Day of Laze

So I have to be honest with you -- I didn't want to write this post.  I didn't even want to bother with a title graphic, though that might change later.  We'll see.

Here's why -- I'm not angry.  Not because I don't think Sami and EJ's exits weren't ridiculous, but because I stopped caring about this show and the characters on it almost a year ago.  So the problem here is that I'm going to be serving up commentary on a show that lost my daily viewership eons ago.

Is it fair to the show?  No.  Do I give a shit?  Bigger no.  The show has treated its fans, and actor after actor, with a similar amount of fairness.  So if you're reading this now and thinking, "What right do you have to judge a show you haven't been watching regularly for a year?", I have two words for you: eat me.  It's my blog and I'll snark if I want to.  If you're determined to hang around until the bitter end, then yay!  Let's get some shit done!

One of my biggest problems with the show - a problem that seems to have gotten increasingly worse over the last ten or so years - is that when the writers aren't abandoning storylines (Tony and the letter 'B', Nicole framing Arianna, Gabi being a major factor in the Daysaster, etc.), they're rewriting history, except without the "rewriting" part.  What they do instead is just continue to chug along clumsily, pretending certain plot-points never happened and hoping the audience will forget.  Actually, I'm not sure they're even hoping we're dumb enough to forget anymore.  I'm convinced they just don't care.  It's clear they're going to do what they want, then do an interview in SOD informing us that it's what we want.  

Now I'm not usually one of those people who believes that outright fanservice is the way to go when approaching the writing.  You need the angst, the drama, blah blah blah, and I'm okay with that.  In fact I'm more than okay with the angst, the drama, and the blah blah blah.  But I'm also crazy about comeuppance, dickish and/or hypocritical behaviour being called out on, and bright lights and a little fresh air at the end of long, dark tunnels.  There's no light or fresh air at the end of Days' dark tunnels.  It's the human centipede of soaps.  

a.  A person (usually one of the town's designated "untouchables" - Kate, Nicole, Theresa, or any given DiMera) tells a lie, hides something from their past, or cheats.

b.  Said person keeps the secret.  All the while, the object of their affection is falling in love with them/opening up to them/beginning to trust them.

c.  Relatives and friends of the romantic interest repeatedly tell them how naive they're being, how the secret-keeper will never change, and all that crap.  Romantic interest tells relatives to mind their own business, that so-and-so has changed, etc. - all ingredients that will end up in the giant crow pie he or she will have to eat later.

d.  Several instances occur where the secret being kept almost comes out via pictures, an audio or video recording, someone who knows "the truth" coming out of a coma, etc.

e.  The secret-keeper and their romantic interest finally sleep together, and the secret-keeper gets that big, long-awaited "I love you" from their romantic interest.

f.  The secret comes out.  The secret-keeper begs for forgiveness.  The romantic interest never wants to see them again.  They have a couple of awkward run-ins in the town square, and then one or both of them end up moving on to someone else so fast that it makes your head spin.

g.  Wash, rinse, repeat.

God, am I tired of it.  I mean, I was tired of it years ago, but we'd had a couple of changes to the writing team that kept me hopeful that things would change.  Days is the secret-keeper and I'm the romantic interest in this story.  I trust them, I start to fall in love again, and then EJ fucks Abigail, or Rafe falls from the ceiling of a safehouse and cock blocks another Ejami reunion, or Jack finally comes back to be the interloper for a Dannifer storyline and ends up dying the kind of soap death that would (and has been) spoofed on many a primetime show.  I grow to trust them again and again, and I end up disappointed every single time.  If Roman had shown up on my doorstep to lecture me on my naivete, I wouldn't have been surprised.  I also would have told him to either shave his head or start wearing hats because the hair kippah he's been sporting for years now just looks ridiculous.

I'm not going to go on about EJ's affair because I pretty much touched (slapped) on all that here and here.  I'm going to try my damndest to just vent about EJ and Sami's exits.  I'm also going to try to keep it brief because fuck Days.

WORST. EXIT. EVER.

Jesus H. Christ, could this have been any worse?  EJ wanders out unarmed into a dark, wooded area to chat with a low-rent Justified villain and gets dusted by a dayplayer.  WHAT.  Worse yet, absolutely no story came out of it.  A couple of years ago I would have said, "But WOW!  How about those performances we got!" just to make myself feel a little less ripped off.  Fuck that.  Days has squeezed enough blood out of the rocks on that show.  The writing combined with the performances are what make a soap great.  Days has let the talent of its actors bear the brunt of their crappy writing for far too long.  Yes, Alison Sweeney was amazing, but she's always amazing.  James Scott is always amazing.  Michael Caine can do a kick-ass death scene, but that doesn't mean I want to see him die every time I watch one of his films just because I know he's a master at it.

Ken, Kristen pumping EJ full of whatever-the-hell to hint that he might not actually be dead isn't "leaving the door open".  It's laziness.  It's merely a way of getting out of having to write a conclusion to a lousy story.  Now what happens?  We wait until there's a chance in hell he'll come back?  Please.  There are a hundred ways this could have ended, but instead it isn't ending at all.  Worse yet, they didn't even bother branching it off into another story.

If I were to pull an ending out of my ass, I would have had EJ fake his death and set it up so that Kristen gets framed for it (since she'll be leaving the show shortly anyways).  How wonderful would it be for Kristen to get her just desserts by ending up in jail for a crime she didn't commit after getting away with so many other crimes she did commit?  Or maybe he frames Kate to get back at her for being the biggest ingrate of ingrates for turning on him after he helped her clean up the Nick mess she, Gabi and Sami found themselves in that set all this nonsense in motion?  Sami does all her mourning (so we still get all those 'wonderful' scenes), and then she announces to her family that she wants to leave town with the children to have a fresh start (something she'd need after Will fucked her over with that article the way he did).  Maybe in a final scene we see Sami and the kids arriving wherever they end up (most likely in Stefano's dark, tiny office dressed up to look like an airport).  We see the back of a tall man who we just know in our heart of hearts is EJ.  The kids yell "Daddy" excitedly and run to the mysterious man (we don't see his face, but of course who else could it be), and Sami stays where she is and smiles with tears in her eyes.  Scheming Sami, after twenty years, has finally managed to pull off the scam of scams (with EJ's cooperation, of course), and the Ejamily is finally free to be a family without Daddy Kippah or Papa Stefano hanging around to bring them down.  THE END.  Roll credits.

So what do we get out of this?  We get two open doors for two returns whether they happen at the same time or separately.  We get two exit storylines with proper conclusions.  We get all the mourning, moments of self-reflection, closure, strolls down memory lane, and goodbye scenes fans of these two characters need, and we get the possibility for future drama, distant and not-so-distant.  An investigation into EJ's death.  Possible courtroom drama (and maybe even a courtroom).  Characters who have been sitting on the shelves collecting dust coming back into play.  Maybe some prison drama.  For the distant future, we have possible drama or intrigue surrounding a reappearance from Sami should Alison Sweeney ever return to the show for a couple of episodes.  She and EJ are in hiding and she needs to keep it that way, but something (coupled with Sami's perpetual stubborness and loyalty to her family) compels her to go back to Salem (Marlena, Roman, or Caroline being in an accident or becoming deathly ill for instance).

Enough rambling.  The point is that there were so many ways EJ and Sami could have been written off, and we got stuck with EJ being killed by a nobody and Sami ending up in L.A. as a Real Former Housewife of Salem.  I have no words.  No, wait.  I have three, actually.

So what happens to this blog?  I'm not quite sure yet.  I might end up giving myself a few months before going back to watching the show and writing (even) meaner, snarkier commentary.  I might go back in time c/o YouTube and write about old episodes and storylines.  Who knows?  I'd love some ideas, though.  If you think of one, drop me a comment below.

IN CONCLUSION

In conclusion, here for absolutely no reason is an animated gif of male model Will Higginson. 

Diggy out, G.