Yet another Salemite has been found lying in a pool of blood.
On Days of Our Lives during the week of 6-05-22, Chad returned from watching a movie with the kids to find Abigail bleeding out on the bed, hours after they’d tried for a third baby.
Tragic? Yes. But is it a compelling story? The jury is still out on that.
Murder mysteries are a soap staple for a reason. When done well, they keep viewers guessing, talking, and tuning in to stay one step ahead of the show’s detectives.
They are most effective when someone kills a bad guy that everyone hated. The suspect lists are long, and viewers and characters struggle with relief that the person is gone while wanting the perpetrator caught and punished.
Lately, though, Days of Our Lives has taken to killing off legacy characters, and that doesn’t work so well.
It feels disrespectful to the show’s history when characters like Laura, Will, and now Abigail are killed off, especially when there’s no compelling reason for the murder.
In Abigail’s case, it’s particularly ridiculous. The motives are less than compelling. So far, the main suspects seem to be:
- Lucas Horton, who was worried that Abigail might make it public that he was the one who kidnapped Sami and who appeared to be passed out drunk at the time the body was discovered.
- Leo Stark, who wanted revenge against Abigail for helping screw up his wedding.
- Gwen Rizchek, who pushed Leo to attack Abigail because Abigail purposely broke a cup Gwen had made to give Jack for his birthday (yes, seriously!), and who the guards were searching for in Statesville Prison.
Not only is this a short list instead of the mile-long suspect list the writers promised us in spoilers, but most of this is beyond belief.
Leo was seen running from the scene of the crime, which likely is a red herring. Lucas was so drunk he probably couldn’t have stabbed Abigail if he wanted to. And while anything is possible in Salem, it’s hard to believe that Gwen sneaked out of prison, stabbed Abigail, and sneaked back in.
After all, if she’d escaped, why go back to prison? And she had no blood on her or anything else, either.
There’s also a fourth, more horrific possibility: Sarah.
Sarah told Marlena that she had nearly attacked Victor when she thought he was Kristen coming to attack her. Marlena suggested she talk to Abigail because Abigail had lived through similar hallucinations.
Is it possible that Sarah thought Abigail was Kristen and stabbed her before coming to her senses? I hate the idea, but it feels like the type of twist Days of Our Lives would think is clever.
Sarah is the last person anyone would suspect of murder and has no real motive, making her a prime candidate for guilt. And Days of Our Lives has this obsession with blaming murder on mental illness.
Abigail killed Andre and blamed Gabi for it thanks to her completely-removed-from-reality case of Dissociative Identity Disorder. Most stories involving mental illness on Days of Our Lives aren’t handled much better.
It wouldn’t be surprising if Sarah turned out to have killed her cousin while hallucinating this time. It’d be another annoying story reinforcing the lie that people with mental illness are dangerous and violent.
The set-up for this murder made it tragic, even if the whole thing was unnecessary. Chad and Abigail had just tried for a baby, and the couple had planned to go to Boston to surprise Jack for his birthday the next day.
Even though it wouldn’t be possible to confirm pregnancy this early in real life, the autopsy will likely show that Abigail and Chad had conceived a third child that afternoon to make her death more heartbreaking.
This couple was finally in a good place and was one of the few couples doing things viewers could relate to. And now Abigail is gone.
If only the Dimera mansion or Statesville Prison had proper security, none of it would have happened.
Leo has been sneaking around the tunnels for several days, and the only one who knows he’s there is little Thomas, who thinks he’s the Tooth Fairy.
While Abby knew that Thomas thought he saw the Tooth Fairy in the tunnels, she hadn’t shared that information with Chad, and Susan got distracted from investigating.
That secret room in the tunnels has caused nothing but trouble. It needs to be boarded up already! At the very least, all entrances need to be locked so that random people can’t get inside.
And while it’s nice that a guard questioned where Gwen had been, viewers could ask him the same question. Gwen threatened Abigail’s life, talked openly with Leo about revenge plots, and called him to demand he murder Abigail — all without the guards knowing because they weren’t anywhere to be seen.
As for Marlena, she should retire, as her advice has gone from merely bad to potentially putting people in danger.
If, as I suspect, Sarah killed Abigail while hallucinating, it’s partially Marlena’s fault.
Marlena suggested Sarah talk to Abigail about hallucinations. Sarah had just told Marlena that she had almost attacked Victor. Did it never occur to Marlena that Sarah could experience another hallucination and hurt Abigail?
The stuff with Marlena treating Jan was bad enough. This was malpractice.
The Marlena/Jan/Shawn/Belle/EJ mess went way too far when Marlena agreed to treat Jan.
There were solid reasons for Marlena to refuse to do so.
As Kate pointed out, she COULD have referred Jan to someone else who wasn’t personally involved with the situation. Dual relationships neer seem to be a problem in Salem — Kayla is also forever treating members of her own family — but in this case, it was particularly egregious.
Jan wants to steal Shawn away from Belle. Marlena is Belle’s mother. In what universe can she possibly be objective in this situation?
Worse, Marlena gave into Jan’s manipulations when she agreed to do this. A psychiatrist with more than 30 years of experience should NOT fall for Jan’s puppy-dog eyes and her claim that no one will give her a chance to turn her life around if Marlena doesn’t treat her.
Among other things, someone with the types of problems that Jan has needs to learn to respect boundaries, and a therapist that can’t say ‘No’ to her is not the right doctor for her.
At least Marlena put her foot down about Jan asking her how she felt about Belle and EJ instead of talking about herself. Still, the rest of the session with Jan was unprofessional. Marlena spent most of the session telling Jan she didn’t trust her, which had no therapeutic value.
She also froze when Jan went into labor, which wasn’t something a medical professional should do.
With the birth of the baby, EJ’s shockingly cold comment about its potential death, and Belle wanting to support Shawn, we’ve now moved into the stage of this triangle where Belle is legitimately torn and bouncing back and forth between the men.
EJ’s absurd suggestion that the baby’s death could be a silver lining (really, how did he think that was appropriate or comforting?) jolted Belle back into reality for a moment. Her anger at him for suggesting such a callous thing woke her up to the fact that she loves Shawn even though she hates this situation, and she ran off to support him.
Thank goodness for that, even if it wasn’t long before she went for dinner, drinks, and drunken kisses with EJ. Belle being civil and compassionate toward Shawn is a vast improvement over all the shrieking she’s been doing!
If there were one thing I could change on Days of Our Lives, though, it would be to end all of these drunk encounters that seem like good ideas at the time. People in Salem are all either alcoholics or emotional drinkers — even the most levelheaded characters get drunk and act stupidly whenever they’re having problems in their relationships!
EJ and Belle already had one kiss that was a mistake, so they can’t keep using that excuse. Belle needs to make up her mind who she wants!
Speaking of which, how obnoxious was Johnny and Allie’s attempt to pressure Chanel to choose between them?
Johnny: Chanel and I were married.
Allie: WERE. You’re not anymore. And you know Chanel and I had feelings long before you came along.
Chanel: STOP! Would you two stop talking about m e like I’m not standing here and like my opinion doesn’t matter?
Chanel was right to tell them to stop talking about her as if she was a toy they were fighting over. Allie made matters even worse by claiming that Chanel’s desire to choose herself was superficial because she was quoting Beverly Hills 90210.
There are too many people who are afraid to put themselves first, and in 2022 it would be compelling to depict an intelligent, headstrong young soap heroine focusing on herself instead of being desperate for a partner.
That’s who Chanel originally was after she lost the spoiled brat attitude and began thinking about what she wanted to do with her life. She defied Paulina t set up her bakery, devised a business plan on her own, and networked with her family and Allie’s to get recipes she could use in her business.
THAT was a compelling character! Once this stupid triangle began and Chanel started skipping out on work because she was upset, I was crushed. Let’s restore Chanel to her former independent, strong-willed self, and then the man, woman, or non-binary person who is right for her can come into her life.
In any case, Allie and Johnny’s competition for her heart was so obnoxious that I started rooting for Chanel to fall for Tripp and forget both of these idiots.
Also obnoxious: Lucas and EJ’s fisticuffs.
It was bad enough that they had to hurl schoolyard insults at one another over their children. Who Chanel dates isn’t even up to either of them, and there was no reason to discuss it. But then they had to start with each other over Sami and this stupid kidnapping.
That harebrained plot has ruined Lucas’ character and been a slap in the face to Lumi fans, who thought their favorite couple was getting back together, only for Lucas to suddenly have turned into EJ 2.0 while EJ is the innocent victim.
And to add insult to injury, Kate and Lucas are constantly discussing this secret in the middle of the Brady Pub. It’s so not private that I wonder if Kate wants Lucas to get caught!
The latest development is not good either. There was no reason for Lucas to suddenly steal a bottle of tequila, especially not after rejecting Clyde’s offer of a drink half an hour before.
Lucas deserves better. So do the fans of this long-running character.
Your turn, Days of Our Lives fanatics. Hit the big, blue SHOW COMMENTS button and let us know what you thought about Abigail’s murder, this EJ/Belle storyline, or anything else that happened on Days of Our Lives during the week of 6-05-22.
If you’re eager for more Days of Our Lives chat, come back on Sunday to check out the latest Days of Our Lives Round Table discussion.
Jack Ori is a senior staff writer for TV Fanatic. His debut young adult novel, Reinventing Hannah, is available on Amazon. Follow him on Twitter.