James Scott on EJ, Hitting Bottom

Has EJ reached bottom? We think maybe he has. His marriage to Nicole was intended to be a sort of business arrangement that would have her acting as a mother to his children, a point of stability in their lives. Before they could say "I do," however, EJ's wandering eye wandered to her sister, Taylor. He seemed to have forgotten his responsibility to his children and, between that and the whole "Rafe2" debacle, he drove away everyone who ever cared for him, or at least tried to.

"He really sort of has lost everything," James agreed. "He's lost Taylor. He's lost Nicole, for whatever that was worth. There was a time in which she was going to be the mother to his children. His children have lost that. He's behaved in a really selfish and callous way."

One could argue, of course, that he behaved in this manner because he at least believed he had found true love. Taylor represented a potential relationship that, while not perfect, was at least one in which the feeling was mutual. One could argue that, but James might not agree. "The way in which he's pursued Taylor â€" whilst on one hand you can argue that it's obviously something that he felt compelled to do because of these feelings that he had â€" on the other hand, it does negate not what he said to Nicole about her role as a mother to his children, but it negates his children's position. In needing somebody to bring them up," James declared. "I think it's incredibly selfish of him to put them through that. He talked to Nicole about how he didn't want to put the children through this situation again, not having a mother figure. So that's why he wants her to be consistent in his life. And ten minutes later he's undoing all of that."

Before Taylor was ever in the picture, however, EJ and Stefano created Rafe's doppelganger, someone they intended to drive Sami to complete despair. In a brutal twist of fate, "Rafe2" was the person who killed Fay, Taylor and Nicole's mother. At first, Taylor didn't want to believe this horrible truth. When she could no longer deny it, however, she spat venom at EJ and wanted nothing more to do with him. Their burgeoning relationship ended before it really began.

Then EJ's son Johnny was confronted with this confusing truth of two Rafes. He no longer trusted his own father and wanted to only be with the real Rafe and Sami. This finally drove EJ to sign over custody of their two children to Sami. "He's certainly not somebody who should be given the responsibility of raising two children," James confirmed. "I think he feels â€" rightly â€" that his emotional problems and his problems with consistency, you can almost think of him as being like an alcoholic or a drug addict or something."

That's certainly an interesting take, one that indicates James believes EJ has as little control over his own behavior as an addict. He is therefore unable to be in a real relationship or to care for his own children. The amazing thing is, however, that EJ seems to realize it, as well.

"It's so incredibly evident that the behavior and actions of that person categorically make them unfit to be responsible for children," James said of alcohol or drug addicts. "They're just not. They've demonstrated they're not able to put the best interests of their children ahead of their own. Unless they're able to demonstrate that, they're not fit to be a parent. He recognizes that. In recognizing that, he does the only thing that he should do, which is to step back. He recognizes that at the moment he's causing these two innocent children a tremendous amount of confusion and pain and uncertainty in their lives. That's not something that he should be doing. And I think that he recognizes that he's unable to break the cycle because he's demonstrated that he cannot. Therefore, probably the best solution, really, is to remove himself from the equation until such time as he can sober up, so to speak.

"He's like an alcoholic," James continued. "He needs to go away. His children need to be absent from the process. But he has to go through it, getting rid of these ailments and developing himself as a stronger person."

It seems so final, so dramatic, however, to have given up custody of his children to Sami. Did he need to take that step? "I think he loves his children," James mused. "But one has to really think that if he really put his children on the same pedestal that he talks about putting them on, then he wouldn't be acting the way he's acting. He just wouldn't. Evidently, as much as he can say that he loves his children, that they're the most important thing in the world to him, clearly they're not. He's inconsistent and he needs to stop being inconsistent. He needs to figure out where he is."

Here's to EJ going through rehab, so to speak, and figuring out where he is and coming out a stronger person. Because once he does, the drama will most certainly get amped up, and that's what we love about the whole DiMera family.