If you’re like us, then you too aren’t buying The Young and the Restless collapse of Jack (Peter Bergman) and Diane (Susan Walters) either. Their crumbling marriage seemed to occur out of nowhere, and their public arguments seem to be a bit too performative.
We’ve speculated that Jack and Diane are faking marital strife as part of a grand plan to stop Victor (Eric Braeden) from wreaking any more havoc on the Abbott clan and Jabot. The duo is also desperate to get Kyle (Michael Mealor) to wake up and stop stomping around Genoa City in his villain era. Now to what end the couple is willing to go and what they actually are trying to do on a grander scale, we aren’t sure. However, Diane drops a small clue on The Young and the Restless episode airing on October 25.
She has a run-in with Victor and Nikki (Melody Thomas Scott) and reveals she and Jack are over, she’s no longer living at the Abbott mansion and she has been let go at Jabot. Furthermore, Diane is ready to make both Jack and Kyle pay for making her feel this great sense of betrayal, and hints to be willing to work with Victor to make this happen. Could she want to align with The Mustache in hopes of learning more about his plans for Jack and then stab Victor in the back? Again, until more hints are dropped, we’re a bit fuzzy on what Jack and Diane are angling to do.
We have to admit, we’re worried that if Jack and Diane are up to something, it could backfire in a major way. Not for nothing, it’s rare that anyone tricks The Great Victor Newman, so if at any moment he senses someone is trying to play him, you better believe he’ll make them pay. He has a long history of revenge to prove this point. Jack and Diane playing with fire could lead Victor to blindsiding them and making a play to acquire Jabot, or push Victor to make sure Jack and Diane’s fake split becomes a real one.
However, Victor is not the glaring problem we see with Jack and Diane scheming, if that’s what they’re doing. It’s Nikki.
Despite the decades of arguing between Jack and Victor, the fact Nikki has never really liked Jack’s spouses and all the animosity that generally flows between the Newman and Abbotts, Jack and Nikki have maintained a solid friendship. Heck, he was even her sponsor when she last spiraled out of control, risking his own sobriety to help her. She cares deeply for Jack and she may not be so understanding about a Jack and Diane lie.
During the week of October 28, Nikki goes to see Jack to check on her bestie given his recent fallouts with his wife and son. She’s deeply concerned for his well-being and is nervous he may turn to substances to cope with all the stress. If he and Diane are faking, he’s likely to keep pretending, which will only draw more sympathy from Nikki.
As Nikki continues to fall down the rabbit hole of sympathy, we think it will be quite the wakeup call when all is revealed. She may become furious to know that Jack could practice such deception. But her anger may not lie with just him.
From our memory, Nikki is still somehow in the dark about Victor actively going after Jack and Jabot. She knows Kyle works for Glissade, but she doesn’t know Victor is funding the company and he’s using Jack’s own son to try and take down the Abbott family legacy.
The Newman matriarch finally has a handle on her sobriety now, but how will she feel learning two of the men she holds closest to her heart have been lying to her? Could Nikki again fall off the wagon? We hope not, but you never know.
As we wait to see if our prediction about Jack and Diane faking rings true, we’ll be paying close attention for more clues.
New episodes of The Young and the Restless air weekdays on CBS. Episodes become available to stream on Paramount Plus the next day.
