EDITOR'S CHOICE
Zen Paradise, All My Children
Soap Opera Digest - November 21, 2006

For Zach and Kendall, whose marry-first, fall-in-love later arc earned Digest’s pick for “Best Use Of A Cliché” in 2005, 2006 has been more for worse than for better. And how badly fans craved a reversal in their fortunes is probably obvious to no one more than this magazine’s beleaguered mail-room staff, who is charged with delivering the stacks of letters – not to mention customized notepads, bins of popcorn and the occasional risqué bachelorette party favors – that express the “Zendall” bridgade’s passion.

In the wake of what the last few months had thrown their way – namely the alliance and faux affair with Dixie that Zach had entered into during the “Who Killed Madden” arc, which paved the way for Kendall to fall into Ryan’s embrace a time or two (though never his bed), and the horror that Kendall felt when Zach confessed to having done nothing to save Greg’s life when he caught wind of Tad’s high-stakes game of bury-the-doctor – there was a lot of mending to be done to repair their spectacular love. “Love like that doesn’t just disappear because of a signature,” pointed out Bianca as Kendall clutched the documents that would, if filed, dissolve the Slaters’ union. Kendall’s world-weary reply? “Love doesn’t matter. Not now.”

She might have felt differently had she known that at that very moment, Zach was gently but firmly giving a smitten Dix the permanent heave-ho, telling her, “There’s only room in my heart for one woman.” But she didn’t know that, so she tried to will herself to stop the flood of memories of her life with Zach that was coursing through her mind. She couldn’t. And so she found herself more hesitant than hopeful, in the doorway of her husband’s office.

At first, they danced around their hearts’ mutual desire. “Did you file them?” asked Zach about the divorce papers. “Do you want me to?” she replied. She even tried to convince him (and herself) that she wasn’t sure why she was even there, so he volunteered to take a stab at articulating her motive. “Go ahead, tell me,” she shrugged. “Because you belong with me,” he said. “I don’t,” she insisted. “I don’t.”

In her last ditch effort to convinced herself that she should have driven to the county clerk’s office and not Zach’s, Kendall was only too willing to list the reasons why loving him was a notion too ridiculous (her word) and crazy (his suggestion) to be 6taken seriously. “I’m no angel,” she acknowledged. “But you! You are…You’re merciless and cruel and unpitying, unforgiving.” Then there was the issue of his morals. “In the toilet!” “Don’t have any,” he concurred. “Never did, never will.”

So he asked if this was it, if this was their goodbye. She stiffened. “I hate that word…It’s so final.” And finally, she could protest no more, admitting to Zach the “annoying habit that I just can’t seem to shake: I love you… Blackouts, phony alibis, this really scary dark side that you have. And yet, I’m still here, crazy in love with you.” Her truth had been told; it was time to ask for his. “Do you still love me?”

Sometimes actions speak louder than words. Kendall got her answer (and replay buttons on TiVo remotes across the land probably go the workout of their lifetime) when Zach responded by sweeping her into his arms, kissing her as if his life depended on it (which come to think of it, it did) and carrying her to a conveniently located bed. Post lovemaking, they each took a turn ripping up those silly papers.

It was romantic, passionate, tender and true to the nature of Zach and Kendall both as individuals and soul mates. And after what AMC has put them through, they – and their devotees – deserved nothing less.