Harmony has been gripped by a major murder mystery, the likes of which has never been seen. This original and daring murder mystery saw a whole group of angry people all arm themselves with guns at the same time and one of them shot a man in cold blood.
The victim: Abe Carver…no, wait, that’s not right. Let me check my notes.
Oh silly me, I got this storyline mixed up with Abe’s murder at the beginning of the Salem Stalker plotline on Days. The Passions murder mystery is of course entirely different. There are ten potential murderers who all magically got guns at the same time instead of eight.
The victim: Julian Crane, drunkard, bastard and lover of bizarre sexual roleplay. But who could have shot Julian? Only one person can solve this:
No, not him
Not him either
Sam Bennett, the best cop in the world.
There’s no way this murder will ever get solved, is there?
New Year, Same Old SillinessIt was New Year’s Day that brought this tragedy upon Harmony. The Cranes were having a big New Year’s party at the mansion. Or at least this is what Ivy organised without telling Julian. So Julian’s first costly mistake was in his choice of party clothes. He came dressed as the New Year’s Baby (with Rebecca as Father Time).
Er...this isn't what it looks like?With this mind-searing sight burned into their brains, it’s no wonder half the guests at this party became deranged. As the new year drew upon Harmony, Julian got a lot of people very pissed off.
There was Brian/Antonio, the long-lost Lopez-Fitzgerald brother who had come to Harmony in order to reconnect with his family, ran into Julian who told him to piss off back to Bermuda if he knew what was good for him. You see, it was the Cranes who are responsible for Antonio’s banishment from Harmony and he is hectic pissed about it (as if moving away from Duhs-ville is a bad thing). So Antonio went off to find a gun and hunt down Julian.
OJ got a snort of some magic dust (surprisingly, this is not a drug reference) and was confronted by an apparition which looked like his dead father. Dead Daddy reminded OJ that he had died of a broken heart caused by Julian (as if the crazy bastard who’s always beating Julian up has forgotten) and advised him to avenge his death. OJ decided now would be the perfect time to go on one of his monthly psychotic rampages.
Painful memories came rushing back for Eve as she reflected on how Julian had taken advantage of Theresa and impregnated her without a second thought. Remembering her own suffering at the hands of Julian’s horniness, she decided she had to end Julian’s trail of sperm and tears forever. Eve picked up a conveniently available gun and tracked down Julian.
Baby BluesTheresa had been hiding her pregnancy from Ethan nicely until a tabloid reporter, hired by Ivy, revealed photos of Theresa standing outside the local family planning. Instead of making up a believable excuse like she had been going there for, ya know, family planning, she stared guiltily at the ground and confessed that Julian had sperminated her while they were down in Bermuda.
Those close to her reacted as if Julian had impregnated her with Rosemary’s Baby itself. “I’ll kill him for what he did to Theresa!” Luis and Ethan shouted in unison. Behind them Pilar gave a guilt-inducing stinkeye only a conservative Catholic mother can. Julian chose that moment to walk in and promptly ran out again when he was chased by three angry people, one of whom was a police officer.
Theresa actually managed to hold herself back from going postal on Julian’s ass, at least until Gwen skipped in and taunted her about losing Ethan. She sadly did not whale on Gwen like I was cheering for but did storm out to kill the man who had gotten her into this mess in the first place.
Meanwhile Ivy cackled in her wheelchair about Julian’s impending death. That is until she realised that Ethan would go to prison if he was the one to kill Julian and zipped off to kill him first. See? Disabled people can do everything able-bodied people can.
On learning that Julian and Theresa’s annulment wasn’t valid since they’d done the pokey sex thing, Rebecca too felt a sudden murderous rage. Taking out her trusty garter gun, she simpered off to find and kill the man she’d so adoringly seen in a nappy and sash just hours before. It’s enough to make you stop believing in love.
As if nine people gunning for his ass wasn’t enough (Abe only had eight after him so Passions says neener neener to Days), Sheridan was later found to have been sleepwalking and mumbling vaguely about having killed someone.
Geez, these people and their blood feuds and their honour killings. I’ve seen saner, less bloodthirsty people in Pollsmoor prison.
Sleeping With The FishesJulian ran through the woods as ten angry people stalked after him, magically appearing guns in their hand. Now this might seem somewhat contrived, all these people finding guns but in this case, I really do mean “magically appearing”. This was Tabitha’s work in case you hadn’t guessed.
With Crane Security slacking off as always, Julian took refuge in his garage only to find a wheelchair-bound wench sitting in front of him holding a gun. It looked like the end of the road for him but Ivy got distracted and Julian was able to wrench the gun out of her hands. He got in his car and crashed through the garage door dramatically. Ivy pouted because he’d stolen her trademark.
Instead of driving off somewhere safe like out of the murder-obsessed town, Julian stopped his car by the docks where he thought no-one could find him. Bitch please, that town consists of about six sets, how on earth could they not find you there? Julian hid in the tuna cannery, its happy fish logo looking particularly sinister in the darkness.
He believed he was safe but a darkened figure brandishing a gun told another story. Julian climbed the scaffolding directly above the tuna manufacturing vat for some unknown reason. The darkened figure raised their gun and…
BANG!
Julian clutched his chest and fell directly in to the tuna vat to be processed into fleshy fish bits. The killer had done their job.
Which of these fools shot Julian?The Morning AfterThe morning saw everyone acting inexplicably suspicious in the way that the eight Salem Stalker suspects did during those first few murders in Days. They all talked about Julian in the past tense and smelled heavily of fish. Oh ewww, that’s disgusting. Murdering people is one thing but not showering after visiting a fish plant? That’s just not on.
Because the Harmony Police Force is about as efficient as a hamster powered nuclear reactor, Tabitha had to physically fish Julian’s tattered jacket out of the tuna vat and show it to Sam. He wasn’t convinced until Tabby showed him a particularly curious can of tuna – it contained a ring. Now that’s what I call a free gift! Sure, there might be bits of human flesh in the tuna but it beats a crappy little plastic toy any day.
Now Sam is on the case with his trusty deputy Luis by his side. Yes, Sam is letting one of the main suspects investigate alongside him. This is the only show that makes me long for the discipline, work ethic and intelligence of the Salem PD, I swear.
So who shot Julian? Since it’s up to Sam to investigate, we all know it’ll never get solved so here’s my brilliant investigative skills at work. The person who pulled the trigger is…
Marlena Evans, former devil possessee and Salem Stalker.
OK, no it’s not. Though it would make for a good crossover. No, my theory is that none of these ten nutbars shot Julian and it’s someone totally unrelated. I say it’s Liz because she wasn’t shown with a gun that night and because she made a supposedly subtle allusion to how the Cranes had hurt her in the past. This is the show’s version of a clever clue.
What Occupies These People’s Time When They’re Not Murdering PeopleWhen Ivy isn’t smashing through walls or windows, she likes to try and get her hooks into Sam. Turns out that she hired David to break up him and Grace by threatening to roll over David’s foot with her wheelchair if he didn’t comply. No, not really. She actually threatened to do horrible things to his puffy-lipped son – run over his foot instead.
Ivy’s plans got even more dastardly when she brought aforementioned puffy-lipped son (named John) to Harmony and made his think that Grace was his mother. How evil! Making anyone believe that boring, limpid Grace is their mother is a terrible thing to do.
Even though Theresa went to the family planning clinic, her Catholic values won out and she didn’t abort the mission. She’s all mopey that Ethan’s left her because she lied to him about something major for the seventieth time (why so unreasonable, Ethan?) and keeps trying to get back to him despite Pilar’s very good advice to stop running after him.
Pilar: Mia, you must stop going after Ethan. He has to be able to recover from this latest lie of yours. You must give him some time.
Theresa: You’re right, Mama.
Pilar: I am glad to see you have seen reason.
Theresa: …
Pilar: …
Theresa: Is this enough time?
Pilar: No.
Theresa: What about now?
Pilar: No.
Theresa: And now?
Pilar: NO, por amor do Dios!
Theresa: Sooo…is now good?
Pilar: [facepalm]
Meanwhile Gwen has immediately entered the picture to try and take Theresa’s place, a ploy which seems doomed to failure because Gwen’s hair is just not shiny enough. But Gwen is proving a worthy opponent because she’s actually being all honest with Ethan and admitting her guilt and mistakes and *bleep!*.
Love Triangles And Bermuda TrianglesAfter popping round Harmony for a spot of boat-returning/murder, Antonio, Liz and Sheridan flew back to the tropical island of Bahaituba where it looked like Sheridan would never recover her memory.
But the Bermuda Triangle had other plans. See, the Bermuda Triangle is sorta like Fate, only it’s a better dresser and likes to screw with a member of the Lopez-Fitzgerald family other than Theresa. In a show of sparkly lights, the Bermuda Triangle descended upon Harmony (Geography is no match for the BT!) and strange things started happening. Well, stranger than usual.
Luis went for a swim in the Crane pool (just because you may have killed the owner of the house doesn’t mean you can’t crash their place) and found himself swimming with Sheridan. The lovers kept traversing the boundaries of time and space. Not that Harmony itself doesn’t traverse the boundaries of time and space pretty often itself, what with the month-long nights and whacked out timeframes.
Antonio is not impressed that the Bermuda Triangle keeps putting the girl he wants to date with her ‘dead’ lover. That’s just unfair, man! How’s a regular guy supposed to compete with the freakin’ Bermuda Triangle?
Is that...porn?Chad and Whitney: This Verse Same As The LastFirst of all, a big up to Chad and Whitney for being the only two people running around on the night of Julian’s murder trying to stop people from killing him. God looks kindly upon people like you; that’s when he’s not sending Giant Angel Girls down to fight the forces of darkness.
Chad still wants to get with Whitney, she still says no because of that stupid promise she made to her sister when she was lying in a coma that she would never go after her non-boyfriend. Instead she would rather Simone live in a deluded fantasy-land where Chad is her pretend boyfriend because that’s real healthy.
Perhaps it was the impending arrival of the Bermuda Triangle but Whitney actually came to her senses about Chad and decided that the promise was the stupidest thing ever and she would tell him she loved him. But alas, when she went to the Book Café to talk to him, he was talking to a female customer!! Can you believe the nerve of that guy?
Zombies Do It BestBefore I get to Zombie Charity’s mishaps and malevolence, I have to talk about the best Christmas miracle ever. Now I generally find TV Christmas miracles corny and stupid but I’m a sucker for anything Timmy, so I loved it when Timmy got his Christmas wish. Giant Angel Girl awarded him a heart and Timmy turned into a real boy.
It was really, really sweet and there was even a sniffly scene where Tabby told him how worried she was that now that he was a real boy, he’d leave her and she’d be all alone. Someone who was watching – certainly not me – may have gotten a bit cloudy-eyed at that scene. Not me.
Tabitha introduced Timmy as her great-nephew who just happened to look like her doll because she’d modelled him on Timmy. Everyone except Reese accepted this without question because they are all fools. Now Timmy is partying with the teens and acting as their confidante. Why Miguel even tearfully confided in him about his woes with Charity.
In Russia, hat wears youZombie Charity is pretending she’s gotten bored of Miguel and needs some space to date other guys. How is it the Zombie sounds more like a normal teenager than the rest of these yahoos with their “Our love is perfect and amazing, let’s get married as soon as we turn 18!” business?
Zombie Charity is really enjoying messing with Miguel’s head. This is because she, in her own words, gets off on pain. I think she has a lucrative career as a dominatrix to look forward to if this Zombie business doesn’t work out.
I just managed to resist photoshopping Charity in black fetishgear by the way. Thank me by sending chocolates.