Just when you think this shit couldn't get any shittier ... it does.
I'm sorry, but that's the only sound way to describe what this show has become, and it's become that, exclusively, since 2010 and the advent of Bryan Kirkwood's stuffing EastEnders, the flagship programme of the BBC, which - until Diederick Santer managed to staunch the flow, somewhat, during his tenure- has actually been bleeding viewers for about ten years..
Tonight's hack - as in writer but also as in someone who wantonly hacks at a body until it's dismembered and bleeding profusely, edging toward an untimely death, is Jesse O'Mahoney, a Yorkshireman and sometime goth wannabe singer and ex-photocopy artist who's an alumnus of - yes, you guessed it - Hollyoaks.
The tripe dished out by O'Mahoney, exemplified by tonight's episode and yesterday's, along with the rubbish his fellow Hollyoaks colleague, Perry Balthazar, deserves to be left on the cutting room floor. This is the legacy of Bryan Kirkwood, and one wonders why the numptie who bears the title "Executive Producer" doesn't clear out the dross that's inhabiting the writing room and being paid for by the licence fee remit.
EastEnders is not a niche soap, but it's fast becoming one for the brain-dead, lowest common denominator of yoof viewer, the ones who couldn't think critically if their lives depended on it, the ones who actually think that the woman who died yesterday was actually (in the words of one Luddite) "Market Thatcher had something to do with the Queen ... innit?"
As I'm increasingly angered by the way EastEnders has been decimated and ripped apart, I'm in a name and shame mood. And as I've named O'Mahoney, I'm going to give you a picture of him in his gothic, wannabe-a-rockstar glory with the band he fronts. He's the pasty-looking chap who's eaten all the pies at the centre of the photo:-
And you can read him waxing lyrical about his favourite subject (himself) here.
I'm not saying he's a name-dropper, but he ends the piece by saying he's related to Harold Pinter, which doesn't necessarily mean he's got Pinter's talent by a long shot.
This show is putrefying fast.
Questions.
I have a few questions. First, does anyone think Sharon or Tanya are classy blondes?
Well, here's a real classy blonde to set the mood ...
My question is this ... who was minding the kids? OK, we know that Dot had Little Lord Fauntleroy, but who was minding Oscar or the once-seen-now-forgotten new Bobby Beale? How about Scarlett and Lexi? Were they all at Dot's? And where was Poppy? She works with Tanya, so why wasn't she invited along to share in all the fun? (Because it was fun, wasn't it?)
Phil was locked up and Lola finally made an appearance, late in the day and at the R and R. Michael was creepily standing around muttering and mumbling and careful not to show his fangs, whilst keeping well out of any light. MyAlice was with the hens, although she nipped away briefly to "check on Scarlett," but where was Scarlett? Left dangling in the house owned by the Queen of the Night, all on her own? Trish Barnes made such a fuss about Lola neglecting Lexi, but who was watching Lexi tonight, whilst Phil fought, Lola partied and "Pops" showed up without a key?
Jean was probably upstairs at the Vic with Amy the Silent, that's a given; but who was minding the rest of the kids? Not Nana Carol, who was busy concocting a romance in her own mind and dealing with her daughter's jealousy.
So is it safe to guess that Dot and Poppy sat in with Little Lord Fauntleroy, NuBobby, Lexi and Scarlett, not to mention Oscar, who was probably forgotten and left in his room upstairs at Branning Arms? In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if Tanya forgot and left Oscar when she leaves Walford,and it will be weeks before his decomposing little corpse is discovered upstairs, starved, in his room.
And another question ... Lola and Abii the Dough-faced Girl are sixteen. The R and R is a nightclub. Nightclubs have age restrictions and, even if they didn't, they have a liquor licence which forbids the selling of alcohol to minors - people under the age of eighteen. So, how did Lola and Abi the Dough-faced Girl gain entrance? There was a bouncer outside when Joey skipped into the place and when the guys showed up, so why didn't he demand to see identification from the younger girls in the bevy? Even if Sharon okayed this (because, as of last night, the R and R was her club), she should have known that she'd risk losing the club's - as in Phil's and Janine's - licence with Lola and Abi the Dough-faced Girl necking cocktails all evening?
It's crap like this that piss me off about the lax state of the show at the moment, because EastEnders used to be a show which dotted all the i's and crossed the t's. Now it's continuity is shot, along with minor points of law and legality which determine life in general - like Cora the Bora knowing within minutes of Ava the Rava being taken from her as an infant that Ava's new surname was Hartman, and she was told this by a nurse. As someone who is married to an adoptee from the period referenced by this storyline, that entire vignette was a lie which could never happen. Fiction is based on fact, which means we can't write a fairy story about Richard III marrying his niece and living happily ever after, pretend the Tudors never came to the throne, that Elizabeth I was a figment of out imagination and that Germany won World War II. But you can pretend and believe all that in EastEnders and more. And the sad thing about all of this is that there's a tranche of viewer, like the mindless xTonix who hyucks her simple-minded, low-standard, barely literate observations of wanton praise throughout Digital Spy, who would watch the test signal and slobber all over it lovingly if someone said that it was EastEnders.
Standards have dropped to the gutter.
This Is What the Dumbasses in the Vic Sounded Like at the Beginning of the Show Tonight:-
Seriously, the chimpanzees were more literate and intelligible than Tyler, Joey, Cock and Fatboy. The scenes when they were wittering on with a private joke about locking Jack up, keeping the secret from Ian Beale - and Adam Woodyatt was reduced to squinting his eyes and pursing his lips like a chicken's arse, and making that "nice prat" face he seems to acquire when he's playing an obnoxious drunk.
This was a bad cartoon, with Shane Richie grossly overacting to the point where is was sickening to watch, knowing that - when called to do so - Richie can step up to the plate with the best of them. I found it difficult to comprehend his bantering with Michael back and forth - and if Michael were so bored with the proceedings, why did he continue to hang around like a bad smell? Why is Alfie even talking to this man, considering the part he played in putting an unnecessary strain on Alfie's marriage, even to the point of advising him that he should stay married to that slut of a wife and allow her to skank around. And why, even were people like Alfie, Michael and Ian even tolerating the presence and loutish behaviour of boys young enough to be their sons?
Quasimodo Joey mouth-breathing, Fatboy bowing out, and Cock and Jay even thinking Phil would be ringing them in the dead of night, expecting them to go back to work.
Jesus Christ, this has devolved into some badly-written, terribly performed amateur dramatic production. Unfunny and painful to watch. What's even more infuriating is the thought of how much each of these "actors" earns, which comes from our licence fee. I appreciate the youngsters might think it's nice work if you can get it, and I doubt they give a rat's arse about the underemployment circumstances of the poor blighters who sit watching them strut their stuff, but you'd expect experienced actors like Shane Richie, Jake Wood and Steve McFadden to balk at the tripey dialogue they're expected to deliver. Still, I suppose money talks.
The Hens.
Multiply this by about seventy and you've got what they sounded like:-
That's why they call it a hen party.
Oh, the contrivances! The decision to party at the nightclub Sharon owns, with underaged kids in tow; the drunken old hag shimmying on the dance floor bragging about how sexy a dancer she was ten years previously, when Cora the Bora looked more and more like this ...
(Pssssst! That's Cora the Bora on the left).
In fact, Cora the Bora, Fat Barbie and Unfunny Kim are so obviously men-in-drag, they should have wrangled Katshit into entertaining the teeming multitudes in the R and R (the two bar staff, the DJ and two losers stood at the bar in suits).
I doubt they were that good. Still, they are what they are - illusions. They all subscribe to the illusion that nothing is ever their fault and that they're always the victims.
Oh, here's another question: Why did Whitney the Wise Gypsy take umbrage with Lucy Beale when Lauren the Lip started being snide with Lucy? Lucy said nothing that wasn't the truth - her surprise at Cora's "ten-year" remark certainly was speaking the truth to Cora's drunken old mutton dressed as lamb. And after realising what an inbred asshole Joey Branning was, we're asked to believe that Lucy's motives are pure jealousy when she finds it pretty repulsive that first cousins should be going at it hammer-and-tong, when Lauren's family seem to have accepted what it really tantamount to class A redneck, poor white behaviour. Seriously, only alumni of DeliveranceLand really do tongue their cousins.
And yet another enticing storyline begins ... we're asked to suffer the unique and talentless acting of Jacqueline Jossa.
Luddites, take note.
This is an Academy-Award winning actress:-
Her name is Jennifer Lawrence.
On the othe hand, this ...
is a hack. A graduate of a second-rate South London wannabe fame academy, who is semi-literate to the point that I imagine her scripts have to be read to her, and who is as lazy, entitled and as self-obsessed as the character she plays. This is a burning, mouth-breathing, shouting, totally OTT amateur, and without a doubt the
WORST ACTRESS EVER TO APPEAR IN EASTENDERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
If the episode, itself, was embarrassing, then Jossa's scenes were simply mind-bogglingly, butt-clinchingly shameful. Besides all that, her character is eminently distasteful and unlikeable. The only people who like this character are pre-pubescent young boys just learning to wank. And Tony Discipline, and he's far from being the brightest lightbulb in the pack.
Something nice and shiny for her ... like an axe.
A Fine Romance.
This is not Carol and creepy Steve.
Ok, before we get to the point about Bianca's pointless panic attack and Kat's behaviour proving she is dumb as actual cat shit, I'm missing something here.
It was only a few weeks ago that Carol met creepy Steve in the Vic for a drink, where they bonded over dead children, both of whom had literally had a fit and fallen in it. Then he asked to see her again, and that was that ... until Carol had been handed her ass for getting the police involved with Liam's gangabanga and returned home from the copshop to find creepy Steve hanging around on her doorstep. She sent him away with a flea in his ear.
Then Masood came over with food, and they clinched.
Now the next thing you know is Carol has creepy Steve over on the sly for a drink and a snog on the sofa. Quick action. So here are some more questions ...
Why are Carol and Steve wittering on about doing something "wrong"? She's not married to anyone. Is he? And if so, does she know? Or is he simply referring to the fact that he was (past tense) Bianca's probation officer, but had the sense to remove himself professionally from her case because it was love at first sight for him with Carol?
Because I can't see what they're doing that's wrong.
And, here's the other question: Bianca asked Carol how long this had been going on and Carol replied that she'd been seeing creepy Steve for several weeks. She even implied that they'd been sleeping together.
Eh?
Retconning much? Because there's not even been any scenes of Carol talking into a pretend telephone, referring to "their good time last night etc" or anything to indicate that she'd let creepy Steve between her well-worn legs. As far as I can recall, she had one casual drink with him in the pub and this evening soiree, which was clearly designed to lead upstairs to something else coming up, but didn't.
Because Bianca came home acting like a div and hiding behind the fact that her probation officer, whom she trusted, was aiming to have it off with her mum. Bianca and Carol are too similar. When Carol's all loved up, she's happy for the world, and that's the same with Bianca. When David dumped Carol last year, Carol stamped her foot and made Bianca split with Ricky, even telling her that the kids didn't need a father. Now Bianca's jealous that Carol's got creepy Steve (and maybe even Masood) and Bianca's got no one. Well, if Carol won't let Ricky come back, maybe Bianca could couple with Ajay. If she married Ajay and Mas married Carol, Bianca and Carol wouldn't just be daughter and mother, they'd also be sisters-in-law.
Go figure.
Ronnie's Not Coming Back.
But it's debatable whether Jack's going to her. Jack is a liar. Boy, is he ever a liar, and no one can flush a liar out like Phil Mitchell. Jack had been to see Ronnie that afternoon. He lied to Fat Barbie on the eve of their wedding. He even lied to Phil. Did you clock the tone of desperation in his voice as he tried to convince Phil that he went to say good-bye to Ronnie? That he'd never see her again?
Come on. We all know Ronnie. She calls a spade a spade. If Jack told her this was it, she'd accept it. She's that type of character, and it's part of her tragic heroine ethos. But Jack must have given her scope for hope, because she wants to see him. Again.
This is probably what Ronnie's voicemail said to Jack:-
Precious moments, indeed, and he'd probably go on spending more of those on the sly with her too. Phil's right that he's known Sharon longer and better than Jack and that Sharon would never have stood for any association of lingering doubts Jack had regarding his ex-wife. But then, Phil also knows that Sharon's still a Mitchell at heart and still loves Phil, or else she wouldn't have sucked on his face so much earlier in the evening. After all, Phil came to the R and R to wait for Sharon, in hopes she'd come to the office and see him for a little 'ow's yer favvah convincing. (Come to think of it, Jack's had experience with his ex-missus over that very desk.)
If anyone ever needed any more evidence of how cowardly the Brannings are, then they only have to look at Jack's craven, wild-eyed panic at the thought of Phil telling Sharon about Jack seeing Ronnie.
Oh, my fucking godfathers, this is like stuff from the schoolground, compounded by Abi's sickly bitch imitation at Jay talking to that stripper. Ooh, Jay, who is sheeeee?
God help me, I want to smack her fat doughface.
Unintentionally laughable moment? The kerfuffle at the door of the office about Phil and Jack being inside.
Sharon: It's gone quiet. That's not good.
They should have been found, locked in each other's arms.
Oh Well, They Tried.
Keirston Wareing is a talented actress, and Jake Wood is a more than competent actor who always rises to the occasion, but even they couldn't do the endless circle of Max's conflicted loyalty once again tonight.
I don't think Kirsty is pregnant. I think that was a desperate lie to gauge Max's reaction. Max always wants what he hasn't got, and at the moment, that's Tanya. Kirsty thinks Max is buzzing around Tanya because of the bond they share with their kids, but little does she realise that when he told her to leave Walford a couple of months ago, and she agreed to divorce him, that as soon as he was ensconced with Tanya, he was thinking of Kirsty.
A kid, if this pregnancy were real, would bond Max to Kirsty, because Max is like that; but, once again, the Branning cowardice comes to the fore, as he's afraid of Tanya and his dictating daughters reacting adversely,when the logical truth of the matter was that he's divorced and remarried. He can have as many kids as he can support.
You have to feel for Kirsty in a way. Her life must have been dreadfully low if she considers someone like Max Branning - an amoral piece of white trash selling four cars at a time on a backstreet car lot - a prize catch; but then, so did Tanya when she was a wild child on a sink estate. I suppose beggars can't be choosers.
More's the pity, because the viewing public dissatisfied with this tripe we're being served up as Porterhouse steak, should have a choice to turn the rubbish off. It's our licence fee that's being squandered.
Lorraine Newman pictured below ...
I'm sorry, but that's the only sound way to describe what this show has become, and it's become that, exclusively, since 2010 and the advent of Bryan Kirkwood's stuffing EastEnders, the flagship programme of the BBC, which - until Diederick Santer managed to staunch the flow, somewhat, during his tenure- has actually been bleeding viewers for about ten years..
Tonight's hack - as in writer but also as in someone who wantonly hacks at a body until it's dismembered and bleeding profusely, edging toward an untimely death, is Jesse O'Mahoney, a Yorkshireman and sometime goth wannabe singer and ex-photocopy artist who's an alumnus of - yes, you guessed it - Hollyoaks.
The tripe dished out by O'Mahoney, exemplified by tonight's episode and yesterday's, along with the rubbish his fellow Hollyoaks colleague, Perry Balthazar, deserves to be left on the cutting room floor. This is the legacy of Bryan Kirkwood, and one wonders why the numptie who bears the title "Executive Producer" doesn't clear out the dross that's inhabiting the writing room and being paid for by the licence fee remit.
EastEnders is not a niche soap, but it's fast becoming one for the brain-dead, lowest common denominator of yoof viewer, the ones who couldn't think critically if their lives depended on it, the ones who actually think that the woman who died yesterday was actually (in the words of one Luddite) "Market Thatcher had something to do with the Queen ... innit?"
As I'm increasingly angered by the way EastEnders has been decimated and ripped apart, I'm in a name and shame mood. And as I've named O'Mahoney, I'm going to give you a picture of him in his gothic, wannabe-a-rockstar glory with the band he fronts. He's the pasty-looking chap who's eaten all the pies at the centre of the photo:-
And you can read him waxing lyrical about his favourite subject (himself) here.
I'm not saying he's a name-dropper, but he ends the piece by saying he's related to Harold Pinter, which doesn't necessarily mean he's got Pinter's talent by a long shot.
This show is putrefying fast.
Questions.
I have a few questions. First, does anyone think Sharon or Tanya are classy blondes?
Well, here's a real classy blonde to set the mood ...
My question is this ... who was minding the kids? OK, we know that Dot had Little Lord Fauntleroy, but who was minding Oscar or the once-seen-now-forgotten new Bobby Beale? How about Scarlett and Lexi? Were they all at Dot's? And where was Poppy? She works with Tanya, so why wasn't she invited along to share in all the fun? (Because it was fun, wasn't it?)
Phil was locked up and Lola finally made an appearance, late in the day and at the R and R. Michael was creepily standing around muttering and mumbling and careful not to show his fangs, whilst keeping well out of any light. MyAlice was with the hens, although she nipped away briefly to "check on Scarlett," but where was Scarlett? Left dangling in the house owned by the Queen of the Night, all on her own? Trish Barnes made such a fuss about Lola neglecting Lexi, but who was watching Lexi tonight, whilst Phil fought, Lola partied and "Pops" showed up without a key?
Jean was probably upstairs at the Vic with Amy the Silent, that's a given; but who was minding the rest of the kids? Not Nana Carol, who was busy concocting a romance in her own mind and dealing with her daughter's jealousy.
So is it safe to guess that Dot and Poppy sat in with Little Lord Fauntleroy, NuBobby, Lexi and Scarlett, not to mention Oscar, who was probably forgotten and left in his room upstairs at Branning Arms? In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if Tanya forgot and left Oscar when she leaves Walford,and it will be weeks before his decomposing little corpse is discovered upstairs, starved, in his room.
And another question ... Lola and Abii the Dough-faced Girl are sixteen. The R and R is a nightclub. Nightclubs have age restrictions and, even if they didn't, they have a liquor licence which forbids the selling of alcohol to minors - people under the age of eighteen. So, how did Lola and Abi the Dough-faced Girl gain entrance? There was a bouncer outside when Joey skipped into the place and when the guys showed up, so why didn't he demand to see identification from the younger girls in the bevy? Even if Sharon okayed this (because, as of last night, the R and R was her club), she should have known that she'd risk losing the club's - as in Phil's and Janine's - licence with Lola and Abi the Dough-faced Girl necking cocktails all evening?
It's crap like this that piss me off about the lax state of the show at the moment, because EastEnders used to be a show which dotted all the i's and crossed the t's. Now it's continuity is shot, along with minor points of law and legality which determine life in general - like Cora the Bora knowing within minutes of Ava the Rava being taken from her as an infant that Ava's new surname was Hartman, and she was told this by a nurse. As someone who is married to an adoptee from the period referenced by this storyline, that entire vignette was a lie which could never happen. Fiction is based on fact, which means we can't write a fairy story about Richard III marrying his niece and living happily ever after, pretend the Tudors never came to the throne, that Elizabeth I was a figment of out imagination and that Germany won World War II. But you can pretend and believe all that in EastEnders and more. And the sad thing about all of this is that there's a tranche of viewer, like the mindless xTonix who hyucks her simple-minded, low-standard, barely literate observations of wanton praise throughout Digital Spy, who would watch the test signal and slobber all over it lovingly if someone said that it was EastEnders.
Standards have dropped to the gutter.
This Is What the Dumbasses in the Vic Sounded Like at the Beginning of the Show Tonight:-
Seriously, the chimpanzees were more literate and intelligible than Tyler, Joey, Cock and Fatboy. The scenes when they were wittering on with a private joke about locking Jack up, keeping the secret from Ian Beale - and Adam Woodyatt was reduced to squinting his eyes and pursing his lips like a chicken's arse, and making that "nice prat" face he seems to acquire when he's playing an obnoxious drunk.
This was a bad cartoon, with Shane Richie grossly overacting to the point where is was sickening to watch, knowing that - when called to do so - Richie can step up to the plate with the best of them. I found it difficult to comprehend his bantering with Michael back and forth - and if Michael were so bored with the proceedings, why did he continue to hang around like a bad smell? Why is Alfie even talking to this man, considering the part he played in putting an unnecessary strain on Alfie's marriage, even to the point of advising him that he should stay married to that slut of a wife and allow her to skank around. And why, even were people like Alfie, Michael and Ian even tolerating the presence and loutish behaviour of boys young enough to be their sons?
Quasimodo Joey mouth-breathing, Fatboy bowing out, and Cock and Jay even thinking Phil would be ringing them in the dead of night, expecting them to go back to work.
Jesus Christ, this has devolved into some badly-written, terribly performed amateur dramatic production. Unfunny and painful to watch. What's even more infuriating is the thought of how much each of these "actors" earns, which comes from our licence fee. I appreciate the youngsters might think it's nice work if you can get it, and I doubt they give a rat's arse about the underemployment circumstances of the poor blighters who sit watching them strut their stuff, but you'd expect experienced actors like Shane Richie, Jake Wood and Steve McFadden to balk at the tripey dialogue they're expected to deliver. Still, I suppose money talks.
The Hens.
Multiply this by about seventy and you've got what they sounded like:-
That's why they call it a hen party.
Oh, the contrivances! The decision to party at the nightclub Sharon owns, with underaged kids in tow; the drunken old hag shimmying on the dance floor bragging about how sexy a dancer she was ten years previously, when Cora the Bora looked more and more like this ...
In fact, Cora the Bora, Fat Barbie and Unfunny Kim are so obviously men-in-drag, they should have wrangled Katshit into entertaining the teeming multitudes in the R and R (the two bar staff, the DJ and two losers stood at the bar in suits).
I doubt they were that good. Still, they are what they are - illusions. They all subscribe to the illusion that nothing is ever their fault and that they're always the victims.
Oh, here's another question: Why did Whitney the Wise Gypsy take umbrage with Lucy Beale when Lauren the Lip started being snide with Lucy? Lucy said nothing that wasn't the truth - her surprise at Cora's "ten-year" remark certainly was speaking the truth to Cora's drunken old mutton dressed as lamb. And after realising what an inbred asshole Joey Branning was, we're asked to believe that Lucy's motives are pure jealousy when she finds it pretty repulsive that first cousins should be going at it hammer-and-tong, when Lauren's family seem to have accepted what it really tantamount to class A redneck, poor white behaviour. Seriously, only alumni of DeliveranceLand really do tongue their cousins.
And yet another enticing storyline begins ... we're asked to suffer the unique and talentless acting of Jacqueline Jossa.
Luddites, take note.
This is an Academy-Award winning actress:-
On the othe hand, this ...
WORST ACTRESS EVER TO APPEAR IN EASTENDERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
If the episode, itself, was embarrassing, then Jossa's scenes were simply mind-bogglingly, butt-clinchingly shameful. Besides all that, her character is eminently distasteful and unlikeable. The only people who like this character are pre-pubescent young boys just learning to wank. And Tony Discipline, and he's far from being the brightest lightbulb in the pack.
Something nice and shiny for her ... like an axe.
A Fine Romance.
This is not Carol and creepy Steve.
Ok, before we get to the point about Bianca's pointless panic attack and Kat's behaviour proving she is dumb as actual cat shit, I'm missing something here.
It was only a few weeks ago that Carol met creepy Steve in the Vic for a drink, where they bonded over dead children, both of whom had literally had a fit and fallen in it. Then he asked to see her again, and that was that ... until Carol had been handed her ass for getting the police involved with Liam's gangabanga and returned home from the copshop to find creepy Steve hanging around on her doorstep. She sent him away with a flea in his ear.
Then Masood came over with food, and they clinched.
Now the next thing you know is Carol has creepy Steve over on the sly for a drink and a snog on the sofa. Quick action. So here are some more questions ...
Why are Carol and Steve wittering on about doing something "wrong"? She's not married to anyone. Is he? And if so, does she know? Or is he simply referring to the fact that he was (past tense) Bianca's probation officer, but had the sense to remove himself professionally from her case because it was love at first sight for him with Carol?
Because I can't see what they're doing that's wrong.
And, here's the other question: Bianca asked Carol how long this had been going on and Carol replied that she'd been seeing creepy Steve for several weeks. She even implied that they'd been sleeping together.
Eh?
Retconning much? Because there's not even been any scenes of Carol talking into a pretend telephone, referring to "their good time last night etc" or anything to indicate that she'd let creepy Steve between her well-worn legs. As far as I can recall, she had one casual drink with him in the pub and this evening soiree, which was clearly designed to lead upstairs to something else coming up, but didn't.
Because Bianca came home acting like a div and hiding behind the fact that her probation officer, whom she trusted, was aiming to have it off with her mum. Bianca and Carol are too similar. When Carol's all loved up, she's happy for the world, and that's the same with Bianca. When David dumped Carol last year, Carol stamped her foot and made Bianca split with Ricky, even telling her that the kids didn't need a father. Now Bianca's jealous that Carol's got creepy Steve (and maybe even Masood) and Bianca's got no one. Well, if Carol won't let Ricky come back, maybe Bianca could couple with Ajay. If she married Ajay and Mas married Carol, Bianca and Carol wouldn't just be daughter and mother, they'd also be sisters-in-law.
Go figure.
Ronnie's Not Coming Back.
But it's debatable whether Jack's going to her. Jack is a liar. Boy, is he ever a liar, and no one can flush a liar out like Phil Mitchell. Jack had been to see Ronnie that afternoon. He lied to Fat Barbie on the eve of their wedding. He even lied to Phil. Did you clock the tone of desperation in his voice as he tried to convince Phil that he went to say good-bye to Ronnie? That he'd never see her again?
Come on. We all know Ronnie. She calls a spade a spade. If Jack told her this was it, she'd accept it. She's that type of character, and it's part of her tragic heroine ethos. But Jack must have given her scope for hope, because she wants to see him. Again.
This is probably what Ronnie's voicemail said to Jack:-
Precious moments, indeed, and he'd probably go on spending more of those on the sly with her too. Phil's right that he's known Sharon longer and better than Jack and that Sharon would never have stood for any association of lingering doubts Jack had regarding his ex-wife. But then, Phil also knows that Sharon's still a Mitchell at heart and still loves Phil, or else she wouldn't have sucked on his face so much earlier in the evening. After all, Phil came to the R and R to wait for Sharon, in hopes she'd come to the office and see him for a little 'ow's yer favvah convincing. (Come to think of it, Jack's had experience with his ex-missus over that very desk.)
If anyone ever needed any more evidence of how cowardly the Brannings are, then they only have to look at Jack's craven, wild-eyed panic at the thought of Phil telling Sharon about Jack seeing Ronnie.
Oh, my fucking godfathers, this is like stuff from the schoolground, compounded by Abi's sickly bitch imitation at Jay talking to that stripper. Ooh, Jay, who is sheeeee?
God help me, I want to smack her fat doughface.
Unintentionally laughable moment? The kerfuffle at the door of the office about Phil and Jack being inside.
Sharon: It's gone quiet. That's not good.
They should have been found, locked in each other's arms.
Oh Well, They Tried.
Keirston Wareing is a talented actress, and Jake Wood is a more than competent actor who always rises to the occasion, but even they couldn't do the endless circle of Max's conflicted loyalty once again tonight.
I don't think Kirsty is pregnant. I think that was a desperate lie to gauge Max's reaction. Max always wants what he hasn't got, and at the moment, that's Tanya. Kirsty thinks Max is buzzing around Tanya because of the bond they share with their kids, but little does she realise that when he told her to leave Walford a couple of months ago, and she agreed to divorce him, that as soon as he was ensconced with Tanya, he was thinking of Kirsty.
A kid, if this pregnancy were real, would bond Max to Kirsty, because Max is like that; but, once again, the Branning cowardice comes to the fore, as he's afraid of Tanya and his dictating daughters reacting adversely,when the logical truth of the matter was that he's divorced and remarried. He can have as many kids as he can support.
You have to feel for Kirsty in a way. Her life must have been dreadfully low if she considers someone like Max Branning - an amoral piece of white trash selling four cars at a time on a backstreet car lot - a prize catch; but then, so did Tanya when she was a wild child on a sink estate. I suppose beggars can't be choosers.
More's the pity, because the viewing public dissatisfied with this tripe we're being served up as Porterhouse steak, should have a choice to turn the rubbish off. It's our licence fee that's being squandered.
Lorraine Newman pictured below ...
thank you agree with everything, even little things like it being stated that Jack divorced Ronnie and he decided it was over is a rewrite its absolutely absurd, i don't know if the actors are afraid to get fired but I would be fighting with the producers and writers about this not being in the voice of my character all the time and obviously these actors just don't care enough to fight or don't want to be labeled a diva or get a reputation of being hard to work with but come on, yes the actors can blame their story lines and dialogue on the writers, the writers can blame the producers, the producers can blame the network all an endless loop of excuses but either you care enough about your craft and hold yourself to a standard or you don't deserve to call yourself an actor or writer, go and write fanfiction in your spare time and stop wasting ours.
ReplyDeleteHOORAH!!! Finally someone else who agrees what a terrible excuse of an actress Jossa is.
ReplyDeleteThe love and hype for shit characters like Lauren, Tanya and Sharon on DigitalSpy is mindboggling. They spoken about as though every performance is oscar worthy when they aren't even Oscar Branning worthy!
Love your blog and the comments about freaks of DS. The worst freaks on the soaps section have to be MonaLisa, MormonGirl (who uses her autism as an excuse for her posts, wtf ? and a poster called Styker who comes across as a creepy freak who probably lives alone with a blow up doll in a blonde wig called Tanya and a fleshlight for company. Looking forward to reading more of your blog entries.
In the world of professional wrestling; upon which I misspent much of my youth; they have a term called 'jobbing'. When the producers want to promote one of their stars or drive the point home to fans that one of their big guns is a force to be reckoned with, they set up a series of 'squash' matches; in which a string of nameless, faceless, unknown young wrestlers are brought out as sacrificial lambs to be decimated by their 'star'. It's no big deal, it gets the message across and the young jobber is more than happy for the experience as they climb their way up the ladder.
ReplyDeleteOnly the current bunch of idiots running Eastenders would be arrogant enough to follow the same modus operandi to promote their precious golden-girl Tanya; only, rather than bringing in nameless, faceless 'jobbers' to be sacrificed at her alter, they have the nerve to hire established, acclaimed actresses and treat them with the same undignified disregard. If they're so insistent upon promoting their whole Goddess Tanya crap - whatever, I won't even bother to go into the multitude of problems with that when yourself and so many others have already said it so perfectly. But if they must insist on this puerile, self-indulgent behaviour; can they not at least exhibit SOME shame? Don't bring in successful, hard-working actresses like Zoe Lucker and Kierston Wareing to serve no other purpose than as a plot device to bolster Tanya's standing. They deserve better. Even Sharon, one of the most successful and popular characters in the show's history, has, as you've said, been relegated to nothing more than a Branning satellite, fawning over her new BFF 'Taaaarn' like some awestruck child who's been granted access to the cool clique at school. It's stomach churning. Glenda Jackson could call Lorraine Newman and offer to come out of retirement for one last acting job on Eastenders, and they'd probably do nothing more with her than have her shagging Max for a couple of months; ribbing Tanya, much to the disapproval of the rest of the Square, naturally, who would all flock to defend their Queen; and eventually be driven out of town by Saint Taaaarn, who would, of course, maintain the moral high ground in all of this.
Kierston Wareing could have been a real asset to Eastenders. They were lucky to get her. Instead she's been reduced to playing the hackneyed 'smirking bitch' opposite Tanya's lovely, mumsy, smiley, nicey-nicey 'heroine', just in time for her to leave the show on a high in the hearts of the type of thick-as-pig-shit viewers you can witness eternally gushing over her on the show's Facebook page. There is an intrinsic fault in the way this show is being run. It's not just on the creative side; it's not just a case of the storylines being a little dry and the writers being dense. Their whole approach to production is completely flawed - a structural fault in the foundations that they're all turning a blind eye to, burying their heads in the sand as it slowly brings the whole building down around them. It doesn't stand a hope of survival if it doesn't get some serious work soon. If it doesn't get a major overhaul in the near future, it won't see another five years.