Days of Our Lives Review: A Killer Revealed!

So Abigail killed Andre.

She's been grieving profusely and seems more heartbroken over his death than over her own father's.

But in a weekend cliffhanger twist on Days of Our Lives during the week of 2-12-18, Stefan walked in on Abigail, dressed in a black wig and flowered overcoat, attempting to put the lid to the urn on his desk.

How will Abigail and her family deal with it when eventually they all discover she's a killer who framed her best friend for murder?

I'm not sure yet how I feel about this twist.

The reveal was well done, with Gabi disappearing from Eli's bedroom and all signs pointing to her being in Stefan's room until the intruder turned around.

The set-up was executed so flawlessly that I forgot that Gabi wasn't in the Dimera mansion so it couldn't have been her.

Stefan was certainly shocked by Abigail wearing the wig, and I'm curious about how he's going to respond.

On the other hand, Days of Our Lives made it pretty obvious that Abigail was the killer, dropping a ton of un-subtle hints priior to the reveal.

And I'm not liking the direction this is going.

Abigail's claim that she'd beaten her mental illness made it clear that that's exactly what we're dealing with here.

Considering the awful way JJ's serious mental illness has been treated by the writers, it's hard to believe that Abigail's will be written with any degree of empathy, sensitivity, or realism.

In addition, the idea that a mentally ill Abigail murdered Andre reinforces the inaccurate negative stereotype that people with mental illness are violent. This is patently untrue and leads people to be ashamed to seek treatment for bona fide mental health issues.

All that tarnishes this storyline for me even though I also think that "perfect" Abigail turning out to be a murderer could be highly entertaining.

Trask: If you had told me that I would be having any fun with a Dimera, I would have said you were crazy.

Stefan: You got something against Dimeras?

Trask: Only that I’ve spent my whole career putting them behind bars.

Stefan: I’m not like the rest of them.

Trask: I don’t know. You and your brother Chad seem to have a lot in common.

Stefan: Like what?

Trask: Like you’re in love with his wife.

_{🔗 permalink: Like you’re in love with his wife.}

More interesting to me is what's going to happen with Stefan and Melinda Trask.

Trask is one of the most obnoxious characters in Days history. She is generally a one-note character who just wants to win her case at all costs.

But in her scenes with Stefan she was fun and interesting, and for the first time ever I found myself enjoying her instead of wanting to fast forward to end the torture.

Trask had a lot of chemistry with Stefan, and their identities are the perfect set-up for a drama-filled relationship.

He is a Dimera, a member of the family she has dedicated her life to putting behind bars at all costs.

She is aware of his interest in Abigail, and now that he's caught Abby dressed as Gabi, he knows she is the real killer.

I could easily see these two hooking up to cause trouble for each other and then falling in love for real.

I know we already have Brady and Eve doing that, but Brady is so unlikeable that I just want Eve free of him! 

Stefan and Trask had the opposite effect on me. Alone, I could do without either of these characters, but I really liked them together.

Gabi: Sorry to interrupt, but did I really see that happen? You’re engaged?

_{🔗 permalink: Sorry to interrupt, but did I really see that happen? You’re engaged?}

Gabi spoke for the audience when she asked whether she'd really seen JJ propose.

Of course, she was happy for her friends, while many viewers were disappointed that Lani's awful scheme had got this far.

The most frustrating thing about this is that the writers seem determined to continue along the path of pretending this is a love story.

Except for a few questions from Doug, no one has even expressed the slightest doubt that Lani is the love of JJ's life — an honor that's really reserved for Paige, who has been mostly erased since her ill-thoughtout death storyline as if she was never part of JJ's life at all.

Lani has done nothing but try to force JJ into a relationship with her over and over and over, and before that she tried to trick Shawn into one, but all of Salem acts as if this is a match made in heaven.

This relationship is allegedly so wonderful and love-filled that Eli is willing to sacrifice raising his own child in order to protect it.

Eli: I’ve given this a lot of thought over the last few days.

Lani: And?

Eli: And I hate the idea of another man raising my child. Lani, I grew up not knowing my real dad. I never even got a chance to meet him.

Lani: Eli –

Eli: Just listen. I don’t want either of us to lose the ones that we love.

Lani: So you’ll do it? You’ll keep the secret?

Eli: Yeah. I won’t say anything.

_{🔗 permalink: Yeah. I won’t say anything.}

I hope the truth comes out sooner rather than later. Lani disgusts me more and more every second she's on screen, and Eli isn't far behind.

Eli is angry that his child may suffer the same fate he did, never knowing his or her real father until it's too late, yet he is doing nothing about this.

No matter how many fake tears Lani cries about how it has to be this way for JJ's sake because he's so happy about being a father, Eli should not be giving in.

He knows what kind of pain Lani is asking his child to suffer.

He knows she lied to him and only admitted the baby was his when she was forced to.

And he knows this continued lie benefits no one but Lani.

So for him to go along with it shows that his priorities are completely screwed up, to say the least. Nothing should come before the welfare of his unborn child. Nothing.

His loyalty should be to his child and his cousin, not to the lying, manipulating scum that is trying to cheat him out of a relationship with his baby and using JJ's mental illness against him.

If only JJ was under the care of a competent therapist and people weren't enabling his using the baby's existence to escape his problems, Lani wouldn't be getting away with any of it.

And yet it's still being written as if she genuinely cares about JJ and is doing the wrong thing for the right reasons when it's clear she is nothing but selfish.

Having JJ give her Alice's ring was over-the-top.

I spent this entire scene wishing Paige was there for him to propose to. She would have deserved Alice's ring and we would have had a legitimate love story.

Instead, we have JJ giving a family heirloom to a woman whose only redeeming quality appears to be that she is related to the most moral character in the show's history and who cares more about possessing him than about his well-being.

I'm still not terribly happy about this John storyline, but at least John is starting to show some remorse.

John told Billie he was glad that Tripp stopped him from administering the fatal dose to Steve and he attempted to subdue the ISA agent who was calling the shots.

All of this suggests that John will be redeemed soon, but I still think it's out of character for him to have done any of it at all.

Now that Steve knows that he's being poisoned and has caught John at his bedside, this could get interesting. John could easily lie his way out of it — but will he?

And in the meantime, what happened to Paul and Will? I doubt John really killed them. Billie has been cleaning up his messes, but what did she do with them?

Eric and Jennifer finally worked out their misunderstanding.

I was glad to see Eric put Dr. Shah and his smirk in their place. Dr. Shah was a waste of screen time who was completely boring, useless, and prone to interrupting every conversation Jen and Eric had to gloat that he was taking Jennifer on dates.

Instead of wasting screen time on him, the actor could have been used to portray a proper therapist for JJ and we could have had a real story about him overcoming depression instead of this nonsense.

Anyway, with some help from Julie, Eric found the courage to interrupt Jennifer's date with Dr. Shah and declare his love for her.

I couldn't help thinking that Eric should want someone who doesn't jump to conclusions based on gossip and I didn't particularly care for Jennifer treating him like a kindergartner and telling him his interruption was inappropriate.

But I'm glad that they're finally back together. I really enjoy this couple and Jennifer was so mismatched with Dr. Shah that she rarely even called him by his first name.

Brady and Eve spent Valentine's Day with Tate, who wanted to give a Valentine to his Mommy.

I loved seeing Eve's softer side and it was clear she was missing Paige while she was comforting Tate.

Her comment that mothers always love their children even when they can't be with them was strange considering she grew up in the foster system, but it was also an acknowledgment that she hadn't stopped loving her late daughter.

If Brady goes against Victor and refuses to betray Eve just as she's showing some tenderness and vulnerability, he might actually redeem himself somewhat.

He's still not terribly likeable, but at least he was bothering to make a connection with his son and he undoubtedly appreciated Eve's help.

What did you think about Days of Our Lives during the week of 2-12-18?

Are you looking forward to the Abigail-as-killer story or is it already annoying you?

Were Eve and Brady tolerable?

Am I the only one who ships Trask/Stefan?

Weigh in below, and don't forget to check back on Sunday for our Days of Our Lives Round Table discussion.