Chad's Behavior

[Poirot]

I don't know what happened to Chad, outside of Gabi's manipulations. Once upon a time, Chad would have fought tooth and nail for Abby, and has done so. He was determined to find her, and did, chained to a bed, fought a battle with Ben, ended up chained/tied to that bed himself, as Ben took the baby and set fire to the bed. He fought, got them both free and amazingly, neither suffered burns. He stood by Abby thru that trauma, and her breakdown. He took care of their child while she was in the hospital, and thereafter.

O.K. writers have a lot to do with it. but WHY? What was the purpose?

Chad has claimed to always have loved Abby, but yet, managed to bed Gabi when they were stranded on an island. Odd.

Then their lives are turned upside down by the arrival of Stefan, not long after the death of Stefano, manipulations of Andre, loss of the company, etc. by said Stefan & Viv. Thru it all, Chad & Abby were a team. And yet, he was unable to see thru Gabi's machinations, claiming now his hatred of Stefan clouded his mind, blinded him to all the truth.

So now, he sees what Kate did, what Gabi did, what he himself did to his wife, the woman he promised to love and honor, sickness & health. He never saw Abby in alter mode, yet did not believe a word she said about being gaslighted, drugged, etc. JJ was suspicious, but Gabi was good at what she was doing.

Who could possibly ever trust anything Gabi says again?

But Chad.......(not referring to the lackluster performance of late) failed miserably, all round. He betrayed his friendship with the guys he grew up with, called friend all their lives. He let down his wife terribly. All because, he says, he hated Stefan so much, and wanted to oust him, etc. And yet, he did not do that either.

So...the writers knew that they were to keep Chad & Abby together....so WHAT THE HECK was the reason to have Chad become such a jerk, fool, (There are other choice words which would get bleeped) ?

 

[FinchelKlaine4E]

I've read some fans bitterly stating that the writers are taking the fans' hatred of Stefan out on Chad and that's why Chad is written this way now.

You know, Chad's war on Stefan kind of reminds me of Sonny's war on Deimos almost 2 years ago. All Sonny cared about was destroying Deimos and it put a strain on his relationship with Paul, then Sonny let Chad, Abigail, and Gabi get kidnapped in order to give Deimos enough rope to hang himself (Sure, he tried to prevent it, but still...), and his personality changed for the worse just as Chad's hatred for Stefan did him.

 

[JasonDíSpeech]

I'll not disagree with your major point; I'd just like to throw in that Chad is an active character - a mean manipulator (sometimes to my enjoyment, usually not, but still). And he's been played this whole year - by his rapist brother, by Gabi, by Kate. He's been passive. I actually dislike it - he should have been trying to figure things out and play against Big Z instead of just being the victim.

 

[guilty pleasure]

I wonder, too, if Chad's downward spiral is somewhat reflected in the writers. In real life, you can start spiraling out of control when one day, you look up, and nothing is as it was. I wonder if the writers can also write some conflict and look up one day, and see that particular characters aren't as they were. Not justifying anything, but just wondering if that might be part of it.

I personally wish they didn't always have to have this conflict, this love triangle, whatever. But in their quest to keep conflict a priority, I bet it is hard to keep characters true to their, well, character. Because, from one angle, Chad was still fighting tooth and nail for Abigail. His perspective was manipulated, and therefore he was misguided and ran with it. He was fighting actively (I suppose that is an appropriate term?) to get Stefan, etc. But from a different angle, it absolutely looks as if he let down those dearest to him and failed himself by losing his integrity.

I wondered, actually, while he was talking to Charlotte on Friday (I think), if he would say something about Stefano's ring. It was obvious, center screen, front and center. It seems like (if memory serves) his personality really started changing when he put that ring on, and I kind of hope that he will remove the ring with some meaningful monologue and symbolically be the real Chad again. I guess time will tell.

And as a disclaimer, Chad is one of my favorite characters. It is partially due to the actor's portrayal. But the Chad of late has been disappointing.

 

[Noel]

I think we all miss the 'real Chad' but he seems afar off now.