won’t be any more of that. And Port Charles has no one to blame but itself.

General Hospital airs weekdays on ABC. For an in-depth look at the show’s history, click here.