Ali Sweeney ‘Days Of Our Lives’ Return, Will EJ Be Back For November Sweeps?

Sami Brady is heading back to Salem on “Days of Our Lives” later this year, and her return has many fans wondering and hoping that her former on-screen love interest EJ will also be coming back to the long-running soap.

Alison Sweeney, who portrayed Sami for 20 years on “Days of Our Lives,” before leaving the NBC soap in 2014, has confirmed she would be filming scenes for the show once again this spring, and that she would be back for an extended stint on the show.

“From my end, it takes a little bit of logistics with projects I’m working on,” she told Soap Opera Digest. “And unfortunately, this year’s been hard for me because of my knee injury, so I had to push some stuff back. So, I figured out a schedule, blocked out some time that I had available and we figured it out! I’ll be shooting in Salem in May and June.”

Because “Days” tapes episodes six months in advance, that would time Sweeney’s return to the soap to land within the November Sweeps period, meaning she should hopefully return to the show in a big way. Her last brief stint on the show was for the 50th anniversary in Fall 2015. In those episodes, Sami returned for her son Will’s funeral after he was murdered by the necktie killer, and she fled after receiving instructions from her deceased husband EJ about how she could steal his family’s money.

Read: Abigail Makes A Stunning Decision On “Days of Our Lives”

When Sami was last on the show for an extended period, her happy reunion with EJ was cut abruptly short after he was murdered by one of Clyde Weston’s thugs. However, his sister, Kristen DiMera, was then seen entering the morgue and injecting his dead body with something, and his father, Stefano DiMera, also later admitted that the ashes Sami had that she thought belonged to her husband were those of another person. Since then, both Kristen and Stefano have also perished, and there’s been no mention of EJ—or what may have happened to him after his death—since.

However, fans have been eager for an EJ return for a long time, and the news about Sami’s return in November has also led to fervent hopes EJ would return again as well.

There hasn’t been any comment from NBC, Sweeney, or James Scott, who portrayed EJ, about a possible return, but bringing back the two iconic characters and revealing that EJ isn’t dead could be beneficial to the soap, which has been struggling in the ratings and was even rumored to be on the chopping block at NBC earlier this year.

Since Sweeney and Scott both exited in 2014, the soap has also lost other big names. Joseph Mascolo’s death led to the official end of Stefano’s storyline, though his character had been killed earlier on. Kristen was also killed off to accommodate Eileen Davidson's role on “The Young and the Restless.” Shawn Christian (Daniel Jonas), Jen Lilley (Theresa Donovan) and Kate Mansi (Abigail Devereaux) all quit the soap, leading to the departures of Daniel and Theresa from the canvas, and an Abigail recast. Will (Guy Wilson) and Bo (Peter Reckell) were also killed off of the soap.

In addition, Ciara Brady (Vivian Jovanni), Diemos Kiriakis (Vincent Irizarry) and Nicole Walker (Arianne Zucker) are all scheduled to exit the show later this year as well.

“Days of Our Lives” airs weekdays on NBC.