The children's hour

The momentum from the big paternity reveal continued through Salem. Chad embarked on an unnecessary apology tour. Will finally woke up. Nick steeped in his own crazy. And Sami was the voice of reason. Hey, it had to happen eventually! Find out more in this week's Two Scoops.

DANIEL, JENNIFER, and CHLOE I like Daniel. But even I grew tired of Maggie, Chloe, Jennifer, and Nicole exalting Daniel's success as a human being. We get it, ladies. His milkshake brings all the girls to the yard.

And, while I enjoyed the Jennifer and Chloe scenes much more than I thought I would, I haven't the strength to watch two fair maidens battle for Prince Charming's heart so soon after the last storyline wrapped.

I say let Danifer work with Doug and Julie to find out what happened with Alice's secret bank account. And have Chloe team up with Nicole and Marlena to try to rescue Brady from Kristen. If any dude needs a multitude of exes in his life right now, it's Brady, not Daniel.

JOHN, MARLENA, KRISTEN, and BRADY That sound you heard when John announced he was leaving town was my mother screaming, "Go back to Roman, Marlena!" Mom's never been a John fan. I doubt last week changed her mind.

John has every right to be mad, but this action was too extreme. I didn't mind the idea of going to Europe. I mean, who here hasn't done that to clear our heads? But John should have taken Marlena with him. They could track down Stefano and barter with him to get Kristen in check. They should unite over Brady rather than go head-to-head in the "Woe is Me" competition. I never thought I'd say this but, Jarlena could really learn something from Lumi right now.

Meanwhile, Brady acted like a jilted frat boy. Now that the truth is out and everyone is telling him it's a bad idea, he might want to realize that Kristen is the common denominator here.

My guess is that he'll realize it about the same time that Kristen falls for him. Stefano wasn't the only one skeptical of her ability to dump Brady. Soap logic is on the big guy's side!

NICK and GABI It's a girl! Gabi and Will are having a girl! And if things continue on the way they've been going, Nick is going to have my fist right in his nose.

Okay, DAYS. You want me to abandon my past love for geeky Nick and see him as a total punk bucket? Fine. Blake Berris is entertaining, so I'll go along with it. However, if you're going to make me do that, then you need to let the rest of Salem see that Nick is a creep. Will, Sonny, Sami, and Justin are on board. Rafe's detective skills are starting to kick in too. But I need more.

I need Gabi to see it and start standing up for Will again, just like she so spectacularly did with T. Between Rafe and Nick, Gabi is falling into that vortex of wimp where she can't make any of her own decisions. When Will made the mistake of asking Gabi to think, I wanted to let him know that he's probably out of luck. It's been a while since the last deposit in that brain trust.

I despise when DAYS does this to its ladies. Gabi needs to speak up and hammer out a custody agreement with Will. Nick needs to go play in traffic. He can get hit, slip into a coma, and awake as the real Nick.

ABIGAIL, CAMERON, and CHAD I really want it to come out that Chad beat up Nick. Then that stupid agreement will be void; Chad will get some anger management (which is far more than Brady ever got for beating up E.J.); and we can open up the House of Chad for an all-you-can-eat buffet of humble pie. Cameron and Abigail should probably go ahead and get in line.

I know that Cameron has only been in Salem for a few months, but describing Chad's actions as "indefensible" was pretty bogus. Then he topped it with the assertion that Lexie would be ashamed of Chad. If anything, she would want her brothers to stick together and be proud of Chad for apologizing twice. The good doctor should probably skim over Lexie's profile.

And, really, Abigail? You have no idea how someone so sweet could ever turn malicious? Should I call Carrie and Austin to weigh in on this topic? Maybe stick to just being your fabulous "I don't need a man" self and snag a shiny new internship at Titan or something like that.

LUCAS and SAMI Lumi is far and away my favorite set of exes in soapland. Bryan Datillo and Alison Sweeney have that "comfiest pajama pants" kind chemistry, and I simply adore them as acting partners!

I also genuinely appreciate the blend of good-natured joking and hard-core supporting between Lucas and Sami. I never felt that they'd turn on each other. Been there and done that. They're in a much better place now. They also love the snot out of Will. And they both made very good points.

Lucas is correct that Sami needs to learn how to coexist with Gabi. This actually shouldn't be that hard, since Gabi told Will that she understood why Sami blew up at the church. Then Lucas warned Sami to stay out of Will's love life. Lucas learned the hard way that parents don't need to swoop in and "fix" their kids' relationships. Right-O, Mr. Horton!

I also can't fault Sami for claiming that Gabi has an agenda. It may not be malicious, but it's there. I'd be a rich woman right now if I had a Schrute Buck for every time Gabi said something like, "You don't want to lose Sonny, right?" Gabi wanted the easier way out, and she wanted Will to go along with her plan. Does that make Gabi a horrible person? No. But does it make Sami right? Yup!

RAFE As much as he gets under my skin, the guy has been legitimately good at getting the truth out of people before he makes accusations. But last week he just threw everything at Sami and waited to see what landed. At one point, he said, "Will is in love with a guy! So your fantasy about Will and Gabi coming together for the sake of the child -- it's never gonna happen." Exsqueeze me, what in the name of unfounded homophobic undertones was Rafe trying to say there?

Look, I understand that Rafe was trying to protect his sister. But he needed to be more aware of his sister and less aware of his own ego. He took jabs at Will, Sydney, and Johnny just to get to Sami. When Rafe is reduced to insulting the very children he worked so hard to lie to, you know that something is off in Rafeville. Unlike Lumi, the Safe scene was bitter and unproductive.

WILL I'll get to all of the moving scenes he had with other characters in a minute. But Will has a couple major character flaws that were front and center last week. How he deals with them will determine what kind of a character he'll be going forward.

Not to sound cruel, but it was almost nice to see Will begging someone he loved to give him another chance. He's dismissed Sami and Lucas on so many occasions in the past. It's time for him to learn that forgiveness is a two-way street.

And both Sami and Will need to stop using sex as a coping mechanism. Last time -- she with E.J. and he with Gabi -- didn't work out so well for either libido-drive Brady, now, did it? Kudos to Sonny and E.J. for not taking advantage of their respective partners.

...and SONNY For the first time, I saw some dimension to Sonny. And I dug what I saw!

The decision of whether or not to stay in a relationship with someone who has a kid is a big one. No doubt, Will was scared of loosing Sonny. But that was Sonny's decision to make. I cheered Sonny on when he pointed that out.

However, Sonny needs to be a teeny bit careful when entering the "you didn't trust me enough to tell me the truth" department. Sonny is keeping a doozey of a secret from Will right now. But like I said, the fact that he's keeping this secret is making him interesting! Better yet, the secret has nothing to do with Sonny's sexuality! Finally, we're moving away from the one-note gay life coach that Freddie Smith has thus far been saddled with playing. I'm interested to see what happens next.

For the sake of Baby Girl Horton, I really hope Sonny stays around. He may be the only sane parental figure the poor girl will have!

... and SAMI No matter how old a child is, when he stacks up a triple bad decision sandwich and just keeps piling on the toppings, the parents kinda have to say something. I would have thought less of Sami and Lucas if they just said, "Well, he's over 18. He's just going to have to deal with this." Heck, when Sami cites Marlena, Eric, Kate, and Lucas as people who will back up her opinion, you know this is a critical situation. Will needed his tush kicked into action, and I'm not mad at Sami at all for doing it.

Yet, Will unleashed anger back at his mother. And Sami had to take it. A lot of people say that Sami never pays for her crimes, but this is the perfect example of how she's constantly paying for them. No matter how right she was, she had to leave the room and just hope that someone else could get through to her own kid. Ouch!

... and E.J. It's a treat anytime Chandler Massey and James Scott share a scene. But this one was especially touching because they brought out softer sides of their characters. Good job, gents!

Will was more honest with E.J. than he's been with anyone. He copped to taking the easy way out, which did my Will-loving heart a ton of good. Self-awareness is always a good look on characters. And I felt his pain when E.J. pointed out the hell of being forcibly separated from your kids. That advice, on top of Sami's screaming, Lucas' tough love, and Marlena's support, convinced Will to be a part of his daughter's life. Wahoo!!!

Still, I couldn't help but realize that E.J. knows the truth about what Gabi did to Melanie. That moment with Will wasn't the right time, but E.J. needs to tell Sami and Will that information pretty soon, especially since Gabi is repeating the exact same pattern of keeping quiet while people she cares about get hurt.

... and RAFE Their scene left me cautiously optimistic. I wasn't crazy about the fact that Rafe started out with a lie to Will. And, I was acutely aware that Rafe is very accomplished at lying to people to get information from them. Nicole has a DVD -- actually doesn't have a DVD -- to prove it.

But since Rafe and Will were bros back in the day, I want to believe that the hug was genuine on Rafe's part. If Rafe can follow through on his suspicion of Nick and nix the extreme personal accusations towards Will, I'll be satisfied that Detective Ex-Stepdad really cares for Will.

LOOSE ENDS: Adrienne can talk to Sonny all she wants, but she crossed the Kate Roberts Meddling Mothers line when she confronted Sami about Will's actions. Please give Adrienne something else to do. Since Ian, Madison, and Brady all left, isn't there an opening at Titan?

I can't wait to see what Nicole has to say to Kristen! I love that she's sticking up for Brady. I adore that she's doing it to help Eric. And anything that keeps her from crying yet again (ugh!) over losing Daniel is fine by me!

Sonny admitted that if Chad didn't put the truth out there, he'd still be in the dark. And Chad was genuinely sorry for putting Sonny in a tough spot. Love this budding friendship! Keep at it, fellas!

Between securing the best custody lawyer in town and sticking up for Sami and Will when Rafe turned into a massive hatemonger, I'm actually comfortable digging my Ejami foam finger out of storage. (I gave it to Allie so that I knew where it was, but I didn't have to look at it every day.) Don't look now, Ejami fans, but they're on their way back to each other organically. Whodathunkit?

HOT Justin's general awesomeness was on full display last week. First, he saw right though Nick's malarkey and told Nick to go find another lawyer. Then Justin put the kibosh on hurricane Adrienne and secured a family hug. At this rate, Justin might even be able to salvage things with Cousin Brady if they can catch John before he leaves town!

NOT I can certainly appreciate the irony of Sami accusing Gabi of lying. But I just don't buy the argument that Sami's past somehow undermines her correct assessment of the present. The two are not mutually exclusive. In fact, both Sami and Gabi can be lying brats, and they can both be wrong for it. Isn't America great?

LINE OF THE WEEK Nicole (to Sami): "Oh, hey, how's it going there, granny?" Arianne Zucker's delivery was a thing of comedic beauty.

RANDOM THOUGHTS Ha! Maxine would only talk to Gabi!

Did you cast your Dankies vote?

Nick responded to the word "insane" the same way Marty McFly responded to the word "chicken." This won't end well.

I didn't realize that many people at the hospital hated Jennifer. Et tu, Haley? Also, who is Haley?

I giggled when Brady knocked over the chair in Eric's office on his way out. It was such a little brother thing to do.

Sami was a monster for yelling at Gabi, but when Sami threw Arianna into a table, Sami was a good guy. Gottcha, Rafe.

Did you check out the new interview with Nu-Cameron, Nathan Owens?

I caught Nicole's snarky comment about Eric's collar being uncomfortable. And I wasn't mad at all.

As Jennifer followed after a steaming mad Daniel, I had to wonder which I'd like less: a) my doctor's girlfriend making him late for surgery or b) my doctor performing surgery angry. Thoughts?

Need more Two Scoops? Head over to read blogs by Laurisa or Tony for more ranting, raving and all out randomness

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