Why Kyle’s Young and the Restless Attitude Towards His Parents Is So Refreshing

Soap operas like The Young and the Restless often have the most bizarre habit of writing grown children as obsessed with getting their biological parents back together. We’re talking grown children who are old enough to have children of their own.

Young and the Restless Difference

You’d think they’d have enough of their own problems, personal and professional, to worry about. We see the worst-case scenario of it on The Bold and the Beautiful, with Ridge Forrester and Taylor Hayes’s children. It’s refreshing to see the best case of it with Y&R’s Kyle Abbott (Michael Mealor).

One Y&R Thing Is Not Like the Other

Kyle was initially suspicious of Diane Jenkins’s (Susan Walters) return, especially when he confirmed that she’d played dead and deliberately left him to mourn her all these years. But then Kyle decided he wanted his mother back in his life, and in son Harrison Locke’s (Kellen Enriquez) life, too. So he welcomed her with open arms. Even when he learned what she’d been up to, and how much danger her presence could put their entire family in, thanks to money launderer Jeremy Stark (James Hyde).

Kyle Abbott: Not the Same

But, at no point, did Kyle express a desire for his parents to reunite. Sure, he wanted Jack (Peter Bergman) to be civil with Diane. But he wanted that from everyone, including wife Summer (Allison Lanier), and even Summer’s mother, Phyllis (Michelle Stafford). Kyle didn’t ask for anything else.

Y&R: Bed Buddies

Kyle certainly didn’t ask for his parents to hit the sheets and reunite. In fact, when advised of that development, Kyle looked distinctively sickened. Just because he wants his Mommy back doesn’t mean he doesn’t understand how bad she has always been for Jack, and how awful things will be once his parents inevitably split up again. (Are you listening, Thomas Forrester and Steffy Forrester?) How nice to see an adult child with a realistic grasp of why his family should never, ever even try to reunite.

The Young and the Restless airs weekdays on CBS. For an in-depth look at the show’s history, click here.

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