Days of Our Lives Review Week of 9-14-20: Big Changes Ahead

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John waking up didn't turn out to completely be the miracle everyone was hoping for.

Fans cheered when John went off on Sami on Days of Our Lives during the week of 9-14-20. He said everything a lot of us have wanted to say to her for months, if not years.

But John quickly realizes he wasn't himself, and later he lost his patience with Marlena. Could we be in for a more realistic medical storyline than we usually get?

John Wakes Up/Tall - Days of Our Lives

So far, this storyline has been more compelling than much of what is going on in Salem.

Technically, it's yet another doppelganger story since John has woken up with somewhat of a personality transplant. But at least the brain damage explanation makes sense and is something that could happen.

It's hard to trust that this story will stay in the land of the possible, though. There have been several sagas revolving around the older characters dealing with health issues, only for them to veer off into silly territory involving Dr. Rolf's ridiculous inventions.

Julie's heart attack story quickly devolved into Gabi being able to control her pacemaker with her phone, for example, and when Marlena was the one in the hospital bed, John switched her with lookalike Hattie so that Belle couldn't take her off life support.

So let's hope that John's issue really is related to his aneurysm and doesn't turn out to be the result of someone slipping a magical drug into his IV to turn him back into the Pawn.

So far this story is enjoyable, though. John's scenes with Marlena were especially powerful.

I was glad that Marlena understood John's behavior was stemming from his brain injury. It would have been ridiculous for her to be unaware of the way that brain injuries can influence mental health, given her line of work.

That didn't make it any less painful when John blew up at her too, aggravated that she wasn't giving him a straight answer about whether his short temper was permanent.

Sami might have deserved John's rage, but Marlena certainly didn't. So these scenes solidified the fact that this was coming from John's damaged brain and not because he'd been holding onto pent-up anger at Sami for 30 years.

Lashing Out at Sami/Tall - Days of Our Lives

Thanks to the brain injury, John now appears to suffer from the same sort of poor impulse control as Sami does. She's definitely getting a taste of her own medicine, but of course she is unable to handle it.

That's disappointing. The writers had a great opportunity to redeem Sami somewhat with this entire storyline. Although Sami will always be Sami, she doesn't have to be quite so over-the-top, and many viewers aren't enjoying the way she's being nasty to Nicole for its own sake.

But after John's collapse, Sami genuinely felt guilty, and that could have been a catalyst for her to change -- not to become all sweetness and light like Belle, but to be a softer Sami who does what she wants most of the time but thinks twice about being so nasty.

Instead, though, the writers allowed her guilt to last about five minutes and the second John said something hurtful, she was back to wishing he would die.

She was doing the same thing all over that she'd just felt so terrible about. 

Sami Confesses/Tall - Days of Our Lives

No wonder Marlena was upset with her after walking in on the tail end of that!

I wish Marlena had put aside her own anger, though. She could have made an effort to explain to Sami that John's outburst was most likely because of his brain injury and that Sami needs to understand that and control herself if John is mean to her.

Marlena: Until I get to the bottom of this, stay away from John.
Sami: I didn't come here to start anything.
Marlena: Sami. You've been starting things from the minute you came back to Salem.

Marlena wasn't wrong in anything she said. Sami has been stirring the pot from the second she set foot in Salem, and yelling at John that she hoped he got a fatal blood clot was inexcusable.

But she should know that she's not going to get anywhere accusing Sami of being the bad guy. That'll just make Sami double down. Marlena needs to use her psychiatry skills if she ever hopes to get through to her headstrong daughter.

Anxiously Waiting/Tall - Days of Our Lives

It was unsurprising that Sami took it out on Nicole once she returned to the Dimera mansion. She was already in a bad mood because of John and Marlena's reaction to her, and her old enemy was a convenient target.

Poor Lucas was stuck in the middle, trying to keep peace for the baby's sake. He clearly still loves Sami and will defend her to the death even though he knows her behavior is wrong, too.

Playing peacemaker between Sami and Nicole just won't work. Sami won't be satisfied unless Nicole is excised from their lives altogether, and I knew when the judge ordered Sami to allow Nicole and Eric to have visitation, it was going to end up like this.

I just hope we're not going for some silly Sami/Lucas/Nicole triangle now that Eric is on his way out the door. That would add nothing of value and just give Sami and Nicole even more of an excuse to be in each other's faces all the time.

And now that Allie's back, what's going to happen with this baby?

Solving the Philip Problem/Tall - Days of Our Lives

I'm hoping the first thing that happens is that Allie gives her son a name. I'm tired of him being Baby Boy Horton, and Sami even went as far as trying to get him on a flight to Europe without first giving a name.

I'm curious as to why Allie showed back up now and how she knew that Sami had the baby at the mansion.

There will probably be another epic confrontation between mother and daughter now that she's back, though, and Sami's choice to undermine Allie at every turn is going to have consequences.

Elsewhere, the silliest story of the week was this nonsense with Philip and Xander fighting over who gets which office.

I'm sure this was supposed to be comic relief, but I didn't find anything amusing about two grown men acting like kindergarteners.

Stunned By The News - Days of Our Lives

If I were Victor, I would fire both of these clowns. While they were busy breaking each other's coffee mugs and stealing each other's keys, the morning slipped away and nobody did a lick of work.

That can't be good for the company's bottom line, and Victor should have known what he was in for when he walked in on the two of them about to get into a fistfight. 

Of course, Victor has more important concerns on his mind... like his plan to deal with Ciara's disappearance by killing Ben.

It's ironic that Kristen was arrested for trying to stab Victor to get revenge for the baby-switch plot. The two of them are exactly alike, both focused on violence and vengeance instead of doing anything useful.

With all his money and resources, Victor could be organizing a more massive manhunt than the Salem PD is capable of to bring Vincent to justice and find out whether Ciara is still alive. But instead, he's wasting time on idle chatter about how he would love to sneak into the hospital with a gun.

Hope's Suspicions/Tall - Days of Our Lives

Relatedly, thank God Hope finally figured out there was a chance Ciara was still alive.

I don't know what took her so long. Ben turned up alive after a similar explosion set by the same person less than a month ago. Nicole survived a similar situation a year ago. And Hope herself has been presumed dead before when she was very much alive.

Considering that there was no evidence Ciara had been in the car other than her rings (which would have melted if that was really all that was left of her after the fire!), there was zero reason to think she was dead.

All those powerful grief scenes were a waste since very few viewers believed Ciara would be "dead" for more than a few days, and we turned out to be right.

Dreaming of the Future/Tall - Days of Our Lives

I know Victoria Konefal (Ciara) is leaving, but I wish that we would be let in on where Ciara is before she goes. Days of Our Lives did something similar when Vivian was resurrected -- Louise Sorel had one last scene and that was it until they were ready for Vivian's return.

That would be a better use of Konefal's last few days on canvas than these silly fantasies Ciara and Ben keep having about their lives together.

It's creepy and weird that they both had the same dream, right down to naming their son Bo and getting a strange gift from him. And it added absolutely nothing to the story.

Finally, Lani and Eli are on the outs after Eli arrested Kristen, and it just makes me wish the writers would admit that Lani is in love with Kristen already.

She consistently puts Kristen first, risks her career and her freedom for her, and defends her even when Eli points out that Kristen stabbed Victor. Kristen also goes to see Lani first thing whenever she sneaks into town and the two of them are constantly holding hands and saying they love each other.

But we're supposed to believe they're "just friends."

The writers wouldn't have to change much of anything to fix that. We already have Eli being jealous of Lani's relationship with Kristen, Abe disapproving of the relationship, and the women constantly having deep conversations. All that needs to happen is for one of them to blurt out that their feelings are not platonic.

It would create amazing drama for Lani to realize she's in love with Kristen when she's carrying Eli's twins, too, especially since Kristen is responsible for getting Eli and Lani back together in the first place.

And now that Sonny and Will are gone, there are no gay people in Salem at all, so a lesbian power couple would be a welcome change.

Your turn, Days of Our Lives fanatics.

What did you think of Days of Our Lives during the week of 9-14-20? Hit the big, blue SHOW COMMENTS button and let us know!

Ad if you're in the mood for more DAYS chat, be sure to check out our Days of Our Lives Round Table on Sunday.

Days of Our Lives continues to air on NBC on weekday afternoons. Check your local listings for airtimes.

Review

Editor Rating: 4.0 / 5.0
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Jack Ori is a senior staff writer for TV Fanatic. His debut young adult novel, Reinventing Hannah, is available on Amazon. Follow him on X.

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