Michael

So weird.

He did Beyond Salem in 2021, and they used him on the main show in 2017 and in Chad & Abby in Paris in 2019, so he'd be the more natural one for them to have asked this time.

Random as hell! I just saw this on Insta. I wonder if they're using him to usher in Noah, and they couldn't get either Christie Clark or Austin Peck. Or someone at Days wants to throw PM a bone for SAG insurance purposes.

Thank you for the tag, @DRW50! I'm away on a trip this weekend and cannot wait to dig into these and read people's commentary.

I need to listen! Forever & a Day was a fun soapy podcast to have available when I walked the dog.

I thought Emily/Hal was a really interesting pairing. And I think KMH played that version of Emily very well! It might not have been what people wanted from Emily, and the writing got pretty gross at the end, but I thought she embodied that character effectively.

It's nice to get some concrete data on this. It makes sense -- there's a lot of value in a show that gets people to open the app every single weekday. I do agree that it'd be nice if there could be a once-a-year kick in the pants for funding a special event or week of episodes or something. The tight margins are what MAKE it a success, so I'm not expecting them to break the bank and upend that, but there has to be a little wiggle room.

I think it's the next day, or nothing explicitly ties this one to the prior one, unless Shawn had on the same clothes as when he called in sick? So maybe I'm wrong. Did they acknowledge that Tate's little sister and babymama seem to have the same birthday? And why wasn't Tate invited to Rachel's tea party?? Javi trained to be an EMT (I thought it was in Corpus Christi, though). He revealed this after he saved Sarah from certain death -- by reminding her that she had an EpiPen -- and Leo questioned how he knew what to do.

It was soooooo goofy. Why even mention it? I was just assuming that the rest of it happened offscreen. Also I didn't care!

Kayla had a line about "moving the bachelor auction online" on Monday that made me guffaw. It just sounded so cheap and lazy. You mean the 7 people crammed in the Pub bidding on Chad didn't fully save the hospital? They're also acting like Maggie's $1 million donation makes a huge difference, but realistically, that's a dent in the budget of a hospital.

No, they aren't supposed to resemble each other, same as Ben and Alex aren't. I really liked the necklace stuff today. I agree that they could've had Tate hold onto this secret a little longer, but the confrontation between Julie and Doug did feel earned. Dare I say, I'm finding this to be a decent little story for the younger set. I like the level at which they're using Tate, Holly, and Doug at the moment.

I could see that working. There are certain things GG does well (sarcastic/snarky and Dad-Mode), and they don't use them nearly enough. I actually loved the scenes with him and Johnny, which surprised me.

I get what you're saying. He's been too overexposed and forced on us for years for it to work anymore, but this is the sort of character he should have been all along.

Yes! The first, Griffith-penned breakdown was... "just" a breakdown (I don't think they ever gave her a specific mental illness diagnosis). Mansi played that really well, though the whole show was way too dark. All the other, Marci-portrayed breakdowns were DID- or drugging-related. All of that was Carlivati.

The Necktie Killer, Abigail's breakdown, and Mansi's exit were all written by Griffith (parts of it credited to Griffith & Higley). Then, in fall of 2016, Griffith was gone, and Higley & Quan wrote Marci Miller's arrival as Abigail, the Chad/Gabi pairing, and Abby's stupid green-card marriage to Dario. Carlivati showed up in late summer 2017 and ended the triangle, reuniting Chad and Abigail. Billy Flynn got some of the better material of Josh Griffith's bleak DAYS run. The aspect of the Necktie Killer storyline that served as a Chad/Abigail love story was really effective. He also got that strange brainwashing/pseudo-pairing with Belle (Flynn and Martha Madison were pretty good together!).

He generally plays sarcastic or smug pretty well. He injects some life into it. They should've made Rafe a caustic [!@#$%^&*] heading up the Salem PD, without leading man storylines, and commenting on everyone else's idiocy long ago. I'll go a step further and say -- which I can't believe I'm doing -- that Galen did a nice job selling Rafe's love for Jada in those reunion scenes today. I like Jada fine, but I've never felt any kind of heat between them or attachment to them, but today had something that kinda worked. Go figure.

I kind of enjoyed that lunch-gone-wrong, too. This is the right "size" of story for current Days, with its budget limitations, to be telling. It was a little overly silly, and it's crazy that Amy Choi somehow doesn't know who Stefano DiMera was, but the idea of it and the scenes were fun.

I skipped all of last week (02/10-02/14) and just watched Wednesday of this past week. It's been about 17 years since I full-on skipped a week of Days. It doesn't feel like I missed anything.

@Cheap21 Exactly! She got so caught up in her mess of stupid lies that she malfunctioned and shut down. She totally overplayed her hand this season, and it blew up in her face.

I've gotta say... I felt like the Potomac cast had interesting, organic chemistry in Part 2 of the finale, without Karen there. It changed the entire dynamic. Still don't need another season of Mia's insane tangled lies or a Who's the Daddy storyline for Jacqueline.

I thought Gizelle had a solid "in-between" season where she wasn't the main focus. It's similar to what Erika is doing over on BH right now. It's not sustainable as a long-term note, but I think it behooves these 'wives sometimes to just be a part of the cast and support other storylines. I do agree that both of them need a new direction or new "era" moving forward if they're to continue. And Britani was great Friend Of casting on SLC. I don't want or need her as a main HW either, but the chaos and delusion she brings as a Friend is fantastic. It gives the other women something to play off.

Race, the fact that her mother and his father have been feuding for the better part of a year, Chanel having been with his sister, Johnny's lack of career... nothing is an issue for them for longer than two weeks.

They’ve skipped over so many potential stories for them. It’s insane.

The new Sophia doesn't seem glaringly bad to me, especially considering that she got thrown into some heavy storyline mid-stream, but she definitely isn't showing that pop that the previous Sophie had yet. I don't know that the character would've been elevated if this actress had been playing her from the get-go.

I wonder if his role is actually "being kept under wraps" or is just a small role.