James Franco's General Hospital Comeback: Even Worse Today

How could James Franco's second day back in Port Charles be even more of a snooze than yesterday's dramatically weird return, which featured around two minutes of the actor smiling menacingly under a hood (slide A), offering entertainment for food (slide B) and petting a toy monkey in a sinister manner (slide C)? Step into the shadowy alleyway and let Movieline explain.

It was worse because Franco got even less screen time than he did yesterday -- less than a minute total, in fact. In that short time, Franco staked out in front of the Harbor View Towers, where his nemesis Jason lives, and during Franco's first micro-scene (and the only scene in which he had lines), Franco creepily asked the doorman about "the mobster who lives in the penthouse."

"You ever see any of the bodies that guy murdered?" sneered Franco.

And that was pretty much it. Later that day, Maxie (aka "Crutch Pixie") saw Frranco in the street but dismissed the hooded figure as a creepy mirage; meanwhile, the rest of Port Charles waited for Franco to emerge from the shadows. To paraphrase one of Franco's plaintive wails this season, "Who do I have to screw to see some actual performance art?!"

Until then, here is his performance from yesterday.