Sonny never really suffered

[Lisa58]

When Sonny woke up and ended up in NF. He became Mike and just kind of "fell" into working around the bar. He did get checked out by a doctor but that was about it. He seemed to settle in pretty easily too. I don't recall any trauma and/or suffering that he really even went thru. So during the ....what, 9 mos. he was in NF, he wasn't traumatized, he was hanging out, taking it easy and doing a lot of nothing.....until Nina entered the picture that is. That is when his life got really interesting...you can even say...fun. So now he had a place to hang around, close friends that he was really close to...... Then there was an intriguing woman that was very attractive to him and seemingly attracted to him as well. This went on for many many months. M & N got very close during that time period. So like I said.....Sonny never really suffered during that time. Whereas, Carly, Jason, Michael, Kristina......all were traumatized. It was a horrible shock and an extremely difficult time to get thru. C&J even had to worry about their lives, thus all of their family and friends lives.

So here we have it....a total disconnect. S/M wasn't traumatized...pretty much..at all and he even found great friends and a woman that he was really attracted to and connected to. While "his family" and Jason were dealing with trauma and the threat of danger.

No wonder why they couldn't connect (S,C,J,K,J....)Sonny didn't suffer, he was a happy camper, he had and has no comprehension on his time away was a party compared to what all of the rest of them faced.. He minimized all of C&J, Michael, Kristina, Joss.....trauma..their pain......the gravity of the situation. Sure Nina was ALSO having fun with S/M she knew from both sides..what was going on, yet she just took what she could get and enjoy every minute of it.

Sonny is a Narcissist for sure because after what happened he just acts and wants...Oh, let's just get on with our lives now...even though I am holding things back because I know that it isn't right and I can't..won't..change how I feel...but I feel much more for you and I want you to Carly while he is giving her ultimatums!

[divamagenta]

Didn't suffer? Sonny lost everything due to Nina's lies and schemes. He remains conflicted in his feelings even now because she messed with his head so badly, and even though it wasn't his fault, his family turned their backs on him.

Just because he doesn't fully grasp all she did to him, it doesn't minimize the cruelty of her actions. It reminds me of when an amnesiac Marty on OLTL fell for Todd without realizing what he had done to her years prior. Her lack of awareness in the moment didn't mean it wasn't horrific and abusive.

[Chris]

Nonsense. Everything Sonny has "lost" is all on him. He could have just gone back to being Sonny and put his family above all else, but the Mike in him doesn't want that and that is in no way Nina's fault. As the OP said, he was happy enough making a life in Nixon Falls. He didn't want to know who he was, even worried that he was maybe not such a nice guy. Sonny would have no such compunctions, but Mike is the alter ego that was always there and didn't make the choice to be a career criminal.

[divamagenta]

Nonsense? I could say that about a lot of opinions here, but I choose to respectfully disagree and leave it at that. It's great to have a differing view, but allow others the same courtesy.

[DayRose]

I haven't thought of it that way before but you're right, Sonny hasn't suffered. You would think that a person who had total amnesia would have been scared, upset, and frantic to find out who he was. But no, he just puts on a flannel shirt, picks up a cloth to wipe down the bar, and starts a new life. Sonny hasn't even suffered since he came back since he doesn't care about his family. Sonny's family are the only one's who have suffered and because of his selfish behavior continue to suffer.

[Mariko]

Fightcrab Well, he did say he had a feeling he'd done something bad in his previous life, and he didn't want to have to confront that. That was one of the reasons he had said he didn't want to know who he really was.

[Fightcrab]

Mariko, Yes, I remember that.

[catster]

Sonny is a pathetic coward.. the writers have done a lot of damage to this character. I see so much hate for him now and I used to see mostly love.

[PinkDiamond]

Sonny is the Teflon Don...nothing he ever does sticks to him...no matter what happens...he somehow, always lands on her feet

[ScrubsFan#1]

Sonny lost EVERYTHING that mattered to him - and he's in a BATTLE with Carly and Michael - teaming up with the lunatic that set out to destroy his family.

He is SO screwed up in the head now because of ALL of Nina's gaslighting and grooming - he doesn't even grasp and comprehend - that he WAS actually Nina's VICTIM.

He cannot understand how much his family SUFFERED because of what she did.

Now walking around as a completely OOC - barely recognizable - former shell of himself.

DROWNING in the remnants of his stockholm syndrome

The REAL Sonny NEVER came back from Nixon Falls

THIS is POD Sonny.

[Chris]

For another perspective, please refer to my remarks to divamagenta above (second comment from the top).

[DayRose]

I agree that we're not seeing the real Sonny anymore. Pod Sonny is a sorry excuse for a father, and he doesn't even care.

[catster]

This is exactly how I see it Scrubs. Sonny is her victim and he is so messed up he doesn't even know it.. when the real Sonny wakes up Nina better run.

[BlindLiberty]

He fell I into a life rather easily in NF. What strange to me is that Sonny's seems to think time should have stopped in PC like it did for him in NF. Carly and the family were in a tailspin, trying to juggle the business and Cyrus. From the time he fell off that bridge Carly was two seconds away from a panic attack practically the entire 9 months.

Sonny however was chillin' with his barn dances and slapping around the locals. Which might be one of the problems with him not connecting with his family. He got a 9 month vacation.

Personally I think Carly deserves a vacation away from Sonny and Nina. She needs chill on the beach with a bunch of half-naked men feeding her grapes. ?

[DayRose]

I love Carly too!

[Carerra]

She does need a looooooong vacation, or they need to rename the show from General Hospital to the Carly show. The writers seem to insinuate her into every storey.

[believeinme246]

She'll probably get pregnant and hide their children from them too. It's just what she does.

[lisav]

Yes OP, ur right. I hadn't thought of it that way before. You illustrate why the family is so mad and hurt by his forgiveness of Nina, its a total disconnect. He has no awareness of why they are so hurt. I didn't either really until you spelled it out. I've thought they've been so unreasonable but your POV makes so much sense. Helps me see both sides of things. I have never been mad at Nina, but now I really see how un empathetic she has been. She's only sorry she made a mess for herself. She doesn't really care about the hurt she caused the family. They are both clueless because they were having such a happy time in NF and can't relate that anyone else was suffering while they fell in love.

I really wish Sonny had walked in on Carly and Jason in bed that night. I think things would have played out more realistically. Everyone would have had hurt to repair from.

[Mariko]

Honestly, I think he could have talked to Carly until the cows came home, and it wouldn't have mattered a lick of difference. Carly has wanted her pound of flesh from Nina, and what Carly wants, Carly is going to make sure she gets it, everyone else's feelings or opinions be damned. Both Jason and Sonny told Carly to cool off when it came to Nina and just let it go, but she couldn't let it go. Carly is just like Michael, no matter what anyone says to them, it doesn't matter, they think they're ALWAYS right.

[1sbkmcfan]

The only person that wants Sonny to "suffer" is Michael. And it is not that he is not with Carly because Michael has witnessed years of both Sonny and Carly in and out of relationships with other men and women. He wants him to suffer because tanked his case to get Nina convicted of whatever the charge was which would get her out of the way of wanting to visit Wiley.

If Sonny is suffering at all it is because he didn't get his way in having Carly be so grateful for his return that she would overlook everything else. I thought Carly could have accompanied him to a psychiatrist to deal with whatever affects having amnesia could have caused. But she didn't. Looking back that may have been a good thing because had she taken him back I think his feelings for Nina would have still caused him to act on them eventually.

[CarnyQueen]

Oh, I think Sonny did suffer in Nixon Falls. He jumped into life at the Tan-O, because he wanted to show his gratitude to Lenny and Phyllis, and because he didn't have anything else to do. In many ways, he acted like Sonny expects his mob flunkeys to act.

But in the beginning Sonny very much wanted to know who he was and he talked to Phyllis about the blond woman in his dreams. As time went on, Sonny became increasingly discouraged and increasingly afraid of the unknown that was his past. So he doubled down on "I'm happy here, this is all I need." Phyllis and Lenny encouraged him in that and they both shoved him toward Nina.

There were a lot of things that were completely unrealistic about this story, but one thing that really stands out is the complete lack of assistance for this amnesiac from the very beginning. The clinic where he was first taken should have gotten him to a bigger hospital, and the hospital should have contacted law enforcement to figure out who this guy was. Instead, Phyllis took him home like he was a stray puppy, and the rest is Nixon Falls history.

[DayRose]

Plot driven writing is the problem with this story. Sonny should have been in a real hospital and not a clinic. He should have had extensive tests and a hospital social worker would have helped him get the resources to find out who he is. But since the writers wanted this outcome anything realistic is ignored.

[Lisa58]

The whole story really wouldn't have worked out if they did what they should have done and had Sonny get a thorough check up....especially with his amnesia and obvious head trauma.....That alone should have required and in depth exam from a neurologist///physciatrist....So Sonny was a happy camper, pretty much from the start. When I say happy I don't mean laughing and joking right away, I mean he wasn't "tortured, physically suffering..... day by day he putzed around and was in no hurry to find out his identity. While his family, friends, professional associates..good and bad, were looking all over for him and in a panic. During a time period accepting that Sonny was dead was devastating to his family and other loved ones. It also put them in the line of fire without the head of the crime family alive anymore. They were tortured in many ways. Sonny was not. The longer he was in NF, the better he felt...and most of that had to do with Nina.

[Clementine15]

l didn't see Sonny suffering. Maybe the first couple of days as he realized he couldn't remember who he was and wasn't taking the bi-polar med. After that he seemed pretty happy with life at the Tan0 and his new friends. And then the deliciously sexy Nina showed up and made life even better!
We might assume an amnesiac would be all in a dither about getting his memory back, but we didn't see that with Sonny. Yes, he lost his family and his 'business', but that didn't bother him in Nixon Falls, he didn't know it, was just living a comfortable life with a new love. He did not suffer at all.
Now, back home, he has lost his wife, several of his children (not obvious that he cares at all about them), mob business is probably not going too well, Mrs. Wu and some other Mr. Big (we don't know who) is on the horizon. But Sonny doesn't seem to worry about any of that. He likes flirting and dancing with the NF hot gal, he doesn't even have sex with her which maybe would make him seem a bit sleazy, he's just playing around.
So, NO, Sonny has not suffered!

[DayRose]

I agree. It's all fun and games for Sonny. It's all flirting and dirty dancing.

[believeinme246]

l he doesn't even have sex with her which maybe would make him seem a bit sleazy, he's just playing around.
!

This fact alone, as well as the fact that he hasn't impregnated her and cured her menopause with his magic sperm, shows that he had neurological damage beyond the psychological. Sonny is a ladykiller.

To me, I don't think the clinic in NF had sufficient imaging equipment to see the damage to Sonny's brain, and if he had diagnostics at a bigger hospital, they might find damage that never showed up in the tests back in NF.

[parker joe]

There were a lot of things that were completely unrealistic about this story, but one thing that really stands out is the complete lack of assistance for this amnesiac from the very beginning. The clinic where he was first taken should have gotten him to a bigger hospital, and the hospital should have contacted law enforcement to figure out who this guy was. Instead, Phyllis took him home like he was a stray puppy, and the rest is Nixon Falls history.

Sonny also refused assistance when offered. IIRC, he didn't want medical attention. Phyllis eventually got him help for his bipolar, but it took a lot of convincing. And he had an instinctual distrust of the police, who might have been able to identify him as a missing person/person of interest in the NJ shooting or his fingerprints.

I know Sonny has feelings, but I've never considered him the kind of person who truly empathizes with or connects to people on an emotional level. I think he sets himself in the role of the wise father/older brother to feel good about himself. And if/when someone leaves that circle, he looks for other people to slot in.

[Mariko]

This! Sonny was still a fully functioning legal adult. Thus, he was fully capable of finding out who he was. He just didn't WANT to do it. He was offered assistance multiple times by multiple people. He turned ALL of them down. No one was going to be able to force him to do what he didn't want to do. People seem to have this idea that amnesia completely incapacitates a person from living a normal life...it doesn't. It simply means they don't remember their life. They still have all the skills and abilities they had before (hence his poker playing, B&E and cooking skills) they just don't have any personal memories. One can still lead a completely full life and make decisions for themselves without memories of their past.

[CarnyQueen]

It's not unusual for bipolar people to initially resist treatment for that condition. Phyllis was completely unqualified to treat him for bipolar disorder. She got him to a doctor who wrote a script and then Phyllis appointed herself the monitor of his medication. No one ever suggested getting him regular treatment with a doctor, which was completely unrealistic and also irresponsible. But when he was first taken to the clinic where Phyllis worked, he should have gotten more help both from medical professionals and law enforcement. It was completely unrealistic that he didn't. And Sonny didn't distrust the police until the local cop tried to pin the break-ins on him.

[parker joe]

CarnyQueen Yes, in a perfect world, Sonny should've gotten more help when he first showed up. But he also has to make the effort. I can't recall him ever mentioning additional visits with the doctor who gave him the script. And he is an adult, Phyllis can't make him search for himself. Or go to doctors. It's a smaller town. They're not going to have the resources to keep tabs on every at risk person who strolls into town.