EJ, Rita, Holly, Gabi, Marlena: Holly’s Crisis Puts EJ Back Under Fire: Days of our Lives Two Scoops for the Week of June 22nd

Days of our Lives spent the week proving that nothing says summer like arsenic-tainted pills, inheritance money becoming everybody’s emotional support weapon, and Stefano DiMera still causing problems from beyond the grave.

Marlena looked back on 50 years of surviving things that would reduce most people to paste, while Belle and Chad tried to decode a chess clue that came with obsolete Italian currency and a whiff of doom. Meanwhile, Holly’s health crisis pulled EJ, Sarah, Xander, Brady, Johnny, and half of Smith Island into the same mess, which is always how one knows the plot has put on its formal shoes.

Marlena’s Anniversary Came With Memories, Lira, and Another Stefano Puzzle

Marlena looked back on five impressive decades in Salem | Image: Peacock

The June 22 episode belonged largely to Marlena, and DAYS used the occasion to look back on the kind of history only Salem can provide. Paul came home just as Marlena was grieving John, which allowed the show to move through decades of memories without making it feel like a random scrapbook had fallen open. Samantha, Don, baby DJ, Roman, John, the possession, the Salem Stalker mess, and all the heartbreak in between made the hour feel like a reminder that Marlena has survived an entire museum wing of trauma.

At the same time, Belle and Chad opened the chess box and found what appeared to be 1,000 lira inside. That was not much help, since the money was obsolete and the clue seemed tailored to Marlena and John rather than anyone currently trying to solve it. Belle and Chad knew enough to realize they were out of their depth, which means Steve and Brady probably need to be pulled in before Stefano’s little game claims another player.

The best part of the chess mystery is that nobody should trust anything Stefano left behind, especially when it involves Marlena and John. Even dead, Stefano has a way of making every keepsake feel like it should be handled with gloves, tongs, and a priest standing nearby just in case. Belle’s instinct to protect Marlena makes sense, but Marlena also knows Salem well enough to understand that ignoring a DiMera clue usually just gives it time to grow fangs.

Cat’s ISA Mission Drifted Closer to EJ Trouble

Cat spent Monday pushing Andrew to let her finish her mission with EJ, even though Andrew had every reason to sound the alarm. He called EJ dangerous, warned Cat about the agency’s honey trap rules, and made it clear that he did not want her becoming EJ’s next casualty. Unfortunately for Andrew, Cat already seems too emotionally tangled in the man she is supposed to be investigating, which is precisely how Salem gets half its crises dressed and out the door by breakfast.

The more interesting reveal was that Marlena had been cleared by the ISA. That detail mattered because it treated Marlena not just as Salem’s beloved psychiatrist, but as someone trusted to handle sensitive, high-level psychological work. After everything Marlena has been through, it was nice to see the story remember that she is not merely the person everyone visits after disasters, but also one of the sharpest minds in the room.

Cat’s determination also makes the EJ situation more dangerous because she is not operating from a cold distance anymore. She wants answers about why she was drawn to EJ in Italy and clearly believes the mission belongs to her after being forced back into agency life. That may be true, but Salem has never been gentle with people who confuse personal feelings with professional instincts, and EJ DiMera is not exactly a beginner-level assignment.

Holly’s Collapse Exposed the Coriseal Nightmare

Holly was somehow affected by the Coriseal buried on Smith Island | Image: Peacock

Holly’s health took over the week once she went from feeling sick at the cabin to passing out and later convulsing at the hospital. At first, everyone circled around the idea of a stomach bug, especially after Liam described similar symptoms before Gage’s mother died. DAYS did a nice job placing those conversations near Holly’s scenes, because once nausea, dizziness, and death started sharing the same sentence, the air around Holly’s story changed fast.

Sarah eventually found Coriseal in Holly’s blood, which sent the whole situation crashing into DiMera Pharmaceuticals territory. Holly insisted she had only taken her antidepressant, and Sarah knew enough about Holly to understand she would not casually mix narcotics with her medication. That pushed the question away from whether Holly did something reckless and toward something much bigger, nastier, and stamped with the DiMera family seal.

Then came the reveal that the Coriseal batch from two years ago had been contaminated with arsenic and supposedly buried on Smith Island. EJ and Rita discussing missing files and old pharmaceutical cleanup made it clear this was not just a medical mystery anymore. It was a coverup with a body count, and Holly may have stumbled into the aftershock because Salem’s idea of hazardous waste disposal apparently involves hiding things where teenagers can eventually trip over them.

EJ and Rita Made DiMera Damage Control Look Routine

A past coverup is returning to the forefront | Image: Peacock

EJ spent the week in full fury mode after realizing Kristen had coerced Sophia into trying to kill Johnny. His confrontation with Kristen was vicious, especially when he damned her to the darkest corner of hell and made it clear he knew exactly what she had done. Kristen’s suggestion that he talk to Susan Banks about Sophia was actually smart, though it also had the energy of someone trying to hand a grenade to a psychic and slowly back out of the room.

By Thursday, EJ had moved from rage to strategy, which meant Rita was back in the room looking wonderfully unbothered by events that would make most people clutch the wallpaper. When EJ told her Kristen tried to murder Johnny, Rita barely reacted, then explained that it takes a lot to surprise her. Although lines of the week are apparently no longer the assignment, it still deserves to be said that Rita may be Salem’s most efficient delivery system for dry chaos.

Rita’s calm is funny, but it is also starting to feel unnerving because she keeps showing up wherever the DiMera machine is most compromised. Missing pharmaceutical files, arsenic-tainted drugs, buried evidence, resurrection-adjacent weirdness, family warfare, and Rita just stands there as if she is waiting for someone to confirm lunch orders. EJ may be dangerous because he acts from ego and fury, but Rita may be dangerous because almost nothing appears to interrupt her workday.

Stephanie Tried to Reclaim Control While Joy Pulled Alex Closer

Stephanie tried looking within herself for clarity | Image: Peacock

Stephanie’s week continued to show how badly she wants to be stable, even as her life keeps adding new pressure points. Joy called Alex in a panic over Kelsey, and while the situation turned out to be less dire than it first sounded, Stephanie was not wrong to wonder whether Joy knew exactly how to get Alex moving. Alex wanting to support his daughter is not the issue, but his lack of a real long-term answer for how this will work with Stephanie is becoming harder to ignore.

Joy may not be twirling an invisible mustache, but she also does not seem completely innocent in how she keeps drawing Alex into her orbit. Stephanie is trying to manage trauma, marriage strain, attachment issues, and the sudden reality of Alex having a child with another woman. That is not a tiny emotional speed bump, and pretending everyone can smile through it with enough maturity only makes the whole thing feel more brittle.

Friday added another layer when Belle told Stephanie that Owen Kent was headed to a maximum-security mental health facility because he was not fit to stand trial. Stephanie tried to convince herself he was out of her mind and out of her life, but then she read about him, deleted the article, and began removing extra locks from her door. Her realization that real safety has to come from within was a good thought, but the way she said it had just enough manic sparkle to make the whole scene feel less like closure and more like the first page of the next problem.

Gabi’s Honesty Made Everything Worse

Theo really let Gabi have it | Image: Peacock

Gabi tried to apologize to Theo, but she made the mistake of telling him what she planned to do with her inheritance money. Giving it to Titan may have made sense to her, but telling Theo about it right after he fought to get her that money was spectacularly bad timing. Theo saw it as another betrayal, and suddenly Gabi’s attempt at transparency became the emotional equivalent of backing over the mailbox while waving politely.

Her bad week continued when Ari saw Liam again and learned Gabi had paid him to leave town. Gabi’s instinct to protect her daughter is understandable, especially after everything that happened with Doug III and the necklace, but paying off Ari’s boyfriend was never going to age well. Once Ari found out, Gabi looked less like a protective mother and more like someone trying to manage her daughter’s life with a checkbook and a fire extinguisher.

The Liam reveal also cleared up one important piece of the Coriseal mystery because his sudden money came from Gabi, not from some shady drug connection. That left EJ looking even worse, which is an impressive achievement considering he was already lurking near hospital conversations and snapping at Sarah. By Friday, Sarah wanted answers, Xander wanted to stop EJ, Johnny had been snooping around DiMera files, and EJ had overheard just enough about Smith Island to start acting fast.

Join us next time when EJ checks whether Smith Island has a toxic waste gift shop, Rachel’s stuffed narwhal gets added to the banned visitor list, and somebody finally asks why every DiMera family secret appears to come with either a tunnel, a chess piece, or paperwork Rita has already alphabetized.