#Days of Our Lives Review Week of 11-01-21: Terrifying Ghosts of the Past

Yes, Days of Our Lives went there.

Instead of the Halloween fantasy episode that has become a tradition in recent years, Salemites — and viewers — were treated to the Devil resurrecting three bad guys.

The Undead tormented Salem for all of two days on Days of Our Lives during the week of 11-01-21. Where will the supernatural storyline go from here?

While I wasn’t a fan of this silly storyline, it wasn’t as bad as I expected it to be.

It was short-lived. The Undead weren’t nearly as strong or death-resistant as the Devil expected them to be, as they ended up back in their graves soon after confronting their enemies.

And we got some great lines out of it, too!

Some random encounters didn’t make a lot of sense. The funniest of these was Kate’s conversation with Julie.

Kate ran into Julie outside Julie’s Place, where Kate offered the Horton matriarch an invitation to Thanksgiving dinner and condolences on Doug’s situation before gloating about Nick’s return from the dead.

Kate: Some trick-or-treaters at the Pub told me they saw someone who looked like Nick.

Julie: It’s obvious what happened. Someone is dressed up as him.

Kate: That would require the stores to sell Nick Fallon costumes. Just what every child wants, to be a psycho killer for Halloween.

The encounter was so weird that some fans wondered whether Kate was the Devil in disguise. If so, the Devil did a better job imitating Salem’s most prominent diva than Kristen did last year.

And Kate was right: there would be no reason for anyone to dress up as Nick Fallon, nor would the stores sell costumes to help people do it.

This confusing encounter would have gone more smoothly had Philip’s passing Nick happened first instead of the day after.

Viewers probably would have bought that Philip mentioned the weird coincidence to his mother, making it far more believable that Kate knew about it.

Nick was the creepiest of the three Undead villains wandering around Salem on Halloween night. He always had a way of talking that chilled me to the bone, and death has not changed that one bit.

He also had a real plan to torment Gabi. He buried Jake alive rather than directly attacking her the way the other Undead attacked their victims.

While I was not too fond of the idea of these three Undead stalkers attacking the women they had tormented while they were alive, at least the women in question were fairly strong.

Gabi more than held her own with Nick, Nicole disposed quickly of Deimos, and Allie refused to back down in the face of Charlie’s threats.

Almost nobody was at your funeral, Charlie. I didn’t go. You know why? I didn’t want to be fined for excessive celebrating.

Allie

Allie was the strongest of the three, completely blocking Charlie’s attempts to kidnap the son he had conceived via rape. (Though how someone who is Undead can take care of a baby anyway is beyond me!)

Thank goodness. Allie has been through enough, and we didn’t need a rerun of Charlie tormenting her. Besides, it led to her finally admitting she loved Tripp!

Let’s hope she remembers how she felt when she thought she might die and that we don’t have any more back-and-forth related to her feelings for Chanel.

Allie wasn’t the only one to turn this terrifying experience into romance, though. Nicole and Rafe finally gave in to their passion for each other!

I’ve shipped Nicole/Rafe forever, but this wasn’t the way I wanted it to go for a couple of reasons.

First of all, this is not the end of the story. Rafe gave in partially because he believed Ava had remained involved in mob business while pretending to have changed.

It’s disappointing that Rafe so quickly believed Gabi when he knows Gabi will say or do anything to break him and Ava up, and when he learns that Ava was telling the truth, he’s likely going to go back to her while trying to keep his one-night stand with Nicole secret.

Ugh. Can we stop this already, please? It’s not fair to either Ava or Nicole, and it’s not much different than when Rafe slept with Sami and tried to keep it secret from Hope.

Plus, why did it have to be on the Basic Black conference table?

This was so close to being a complete redux of John/Marlena that it might as well have been a scene in Johnny’s movie.

All that was missing was for a teenaged Holly to walk in and never be able to get over what she’d seen.

Sheesh. I’m all for nights of passion, but can we have some originality, please?

And if Nicole throws herself into a relationship with EJ, it’s going to be doubly frustrating.

Not only would Nicole be using EJ as a distraction from her feelings from Rafe, but she’d be playing with fire.

EJ tormented Sami after learning about her affair with Lucas. What will he do if he learns Nicole slept with Rafe?

Technically, EJ and Nicole aren’t a couple yet, but that wouldn’t stop EJ from believing he owns her. And if and when he learns about this conference table encounter, there will be hell to pay.

Nicole really should think twice before getting any further involved with him, but probably won’t.

Anyway, the Undead were so quickly returned to their graves that I had to wonder what the Devil’s plan was here.

They didn’t cause much real damage. They scared their victims a little bit, got conked over the head (or, in Deimos’ case, stabbed in the neck!), and went back to being dead.

Sure, there’ll be psychological effects, but what was the point of this?

Elsewhere, the most exciting news was that Steve realized something wasn’t right about John’s disappearance.

This particular Devil isn’t smart.

It almost got caught tormenting John once already, and Steve is incredibly loyal and resourceful, so he’s not going to stop until he finds and rescues John.

If the Devil tries to torment Steve too, it’ll have to answer to Kayla and Jack. Is its plan to make the entire town disappear so that no one knows its back?

That’s part of the problem with this Devil story. The evil demon doesn’t seem to have any goals beyond just possessing Marlena and making her do stupid stuff.

Technically, I suppose its goal is to possess Ben and Ciara’s baby as well, but to what end? The Devil should be about more than random bad behavior. It should have specific evil goals in mind, not just to wreak havoc for its own sake.

I’m excited that Susan’s back and is going to try to warn Ben and Ciara about the Devil’s plans for their baby, not that they’re going to understand what she’s talking about.

No one ever does, and everyone thinks she’s nuts even though she turns out to be correct most of the time.

I’d rather Ben and Ciara interact with her than any more of this annoying and obnoxious way they are approaching Ciara’s pregnancy, though.

The couple’s storyline has shifted from having endless sex in the hopes of getting pregnant to discussing whether they should have more sex in case they’re not pregnant.

And now that Ciara’s pregnancy has been confirmed, it’s all about her enjoying being waited on hand and foot while Ben treats her like she’s too weak even to answer a door because she’s two weeks pregnant.

Yuck! At least Susan will provide some entertainment.

Similarly, Victor was the best part of Justin and Bonnie’s impromptu wedding.

Everything about that wedding was ridiculous, from how tiny it was to Maggie randomly being able to perform the ceremony.

But Victor mocking it made it almost worthwhile.

Maggie: If any man, woman, or child should have valid reason to object to this marriage, speak now or forever hold your peace.

*Victor raises his hand*

Justin: Don’t even think about it, Uncle Vic.

Victor: It was worth a shot.

Victor’s characteristic one-liners cracked me up, he spoke for many viewers when he disapproved of this whole relationship, and he finally shared scenes with Maggie.

Having to put up with Justin’s “love story” with this Adrienne lookalike was a small price to pay for all that.

Finally, the impossible happened: I felt bad for Gwen.

This secret has been ridiculous from the get-go.

Gwen already admitted that Abby didn’t cause the miscarriage, and Jack forgave her for the initial lie. So there was no real reason to be angry at her now other than it fit the plot.

And for Jack to go from asking Gwen to call him Dad to telling her never to do so again, all within the space of an hour, made him seem wishy-washy and overly emotional.

I missed Jennifer during these scenes. Jack needs her to balance him out, or things like this happen.

Gwen was right, too, that Abigail did NOT handle the situation with grace. Not one bit. Abby spent months throwing tantrums because Gwen wouldn’t have an abortion and did cause the accident on the stairs, even if the baby had died earlier.

And now, her claim that Gwen lives to hurt the whole Deveraux family is ludicrous because it’s based on something that happened months ago that Gwen kept secret out of fear of Jack’s reaction.

Nope. Abigail is not the saint she claims to be, and while Gwen did plenty wrong in this scenario, she didn’t deserve Jack’s over-the-top wrath over this.

As for Xander, he shouldn’t have gone to see Trask alone, nor should he have given in to her blackmail. It was unnecessary, both because Abby had already told Jack the truth and because Jack wouldn’t have listened to Trask if she’d shown up with this story and no proof.

And doesn’t Xander need to pay EJ back still? Whatever happened to that?

Your turn, Days of Our Lives fanatics!

What did you think of the Night of the Living Dead storyline, Ciara’s pregnancy, and everything else that happened on Days of Our Lives during the week of 11-01-21?

Hit the big, blue SHOW COMMENTS button and let us know!

Hungry for more Days of Our Lives chat? Be sure to check back on Sunday for the latest Days of Our Lives Round Table discussion.

Days of Our Lives airs on NBC on weekday afternoons. Check your local listings for airtimes or watch on Peacock TV weeknights after 8 PM EST/5 PM PST.

Jack Ori is a senior staff writer for TV Fanatic. His debut young adult novel, Reinventing Hannah, is available on Amazon. Follow him on Twitter.