After the news of Ashlee Simpson departing the show, she does not plan to stay unemployed for very long, which is nice, since the last thing we need is another "actor" on the government dole collecting an unemployment check. :)

Anyway, she is planning on returning to her role on Broadway in the musical Chicago in the role of Roxie Hart for a six week run starting in December.  To get ready for the role, she has dyed her hair black.

Well, we probably won't have a whole lot to say about her for too much longer.  How do you think she will exit the show?  Dead?  Locked up int he clink?  Locked up in a padded cell?  Maybe run off to Mexico with Auggie...  Who knows.  Let us know your thoughts in the MelrosePlace.tv Forum!

It's almost that time boys and girls.  Less than a week until...

• We pick up right where we left off, with Jonah and Kendra debating Tarantino and making with the flirty faces. After they start kissing, Jonah freaks out and says he's engaged. Kendra, to her credit, doesn't say, "So what?" but "Don't break your fiancee's heart! And Tarantino does TOO suck! Check!"
• Over at Coal's (The Only Restaurant in Town), Auggie Doggie and Increasingly Vapid Violet discuss Auggie's new appetizer. Suddenly, Donald Trump walks to the counter and says, "I see nuthin' but Dead Plot Walking here. Ya both fired!" Marcello - whose real name is probably Ryan - poo-poohs Auggie's platter.
• However, Marcello later chats with Master Eater Mason (Rick Fox of the NBA) and pitches Auggie's new dessert as his own! Swine! Violet gives Marcello the stink-eye and tells Auggie that he needs to resist Marcello's dominating will. Auggie says, "I'm helpless. I feel that decisions are being taken out of my hand, like there's little future for me.... Oh, excuse me, my phone. It's my agent."
  
• Dizzy David's impromptu make-out session in the MP courtyard is interrupted by Detective Smarmy, who is still investigating Sydney's murder. Oh, that old thing! Two quick points: 1) Detective Smarmy looks like Alberto Gonzales' younger brother, which doesn't inspire confidence. 2) Why is something always on fire in the MP courtyard? Do they keep a Eternal Flame burning for Kimberly Shaw?
• Smarmy's questioning of David's actions prompts ... Flashback! During the Red Scare of the '50s, a Senate panel questions Nick Knight about his Communist sympathies and the bottle of blood in his icebox and ... oops, wrong show. Sydney meets David as he weeps over the tomb of his newly dead mother. She says, "My father died, too. He used to be the White Shadow." "The White Shadow? Who's that?" "Sigh. Never mind. Let's just have Wild, Grief-Motivated Sex." "Okay with me." Wait, the White Shadow died? Noooo!
• Jonah and Riley discuss ... well, nothing much. He ducks discussion of the Auggie Situation. It's at this point that I realize, "Crap, I forgot to record the new 'V'!" Could these two just break up already? OK, it does start moving in that direction by episode's end. (Thank you, Caprice.) Riley offers to help Jonah with his wedding shoot, since there's no school today...
• ...but weekends clearly mean doo-doo over at the PR firm, which is fully staffed! Boss Coop preps Ella on this week's Fictional Celebrity Crisis. Beloved teen rocker Jesse Roberts has OD'd on bad cocaine and is in the hospital. They need to cover this up! (Forget bringing back Heather Locklear; this agency is so crisis-laden that they need to hire Noah Wylie and Sherry Springfield. Stat!)
• Over at the hospital, Ella talks to Jesse and tries to figure out a plausible excuse for him to be here. While you're at it, Ella, try that trick for the rest of the cast. She also tries to convince him to stay away from the drugs, "otherwise you'll going to have a power lunch with River Phoenix." Blank look. Ella, horrified, realizes that Jesse doesn't know who she's talking about. I love that!
• She then attempts to cajole her roomie Lauren into falsifying Jesse's admittance records. (Yes, of course, it's the same hospital where Lauren works.) Lauren refuses, saying that, well, it's freakin' illegal and she plans to take an oath soon: "Do no harm, and maintain my American accent at all costs!"
• Boss Coop isn't happy. He tells Ella to go back and offer Lauren $50,000, five sessions with a dialect coach, and a shrimp on the barbie. Two seconds later, Ella is confronted by David, who is fully aware that the agency is open on weekends. He's mad: Detective Smarmy told him about Ella's hiring of Private Eye Babylon 5 Guy to rummage through Sydney's pad on the night of her death. He's also worried: He admits to Ella that he blacked out after his argument with Syd that night. Wow, he really is Dizzy David! Flashback! Duncan MacLeod and Darius play chess in the Cathedral of Notre Dame in 1765 when... oops, wrong show. A furious David has just learned about Syd's long history with his father and realizes he's been played as part of Syd's sick-but-oh-so-enjoyable revenge kick. There are accusations of bitchiness and bitchslaps. End result: David doesn't know whether or not he killed Syd. Gee, I'm sure Ella is just loving the possibility that she had sex with an amnesiac killer! Better still, if Sydney was lying to David about her father, then the White Shadow is NOT dead! Yay.
• At the wedding shoot, Jonah and Ella argue over what's better at a wedding: band or DJ? For what it's worth, I vote for DJ. It's only one extra mouth to feed, and do you really want to hear someone other than the B-52s singing "Love Shack"? Come on, you've seen karaoke. You know the horror I'm talking about. Oh wait, they're still arguing.... Finally, Jonah says that he kissed Kendra last night, and that he knows Riley kissed Auggie. The big difference (at least to him) is that he feels terrible about it, yet Riley doesn't seem at all riled about kissing the Augmeister. Clearly, Jonah is either Jewish or Catholic. No other religious group has so mastered the art of obsessive guilt. He and Riley get dirty looks from some of the wedding attendees, who can't appropriately insult them because they're extras. Damn.
• Ella goes home to play "Let's Make a Deal" with Lauren, but when she doesn't see her, she casually starts flipping through Lauren's superb collection of hot, expensive, sexy dresses and envelopes of cold hard cash by the hundreds. Lauren shows up a second later (in a very hot dress) and expertly lies her way around Ella's somewhat-impressed belief that Lauren is remaking Pretty Woman. Ella says, with some level of understanding, "I can relieve you of the burden of your 'company lunches.'" And she repeats Boss Coop's generous offer. Lauren still says no! "My career comes first. I thought you of all people would understand that. Now quick, get out... I have to see a client who wants to me to dress up as Dora. He'll play Boots. Uh, I mean, I have to go to another company lunch!"
• Ella, who is supremely resilient, returns to Boss Coop with "Plan B": Tell the truth about Jesse's drug problem and get the best spin out of the recovery angle. Boss Coop says, "It's risky, but inspired." Inspired? What's inspired about it? Their one shot at getting the hospital records falsified didn't pan out, so what was their alternative? Sneak Jesse out the laundry chute?
• Riley goes to Coal's and tells Auggie that they can't hang out anymore: "No more jogging, no more Jenga, and certainly no more kissing. And besides, Auggie ... you've been fired. There's no future with us." After she leaves, Marcello starts making lewd comments about her to an sad, tense Auggie. Marcello: "Mmm, she's exotic and tasty." Auggie: "She's not a piece of meat." Marcello: "She's sweet, like dessert." Auggie: "Shut up." Marcello: "She's like a Dunkin' Donuts coffee roll ... no, more of a jelly donut. Can we share?" Auggie: "That does it! I love Krispy Kreme!" Auggie hits Marcello so hard Marcello goes back to the days when he had a real name. Violet looks on in what is supposed to be horror as people pull Auggie off. And, um, Auggie is fired. Again!
• Violet consoles a topless Auggie at his pad later. She voices empathy: "That guy is a total dick." Can you say that on broadcast TV? I guess so. Wham, she and Auggie start having passionate pink-slip whoopie.
• By the way, what the hell happened to Violet blackmailing Michael? Was that forgotten during the off week?
• David has a spontaneous schizophrenic episode. Either that or he just stepped into a David Fincher film. Hard to tell the difference. Anyway, these visions suggest he stabbed Sydney (although we don't see the deed, which means he didn't do it). He returns to the construction site where he believes he buried the knife, but it's not where he hid it.
• That's because the knife was conveeeeeeeniently found and given to Detective Smarmy. Just now. With blood and everything! Still, it was nice of the construction worker who found it to cover up David's hole. Detective Smarmy has a board of 8x10 glossies of the folks auditioning to replace Auggie and Violet.
• A guilt-ridden David visits Sydney's tombstone. Here you go, MP fans: August 19, 1972 - September 9, 2009. Here is the following conversation at home between me and my wife. Me: "So, she was 37." Judy (dripping sarcasm): "Yeah, right." Me: "Nooo, that's about right. If you figure that Syd was fresh out of college when she joined the cast back in the '90s, that's right." Judy: "She looks older." Me: "Our Sydney had a rough life. Porn producer, dead once before, spent years in prison ... it takes its toll."
• Riley and Jonah start... ah, I can't muster the energy for these two anymore. They acknowledge that they're two ships going in the wrong direction. Hopefully, Riley is the Titanic and Jonah is the Lusitania.
• Ella apologizes to Lauren for trying to bribe her. She also says that if Lauren ever wants to talk to her about her, um, side business, she's there to listen. Lauren still plays dumb, and Ella teasingly suggests they watch movies. "How about a Julia Roberts marathon?" That was cute.

I ran across this great promo from original series finale and felt that it should be posted.  There are so many people watching the new show that never saw the old one, so they may not be able to appreciate each clip in this as it highlights many of the characters and some of the greatest moments.  It's kind of one of those things that if you were there, you can appreciate how great it was, otherwise, a hand poking out of the ground or a chick rising from a foggy pool doesn't mean a whole lot and may just make you think that it was a Halloween episode.

The truth is, these clips only make sense after you are invested in the characters and you start to empathize with them and see where they are coming from.  You can better predict what they will do because you understand them.  As Henry Higgins would say, you become "accustom to their face" and then WHAP!  You get smacked upside your head with something that you didn't see coming.

Back in the day, there were not many night time dramas, but that kept changing in the 90's.  People saw the success of Beverly Hills 90210 and Melrose Place and kept trying to make "the next Melrose Place".  Many came and most went back to the forgotten realm of obscurity (although I don't know of any that lasted only 2 episodes like The Beautiful Life: TBL!!)

Now, Melrose Place is back and while all of the naysayers whine out loud, by next year they will be singing it's praises and talking about how they always believed in it.

Just sit back and chillax for a couple more weeks.  We have a few episodes to go and then...

Looks like we have a rerun to look forward to tonight.  :(  Melrose Place will be back next week on November third with episode 9 entitled "Gower".

Another character will be removed from the new Melrose Place show when Ashlee Simpson leaves the cast.  According to the Todd Slavkin, executive producer of the show, that has been the plan since the beginning and Ahslee has known the whole time. 

Ashlee Simpson was quoted as saying "Having the chance to play Violet on 'Melrose Place' has been a thrill. Although I always knew her story would come to a final, insanely unpredictable end, playing a creepy, unstable character was something I always wanted to do, so I jumped at the chance. Thanks to the entire cast and crew of Melrose Place for allowing me this opportunity."

Ashlee Simpson is the second cast member to have their release from the show announced this week.  A couple of days ago, Collin Egglesfield (Auggie) was announced to be released also.  It is not known if his release was previously planned also though.

You have to wonder though how this will affect the Who Killed Sydney poll! Polling will last until the night we all find out.