Ladies and gentlemen, the Smell-the-Fart School of Acting, as exemplified by this scene from Friends:-
Or how about these tricks of the trade for Messrs Witts and Discipline from their spiritual mentor:-
And do you think they go through this ritual of "Acting Exercises" before they go in front of the camera?
Tonight, we, the viewers, were afforded a rare treat - two future scions of the British acting industry indulging in their art in one episode. I know it was a hard thing to fathom, but they actually shared a scene, each one gutterally mumbling unintelligible dialogue at each other before engaging in the most butt-clinchingly embarrassing travesty of a fight, it was pathetic.
Maybe Lorraine Newman (or rather, Simon Ashdown, the man who actually does run the show) is conducting an experiment to see which of the two so-called actors is the worst and should be up for the chop.
The answer, unfortunately, is that neither one is going anywhere.
First, Joey is a Branning, so he's safe. Second, Lorraine Newman thinks he's fit (fit for what, I don't know). Then there's Tyler. He's safe too, and not because of Whitney. Tony Discipline dates Jacqueline Jossa, whose alter ego is Lauren Branning, the ingenue Lorraine Newman is also trying to flog to the viewing public as the hottest ticket in town. As long as Jossa is the go-to girl for this bunch of jerks fucking up what used to be the BBC's flagship programme, Discipline's non-job is safe ... all at the expense of the licence fee-payer.
Are you getting your money's worth?
No, I didn't think so ... still, all isn't lost. In the view of one of Digital Spy's foremost EastEnders' shippers ...
LOL ... LOL ... Lauren is hot ... LOL ... LOL ... hyuck hyuck hyuck,
Really, this wasn't a very good episode; however, it did have its one high point.
The Wrath of Dot.
There is a thread on Digital Spy at the moment, started by the village idiot who's a regular Cora-shipper - you know, the one who pushed the meme of Sharon being Cora's daughter?
This thread tries to liken Cora to Pat, Pauline or Peggy, in matriarchal status. The truth is that Cora is like none of those women, all of whom were flawed, but all of whom were institutions in Walford - none moreso than Pat. The reason why Cora will never even be good enough to wipe dogshit from the shoe of any one of them is simply because they all had heart, compassion and spleen. Heart and grit. They cared about their own and/or the entire Square or any underdog who sought (and some who didn't seek) their help, wisdom or understanding. The advice they gave was always well thought and dependable.
Cora, like her daughter and granddaughter, looks out for number one. As such, her advice is often skewed and relates to incidents in her own life about which she's learned nothing. Because she put her daughter up for adoption ages ago - and no one held a gun to her head forcing her to do so - she tells Lola to go bang the doors down at Social Services until they return Lexi to her. Lola follows her advice, and Lexi remained in care. She tells Tanya not to talk to Max, when Max wanted to reason with her about his current situation; instead, she tells Tanya to take Oscar and run away, not to even answer any of Max's calls. That wasn't done for any concern about Tanya's welfare; it was done because the drunken old bitch had lost her home and job, again, and needed a place to stay. Tanya was adamant about Cora the Bora not staying with her, so she had to get Tanya out of the way, with her assertion of staying there to look after Abi and Lauren the Lip.
I'm not and never have been Dot's biggest fan, but since she's returned and since everyone else in this programme has been changed beyond recognition by Ashdown, the millennial wunderkind Emer-if-it-happened-before-I-was-born-it-ain't-relevant-Kenny and Numptie the Newman or else they've just been bloody unlikeable since the beginning, I'm warming to Dot as the voice of courage and reason on the show.
She's been the real (albeit reluctant) matriarch since her return, although I daresay the idiots who control the storylines are working overtime at our expense to make sure that her tenure isn't permanent.
I wanted to stand up and cheer for what Dot did tonight - which was to hand the Branning Satellite of Luurrrve her blowsy, fat, permatanned arse.
To begin with, Sharon had absolutely no right to order Max to leave Jack's flat. The flat belongs to Jack, and Max is Jack's brother. Surely, Sharon hasn't forgotten the concept of family as enforced in the East End, nor the other tenet of siblings sticking together - although, the Max-Jack devotion is a bit hard to swallow considering everything that went down in 2008.
Like this ...
Or this ...
You see, TPTB depend on the viewers not having braincell capacity to remember back to 2008 or even further; but - hey - that's all right, because EastEnders is always good ... hyuck hyuck hyuck.
(Aside: hasn't Scott Maslen aged? He's almost got a turkey neck).
Still, Sharon is living in Jack's flat on Jack's good nature. She isn't his wife, yet, and even if she were, there's a line you don't dare cross in interfering in your partner's family, especially if you know jack shit (pun intended) about what's really going on.
Let me get this right ... Sharon, who - post-Sharongate - has always maintained a high sense of morality in her views, made fast friends some six months ago, with a woman to whom the word "moral" means nothing. This woman broke up Max's marriage eighteen years ago. She cheated on her husband with Max one year ago. She was divorced from Max and married to another at the time. In good faith, Max got married, and Sharon is taking up for her "friend," the other woman, as opposed to a man who really did nothing wrong other than trust his dodgy older brother.
Jack was well in order to take his brother in off the street into his home and Sharon should have kept her judgemental mouth shut. I don't know who thought about the idea of using Sharon to validate the Brannings and to slot her into a friendship with a dipshit piece of trailer trash like Tanya, but whoever did that does not know or understand Sharon.
Who was this woman, ordering Max to move on? Not Sharon. And why didn't Jack tell her to shove it up her fat arse, because I tell you what, a Mitchell bruv would have done just that, and she would have loved it. Bitch.
Two good things came from this:
Max approached Dot with his problems. I liked this scene, because we seldom see Dot and Max together, unless Dot is disapproving of something Max has done. Don't get me wrong; Dot can be very judgemental and has been, of Max. In fact, she's blatantly favoured Jack over Max, based entirely on the fact that Jack was Jim's favourite son, and Mas wasn't. So it was good to hear Max lay out his situation to his step-mother tonight and to see her take on board what his troubles were and tell him what he should do.
It was classic when she asked Max who was staying in his house, looking after Abi and Lauren, in Tanya's absence (because, you know, being sixteen and eighteen, they're still little kids). When Max told her Cora was there, Dot's face was a picture.
Cora! Why, Cora can't even look after herself! When I think o'the state she left me in! I ain't sleepin' at nights and I can feel me migraines comin' back.
Too true. Cora abused Dot's hospitality, brought strangers into the house and used the rent money they paid her to indulge in booze and cigarettes, all the while allowing utility and phone bills and council rent to backlog. As a result of that, Dot might be facing court proceedings, and all Cora does is smirk. Someone should smack her flabby, dried-up old face.
Dot offers him a place with her, but she really feels that if he can't be with his daughters, he should at least be with his brother for support, and I'm glad Max, in so many words, implied that his eviction from Jack's was down to the Branning Satellite of Luurrve, who's an old friend of Dot's.
The absolute best scene of the night was that where Dot, in the nicest sort of way, called Sharon a brazen hypocrite and reminded her of the time she was shunned by all and sundry in Walford for her affair with Phil Mitchell whilst married to Grant.
There was a time all them years ago when you was needin' sanctuary ... with Michelle about that business with Grant. All's I'm sayin' is that Max needs 'is brother.
Great one, Dot. Remind the newly-incarnated Queen Bitch that she's not so lilywhite, and how lame did Sharon's protest about her doing it for Tanya sound? A year ago, she'd never heard of Tanya. Even Jane Beale, at her most bovine Tanya-shipping, would see two sides to this argument.
Too bad Ian has been backburnered as Sharon's friend and is now too busy making Denise comfortable that he isn't able to tell Sharon a few more home truths about herself. And Phil needs to tell her about Richard.
Vital Observation: Dot mentioned Michelle tonight. Sharon still hasn't uttered her name. Or Vicky's.
The Return of Shitney.
Just when you had almost forgotten about Valentine's Day 2012 and those awful balloons.
For all of you who've reached your comfort zones of forgetfulness, here's what Bryan Kirkwood (and Lorraine Newman, who signed off on this shit) was trying to ship us last year ...
Within a matter of a couple of months, the couple vanished, literally, from our screens. Oh, they were still in Walford; but Tyler seemed to be relegated to the status of background actor with an occasional line here and there (which we couldn't understand); and Whitney was seen even less.
When she did emerge, she emerged in likeable mode, which means she was used in scenes where she interacted with Bianca or - more importantly - Janine, older young women who mentored her in some way. She was a great support to Janine during the early days of Scarlett's hospitalisation and stood godmother to Scarlett.
And, lately, in the silly triumvirate of entitled non-maidens which Lucy, Lauren and Whitney encompass, she's taken the lead as the most sensible one of the lot.
However, Whitney comes with form, and she did respond to the spontaneously-planned-on-purpose-kiss-that-was-probably-part-of-a-storyline-that-was-dropped moment a few months ago with Joey.
Now they've resurrected Shitney again, probably because the likes of Steve McFadden, Adam Woodyatt and Shane Ritchie were either on panto breaks or getting ready to go on panto breaks when this was filmed, so they had to have someone to make up screen time. After all, according to TPTB, who've told us gems of truth (not) about the public loving Kat and Alfie fighting, Shitney run a close second to the omnipresent Branning charade in popularity. And if you believe that, I've got a bridge in Brooklyn I need to sell you.
Actually, and I'm surprised to be saying this, I did glean a couple of positives from Shitney tonight, although I'm certain TPTB and the numptie who wrote this episode didn't intend that these details should be positives in any way. Nope, the positives were the sheer joy of seeing Shitney together again, but there were a couple of unintentional surprises.
The first was that I'm not surprised that Shitney need more space. Not having seen Shona McGarty for sometime, I was surprised at the amount of weight she'd put on. Besides your backside, one place a woman always stores extra weight is in her face, and if you look at Shona's face tonight and compare it with that last year's clip, you'll see she's heftier around the jowls.
Then if you recall that embarrassing scene of Tyler flogging goods on his stall at Christmas with his shirt off and a sizeable gut, you'll see that he's packing some extra pounds too.
And then there's Morgan Le Fat, who thundered down the hall tonight like a baby water buffalo.
So it seems that, during all the time Shitney have been off our screens, they've been sitting around the Jackson-Butcher house, babysitting MOWgan and stuffing their faces with chicken nuggets, amongst other things.
I would imagine, as well, that they need a break from Bianca's awful mouth and Tiffany's developing one.
The other positive I noticed tonight was Whitney's face when Lauren the Lip and the clusterfuck cousin decided to indulge in a little vice-is-nice-but-incest-is-best in public in the cafe. Whitney was clearly uncomfortable with cousins in such a consaguinous relationship.
(Pssst ... did you realise that you have the same consaguinity relationship with a cousin that you do with a half-sibling? Michael Moon has a half-sister, Frankie, with the same consaguinity that Joey and Lauren share. It's not about sharing a parent, it's that your parent and your parent's sibling - your uncle or aunt - share the same DNA. Let's take that one step further and into more familiar territory - Lauren and Bradley share the same consaguinity as Lauren and Joey.)
But I digress. Lauren isn't comfortable being a third wheel to the sort of relationship that's interfamilial, and Joey takes offense? Not only does he take offense with her reaction, to which she's entitled, he threatens her with telling her boyfriend about a kiss they shared.
The apple doesn't fall far from the tree ... the King is dead, long live the King and all that.
Joey is Derek's son. In other words, an even bigger prick than we imagined. The tadpole has become a frog.
Like I said, Whitney's got form - for dumping any dependable bloke who genuinely likes her for a bad boy. She dumped Todd for Billie, and Billie dumped her. She dumped Peter Beale for Connor and got dumped. She dumped Fatboy for Tyler when Tyler seemed to be the edgier bad boy type, but Tyler's become the dependable bloke, who wants to settle down with her, and Joey kissed her.
She even admitted to a secretly jealous Lauren that she may have had feelings for Joey then; and tonight, after she again confronted Joey and he taunter her in a way of which Derek would have been sublimely proud (and with an open mouth as well), when she confided in Bianca, I nearly fell off my seat at Bianca's advice ... don't say anything to Tyler.
Errr ... unless I'm mistaken, this was the same piece of advice Pat gave Ricky when he was conflicted last year about his one night stand with Mandy. Say nothing.
But Bianca's advice led to the third and most astounding thing about the Shitney ordeal tonight ... Whitney told Tyler. She chose to tell him about the incident, herself.
She took responsibility for her action and told him what happened.
Wow, that's something you'd never see the likes of Kat, Bianca, Tanya or Zainab do in a million years. That's character progression. At last.
She didn't even pull any punches. Joey made the first move (true) and she responded (also true). It was nothing, and she actually was, at this point, telling the truth. Whether she was telling the truth because Tyler was offering her a plan about a future together or whether she was just scared shitless, I don't know. But she took what happened onto her own shoulders and told Tyler before any other word came out about it.
And we then got to see Joey, unintelligibly morph even further into Derek. He totally lied about the event, putting all the blame on Whitney for initiating the situation.
The shame about all that was that the scene between Discipline and Witts was almost unintellible and embarrassingly badly acted. It was smell-the-fart acting of the worst degree.
The punch and the ensuing "fight" was pitiful.
This is what they both deserve ...
Ah well, just when you thought it was safe to go into the water ...
We get Shitney.
Don't It Always Seem to Go That You Don't Know What It's Like Til It's Gone ... Katshit, Bianca and My Aaa-aaass.
For these three:-
It's a shame that Jasmyn Banks is the one young actor on the show with a sizeable portfolio and reasonable talent, and all she's got to show for it is being presented as a gormless drip who utters lines like, "I need a wee wee," and who is the last of the red hot virgins.
As many days as Alice has had off - and her "it's-my-day-off-I've-got-time-coming-to-me" became a standard joke amongst the viewers even if TPTB didn't think it intentionally funny. There wasn't a week which went by that Alice either didn't have a day off or pulled a sickie. What was funny was that she was so "thickie" enough to think she was coming on leaps and bounds enough to be promoted - I mean, why else would her boss call her in on - yes - another day off?
She got the sack. Who couldn't see that coming a mile off? But it was necessary and contrived. Alice had to lose her job in order for one on the Square to be found for her, and what else but being a nanny (unqualified) to Janine Butcher's daughter, thus bringing Scarlett Moon into the realm of blackness known as BranningVille, a dark vortex of hopelessness.
I don't know why, but Alice looked weird tonight. Maybe it was that silly hat or the way she held her head, but her smile was all wonky. One thing's clear though, the only woman about whom Joey genuinely cares is Alice. Keeping it close to home ... just like Dear Old Dad and Auntie Carol.
Bianca and Kat are jobless again, but ne'mind ... they've got a cunning plan ... they'll open a market stall and sell clothes, because no one's got the nous to sell clothes with any taste except some petty criminal chav in a puffa jacket and a fortysomething slapper who dresses like a whore. They can call the stall "Classy Clothes" ... not.
And ne'mind they got no money to back this - I mean, Kat's assertion that they could get stock on credit ... really? Bianca is a convicted thief, who is going to give you credit, sunshine?
Really, this is straight from a Mickey Rooney-Judy Garland 1930s kids' film, like, "Let's put on a show ... " only it's "Let's open a stall..."
(I always did say Ricky Butcher reminded me of an English Mickey Rooney without the talent.)
So the poor, honest, hard-done by victims do the best they can to raise money for their endeavour. After all, Bianca is still poor ...
Bianca tries selling tat in the pub, and ends up getting chatted up by Ajay, whom she later snookers, but poor pitiful Kat, the serial marital cheat, who blames everyone else for her predicament except herself, is caught by Alfie trying to pawn her wedding ring.
When Alfie finds out from the resident Walford Mouth (Bianca) that they're starting a stall, Alfie fronts her the money. She tries to be the noble martyr and refuse, but Alfie presses the dough into her hand, and ... well, you can imagine the rest.
So they're in business, and they celebrate it with a bottle of wine hocked off Ajay.
Observation: Knowing what I know is about to happen with Kat, and how Roxy and maybe even Janine will be sacrificed at the altar of Lorraine Newman's creation, I really do wish this spent character would just go. As for Bianca, I can't think of a more fitting relationship than with Ajay Ahmed. Bianca is a triple village idiot - the Beales can claim her, the Butchers can claim her and so can the Brannings. Ajay is the Masoods' liability. The two deserve each other. At least he can drone out her awful voice with his earphones and Led Zeppelin.
The Slow Death of the Masoods.
This is so painful to watch. Zainab didn't get the regional manager's job, but the kid who did has her mopping floors at the Minute Mart. When he finds out the truth, Masood is, as he says, there for her with the best kind of emotional support.
Since Nina Wadia leaves next week, and we get an entire Masood Week to hurriedly end a marriage which, this week, still looks as though the husband is nuts about the demanding woman he married, we know she isn't going to be promoted out of the show.
TPTB have managed to make Zainab even more unlikeable than they made Pauline Fowler at the end of Wendy Richard's tenure, and rumour said that was payback for Richard's attitude. Well, all I can say is they sure must have disliked Nina Wadia.
That Zainab would dis her own son, Tamwar, as inadequate as some sort of intellectual role model for the insipid Ayesha, is cruel beyond belief. What's even more unrealistic is that the subtle little shitstirrer Ayesha is going to be the catalyst who convinces the Masoods that their thirty-year marriage is dead. There isn't going to be an affair, although Masood was sorely tempted to kiss her tonight, so if he is tempted, it's on a physical level. But rather, she's going to plant some unpleasant home truths in their minds, which have been boiling on a backburner since Yusef came into play and certainly since Syed effected his last treachery - tonight Ayesha said it: that Zainab doesn't love Masood anymore. It's simply going to be a classic tale of two people who invested themselves heavily into their children, suddenly finding they have nothing in common once the children have grown. Empty nest syndrome.
A character like Zainab deserves better than the rushed ending she will receive next week.
And we still have Tanya yet to return ... for several more months.
Verdict.
Or how about these tricks of the trade for Messrs Witts and Discipline from their spiritual mentor:-
And do you think they go through this ritual of "Acting Exercises" before they go in front of the camera?
Tonight, we, the viewers, were afforded a rare treat - two future scions of the British acting industry indulging in their art in one episode. I know it was a hard thing to fathom, but they actually shared a scene, each one gutterally mumbling unintelligible dialogue at each other before engaging in the most butt-clinchingly embarrassing travesty of a fight, it was pathetic.
Maybe Lorraine Newman (or rather, Simon Ashdown, the man who actually does run the show) is conducting an experiment to see which of the two so-called actors is the worst and should be up for the chop.
The answer, unfortunately, is that neither one is going anywhere.
First, Joey is a Branning, so he's safe. Second, Lorraine Newman thinks he's fit (fit for what, I don't know). Then there's Tyler. He's safe too, and not because of Whitney. Tony Discipline dates Jacqueline Jossa, whose alter ego is Lauren Branning, the ingenue Lorraine Newman is also trying to flog to the viewing public as the hottest ticket in town. As long as Jossa is the go-to girl for this bunch of jerks fucking up what used to be the BBC's flagship programme, Discipline's non-job is safe ... all at the expense of the licence fee-payer.
Are you getting your money's worth?
No, I didn't think so ... still, all isn't lost. In the view of one of Digital Spy's foremost EastEnders' shippers ...
LOL ... LOL ... Lauren is hot ... LOL ... LOL ... hyuck hyuck hyuck,
Really, this wasn't a very good episode; however, it did have its one high point.
The Wrath of Dot.
There is a thread on Digital Spy at the moment, started by the village idiot who's a regular Cora-shipper - you know, the one who pushed the meme of Sharon being Cora's daughter?
This thread tries to liken Cora to Pat, Pauline or Peggy, in matriarchal status. The truth is that Cora is like none of those women, all of whom were flawed, but all of whom were institutions in Walford - none moreso than Pat. The reason why Cora will never even be good enough to wipe dogshit from the shoe of any one of them is simply because they all had heart, compassion and spleen. Heart and grit. They cared about their own and/or the entire Square or any underdog who sought (and some who didn't seek) their help, wisdom or understanding. The advice they gave was always well thought and dependable.
Cora, like her daughter and granddaughter, looks out for number one. As such, her advice is often skewed and relates to incidents in her own life about which she's learned nothing. Because she put her daughter up for adoption ages ago - and no one held a gun to her head forcing her to do so - she tells Lola to go bang the doors down at Social Services until they return Lexi to her. Lola follows her advice, and Lexi remained in care. She tells Tanya not to talk to Max, when Max wanted to reason with her about his current situation; instead, she tells Tanya to take Oscar and run away, not to even answer any of Max's calls. That wasn't done for any concern about Tanya's welfare; it was done because the drunken old bitch had lost her home and job, again, and needed a place to stay. Tanya was adamant about Cora the Bora not staying with her, so she had to get Tanya out of the way, with her assertion of staying there to look after Abi and Lauren the Lip.
I'm not and never have been Dot's biggest fan, but since she's returned and since everyone else in this programme has been changed beyond recognition by Ashdown, the millennial wunderkind Emer-if-it-happened-before-I-was-born-it-ain't-relevant-Kenny and Numptie the Newman or else they've just been bloody unlikeable since the beginning, I'm warming to Dot as the voice of courage and reason on the show.
She's been the real (albeit reluctant) matriarch since her return, although I daresay the idiots who control the storylines are working overtime at our expense to make sure that her tenure isn't permanent.
I wanted to stand up and cheer for what Dot did tonight - which was to hand the Branning Satellite of Luurrrve her blowsy, fat, permatanned arse.
To begin with, Sharon had absolutely no right to order Max to leave Jack's flat. The flat belongs to Jack, and Max is Jack's brother. Surely, Sharon hasn't forgotten the concept of family as enforced in the East End, nor the other tenet of siblings sticking together - although, the Max-Jack devotion is a bit hard to swallow considering everything that went down in 2008.
Like this ...
Or this ...
You see, TPTB depend on the viewers not having braincell capacity to remember back to 2008 or even further; but - hey - that's all right, because EastEnders is always good ... hyuck hyuck hyuck.
(Aside: hasn't Scott Maslen aged? He's almost got a turkey neck).
Still, Sharon is living in Jack's flat on Jack's good nature. She isn't his wife, yet, and even if she were, there's a line you don't dare cross in interfering in your partner's family, especially if you know jack shit (pun intended) about what's really going on.
Let me get this right ... Sharon, who - post-Sharongate - has always maintained a high sense of morality in her views, made fast friends some six months ago, with a woman to whom the word "moral" means nothing. This woman broke up Max's marriage eighteen years ago. She cheated on her husband with Max one year ago. She was divorced from Max and married to another at the time. In good faith, Max got married, and Sharon is taking up for her "friend," the other woman, as opposed to a man who really did nothing wrong other than trust his dodgy older brother.
Jack was well in order to take his brother in off the street into his home and Sharon should have kept her judgemental mouth shut. I don't know who thought about the idea of using Sharon to validate the Brannings and to slot her into a friendship with a dipshit piece of trailer trash like Tanya, but whoever did that does not know or understand Sharon.
Who was this woman, ordering Max to move on? Not Sharon. And why didn't Jack tell her to shove it up her fat arse, because I tell you what, a Mitchell bruv would have done just that, and she would have loved it. Bitch.
Two good things came from this:
Max approached Dot with his problems. I liked this scene, because we seldom see Dot and Max together, unless Dot is disapproving of something Max has done. Don't get me wrong; Dot can be very judgemental and has been, of Max. In fact, she's blatantly favoured Jack over Max, based entirely on the fact that Jack was Jim's favourite son, and Mas wasn't. So it was good to hear Max lay out his situation to his step-mother tonight and to see her take on board what his troubles were and tell him what he should do.
It was classic when she asked Max who was staying in his house, looking after Abi and Lauren, in Tanya's absence (because, you know, being sixteen and eighteen, they're still little kids). When Max told her Cora was there, Dot's face was a picture.
Cora! Why, Cora can't even look after herself! When I think o'the state she left me in! I ain't sleepin' at nights and I can feel me migraines comin' back.
Too true. Cora abused Dot's hospitality, brought strangers into the house and used the rent money they paid her to indulge in booze and cigarettes, all the while allowing utility and phone bills and council rent to backlog. As a result of that, Dot might be facing court proceedings, and all Cora does is smirk. Someone should smack her flabby, dried-up old face.
Dot offers him a place with her, but she really feels that if he can't be with his daughters, he should at least be with his brother for support, and I'm glad Max, in so many words, implied that his eviction from Jack's was down to the Branning Satellite of Luurrve, who's an old friend of Dot's.
The absolute best scene of the night was that where Dot, in the nicest sort of way, called Sharon a brazen hypocrite and reminded her of the time she was shunned by all and sundry in Walford for her affair with Phil Mitchell whilst married to Grant.
There was a time all them years ago when you was needin' sanctuary ... with Michelle about that business with Grant. All's I'm sayin' is that Max needs 'is brother.
Great one, Dot. Remind the newly-incarnated Queen Bitch that she's not so lilywhite, and how lame did Sharon's protest about her doing it for Tanya sound? A year ago, she'd never heard of Tanya. Even Jane Beale, at her most bovine Tanya-shipping, would see two sides to this argument.
Too bad Ian has been backburnered as Sharon's friend and is now too busy making Denise comfortable that he isn't able to tell Sharon a few more home truths about herself. And Phil needs to tell her about Richard.
Vital Observation: Dot mentioned Michelle tonight. Sharon still hasn't uttered her name. Or Vicky's.
The Return of Shitney.
Just when you had almost forgotten about Valentine's Day 2012 and those awful balloons.
For all of you who've reached your comfort zones of forgetfulness, here's what Bryan Kirkwood (and Lorraine Newman, who signed off on this shit) was trying to ship us last year ...
Within a matter of a couple of months, the couple vanished, literally, from our screens. Oh, they were still in Walford; but Tyler seemed to be relegated to the status of background actor with an occasional line here and there (which we couldn't understand); and Whitney was seen even less.
When she did emerge, she emerged in likeable mode, which means she was used in scenes where she interacted with Bianca or - more importantly - Janine, older young women who mentored her in some way. She was a great support to Janine during the early days of Scarlett's hospitalisation and stood godmother to Scarlett.
And, lately, in the silly triumvirate of entitled non-maidens which Lucy, Lauren and Whitney encompass, she's taken the lead as the most sensible one of the lot.
However, Whitney comes with form, and she did respond to the spontaneously-planned-on-purpose-kiss-that-was-probably-part-of-a-storyline-that-was-dropped moment a few months ago with Joey.
Now they've resurrected Shitney again, probably because the likes of Steve McFadden, Adam Woodyatt and Shane Ritchie were either on panto breaks or getting ready to go on panto breaks when this was filmed, so they had to have someone to make up screen time. After all, according to TPTB, who've told us gems of truth (not) about the public loving Kat and Alfie fighting, Shitney run a close second to the omnipresent Branning charade in popularity. And if you believe that, I've got a bridge in Brooklyn I need to sell you.
Actually, and I'm surprised to be saying this, I did glean a couple of positives from Shitney tonight, although I'm certain TPTB and the numptie who wrote this episode didn't intend that these details should be positives in any way. Nope, the positives were the sheer joy of seeing Shitney together again, but there were a couple of unintentional surprises.
The first was that I'm not surprised that Shitney need more space. Not having seen Shona McGarty for sometime, I was surprised at the amount of weight she'd put on. Besides your backside, one place a woman always stores extra weight is in her face, and if you look at Shona's face tonight and compare it with that last year's clip, you'll see she's heftier around the jowls.
Then if you recall that embarrassing scene of Tyler flogging goods on his stall at Christmas with his shirt off and a sizeable gut, you'll see that he's packing some extra pounds too.
And then there's Morgan Le Fat, who thundered down the hall tonight like a baby water buffalo.
So it seems that, during all the time Shitney have been off our screens, they've been sitting around the Jackson-Butcher house, babysitting MOWgan and stuffing their faces with chicken nuggets, amongst other things.
I would imagine, as well, that they need a break from Bianca's awful mouth and Tiffany's developing one.
The other positive I noticed tonight was Whitney's face when Lauren the Lip and the clusterfuck cousin decided to indulge in a little vice-is-nice-but-incest-is-best in public in the cafe. Whitney was clearly uncomfortable with cousins in such a consaguinous relationship.
(Pssst ... did you realise that you have the same consaguinity relationship with a cousin that you do with a half-sibling? Michael Moon has a half-sister, Frankie, with the same consaguinity that Joey and Lauren share. It's not about sharing a parent, it's that your parent and your parent's sibling - your uncle or aunt - share the same DNA. Let's take that one step further and into more familiar territory - Lauren and Bradley share the same consaguinity as Lauren and Joey.)
But I digress. Lauren isn't comfortable being a third wheel to the sort of relationship that's interfamilial, and Joey takes offense? Not only does he take offense with her reaction, to which she's entitled, he threatens her with telling her boyfriend about a kiss they shared.
The apple doesn't fall far from the tree ... the King is dead, long live the King and all that.
Joey is Derek's son. In other words, an even bigger prick than we imagined. The tadpole has become a frog.
Like I said, Whitney's got form - for dumping any dependable bloke who genuinely likes her for a bad boy. She dumped Todd for Billie, and Billie dumped her. She dumped Peter Beale for Connor and got dumped. She dumped Fatboy for Tyler when Tyler seemed to be the edgier bad boy type, but Tyler's become the dependable bloke, who wants to settle down with her, and Joey kissed her.
She even admitted to a secretly jealous Lauren that she may have had feelings for Joey then; and tonight, after she again confronted Joey and he taunter her in a way of which Derek would have been sublimely proud (and with an open mouth as well), when she confided in Bianca, I nearly fell off my seat at Bianca's advice ... don't say anything to Tyler.
Errr ... unless I'm mistaken, this was the same piece of advice Pat gave Ricky when he was conflicted last year about his one night stand with Mandy. Say nothing.
But Bianca's advice led to the third and most astounding thing about the Shitney ordeal tonight ... Whitney told Tyler. She chose to tell him about the incident, herself.
She took responsibility for her action and told him what happened.
Wow, that's something you'd never see the likes of Kat, Bianca, Tanya or Zainab do in a million years. That's character progression. At last.
She didn't even pull any punches. Joey made the first move (true) and she responded (also true). It was nothing, and she actually was, at this point, telling the truth. Whether she was telling the truth because Tyler was offering her a plan about a future together or whether she was just scared shitless, I don't know. But she took what happened onto her own shoulders and told Tyler before any other word came out about it.
And we then got to see Joey, unintelligibly morph even further into Derek. He totally lied about the event, putting all the blame on Whitney for initiating the situation.
The shame about all that was that the scene between Discipline and Witts was almost unintellible and embarrassingly badly acted. It was smell-the-fart acting of the worst degree.
The punch and the ensuing "fight" was pitiful.
This is what they both deserve ...
Ah well, just when you thought it was safe to go into the water ...
Don't It Always Seem to Go That You Don't Know What It's Like Til It's Gone ... Katshit, Bianca and My Aaa-aaass.
For these three:-
It's a shame that Jasmyn Banks is the one young actor on the show with a sizeable portfolio and reasonable talent, and all she's got to show for it is being presented as a gormless drip who utters lines like, "I need a wee wee," and who is the last of the red hot virgins.
As many days as Alice has had off - and her "it's-my-day-off-I've-got-time-coming-to-me" became a standard joke amongst the viewers even if TPTB didn't think it intentionally funny. There wasn't a week which went by that Alice either didn't have a day off or pulled a sickie. What was funny was that she was so "thickie" enough to think she was coming on leaps and bounds enough to be promoted - I mean, why else would her boss call her in on - yes - another day off?
She got the sack. Who couldn't see that coming a mile off? But it was necessary and contrived. Alice had to lose her job in order for one on the Square to be found for her, and what else but being a nanny (unqualified) to Janine Butcher's daughter, thus bringing Scarlett Moon into the realm of blackness known as BranningVille, a dark vortex of hopelessness.
I don't know why, but Alice looked weird tonight. Maybe it was that silly hat or the way she held her head, but her smile was all wonky. One thing's clear though, the only woman about whom Joey genuinely cares is Alice. Keeping it close to home ... just like Dear Old Dad and Auntie Carol.
Bianca and Kat are jobless again, but ne'mind ... they've got a cunning plan ... they'll open a market stall and sell clothes, because no one's got the nous to sell clothes with any taste except some petty criminal chav in a puffa jacket and a fortysomething slapper who dresses like a whore. They can call the stall "Classy Clothes" ... not.
And ne'mind they got no money to back this - I mean, Kat's assertion that they could get stock on credit ... really? Bianca is a convicted thief, who is going to give you credit, sunshine?
Really, this is straight from a Mickey Rooney-Judy Garland 1930s kids' film, like, "Let's put on a show ... " only it's "Let's open a stall..."
(I always did say Ricky Butcher reminded me of an English Mickey Rooney without the talent.)
So the poor, honest, hard-done by victims do the best they can to raise money for their endeavour. After all, Bianca is still poor ...
Bianca tries selling tat in the pub, and ends up getting chatted up by Ajay, whom she later snookers, but poor pitiful Kat, the serial marital cheat, who blames everyone else for her predicament except herself, is caught by Alfie trying to pawn her wedding ring.
When Alfie finds out from the resident Walford Mouth (Bianca) that they're starting a stall, Alfie fronts her the money. She tries to be the noble martyr and refuse, but Alfie presses the dough into her hand, and ... well, you can imagine the rest.
So they're in business, and they celebrate it with a bottle of wine hocked off Ajay.
Observation: Knowing what I know is about to happen with Kat, and how Roxy and maybe even Janine will be sacrificed at the altar of Lorraine Newman's creation, I really do wish this spent character would just go. As for Bianca, I can't think of a more fitting relationship than with Ajay Ahmed. Bianca is a triple village idiot - the Beales can claim her, the Butchers can claim her and so can the Brannings. Ajay is the Masoods' liability. The two deserve each other. At least he can drone out her awful voice with his earphones and Led Zeppelin.
The Slow Death of the Masoods.
This is so painful to watch. Zainab didn't get the regional manager's job, but the kid who did has her mopping floors at the Minute Mart. When he finds out the truth, Masood is, as he says, there for her with the best kind of emotional support.
Since Nina Wadia leaves next week, and we get an entire Masood Week to hurriedly end a marriage which, this week, still looks as though the husband is nuts about the demanding woman he married, we know she isn't going to be promoted out of the show.
TPTB have managed to make Zainab even more unlikeable than they made Pauline Fowler at the end of Wendy Richard's tenure, and rumour said that was payback for Richard's attitude. Well, all I can say is they sure must have disliked Nina Wadia.
That Zainab would dis her own son, Tamwar, as inadequate as some sort of intellectual role model for the insipid Ayesha, is cruel beyond belief. What's even more unrealistic is that the subtle little shitstirrer Ayesha is going to be the catalyst who convinces the Masoods that their thirty-year marriage is dead. There isn't going to be an affair, although Masood was sorely tempted to kiss her tonight, so if he is tempted, it's on a physical level. But rather, she's going to plant some unpleasant home truths in their minds, which have been boiling on a backburner since Yusef came into play and certainly since Syed effected his last treachery - tonight Ayesha said it: that Zainab doesn't love Masood anymore. It's simply going to be a classic tale of two people who invested themselves heavily into their children, suddenly finding they have nothing in common once the children have grown. Empty nest syndrome.
A character like Zainab deserves better than the rushed ending she will receive next week.
And we still have Tanya yet to return ... for several more months.
Verdict.
(Pssst ... did you realise that you have the same consaguinity relationship with a cousin that you do with a half-sibling? Michael Moon has a half-sister, Frankie, with the same consaguinity that Joey and Lauren share. It's not about sharing a parent, it's that your parent and your parent's sibling - your uncle or aunt - share the same DNA. Let's take that one step further and into more familiar territory - Lauren and Bradley share the same consaguinity as Lauren and Joey.)
ReplyDeleteNot according to a medical consanguinity website I'm afraid:
Second degree Half siblings
Uncle-niece 1/4
Aunt-nephew
Third degree First cousins
Half uncle-niece 1/8
Half aunt-nephew
Therefore first cousins LESS connected by one degree than the half-sibling example you gave with Lauren and Bradley.
It's an important distinction otherwise you are giving the wrong impression. While it may not be ideal, first cousin relationships have less consanguinity than half-siblings, and whether or not you agree with the ethics, legally first cousins are doing nothing wrong.
I'm sure you won't allow your mistake to be pointed out by publishing my comment, but if so that's a shame. I know you were trying to make a link in ways ordinary people would understand, and are looking at it from one particular angle, but all the research/genetic information I've seen confirms that half-siblings are one step more closely related (which is common sense anyway, when you think about it) than first cousins. However, if there's other research and genetic information out there which contradicts this then happy to read it!