DAYS: November Discussion Thread

[Dr Neil Curtis]

So all and all She still can be charged with false statements because it was assumed the baby died from the fall.

[Cheap21]

But thats the thing, Nicole didnt make a false statement. Prior to her official statement, all she said to the cops was that Jennifer pushed her and considering how fast it all went down and her state of mind, its not hard to see why she would think that. Once time had passed and she had time to process things, she was able to think more clearly and clarified what happened by the time ashe actually did make and signed a formal statement. Its not her fault the police made an assumption. The SPD isnt spposed to just "assume". An actual investigation into what happened would have uncovered that the baby was already dead from the fall. An autopsy is standard for homicide cases and I dont recall Roman ordering one

[Soaplovers]

Such a shame they went choose the direction they did with Nicole... when she could have been just the character to not cut Jennifer any slack. I happened to be on youtube.. and found this very nice video of a certain vixen from yesteryear basically calling Jennifer a selfish shrew...

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[dc11786]

Cheap, thanks for pointing that out about the police report and her statement. It hadn't dawned on me that Nicole hadn't given her official statement until later. It still doesn't negate the fact that Nicole led people to believe Jennifer had killed her baby. Jennifer wasn't being acccused of pushing Nicole down the stairs; Jennifer was facing manslaughter charges. Nicole knew Jennifer hadn't killed the child. Nicole's statements in front of Brady, Billie, and the paramedics led to Jennifer's arrest. Nicole stated that Jennifer did this to harm her baby when Nicole knew, at that moment, the baby was already dead. Nicole's claims at the Square lead everyone to believe that Jennifer had committed a crime. Nicole set in motion the events that led to Jennifer's arrest and at no point revealed that her child was already dead.

[DRW50]

A) This reminds me of why I don't watch a lot of old Jennifer scenes - they make me feel sad. It's sad to see someone who had a lot of charisma and natural appeal become hard and tired and pointless. Melissa Reeves is the Beth Ehlers of DAYS (in more ways than one, apparently)

B ) If anyone on DAYS today called Jennifer on her [!@#$%^&*], the character would not be so disliked. I have no idea what this character is supposed to be and why viewers are supposed to care about her. She is basically like those annoying neighbors who would show up on the Golden Girls and then die.

[FrenchFan]

Nicole facing charges? Huh, not the ending I was hoping for. AZ rocked her scenes this week. Everything else is boring: I love ED and Kristen and the ambiguity about whether she changed or not but her scenes with John are so coma-inducing. I like the Gabi/Nick/Will/Sonny storyline, that's all for the moment.

[Cheap21]

Thanks for this clip. Had no idea Eve was so feisty! Those scenes seem so reminiscent to the recent stuff with Nicole

Thanks. Guess makes sense but I hope this is dropped soon considering her mental state

[DynamiteKiddo]

I think Missy Reeves played this story as Jennifer being unhinged . . . the problem was that during her 'angst-y' scenes with Daniel, she still played Jennifer so cold . . . there's a total absence of warmth in her performances now. But she hasn't been given an opportunity to play much other than the 'shrew' role since DRT & MMcP took over. TL and then PB & PC positioned her as the heroine who all the boys wanted and it didn't go over well (though I loved the writing for J&J during PB & PC's tenure), then the Patrick and Frankie stuff didn't turn out either during Reilly Round II . . . DRT & MMcP were braindead to center a triangle around Jennifer, who had no compassion for Jack, esp. given his rewritten time away from the canvas. It portrayed Jennifer in the worst possible light and after they realized they screwed up so bad, they sidelined J&J and repositioned Daniel on the canvas, first with Billie and then Nicole. I do think Missy did a nice job with the, like, six scenes she did get from March-July '12 . . . because she got to be happy!

I may be in the minority, but I think this baby story got a lot of characters back on track. Before GT & CW, a lot of the characters were aimlessly meandering about the canvas, particularly characters like Nicole/Daniel/Jenn . . . this story instantly put them back on the map with relevance and clear focus. But the whole thing sped along and there wasn't enough of an effort made to draw the viewers into Daniel/Jennifer 2.0 . . . there should've been a lot of longing and the stakes should've been raised . . . Jenn should've gone to trial, etc. The pacing was just way too fast and none of the other characters (besides Nicole) suffered enough through it.

Ari Zucker, like always, completely stole the show . . . but at the end of the day, Nicole was afforded a lot more POV, and consequently, we didn't care about any ramifications for Daniel, Jenn, or their 'romance.' And I don't object to Nicole losing the baby--DRT & MMcP never should've given her a pregnancy story, a defining part of Nicole's character is her tragedy of not being able to be a mother.

But I think the real problem was that Daniel freakin' Jonas joke character fool was at the center of this triangle--I don't think anyone wanted Nicole or Jenn with him, so it was a lot of drama over nothing.

And how horribly were Ari Zucker and Missy Reeves styled for this climax?!? Holy shitballs, "Days" needs to fire their wardrobe and hair people!!!

[Cheap21]

I think Nicole's pregnancy was one of the worst storylines of 2012. I think only that stupid stuff in Alamania trumps it but that fortunately didnt last most of the year

[AlexElizabeth]

I just can't believe I had to sit through that whole pregnancy story and all the Daniel worship, and Nicole didn't even get a baby in the end.

[DynamiteKiddo]

Regardless of the content, the form of GT & CW's stories are leaps and bounds better than DRT & MMcP's. I know it's reductive to compare bad and worse, but just thinking about Alamania (and why the f would they send John/Hope/Stefano there when they had nothing to do with the original story?!?) reminds me of how poorly plotted everything they did was. I'm not a total hater, I'm happy to point out their good intentions, but even the ill-paced baby story (and everyting happening now) was, IMO, SOOO much better than the pointless Lumi reunion, the pointless Will/EJ matchup (which could've been so good!), that freakin' safe house stuff, Austin/Abby?!?, Mel/Chad/Gabi, and OMG Kate/Ian/Madison/Brady. I feel very badly for DRT & MMcP because they had such enthusiasm, but suffered from a total lack of experience. But at the end of the day, most of those ideas were just horrible. The bright spot for me during their tenure was Rafe/Carrie--those two finally worked in a pairing, for me anyway.

[DRW50]

It's one of the worst stories I have ever seen on a soap opera, in over 20 years of watching. It was not only unfocused, depressing, and degrading, and not about the mother, it was entirely pointless, and a huge slap in the face to the character and her fans.

[DynamiteKiddo]

I think it was much more degrading to Nicole and her fans to re-pair her with EJ and then give her a baby with him. One of the best things about Nicole is her plight of being childless--it has provided her with so much motivation and empathy. It may sound cruel, but from a character/writing standpoint, I don't think Nicole's supposed to have a baby and she's supposed to be on the outside looking in with Sydney. DRT & MMcP turning her into a supporting heroine with a sympathetic baby story involving Daniel was a big mistake huge. Rafe and Nicole have relevant history together baby/EJ-wise, and him claiming the baby was a nice temporary spoiler for him and Carrie, but moving Daniel over into the plot was ridiculous . . . he's her best friend's ex and they never would've gotten involved together.

GT & CW didn't clean this up well, but at least it finally became a story with movement and consequences. I don't know what I'd do if I inherited a story as disastrous as this. But I do think that, instantly, GT & CW provided the characters involved with clear focus and purpose--the story became a spider web of characters . . . it was actually an ensemble, whereas before Nicole & Daniel were somewhere over here, Rafe was over there with Carrie, EJ would pop up randomly, and other characters would awkwardly comment. GT & CW weaved Nicole, Daniel, Jennifer, EJ, Rafe, Brady, and even Justin and Abby into this cohesively and connectively. The story may've been bad but the form could've been a lot worse. I also am inclined to give Loraine Broderick a lot of credit as breakdown writer.

But I do agree that it was horrible that Nicole went through this another time, and it involved Daniel and Rafe, whereas before it was so much more organic with EJ and Brady. But like I said, I think GT & CW inherited a gnarly task with wrapping up this story and they seemingly agree that it's important to keep Nicole childless.

[DRW50]

To me, if you're going to have Nicole lose another child, and this one a late term baby, the last thing you should do is turn that loss into being about the orange monkey she's only been with for a few months. It took away what the audience was supposed to feel - her pain and grief - and made it about a manwhore, and a horribly unsympathetic woman who treated her mentally ill, longtime husband's death like a split end.

I get the idea of her not needing a baby with EJ, and GT/CW inheriting a mess, but the execution...didn't work for me.

I love your posts though.

[skiman12082004]

The only saving grace to this horrible story with Nicole were the performances on Friday's episode. AZ did a great job and I totally agree, Nicole shouldn't have a child because it does make her a more sympathetic character and when she does terrible things its due to that yearning she has for a child and that void she has because she doesn't have one. I want her to hit rock bottom and come back badder than ever. Not sure how GV's Eric will play into things but I want Nicole to be the biggest BITCH ever.