Hey, you know? That wasn't too bad, for what it was. ABC and SOAPnet have released General Hospital: Nightshift - Complete First Season, the 2007, 13-episode original cable spin-off of the long-running ABC daytime serial. Focusing strictly on the nighttime duties of the doctors and nurses who run General Hospital (and those duties would appear to revolve largely around sex), General Hospital: Nightshift features some fairly convincing thesping, a reasonably compelling story arc, and, thankfully, a quick pace to glide over the submerged ridiculousness of it all.

Now, before we go any further: if you're a huge soap buff or General Hospital fanatic, cut me some slack, okay? I haven't watched a daytime soap opera since I was a little kid, when my grandma babysat me in the afternoons for a couple of months (and she was a strict The Guiding Light viewer). All of the people and situations in General Hospital: Nightshift are completely new to me, and even after doing some background research on the characters, I'd still be on shaky ground trying to figure exactly who's who - not until about halfway through General Hospital: Nightshift did I figure out that Jason Morgan was some kind of good guy mob enforcer and not a cop. But as with most well-structured daytime serials, one or two episodes are enough to get a viewer hooked on the basic storylines, with part of the fun trying to figure out who's sleeping with whom.

General Hospital: Nightshift takes place in the fictional big city of Port Charles, and centers around the night-time activities of a busy, besieged urban hospital. "Besieged," because General Hospital is soon-to-be the subject of a hostile take-over by a large, soulless medical conglomerate, MedCam, who, it is suggested, will further parse care for uninsured patients, while running a tighter ship concerning the staff (in other words: no more doctors and nurses screwing in empty OR theaters). Counting the pennies of the resources-stretched hospital is stern, disliked Dr. Russell Ford (Richard Grant), while commanding, dismissive (but with a heart of gold) nurse Epiphany Johnson (Sonya Eddy) keeps the ER running smoothly, barking out orders to nurses and doctors alike.

Key players on the General Hospital ER floor are Dr. Robin Scorpio (Kimberly McCullough), an HIV-positive nurse who feels too much about everything; Dr. Patrick Drake (Jason Thompson), a brilliant neurosurgeon involved with Dr. Scorpio who has committed the worse sin any boyfriend can with his girl (he's prettier than she is); Dr. Kelly Lee (Minae Noji), a nymphomaniac who can't keep her hands off anything in pants; Dr. Andy Archer (Ron Melendez), an anesthesiologist who can't keep his hands off Dr. Lee or that pesky IV drip full of drugs; Dr. Lainey Winters (Kent King), a shrink whose father is suffering from Alzheimer's; Dr. Leo Julian (Dominic Rains), whose importance to the show, after 13 episodes, I still couldn't figure out; Maxie Jones (Kirsten Storms), a foxy little blonde nurse who likes handcuffs during sex but who picks up a nasty staph infection; Jolene Crowell (Amanda Baker), an enigmatic, no-nonsense nurse; and sweet, innocent man-stealer Leyla Mir (Naznin Boniadi), a rival for Dr. Drake's attention.

Into this world of constantly humping medical staff comes Jason Morgan (Steve Burton), a mob enforcer with a heart of gold who must perform community service mopping up floors at General Hospital when his buddy, computer nerd/geek/dork with a heart of gold Damien Spinelli (Bradford Anderson) shoots himself in the foot, an act for which Morgan takes the blame so Spinelli won't be arrested on serious charges. Working under the guidance of former R&B singer and now wise-beyond-compare maintenance man Toussaint Dubois (Billy Dee Williams), Morgan is now available on the ER floor to solve the many routine problems that arise for a floor cleaner at a large urban hospital, including delivering a C-section baby in a stuck elevator, killing five gang members in a pitched gun battle in the lobby, and solving the mystery of who's going around sabotaging medications and medical records - as well as killing patients - in an effort to ruin General Hospital's reputation.

General Hospital: Nightshift premiered back in July of 2007, and quickly became the highest-rated show on the fledgling cable outlet, SOAPnet. As I wrote before, I'm not a devotee of daytime soaps, although I appreciate their reliance on time-tested melodrama as a viable method of storytelling. And General Hospital: Nightshift seems to have that formula down pat. Since General Hospital: Nightshift is a more self-contained soap series, with internal subplots resolved within a few episodes rather than the weeks and months (and sometimes years) that such a resolution might take on a daytime serial, there isn't a lot of time for careful exposition or character development. Things happen fairly quickly here, and characterizations are executed in shorthand to facilitate speedy audience recognition.

And that fast pace isn't necessarily a bad thing, either, if you take the time to really examine the silliness that's involved here. Although there's an obvious attempt to inject topical issues into the storylines (HIV infection for mothers and their fetuses, gang violence, sexual and drug addiction), the fantasy-based structure of a typical soap is rigidly adhered to. Characters still misunderstand each other, seemingly on purpose; coincidences abound, with characters always walking in on someone else when they shouldn't, or hearing something untoward during an eavesdropping session (always a surefire method of info-gathering on a soap); and, particularly in General Hospital: Nightshift's case, characters still loiter around as they tend to do in soaps, conveniently placed to take part in the action once it gets going. That may be the funniest element of General Hospital: Nightshift - how characters who have no business being on a hospital floor continually hang out there - but once you accept the conventions of the genre, the basic appeal of serial storytelling kicks in, and it's not hard to just ride along, to see what happens next.

Soap actors used to get a bad rap for their skills from mainstream critics and the entertainment industry; saying someone was "just a soap star," was a convenient go-to joke when ranking levels of popularity or skill in discussing other actors (Friends used to have a field day with that conceit, when Joey played on a soap). Certainly the restrictions of the genre may influence the kind of acting that plays well within the soap framework (lots of meaningful or confused staring, plenty of stripping off of their clothes), but overall, the actors on General Hospital: Nightshift were quite good. I can see why a lot of attention is paid to Steve Burton; he's charismatic and has a strong presence. Evidently, Kimberly McCullough is one of the main stars of General Hospital; I didn't care for her character (too whiny when she's supposedly tough), but she was more than adept at running through the various emotions required of her stressed out character. Kirsten Storms was agreeably kooky and slutty (until she became all dewy and sick) and Bradford Anderson was suitably annoying as techno-goof Damien. And it's always great to see the criminally underutilized Billy Dee Williams. His assured performance here was welcome, and notched up General Hospital: Nightshift's cred significantly.

The DVD:

The Video:
General Hospital: Nightshift - Complete First Season's 1.33:1, full screen video transfers look about on par with what you would expect from a lower-budget video shoot. Blurry at times (especially when the camera moves) with some video noise, you may not like how this looks on a big monitor, so keep it small.

The Audio:
The Dolby Digital English 2.0 stereo mix is more than enough for this largely dialogue-driven series. English subtitles and captions are available.

The Extras:
There's a brief behind-the-scenes featurette, On the Set: At Night Shift, running 7:40, which has some cast members discussing the show.

Final Thoughts:
Evidently, there's supposed to be a second season of General Hospital: Nightshift coming soon, and if it's as fast-paced and entertaining as this first season, I'll gladly check it out. It's certainly not art, but it's well-done for what it is. I recommend General Hospital: Nightshift - Complete First Season.