Yes, why are we waiting? And for what?
Things have come to a pretty pass when one of the biggest passive-aggressive bullies in Walford Web Kindergarten's history, Jark, and I are in total agreement about something.
Jark paraphrases my question in another way by beginning a thread on the site simply asking where the hell all the storylines are. Because at the moment, the show is barely treading water.
We're two weeks away from March, and we're still in a circular welter with the leftovers from the Walford Christmas dinner. Let's recap:-
Derek died. Not from a stab or a gunshot wound, but from a heart attack. Everyone, except - arguably - My Aa-aasss, has moved on from this event. Indeed, he's barely mentioned now, even though his name was constantly on Katshit's lips for two weeks after the fact. Why? Because, dontcha know, the reason Kat cheated on Alfie most of the summer right up until October (and maybe afterward, that's debatable) is down to Derek forcing her to have an affair. Force, as in rape; and that was followed by blackmail.
Now we know all of that is a pack of lies, or is it? Yes, we saw Katshit, dressed like a common whore and suddenly the interest of every male, gay or straight, with a biological pistol in his pocket in Walford. We saw her lick her lips, spread her chunky legs an invite the then-unknown Shaggerman into the Vic's kitchen for a little sperm-spreading on the counter where Ray puts the ingredients together for the daily fare. We then saw her hike down her skirt and leave satisfied. We saw her leave Alfie waiting for her in bed, whilst she had yet another knee-trembler in the alleyway. No one forced her, and no one was blackmailing her, when we saw Shaggerman's heel go in the bedsit's bathroom, whilst she law, smiling in the afterglow of their afternoon fuck.
So Kat was lying ... or maybe Lorraine Newman, hell-bent on repairing Kat's image and reuniting the Moons, is doing a Bobby Ewing on us - you know, like all this summer, what happened didn't happen and Kat was forced, she was blackmailed, and we were actually seeing all this from Shaggerman;s (shit, Derek's) fantasy point of view.
Who knows? Derek is dead, one of the most unpopular characters ever in the show's history, who graced the screen for a year, hijacked Pat's death and funeral, and had a significant part of an episode dedicated to his funeral.
Go figure.
Max Is Still Torn Between Two Lovers.
Max loves Tanya. No, wait, he still has feelings for Kirsty; but he wants Kirsty to leave, so he can stay with Tanya, with whom he's comfortable and on whom he can cheat regularly without compunction. So he bins off Kirsty, and tells Tanya, for once, the truth. Basically, he loves her, but he still has feelings for Kirsty, and he married her because he was free to do so, and he loved her. So Tanya bins Max. And leaves Walford for a bit. So Max gets back with Kirsty, telling her she's the one ...
Trust me, Max is not Bruce Springsteen.
But Tanya's coming back and the merry-go-round will begin again. Meanwhile, lazy Lauren and silly Abi have shunned Max, again - except when they need money - and Cora the Bora and Lauren are drinking the house down. Same old same old .. and so it goes until Yummy Mummy leaves ... in May.
Nothing changed there.
Sharon Is Still a Bimbo and a Branning Satellite.
It was bad enough that Bryan Kirkwood fucked up Kat. It was worse that he made Bianca a vile piece of stinking, chav flesh. But the Branningisation of Sharon is down to Lorraine Newman and Simon Ashdown, two people who have been with the EastEnders' team since the 90s and who would have known how iconic Sharon is.
She looks more like Miss Piggy, hasn't mentioned Michelle or Vicky, couldn't be bothered to remember the anniversary of the fey man whom people think was the love of her life, treats Ian like an unpaid babysitter, hasn't mentioned Pauline's death, and shrugged when she heard the news about Pat.
Add to that, she's become hypocritical, judgemental, petty, vengeful and she considers Tanya her best friend - someone she only met a few months ago. She slept with Jack her first night back in Walford - Sharon doesn't do one night stands and never with strangers, and rather than find a place for herself and her boy, she prostituted herself to Jack to be coddled, controlled and looked after.
Her much-touted prescription drug abuse storyline was a pathetic joke.
Her contract is up in August. Does anyone see a renewal? Does anyone like Bimbo Sharon?
One shudders to think what they'll do to Janine, whose return is imminent.
Eternal Triangles of Love.
For someone who doesn't want to emphasize romantic relationships, Lorraine Newman is becoming known for tiresome love triangles.
By announcing up front that she intends to repair Kat, an iconic character whom TPTB shredded to the point that she is now unlikeable and spent, because Kat was one of the first character creations in which she was involved (ego, anyone?), and by further announcing that she wanted a Moon reunion and Alfie in the pub, we now know the aim of the year, culminating in a Christmas renewal of wedding vows between Alfie and Kat, which will have been their tenth wedding anniversary.
To achieve this, Kat is being written like the Holy Virgin Mary, and Roxy has become a desperate, jealous shrew. Once again, we'll have a long-standing character (Roxy) sacrificed at the altar of a character who's been toxic since she returned in 2010, badly written and unrecogniseable. Whereas Roxy came into her own with her initial romantic involvement and friendship with Alfie - but that could never be a success in and of itself unless Kat left.
And she's going nowhere.
If that's not enough, Newman is giving us two triangles for the price of one - with Kat bonking and moving in with Michael (in Janine's house with Janine's baby) just in time for Janine's return - cue Square-wide fight, complete with excessive bitch-slapping and designed to re-introduce Evil Janine, who abandoned her baby, and to reinforce Holy Mother Kat, who took the mite in.
Other than that, we have the three remaining Masoods morphing into Men Behaving Badly, Lauren drinking, Joey still mouth-breathing, Abi's most probable eventual pregnancy due to unprotected sex with Jay and the Lola saga again and again and again.
And despite the West Side Story gangabanga with Liam the Lunk, Bianca will still be poor.
This is EastEnders 2013?
Things have come to a pretty pass when one of the biggest passive-aggressive bullies in Walford Web Kindergarten's history, Jark, and I are in total agreement about something.
Jark paraphrases my question in another way by beginning a thread on the site simply asking where the hell all the storylines are. Because at the moment, the show is barely treading water.
We're two weeks away from March, and we're still in a circular welter with the leftovers from the Walford Christmas dinner. Let's recap:-
Derek died. Not from a stab or a gunshot wound, but from a heart attack. Everyone, except - arguably - My Aa-aasss, has moved on from this event. Indeed, he's barely mentioned now, even though his name was constantly on Katshit's lips for two weeks after the fact. Why? Because, dontcha know, the reason Kat cheated on Alfie most of the summer right up until October (and maybe afterward, that's debatable) is down to Derek forcing her to have an affair. Force, as in rape; and that was followed by blackmail.
Now we know all of that is a pack of lies, or is it? Yes, we saw Katshit, dressed like a common whore and suddenly the interest of every male, gay or straight, with a biological pistol in his pocket in Walford. We saw her lick her lips, spread her chunky legs an invite the then-unknown Shaggerman into the Vic's kitchen for a little sperm-spreading on the counter where Ray puts the ingredients together for the daily fare. We then saw her hike down her skirt and leave satisfied. We saw her leave Alfie waiting for her in bed, whilst she had yet another knee-trembler in the alleyway. No one forced her, and no one was blackmailing her, when we saw Shaggerman's heel go in the bedsit's bathroom, whilst she law, smiling in the afterglow of their afternoon fuck.
So Kat was lying ... or maybe Lorraine Newman, hell-bent on repairing Kat's image and reuniting the Moons, is doing a Bobby Ewing on us - you know, like all this summer, what happened didn't happen and Kat was forced, she was blackmailed, and we were actually seeing all this from Shaggerman;s (shit, Derek's) fantasy point of view.
Who knows? Derek is dead, one of the most unpopular characters ever in the show's history, who graced the screen for a year, hijacked Pat's death and funeral, and had a significant part of an episode dedicated to his funeral.
Go figure.
Max Is Still Torn Between Two Lovers.
Max loves Tanya. No, wait, he still has feelings for Kirsty; but he wants Kirsty to leave, so he can stay with Tanya, with whom he's comfortable and on whom he can cheat regularly without compunction. So he bins off Kirsty, and tells Tanya, for once, the truth. Basically, he loves her, but he still has feelings for Kirsty, and he married her because he was free to do so, and he loved her. So Tanya bins Max. And leaves Walford for a bit. So Max gets back with Kirsty, telling her she's the one ...
Trust me, Max is not Bruce Springsteen.
But Tanya's coming back and the merry-go-round will begin again. Meanwhile, lazy Lauren and silly Abi have shunned Max, again - except when they need money - and Cora the Bora and Lauren are drinking the house down. Same old same old .. and so it goes until Yummy Mummy leaves ... in May.
Nothing changed there.
Sharon Is Still a Bimbo and a Branning Satellite.
It was bad enough that Bryan Kirkwood fucked up Kat. It was worse that he made Bianca a vile piece of stinking, chav flesh. But the Branningisation of Sharon is down to Lorraine Newman and Simon Ashdown, two people who have been with the EastEnders' team since the 90s and who would have known how iconic Sharon is.
She looks more like Miss Piggy, hasn't mentioned Michelle or Vicky, couldn't be bothered to remember the anniversary of the fey man whom people think was the love of her life, treats Ian like an unpaid babysitter, hasn't mentioned Pauline's death, and shrugged when she heard the news about Pat.
Add to that, she's become hypocritical, judgemental, petty, vengeful and she considers Tanya her best friend - someone she only met a few months ago. She slept with Jack her first night back in Walford - Sharon doesn't do one night stands and never with strangers, and rather than find a place for herself and her boy, she prostituted herself to Jack to be coddled, controlled and looked after.
Her much-touted prescription drug abuse storyline was a pathetic joke.
Her contract is up in August. Does anyone see a renewal? Does anyone like Bimbo Sharon?
One shudders to think what they'll do to Janine, whose return is imminent.
Eternal Triangles of Love.
For someone who doesn't want to emphasize romantic relationships, Lorraine Newman is becoming known for tiresome love triangles.
By announcing up front that she intends to repair Kat, an iconic character whom TPTB shredded to the point that she is now unlikeable and spent, because Kat was one of the first character creations in which she was involved (ego, anyone?), and by further announcing that she wanted a Moon reunion and Alfie in the pub, we now know the aim of the year, culminating in a Christmas renewal of wedding vows between Alfie and Kat, which will have been their tenth wedding anniversary.
To achieve this, Kat is being written like the Holy Virgin Mary, and Roxy has become a desperate, jealous shrew. Once again, we'll have a long-standing character (Roxy) sacrificed at the altar of a character who's been toxic since she returned in 2010, badly written and unrecogniseable. Whereas Roxy came into her own with her initial romantic involvement and friendship with Alfie - but that could never be a success in and of itself unless Kat left.
And she's going nowhere.
If that's not enough, Newman is giving us two triangles for the price of one - with Kat bonking and moving in with Michael (in Janine's house with Janine's baby) just in time for Janine's return - cue Square-wide fight, complete with excessive bitch-slapping and designed to re-introduce Evil Janine, who abandoned her baby, and to reinforce Holy Mother Kat, who took the mite in.
Other than that, we have the three remaining Masoods morphing into Men Behaving Badly, Lauren drinking, Joey still mouth-breathing, Abi's most probable eventual pregnancy due to unprotected sex with Jay and the Lola saga again and again and again.
And despite the West Side Story gangabanga with Liam the Lunk, Bianca will still be poor.
This is EastEnders 2013?
OK, so there will be no Sharon and Phil back in the Vic. The one big thing longtime fans were hoping for. If that doesnt happen, then Sharon will be gone, and probably for good (few years). Its like they want to completely erase all of EE prior to the last 10 or so years, destroy everything that was good about the programme.
ReplyDeleteI liked Janine just before she left. She was starting to really care about people. I dont want evil Janine back, I want Janine that helps those that helped her, and look out for anyone trying to cross her. But no, the Kat is going to steal the cream.
Bad girl Lorraine, bad girl!
Professor Plum