Dear John: Is Days of Our Lives About to Say Farewell to a Fan Fave?

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The good news is, after that disaster of a wedding on Days of Our Lives, Steve looks like he’s going to live to fight another day. Provided he survives Kayla’s wrath, that is. The bad news is, while John snapped himself out of The Pawn trance in time to avoid murdering his best friend, it’s clear his problems are far from over. And now he’s just informed Marlena that it’s time for him to leave Salem. (Check out today’s recap here.)

That’s not a terrible thing, John tried to reassure his wife — he just wants to get some closure by finding Catharina’s grave. But he wants to go alone… and that’s never a good thing. Add to that John’s certainty that he’s a “ticking time bomb” and that eerie music we got when he glanced at the card while hugging Marlena and we’re starting to wonder where this is going.

Sending characters out of the country together to investigate something is one thing. That gives the show more of a chance for a “location” shoot — you know, like everyone off in Montana grabbing Goldman and Clyde. But characters leaving town on their own tend to end up more like Gwen, who’s been off in Europe trying to get Dimitri’s money and was only seen during one brief call about The Spectator. 

We just got Steve in the clear and now the show’s got us worried about losing John? There’s still something wrong with him, and it’s clear he doesn’t have faith that Marlena will be able to cure him this time. Is his talk about tracking Catharina’s grave down just an excuse to hide away while he worries he’s going to hurt the people he loves?

We don’t see that sitting well with Marlena at all, which would be why he assured her he’s not running away. But can we trust that? Steve and Kayla just had a heated talk about keeping things from each other, and we can’t help but shake the feeling that as they patch things up, John and Marlena are about to go down that same path.

John’s secrets, though, could take him away from Salem and from us. Maybe not for good — John and Marlena have come and gone a bit over the years, but they always come back —but we may have to brace ourselves for the very real possibility that we could be seeing a whole lot less of him soon. Of course, if it’s to finally free himself of this Pawn nonsense once and for all, maybe it’s worth it… but we hope it doesn’t have to come to that.