#Days of Our Lives Review Week of 11-30-20: An Old Testament Kind of Girl

It’s official.

The Allie rape story has become a cartoonish mess that does real-life rape survivors no favors at all.

On Days of Our Lives during the week of 11-30-20, Allie went way too far in an attempt to get revenge on her alleged rapist, and it made a mockery of her entire plight.

This story could have been so powerful. It had all the elements of a great, soapy story that could have made a serious point about rape.

The circumstances of the rape made it a difficult case to prosecute, and Allie’s torment over not getting justice was legit.

So was Kayla’s anger over having to share living space with a stepson that she believed raped her niece and her difficulty separating what happened to Allie from her own feelings about what was done to her 30 years ago.

But then Days of Our Lives went completely off the rails by focusing on Tripp being falsely accused of the rape while Allie’s pain was mostly an afterthought. And to make matters worse, the writers wrote a very stereotypical type of rape while ignoring the fact that Allie was too drunk to be able to consent in the first place.

That all came to a head with Allie’s rushed and ridiculous decision to confront Tripp with a gun.

To be clear, the premise itself wasn’t necessarily terrible.

When Sami did it years ago, it made sense because she’d been screwed over by the justice system as well as violated by her rapist, and she took the only action she could think of to help herself feel safe again.

And an early episode of Law & Order: SVU featured a woman shooting and killing her rapist after the system failed her while still taking the crime of rape seriously.

But the way this particular story was handled was awful. It perpetuated the angry woman goes crazy stereotype, came out of nowhere and featured Allie trying to force an innocent man to claim he raped her.

Tripp made up a story about having consensual sex because Allie and her gun scared him; both of them ignored the fact that Allie could not consent to sex while drunk out of her mind anyway, and Allie conflated Tripp denying he was the rapist with Tripp denying that Allie was raped at all.

And if that wasn’t bad enough, Ava derisively told Kristen (who for some reason has full access to a computer with an Internet connection in a prison visiting room!) that Allie was no victim because she accused Tripp and called her a liar to her face without knowing a single detail of the story.

Sheesh. Could the rape apologism in this storyline be any worse?

It was clear that we’re supposed to agree with Ava that Tripp is the victim and Allie is the bad girl who accused him of something he didn’t do. And while Allie is wrong about who her rapist is, she still was raped, and that still should be taken seriously.

One of the many reasons this story fails is because we’ve seen little to no of Allie’s trauma.

Her emotions are restricted to anger at Tripp and disappointment that he can’t be prosecuted.

She acts like no one believes her because she was a party girl, but that would be more believable if the story were about questioning whether a sexual encounter was rape, not about questioning the identity of her rapist.

And again, this story would also be easier to take seriously if someone, anyone, acknowledged that sex with someone so drunk they can’t walk is not consensual. 

Instead, someone holding Allie down while she says No is rape, and someone taking advantage of her while blacked-out drunk is treated as consensual sex. Disgusting!

If Allie got way drunker than usual after just one or two drinks, why has nobody considered the possibility that someone slipped her a date rape drug? 

What it comes to is that the writers putting words in Allie’s mouth about how much it hurts not to be able to prove that Tripp raped her or that people think she deserved it because she’s a party girl aren’t enough, not when the writing is full of stereotypes, myths, and victim-shaming BS.

Once Ava disposed of Allie, the storyline quickly shifted to the question of whether Tripp would betray his mother’s confidence and tell anyone she was alive.

Mom? You can’t be here. You’re dead.
Tripp

It would have been nice if that was a lower priority than Allie’s suffering, but still, I laughed at Tripp’s reaction to discovering Ava was alive.

I don’t know why anyone is shocked when someone reappears from the dead courtesy of Rolf. It happens multiple times a year, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Rolf smuggled some resurrection serum into the prison if anyone gets killed in a yard fight.

Anyway, Tripp barely knows Ava, and it was ridiculous for her to think he would keep her secret. Plus, he was right: Joey didn’t kill her, so he shouldn’t stay in jail for her murder. (Attempted murder is another story, but apparently nobody thought about that.)

When Ava’s true colors came out, Tripp was repulsed, and quite frankly, so was I.

Tripp: Joey knows what he did was wrong and he regrets it.

Ava: One thing you’ll learn about your mother is she’s more of an Old Testament type of gal. Joey deserves to rot in prison for what he tried to do to me.

We’ve had more than enough revenge stories recently, not even counting Allie.

Plus, Ava doesn’t see the irony in her constant attempts to get rid of Kayla for “Steve’s own good” after she lost Tripp because her father drugged her and took the baby away for “Ava’s own good.”

She did her good deed by getting the gun away from Allie. Now she can go back to wherever she came from, thank you very much.

At least she and Steve came face to face, making her demand that Tripp keeps quiet about her resurrection more or less moot.

Meanwhile, I wasn’t much happier with Kayla than I was with Allie.

As both a rape survivor and Allie’s aunt, it was more than understandable that Kayla would have difficulty dealing with the Tripp situation.

But accused rapist or not, Tripp is Kayla’s stepson. Marrying Steve meant accepting Tripp into her family.

And while she doesn’t have to be buddy-buddy with an accused rapist, she can’t just demand that Steve kick his son out of the house and expect that to solve anything.

Steve was right that Kayla was putting him in an awkward position, too.

How am I supposed to tell him that? “I’m here for you, son. Anything you need. You’ve got my full support. But you can’t live here.”
Steve

He can’t be 100% in Tripp’s corner and simultaneously tell him to leave. Not only does that put Tripp at risk of deciding to live with Ava instead, but it will ruin Steve’s relationship with Tripp.

The three of them should have sat down together and discussed how difficult this situation was and made some decisions as a family. And if Kayla was hellbent on kicking Tripp out, she and Steve should have at least told him this together.

Expecting Steve to do all the heavy lifting on this because Tripp is his son wasn’t fair, and it’s only going to cause more resentment between Steve and Kayla down the line.

Kayla’s demands weren’t nearly as obnoxious as Lani’s, though.

Lani does have the right to decide who she does and doesn’t want by her side at her prenatal appointments and the delivery room, but she was so damn manipulative about it.

She didn’t seem to have any clue that she was keeping Eli from having anything to do with his unborn babies; she still acts like Kristen is her first priority while denying that she’s more in love with her “best friend” than her husband, and she tried to guilt Eli out of standing up to her nonsense.

Eli: Who are you going to get to be your Lamaze coach at this late date?

Lani: I don’t know. Not my dad, cause he’s on your side. And not my best friend, cause she’s in prison because of you.

Eli: I AM SO DAMN TIRED OF YOU THROWING THAT BACK IN MY FACE!

Lani: I’m eight months pregnant and you’re yelling at me?

Thankfully, this time Eli didn’t fall for it.

I 100% supported his standing up to Lani, telling her that he was not only doing his job but keeping her stupid ass out of prison, and informing her that he was not giving up his right to be a father to her babies just because she’d been throwing a tantrum for a couple of months.

I was just disappointed that Eli didn’t ask for divorce himself instead of saying he’d be in the kids’ lives if Lani chose to get one. There is no reason for him to stay with someone who doesn’t love him, regularly excoriates him for doing his job, and is as abusive and manipulative as hell. 

Eli deserves better. Plus, next time Lani throws this crap in his face, he should remind her that she was lucky he took her back after she dumped him at the altar because she was afraid to stand up to Gabi.

Speaking of which, could Gabi please join Dario wherever it is he wandered off to?

I don’t mind Rafe returning, but one episode’s worth of Gabi is more than I can handle.

She had some nerve expecting Jake to wait around for her to show back up after she dumped him in no uncertain terms and broke his heart. It doesn’t matter that she lied to protect him from some Mexican mob.

Nobody in their right mind would want her back after the way she treated Jake, and she needs to get over herself and realize that.

Almost as annoying: This Philip/Sarah/Xander thing. 

First of all, pretending to be into someone always blows up in the person’s face. They always fall in love with their target. Always.

Whether it’s conman Doug falling hard for Julie, Brady falling for Eve, or Gabi falling for repulsive-to-her Stefan, relationships are borne out of spying become the real deal sooner or later.

So Xander has good reason to be worried, and it doesn’t help that he couldn’t tell Maggie the truth. No matter what she says, sooner or later, she’s going to put her nose into Sarah and Xander’s business, and then what?

I don’t care about Philip and Xander’s rivalry, and this Philip/Ava storyline is twisting Philip’s character out of shape.

Plus, with Chloe back in town, Philip will likely try to get with her for the millionth time, and then what’s going to happen to Sarah’s plan?

I’m thrilled Chloe is back, but at this point, Philip is bouncing from past love to past love, with a little flirting with Sarah to annoy Xander thrown into the mix. He needs to find some meaning in his present life instead of holding onto every one of the loves that got away.

I’m more interested in the Basic Black storyline, even though Nicole is better suited to either counseling or investigative journalism than being the CEO of a fashion company.

Chloe: So we’re all going to be working together?

Nicole: It’s a dream team, don’t you think?

Brady: As long as you two don’t gang up on me.

Chloe: Oh, we will. But you’re man enough to handle both of us.

All three of the people involved have a rich, complicated history, all of them are now single parents, and the banter between them during their first meeting was a fun diversion from the irritating Allie/Tripp/Ava stuff.

Of course, Brady is just as prone to rediscovering past loves of his life as Philip is, so with Kristen in jail, it may be a matter of time before Brady and Chloe give it another try. But for now, this storyline is entertaining, which is more than I can say for some of the other goings-on.

And finally, can we not have Charlie getting jealous of Claire’s relationship with Ben? Please?

That whole situation could have been avoided if Claire had explained properly where her new necklace came from. And she doesn’t know Charlie that well and owes him no explanations.

Charlie’s jealousy makes me even more convinced that he’s the real rapist, though. It would be predictable, though logical if Claire got together with him only to discover that Tripp was telling the truth and her new boyfriend was the one who raped her cousin.

Your turn, Days of Our Lives fanatics!

Hit the big, blue SHOW COMMENTS button and let us know what you thought of Days of Our Lives during the week of 11-30-20.

Eager for more DAYS chat? Check back for our Days of Our Lives Round Table discussion on Sunday.

Days of Our Lives continues to air on NBC on weekday afternoons. Check your local listings for airtimes.

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.