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Days of Our Lives is still playing the catch up game as far as ratings, but the stories themselves are finally moving at a quick but steady pace. This last week was full of characters coming to reality – or to their own terms of reality, for some. For so long, Salem has been full of people wandering in a fog or a bubble, solely interacting with people tied their certain plot or just being completely oblivious. Not only were the storylines streamlined, but the transitions and interactions were so tight that stories just flowed one into the other. While I may be absolutely over the whodunit story, I have to applaud the writers for attempting to give these stories well thought out and entertaining stories. It seems like these stories are building to an actual climax, another important storytelling factor that DAYS has been missing for far too long.
The show is definitely not perfect but it’s watchable, it’s enjoyable and it does not feel like a drag. That’s more than I can say about this show in a long time. I only hope the naysayers hang in until Dena Higley’s material finally dries out and we can see the new writing squad in full effect.
Again, I enjoyed this last week in Salem, it was hard to pick out pans for the week – I love that! Let’s check out some of my picks and pans from this last week on Days of Our Lives!
Picks of the Week
Wake Up To Love
We all knew it was going to happen this last week. Abigail Hernandez (Ugh, I know!) was going to wake up and it’d be a magical moment, surrounded by all of her loved ones and the end! This is a trope done to death (no pun intended) on soap operas and one heavily used on DAYS, but Abigail’s fight to survive held so much more gravitas. Her survival was obvious but what about her love and forgiveness? Chad Dimera was by Abigail’s bedside the entire night and we all knew why – true love, duh! I didn’t just love these moments because a favorite couple of mine was reuniting, but because it didn’t feel like the writers just put a Band-Aid on the screw ups in this story but might actually tell a story to solve a previous, bad story.
Fitting the theme of characters realizing stuff (Kylie Jenner was a year off!), Chad was finally clued in on everything that was happening right under his cute nose; while also realizing that he’d been a major douche in the process. We first see Chad flashing back to his final words to Abigail before the car came careening toward them, wishing the mother of his child dead only to have her have a very near brush with death just moments later. These two characters have been through hell but so much of it was self-inflicted. These scenes of Chad realizing he’d pushed Abigail away while she was foolishly trying to help him out were the things heartbreak is made of. In such a short time, Chad had to wrap his mind around not only Abigail shielding him from a car but from a murder investigation and her own sham marriage, all while he lived a farce with Gabi Hernandez.
Gabi reveals to Chad that Abigail’s marriage to Dario was for green card purposes. Courtesy JPI
Speaking of Gabi, she deserves props for not just standing up to mass murderer Andre Dimera and demanding the truth about Deimos’ murder but for also knowing it might be time for her to take a step back. It must have hurt like hell for her to watch Chad confess his feelings for Abigail, completely erasing anything he’d begun to build with Gabi in just a flash of a second but to also realize she was just standing in the way. Although I think these two women should have fought at least once, it was nice to see that undercurrent of them still trying to be friends through it all play out when Gabi went to pray for Abigail’s recovery.
I think anyone can sympathize with feeling like the third wheel and Gabi was feeling that in waves this last week. I must say that at this point, I don’t really care about Gabi’s feelings – and I’m even just as unbothered by Chad’s, even if Billy Flynn is such a pretty crier. Chad and Gabi were sexy together in the beginning, they could have had something great and comparable to Chabby’s epic story had their colorful history been heeded. Instead they were insufferable together and both deserve some heartbreak, in my opinion. But imagine how much more enjoyable this triangle could have been had Abigail not only had a problem with Gabi, but referenced the kidnapping of her best friend Melanie Jonas on top of her dangerous chain of events setting off the death of Jack Deveraux? Gabi was a woman so obsessed with Chad she literally caused Salem to blow up.
The set up for this triangle was just so confusing, so muddled for no reason! I truly hope that as we seem to be moving into the final act – finally – which will have some sense be made out of it all. Chad and Abigail may have had their magical moment at the end of this week with Chad’s love reawakening alongside Abigail, but no one wants a fairy tale reconciliation between them. Just like the many (unnecessary) layers that were added to tear Chad and Abigail apart, their finding one another needs to take some time and caution as well. I want them to kiss and make up just as much as everyone else, but I don’t watch soap operas solely for the couples. I want to see the human struggle of life and love and everything in between. This is the perfect story to play out that everything in between bit as it weaves so many different families and friendships through it that it’d just be plain lazy to do a one and done deal.
Don’t be lazy, Uncle Ron! We’ve had far too much of lazy with this show.
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