For the week of July 23rd-27th, 2012

Don’t miss July 25th-27th!

Carrie says a sad goodbye to Rafe.. and he can barely face her departure. She joins Austin at the pub and then they leave Salem for Switzerland! Austin and Kate share a heartfelt goodbye! Across town, Cameron continues to keep Abby distracted from worrying about her missing friend. He gets her to help him plan a party in honor of his sister Lexie. He also winds up spending quite a bit of time convincing Jack that he has honorable intentions in dating Abby.

Sami is furious when she learns that EJ is not a DiMera. She lashes out at him for keeping this secret from her. Lucas is upset about Sami’s Elvis obsession and gives her an ultimatum. While she thinks that over, Sami stomps off to see her son and lecture him about keeping secrets. Will defends his boss and she admits to him that she’s made a back-up copy of the surveillance tape. Meanwhile, Ian is thrown off guard when Brady and Madison declare that they are tying the knot immediately. Madison is startled by how much this upsets Ian. His day gets worse when Lucas shows up to talk about EJ’s arrest and the surveillance footage, so Ian sends his henchman off to take care of the loose ends. At that very moment, Elvis sends William off to hunt down the surveillance tape as well. As soon as Will and Sonny curl up to watch the tape, the footage is magically deleted!

Rafe continues interrogating EJ, who is doing his best to convince his old enemy that he is being framed. Sami drops by to see Elvis. He tells her how hard it was to come to terms with not being a DiMera. She decides to let him have the surveillance tape. When Chad arrives to offer his brother his full support, Sami heads off to see a lawyer but is attacked on the way. She limps home to Lucas and avoids explaining anything to him . After she insists to Lucas that she is not choosing EJ over him, Will calls and asks her to bail out Elvis. Lucas is furious. Sami shows up to bail out EJ anyway, and this doesn’t go over well with Roman. He soon gets a tip that EJ is planning to jet out of town, so he gets ready to re-arrest him. Will gets wise to this and warns Elvis, who claims he had no plans to run. Sami tells him it’s the last shot he’s got at freedom. She helps him get ready to go. Will brings him the children so they can say goodbye. Before EJ can go, Roman and Lucas arrive. Roman nearly takes a shot at EJ but Sami gets in the way. An explosion hits. The cops are knocked out and Sami nearly falls through the ground to her death. EJ manages to grab her at the last minute, but can’t hold on when the second explosion comes. Uh, Oh!

Elsewhere, Daniel is caught off guard when Nicole tries distracting him with a romantic dinner. She thinks he needs to take a breather and eat but he runs off to continue searching for Melanie. Daniel goes to see Victor, who lays into him for being with Nicole. She is summoned over to the mansion. Victor makes it clear that he does not want his ex-wife in his godson’s life. Daniel defends Nicole and Maggie lets Victor have it! Doug and Julie are back for a visit.

The cops question Gabi for more clues but nothing is making sense. Why were fingerprints on the note? Hope thinks they should start using hypnosis to get some answers (!) Down in the tunnels, Mel manages to catch Andrew off-guard and grabs his cell phone.  She calls Chad. She tries telling him where she is but the connection is bad and then Andrew catches her and takes the phone away. Chad or Bo manages to glean that she is somewhere under the city. Brady just happens to walk by and overhear the conversation. He guesses she must be in the underground tunnels and they run off together to search. Gabi is also snooping around in the tunnels. Melanie has been bickering with Andrew as they move further into the tunnels. It’s very dark so he lights a flame, resulting in an explosion! Gabi approaches them. Andrew and Mel are confused by the blast. Gabi and Andrew bicker, making Mel even more confused about the situation. Gabi tries convincing him to run but he won’t budge. Mel freaks out when she sees sparks. Andrew is about to tell her about Gabi’s role in her abduction when another explosion hits. The debris knocks him out. Gabi tries to help Andrew escape. Brady rushes in to rescue Mel and Chad is on the verge of attacking Andrew when the next explosion hits and Horton Square falls on top of them! Meanwhile, John and Ian have it out as Madison anxiously waits for Brady to show up for their wedding. The wait comes to an end when another explosion hits. Abby is trapped in an elevator. Across the square, Nicole collapses in pain as the ground gives way and Daniel gets caught in the falling debris! Who will make it out alive?

Update: Horton Square was heralded as a new beginning for the show in September 2011, when old cast members came back with familiar storylines. But just like the characters that come and go, so do the places and buildings. The new writers have decided that Horton Square will no longer be central to the show. My, how things change!