Mackenzie can’t catch a break.
First, her husband dies at a tragically young age soon after marriage. Then, her fear and reluctance cause her to lose Haz romantically just as she’s ready to start dating again.
And now, according to Neighbours spoilers for the week of 10-23-23, Mackenzie will face yet another devastating loss.
Heartbreak and devastation are standard soap opera tropes. Allowing Mackenzie to go through the same painful situations as everyone else rather than focusing solely on her gender identity is the best transgender representation.
Still, it’s as devastating for fans as it is for her when she has one failure after another in the romance department. She got stood up just before she met too-good-to-be-true Ed, and it sucks for her that he’ll turn out to be Holly’s violent, no-good ex-boyfriend.
Ed’s acting like the nicest, sweetest guy is a realistic portrayal of how domestic abusers target victims. Right now, he’s making Mackenzie feel exceptional and loved, but once he entraps her, that’ll change.
This a more nuanced portrayal of domestic violence than usual; often, TV relies on tired tropes about women with very low self-esteem and men who immediately jump to physical violence.
Still, there was something creepy about Ed from the start, and I predicted he was Holly’s ex even before she began deleting photos and videos and crying. Ed’s hanging around the pub doing nothing while Mackenzie was drinking and feeling sorry for herself raised red flags. He seemed like a stalker.
And now, Mackenzie may finally learn who he really is — hopefully, before he can seriously hurt her.
Please scroll down to check out our full list of Neighbours spoilers for the week of 10-23-23.
JJ’s erratic behavior becomes increasingly troubling.
Ironically, this spoiler could easily have applied to Days of Our Lives’ JJ Deveraux back in the day. As far as this JJ goes, he’s desperate to hide the fact that he thinks Andrew is his father, which is silly.
Yes, Andrew has another family, but it’s not like he had an affair. He donated sperm, and it was likely supposed to be anonymous.
The animosity between Wendy and the Varga-Murphy family is mostly one-sided now, with Wendy trying to make amends and Cara not having it. There’s no telling what would happen if she learned about Andrew’s sperm donation, but Andrew would likely put his foot down if she threw a tantrum.
Either way, this secret needs to come out, and with Andrew getting close to JJ and investigating the violence against his mothers, it’s bound to happen soon.
Jane’s new plan hits shaky ground.
Uh oh. What is Jane up to now?
She’s desperate to save her school and angry at Terese. Will she try to undermine the plans for the retirement center?
She already messed up things with Terese’s meeting with Hilary, so how much more damage can she do? Let’s hope she doesn’t resort to anything more underhanded than that.
Reece gets a visit by an unwelcome guest from home.
We may finally get answers to what Reece has been up to!
She has some secret plan with the father she plans to hate — or is she hoping to double-cross him?
Reece has had one secret after another since she arrived in Erinsborough, and they keep leading her and Bryon to a breakup for the sake of drama, only for them to make up again.
If they break up again, let’s hope it sticks this time!
Mackenzie is forced to confront a horrifying truth.
How will the truth about Ed come out?
Holly keeps missing him, and she’s the only one who can identify Ed as her ex. But she did say she couldn’t bring herself to delete all the photos and videos.
Could Mackenzie see something on Holly’s phone that makes her realize that Ed and Eden are the same person?
Byron discovers things are not as they seem with Reece.
As noted above, this story is going in circles. Byron continually finds out something is wrong with Reece, only to be drawn back toward her.
Enough already!
Let’s hope this final secret breaks them up permanently, though November spoilers suggest Byron might help Reece with her plan, whatever that means.
Mackenzie grapples with a devastating loss.
It’ll be heartbreaking for Mackenzie to realize that her new romance with Ed wasn’t anything but an obsessive love story on his part.
Ed might not be so quick to let her go, either — the most dangerous time for a domestic abuser’s intended victim is when that victim decides to leave.
Spoilers say that Haz will have to come to Mackenzie’s rescue. What exactly will Ed do?
Reece struggles under the weight of her lies.
This vague spoiler suggests that viewers will finally learn what Reece has been hiding.
Her towers of lies, whatever they are, are about to fall like a house of cards.
Let’s hope this reveal is worth the wait! Neighbours has been teasing us with unclear hints for weeks!
Cara attempts to make peace.
Cara decides the only way to create peace is to face her issues head-on. That means the Linwell brothers are likely behind the smashed car window and any other problems that may occur.
These villains haven’t been on-screen yet, but it doesn’t seem like they’re the kind to accept an apology. They’re out for blood, and Cara’s decisions may make things worse instead of better.
And if she finds out that Wendy’s poking around in her business brought the LInwell brothers to town, she won’t hesitate to confront her.
Your turn, Neighbours fanatics. Hit the big, blue SHOW COMMENTS button and let us know what you think of these spoilers!
For more Neighbours chat, check out the latest Neighbours reviews.
Neighbours streams on Amazon Freevee in the US and UK and Amazon Prime in Canada after airing on Australia’s Peach 10. New episodes drop on Monday through Thursday mornings at 2/1c.
Jack Ori is a senior staff writer for TV Fanatic. His debut young adult novel, Reinventing Hannah, is available on Amazon. Follow him on X.