I wonder if the Beeb should consider making EastEnders an unintentional comedy, because tonight it was like watching a bad sitcom full of people you hate and wish would die. I wonder, does Lorraine Newman know how much the actual intelligent and long-term viewers are beginning to hate this programme? Or does she cling religiously to the spate of the regular EastEnders' cheerleading squad like the uxoriously stupid and falsely cheerful The Queen Vic ("Is anybody warming to Kat's storyline now? giggle giggle") or dan2008 from Digital Spy or those infantile manchildren *Betty* and mr sunshine from Walford Web kindergarten?
This show is in trouble, and it's showing the same terminal signs Brookside showed only a couple of years before it stiffed. There's the ubiquitous plethora of tits (as in boobs and people who act like boobs), there's the weak man motif and there's the public service announcement.
Tonight we had all three. The public service announcement - well, actually, it was a political statement - came in the storyline surrounding Ray being a victim of stop-and-search. You can almost telll what a patronising Islington-cum-Hampstead Heath fashionable leftie Jeff Povey is in the contrived, butt-clinchingly embarrassing dialogue which occurred between Ray and the stereotypical policeman who stopped him. This was EastEnders' attempt at relevance, and it came across as contrived and amateurish - in fact, it reminded me of that awful public health service announcement on Brookside a year before it finished, when Ron Dixon had a heart attack and his son-in-law, Max Farnham and the dishy doctor had a conversation which told the public how people could avoid the risk of heart attacks. I almost expected them to look at the camera.
Throw in a line or two about ageism and the elderly - Mo's remark about being "an age" at her time of life - and you've killed two birds with one stone.
But ... then the storyline morphed into something which, since 2010, has become stock for EastEnders - the ritual emasculation of yet another male character, this time Ray Dixon. We've seen it done to Phil. We've seen it done to Ricky Butcher. We've seen it done to Alfie. We've seen it done ti Ian. And now, it's Ray's turn. Suddenly, Ray doesn't know how to respond to this treatment. Of course, it takes a woman (Denise) to suggest that he report this to the police, but not Ray. Nope. He's going to stop jogging and become a couch potato.
Ne'mind that he's induced the proverbial couch potato Kim to run with him - attired in a rah-rah skirt and soft waking shoes instead of trainers. But it's Kim, EastEnders' bad attempt at a comedy character, who's suddenly and inexplicably revealed to be the strong woman with more sense in her pinkie finger than Ray has in his testicles, who has to see Ray right - remind him that he has to push back against this for his son's sake (you know, the one he didn't know he had until last January) and be a role model for Morgan (who calls Ricky Butcher "dad") and thereby, a role model and father figure for all of Morgan's friends. Strong woman-weak man. Or rather, strong man-in-drag, weak man. Maybe Ray should consider cross-dressing.
For anyone who doesn't think Kim looks like a man-in-drag (one of three, all of whom featured on tonight's programme), take a look from this clip from the 1970s, featuring the late Flip Wison, an American comedian. Now tell me, Kim is not based on Geraldine Jones - a man in drag:-
Now the writers are teasing us with the Branning brothers-in-arms back from an all-night drinks' session, in what is about to become a cack-handed lesson in trust. Of course, it all centres around Kat, the slut, who wakes up in her bug-infested shagflat, alone.
Shaggerman luuuuuurves her so much, he can't abide to wake up beside her, which earns him a lecture from Kat about love and trust. What. The. Fuck. For all Shaggerman knows, if Kat will cheat on Alfie, she'll cheat on him too; and maybe he's just stringing her along for the ride.
I still say, Shaggerman is Derek - clock his remark to Alfie in a request for the hair of the dog:-
"You're a very accommodating man, Alfie."
Kat is such a scurvy bitch, and her using Kim for a lie is as low as it gets. Kim's an idiot, but I don't think she approves of cheating. After all, she left Dexter when she found him to be unfaithful (although, I daresay this lot of writers have forgotten that Dexter even exists). I do think Kim saw through the lie Katshit told her, however, and more important, I think Alfie is beginning to suss something is wrong.
Also, cue EastEnders' last-ditch effort to get the viewers onside with poor, mistreated Kat.
Whine, whine ... "Why do yer love me, Awwwfie? Why do yer put up wi'me?"
Why indeed? How many mothers of young children like that spend all night "getting wasted" when they have a toddler to look after? If Kat were someone like Lola, she'd have Tommy taken off her. Alfie knew the minute Kat couldn't answer his question about why she should love him, and he definitely knew Charlie didn't send the flowers.
What a dirty slut she is.
Then we had Tanya lecturing Max on his all-nighter - this time about "respect." That's another joke. "Respect" is a word that isn't found in either Max's or Tanya's vocabulary. Where was the respect either had for Rachel or Bradley - or, more recently, Greg, when they wantonly cheated on these people and laughed about them behind their backs? Where's the "respect" they show each other when they undermine each other as parents?
That scene in the salon with Max bringing Tanya flowers was totally embarrassing. Jake Wood is one of the stronger actors in EastEnders, but even he looked pedestrian in that scene and could do nothing with the lame dialogue, not to mention the weird little dance he affected.
Lord, have mercy! What the fuck is happening to this show?
And as for Jack and the femae impersonator pretending to be Sharon, please don't even go there. When did Sharon start simpering? More specifically, when did she ever start simpering around a block of wood like Jack Branning?
This show is in trouble, and it's showing the same terminal signs Brookside showed only a couple of years before it stiffed. There's the ubiquitous plethora of tits (as in boobs and people who act like boobs), there's the weak man motif and there's the public service announcement.
Tonight we had all three. The public service announcement - well, actually, it was a political statement - came in the storyline surrounding Ray being a victim of stop-and-search. You can almost telll what a patronising Islington-cum-Hampstead Heath fashionable leftie Jeff Povey is in the contrived, butt-clinchingly embarrassing dialogue which occurred between Ray and the stereotypical policeman who stopped him. This was EastEnders' attempt at relevance, and it came across as contrived and amateurish - in fact, it reminded me of that awful public health service announcement on Brookside a year before it finished, when Ron Dixon had a heart attack and his son-in-law, Max Farnham and the dishy doctor had a conversation which told the public how people could avoid the risk of heart attacks. I almost expected them to look at the camera.
Throw in a line or two about ageism and the elderly - Mo's remark about being "an age" at her time of life - and you've killed two birds with one stone.
But ... then the storyline morphed into something which, since 2010, has become stock for EastEnders - the ritual emasculation of yet another male character, this time Ray Dixon. We've seen it done to Phil. We've seen it done to Ricky Butcher. We've seen it done to Alfie. We've seen it done ti Ian. And now, it's Ray's turn. Suddenly, Ray doesn't know how to respond to this treatment. Of course, it takes a woman (Denise) to suggest that he report this to the police, but not Ray. Nope. He's going to stop jogging and become a couch potato.
Ne'mind that he's induced the proverbial couch potato Kim to run with him - attired in a rah-rah skirt and soft waking shoes instead of trainers. But it's Kim, EastEnders' bad attempt at a comedy character, who's suddenly and inexplicably revealed to be the strong woman with more sense in her pinkie finger than Ray has in his testicles, who has to see Ray right - remind him that he has to push back against this for his son's sake (you know, the one he didn't know he had until last January) and be a role model for Morgan (who calls Ricky Butcher "dad") and thereby, a role model and father figure for all of Morgan's friends. Strong woman-weak man. Or rather, strong man-in-drag, weak man. Maybe Ray should consider cross-dressing.
For anyone who doesn't think Kim looks like a man-in-drag (one of three, all of whom featured on tonight's programme), take a look from this clip from the 1970s, featuring the late Flip Wison, an American comedian. Now tell me, Kim is not based on Geraldine Jones - a man in drag:-
Now the writers are teasing us with the Branning brothers-in-arms back from an all-night drinks' session, in what is about to become a cack-handed lesson in trust. Of course, it all centres around Kat, the slut, who wakes up in her bug-infested shagflat, alone.
Shaggerman luuuuuurves her so much, he can't abide to wake up beside her, which earns him a lecture from Kat about love and trust. What. The. Fuck. For all Shaggerman knows, if Kat will cheat on Alfie, she'll cheat on him too; and maybe he's just stringing her along for the ride.
I still say, Shaggerman is Derek - clock his remark to Alfie in a request for the hair of the dog:-
"You're a very accommodating man, Alfie."
Kat is such a scurvy bitch, and her using Kim for a lie is as low as it gets. Kim's an idiot, but I don't think she approves of cheating. After all, she left Dexter when she found him to be unfaithful (although, I daresay this lot of writers have forgotten that Dexter even exists). I do think Kim saw through the lie Katshit told her, however, and more important, I think Alfie is beginning to suss something is wrong.
Also, cue EastEnders' last-ditch effort to get the viewers onside with poor, mistreated Kat.
Whine, whine ... "Why do yer love me, Awwwfie? Why do yer put up wi'me?"
Why indeed? How many mothers of young children like that spend all night "getting wasted" when they have a toddler to look after? If Kat were someone like Lola, she'd have Tommy taken off her. Alfie knew the minute Kat couldn't answer his question about why she should love him, and he definitely knew Charlie didn't send the flowers.
What a dirty slut she is.
Then we had Tanya lecturing Max on his all-nighter - this time about "respect." That's another joke. "Respect" is a word that isn't found in either Max's or Tanya's vocabulary. Where was the respect either had for Rachel or Bradley - or, more recently, Greg, when they wantonly cheated on these people and laughed about them behind their backs? Where's the "respect" they show each other when they undermine each other as parents?
That scene in the salon with Max bringing Tanya flowers was totally embarrassing. Jake Wood is one of the stronger actors in EastEnders, but even he looked pedestrian in that scene and could do nothing with the lame dialogue, not to mention the weird little dance he affected.
Lord, have mercy! What the fuck is happening to this show?
And as for Jack and the femae impersonator pretending to be Sharon, please don't even go there. When did Sharon start simpering? More specifically, when did she ever start simpering around a block of wood like Jack Branning?
Jack Branning
The coy little smirks, the double entendres ... why does she even bother with saying she only has room for "one man" in her life (her fey son), when it's obvious that she's doing this to try to snare Jack?
It's totally embarrassing to watch and a disgrace to the character Sharon is. It's bad writing. It's lazy writing, and - more to the point - it's bloody living proof that Scott Maslen manages, single-handedly plebecizes every actress with whom he shares a scene - from Sam Womack to Jo Joyner to Rita Simons to Letitia Dean. As nice a man as Maslen seems, he's a pretty crap actor, and I question Lorraine Newman's decision to axe John Partridge's character when Scott Maslen is still considered viable to the show's success. Partridge is as good an actor as Maslen, which is to say, not very good; but at least Partridge is under no such allusions. They were both worth the chop.
And as much as I have loved the character of Sharon, shoehorning her with the Brannings is beyond belief. As for her appearance this time, she looks like the natural lovechild of Miss Piggy and Dolly Parton (who did not sing "Stand by Your Man," incidentally).
Someone slap Anorexic Annie. Please. Hard. And please stop showing shots of her walking away from the camera wearing those tight jeans. It's painful. And are you telling me that, in all her "empire", she can't summon a thousand quid to repay Janine's debt? She deserves a smack for the abjectly rude way she spoke to Ian tonight, and he deserves a smack for running away from her like a scared rabbit. She and Joey should really see a specialist about their inability to breath with their mouths shut. It seriously affects Joey's enunciation, which is now worse than Tyler's.
Joey's dialogue: "Argha-wargha-arrah-fair-mly."
And Lauren the Gurner needs to tome down the acting. How many times do I have to say it? How many times do we have to have it thrown down our throats that - yes, the Branning fathers are a pain; yes, they are an embarrassment. So now with "mah-Alice-mah-Angel" deciding to move out and move in with Fatboy, we now not only have the Hollyoaksification of EastEnders, we have the Neighbourisation of the show, itself. 'Struth.
Let's see, now we've got Fatboy, Roxy and "mah-Alice-mah-Angel" living in the old Slater house, for which Mo was charging the Moons £1000 per month. Fatboy's on minimum wage as a popboy-trainee-barman, Roxy's unemployed, and at the rate Alice is going, she'll soon be unemployed too. It defies belief.
And, finally, Janine. Once again, she's being mind-gamed by Michael. I'm convinced he doesn't love her now, and maybe this is his aim - to control her by making her so insecure. He's obviously got little toerag shits like Anorexic Annie believing that he controls all of Janine's money. I hated that snidey litte face he pulled when she confronted him about his nocturnal walks. Janine is right when she tells Billy she can't confront Michael and question him directly. She knows he's a liar, and he knows she has trust issues and he's deliberately tormenting her. As much as I hate to see Janine go, I'm pleased that when she does, she delivers the sucker punch of all sucker punches to his cadaverous ass.
I want to see her return triumphant.
The rest can go to hell in a handcart.
And as much as I have loved the character of Sharon, shoehorning her with the Brannings is beyond belief. As for her appearance this time, she looks like the natural lovechild of Miss Piggy and Dolly Parton (who did not sing "Stand by Your Man," incidentally).
Someone slap Anorexic Annie. Please. Hard. And please stop showing shots of her walking away from the camera wearing those tight jeans. It's painful. And are you telling me that, in all her "empire", she can't summon a thousand quid to repay Janine's debt? She deserves a smack for the abjectly rude way she spoke to Ian tonight, and he deserves a smack for running away from her like a scared rabbit. She and Joey should really see a specialist about their inability to breath with their mouths shut. It seriously affects Joey's enunciation, which is now worse than Tyler's.
Joey's dialogue: "Argha-wargha-arrah-fair-mly."
And Lauren the Gurner needs to tome down the acting. How many times do I have to say it? How many times do we have to have it thrown down our throats that - yes, the Branning fathers are a pain; yes, they are an embarrassment. So now with "mah-Alice-mah-Angel" deciding to move out and move in with Fatboy, we now not only have the Hollyoaksification of EastEnders, we have the Neighbourisation of the show, itself. 'Struth.
Let's see, now we've got Fatboy, Roxy and "mah-Alice-mah-Angel" living in the old Slater house, for which Mo was charging the Moons £1000 per month. Fatboy's on minimum wage as a popboy-trainee-barman, Roxy's unemployed, and at the rate Alice is going, she'll soon be unemployed too. It defies belief.
And, finally, Janine. Once again, she's being mind-gamed by Michael. I'm convinced he doesn't love her now, and maybe this is his aim - to control her by making her so insecure. He's obviously got little toerag shits like Anorexic Annie believing that he controls all of Janine's money. I hated that snidey litte face he pulled when she confronted him about his nocturnal walks. Janine is right when she tells Billy she can't confront Michael and question him directly. She knows he's a liar, and he knows she has trust issues and he's deliberately tormenting her. As much as I hate to see Janine go, I'm pleased that when she does, she delivers the sucker punch of all sucker punches to his cadaverous ass.
I want to see her return triumphant.
The rest can go to hell in a handcart.
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