OK, someone, someplace has politely asked the writing room and the research person to watch some episodes from the 1990s - you know, when themes united the storylines featured.
Natalie Mitchell, on her first attempt, captured the spirit of classic EastEnders beautifully last night. Tonight it was Katie Douglas's turn.
As the old Lay's Potato Chips advert from the 1960s in the US used to say:-
She tried, but she couldn't do it.
OK, I'll give her E for effort, but the linking theme she came up with for her episode was children's birthday parties, and whoever storylined this contrived the issue by making Scarlett have a second birthday in one year - kind of like the Queen, but then maybe that's not so unusual since she's the daughter of the Crown Princess of Walford.
The object of the linking themes was always their subtlety. The more prescient viewer got them succinctly and exactly. But on another level, the show's storylines, themselves, were capable of catering to the lower-level pondlife of viewer, such as the moron on Digital Spy who keeps talking about "sexy times" and also keeps trying to troll this blog to feed her massive ego and her even more massive stupidity level.
In the subtlety test, Douglas failed tonight; but then, I hear she's either leaving the production staff or has actually left.
Good.
She never got the ethos of the programme, she never understood the characters - certainly not the older, more established characters - and most of all, her writing usually sucked.
If this were her swansong, good effort, but it was puerile and repetitive. Watchable, but on the level of the age dynamic around whom tonight's parties centred.
Tonight's children's parties were a mask to the games the grown-ups play behind them. That's a good hidden meaning, but she still doesn't get the characters.
The Butcher Bonanza.
Once again, Janine and Michael take centre stage tonight. That's obvious, considering that Charlie Brooks is easily the best actress in the programme.
Of course, it's all about mind games ...
Michael is, to put it mildly, despicable. I'm not going to go into the obvious anymore by stating how and why he can be identified as a psychopath; suffice it to say that he is a psychopath.
He states the obvious about how he feels, but he has snookered so many stupidly shallow people (which is what psychopaths do) that he can actually tell the the way he really feels, and they'll coo and insist that he really doesn't feel that way at all.
Take, for example, the scene where he was wrapping a present, ostensibly for Scarlett, and talking about how he, basically, thought that children's parties and the people who attended them were pukeworthy. Of course, Kat insisted that he didn't feel that way at all; why, he'd spent the past few days obsessing over his present to Scarlett, when all he really was doing was obsessing over undermining Janine's self-esteem and resolve, once again.
Yes, Janine's party for Scarlett was OTT, and I can understand why she did it and also why she remarked about having been indifferent to Scarlett's actual first birthday.
Shall we recap what really happened the day Scarlett was born?
Well, Scarlett's birthday is also the Janine's and Michael's wedding anniversary. As this is their first anniversary, this means that they can now actually start divorce proceedings properly.
On that day, Janine was baited and heckled by Rose Cotton and Cora the Bora. Jean was being scammed by Michael, and was blaming Janine for being behind the scam. It was Jean, who approached Janine, touched her stomach and told her that her baby would be unloved. Then Michael stopped the wedding ceremony and challenged Janine to prove that she loved him by ripping up the pre-nuptual agreement, which she did.
Then, she went into early labour, was rushed to hospital and underwent an emergency Caesarian, giving birth to a premature and very ill baby.
Michael was right. It wasn't the happiest of times. The honesty he displayed in telling Janine that he almost bolted the day Scarlett was born was meant to give Janine a point of identification in her own insecurity as a parent. This doesn't belie the fact that his scathing observation that Janine invited the "wrong" play group to the birthday party, a play group which consisted of "scummy" children, I suspect, was a clever ploy designed to make Janine feel inadequate.
I suspect the people who showed up at the party were actually the parents and children of Scarlett's actual playgroup. Had this been changed, the number on the fridge would have been tacitly removed. Michael revealing that the new number was "saved on his phone" was just another control technique, once again, designed to re-inforce Janine's feelings of inadequacy.
This is just another version of what went on last year. I so await the day when Janine finds out just what a conniving little dumbass Alice is and that she slept with Michael. I want to see Janine bitch-slap her about the Square so much that her plastic veneers go bouncing down the street ahead of her.
You'd better get over here.
This is Janine's money and a party for her child. By the way, Scarlett, for the past year has been an infant. Infants don't react as definitely to other infants in the same way as children of Amy's or Oscar's age do. Yet the writers have Michael and Alice talk about Scarlett as if she were a five or six year-old child.
Swimming lessons, singing lessons, playgroups ... this is all a way to tire the kid out so that, when Michael had control of her, she'd be bloody exhausted by the time she was returned to him, so he'd just see her put to bed and he'd be free for the evening.
I'm glad Janine suddenly came to her senses and remembered what she went through last year at Michael's hands, suddenly sussing what the bronzed baby feet and the happy family picture really meant. Seeing a photo of herself, Michael and Scarlett en famille made Janine suddenly realise just who Scarlett's father was and of what he was capable.
Quite sensibly, she ran from the situation, but not before telling Michael to call before he came to visit.
Once more, Michael doesn't love Scarlett. She's the ultimate means to an end. Michael seeks to control and manipulate fragile females for his own end, and who's more vulnerable than a helpless child. Prior to Janine's return, Scarlett wasn't even referred to by name; for Michael, she was simply "the child."
He's an overgrown spoiled kid about to lose his toy.
I suspect that the person Janine rang was Danny Pennant, and that he'll be getting Billy's old position, since Billy decided to heed chavvy Lola and refuse to go to the South Coast to inspect properties. OK, it was Lexi's birthday the following week, but why not take Lola and Lexi with him?
The Poor White Party.
Lola wants to remember who pays her Pops's wages. She also wants to lay off the tanning machine and taking advantage of the place where she works, especially since it's about to be sold.
Everybody decides to have a spur of the moment birthday party for three kids, and not one of the Mitchell numpties thinks to buy any food? And white trash Cora-the-Bora, eating corn flakes - corn flakes - out of the box was just too common for comment. Not only were they just corn flakes, but unflavoured ones (as they usually are) and the cheapest sort from Aldi's.
I can see eating sugar-coated cereal dry, and I've seen children snack on this from the box, but eating ordinary corn flakes? Cora-the-Bora liked them and so did Lola. There's no accounting for the tastes of white trash.
And how apropos that this lot eventually managed to furnish Lexi's party with food and fare stolen from Scarlett's party.
Another thing to remember ... Billy using Janine's credit card to kit out Lola's nursery, which is really stealing (Billy's lucky Janine refused to press charges) and later Lola stealing bum cream and nappies from Scarlett for Lexi. You can't tell me that Phil Mitchell couldn't have rustled up buying a cake and putting out a spread at a moment's notice.
As for Lola, treating Sharon like shit, whilst accepting Shirley's (stolen) present, Lola's done worse to Lexi, herself - plying her with industrial paint and adult skin cream, amongst other things, whilst lately, lumbering "Pops" with Lexi's care whilst she trolls Walford in the company of Jay and Abi the Dough-Faced Girl, or "Scabby" as Lola calls her. Some friend.
The Beales' Deal.
Round and round in circles we go with Lucy in a sulk and Peter sullen with Ian.
Once again, why doesn't Ian just tell everyone - Peter and Denise, in particular - exactly how Lucy came to have control over the chippie, the cafe and the house. And tell it in the presence of Lucy, just to watch her skinny, anorexic arse squirm and try to deny it. Let him remind her, in front of her brother and Denise, of how she and Joey spoke to him and treated him. Alfie Moon will certainly attest to the fact that, when Lucy first saw Ian, she slammed the door in his face.
Are Peter and Denise so pigshit thick that they don't understand that Ian was mentally ill at the time? That he wasn't responsible for his actions in the days leading up to his disappearance and, certainly, for sometime after returning. Peter may not have been around, but Denise certainly was. There's no excuse for that.
As well, Lucy's fake concern for Ian's mental health when he opened the restaurant was as phoney as a three-pound note. She was jealous. And greedy. She saw the boost that working in that place gave to Ian's self-esteem and morale and she was afraid that he was right on the right track either to re-take his interests (which he did) or buy her out, eventually. She wanted him to sell up, but probably to her.
I still marvel at how Peter's forgotten something he sussed so early on after his return - that Lucy's possession of the Beale businesses, effectively cut him and Bobby out of any sort of inheritance ... and now he's happy to work as her employee on the fruit'n veg stall? Hello?
I will say this about Ian. They were utterly consistent in his character in this episode. We know, from the past, that Ian wasn't above manipulating his kids or using them in order to achieve the end that he wanted. Sometimes this became a massive fail - as when he lied about Lucy having cancer in order to convince Mel to stay with him.
He wasn't above using Bobby tonight, albeit without Bobby's knowledge, to attain the aura of family he so craved.
Why should Ian want Lucy's forgiveness anyway? She never apologised for scamming him of his businesses, and in the past, Lucy's treated Ian abysmally.
Remember this?
And, by the way, Ian didn't "drive Lucy's mother out," Lucy's sainted mother chose to be unfaithful to Ian, not once, not twice, but three times - the first time, she left him for Simon Wicks, Steven's biological father, who promptly dumped her and the sprog and went to New Zealand. The second time was with a toyboy lifeguard at the local swimming pool, and the third time was with Ian's older brother David, the selfsame David Wicks, people are pining for this very moment.
Except the last time Cindy strayed, she actually paid a hitman to kill Ian, and he almost did just that.
Ian's worst parental feature is apologising to his children after they - meaning, usually Lucy - have done wrong. Just like Tanya used to make Max do.
So there you go. Lucy Beale has struck Ian. And Ian isn't her "dad", just her biological father?
Please.
Lucy forced Ian to lie to the police, covering for Steven's shooting of Jane. He lied to Jane about Lucy having an abortion, saying she'd had a miscarriage. It was that lie, more than Ian's infidelity with Glenda, which convinced Jane that her marriage to Ian was a sham. So not only did Lucy bust up Ian's relationship with Mandy Salter, she effectively did the same for him and Jane.
Lucy's acting like a spoiled little brat who's just had her favourite toy taken away from her as a punishment, and Peter is acting like a wimp.
Another consistency TPTB have remembered is that Ian was always throwing high-calibre expensive presents at his kids, and when he wasn't doing that, he was throwing money at them. He did it with Peter, and he did it with Lucy. And now, he buys Bobby the latest top-of-the-range mobile phone, most likely a SmartPhone or an IPhone, when he should be thinking about the money he owes Carl and how he's going to pay him off.
As for Bianca, who's scared shitless of Ian at the moment, for obvious reasons (i.e., her criminal activity), it's obvious Ian's making a cack-handed effort at acknowledging her as family, by inviting her and her kids to Bobby's party, only to discover that it's Bobby and Tiffany who are having a childhood romance - or, as Carol is wont to put it, "the real thing."
Couple of things here ...
Natalie Mitchell, on her first attempt, captured the spirit of classic EastEnders beautifully last night. Tonight it was Katie Douglas's turn.
As the old Lay's Potato Chips advert from the 1960s in the US used to say:-
She tried, but she couldn't do it.
OK, I'll give her E for effort, but the linking theme she came up with for her episode was children's birthday parties, and whoever storylined this contrived the issue by making Scarlett have a second birthday in one year - kind of like the Queen, but then maybe that's not so unusual since she's the daughter of the Crown Princess of Walford.
The object of the linking themes was always their subtlety. The more prescient viewer got them succinctly and exactly. But on another level, the show's storylines, themselves, were capable of catering to the lower-level pondlife of viewer, such as the moron on Digital Spy who keeps talking about "sexy times" and also keeps trying to troll this blog to feed her massive ego and her even more massive stupidity level.
In the subtlety test, Douglas failed tonight; but then, I hear she's either leaving the production staff or has actually left.
Good.
She never got the ethos of the programme, she never understood the characters - certainly not the older, more established characters - and most of all, her writing usually sucked.
If this were her swansong, good effort, but it was puerile and repetitive. Watchable, but on the level of the age dynamic around whom tonight's parties centred.
Tonight's children's parties were a mask to the games the grown-ups play behind them. That's a good hidden meaning, but she still doesn't get the characters.
Once again, Janine and Michael take centre stage tonight. That's obvious, considering that Charlie Brooks is easily the best actress in the programme.
Of course, it's all about mind games ...
Michael is, to put it mildly, despicable. I'm not going to go into the obvious anymore by stating how and why he can be identified as a psychopath; suffice it to say that he is a psychopath.
He states the obvious about how he feels, but he has snookered so many stupidly shallow people (which is what psychopaths do) that he can actually tell the the way he really feels, and they'll coo and insist that he really doesn't feel that way at all.
Take, for example, the scene where he was wrapping a present, ostensibly for Scarlett, and talking about how he, basically, thought that children's parties and the people who attended them were pukeworthy. Of course, Kat insisted that he didn't feel that way at all; why, he'd spent the past few days obsessing over his present to Scarlett, when all he really was doing was obsessing over undermining Janine's self-esteem and resolve, once again.
Yes, Janine's party for Scarlett was OTT, and I can understand why she did it and also why she remarked about having been indifferent to Scarlett's actual first birthday.
Shall we recap what really happened the day Scarlett was born?
Well, Scarlett's birthday is also the Janine's and Michael's wedding anniversary. As this is their first anniversary, this means that they can now actually start divorce proceedings properly.
On that day, Janine was baited and heckled by Rose Cotton and Cora the Bora. Jean was being scammed by Michael, and was blaming Janine for being behind the scam. It was Jean, who approached Janine, touched her stomach and told her that her baby would be unloved. Then Michael stopped the wedding ceremony and challenged Janine to prove that she loved him by ripping up the pre-nuptual agreement, which she did.
Then, she went into early labour, was rushed to hospital and underwent an emergency Caesarian, giving birth to a premature and very ill baby.
Michael was right. It wasn't the happiest of times. The honesty he displayed in telling Janine that he almost bolted the day Scarlett was born was meant to give Janine a point of identification in her own insecurity as a parent. This doesn't belie the fact that his scathing observation that Janine invited the "wrong" play group to the birthday party, a play group which consisted of "scummy" children, I suspect, was a clever ploy designed to make Janine feel inadequate.
I suspect the people who showed up at the party were actually the parents and children of Scarlett's actual playgroup. Had this been changed, the number on the fridge would have been tacitly removed. Michael revealing that the new number was "saved on his phone" was just another control technique, once again, designed to re-inforce Janine's feelings of inadequacy.
This is just another version of what went on last year. I so await the day when Janine finds out just what a conniving little dumbass Alice is and that she slept with Michael. I want to see Janine bitch-slap her about the Square so much that her plastic veneers go bouncing down the street ahead of her.
You'd better get over here.
This is Janine's money and a party for her child. By the way, Scarlett, for the past year has been an infant. Infants don't react as definitely to other infants in the same way as children of Amy's or Oscar's age do. Yet the writers have Michael and Alice talk about Scarlett as if she were a five or six year-old child.
Swimming lessons, singing lessons, playgroups ... this is all a way to tire the kid out so that, when Michael had control of her, she'd be bloody exhausted by the time she was returned to him, so he'd just see her put to bed and he'd be free for the evening.
I'm glad Janine suddenly came to her senses and remembered what she went through last year at Michael's hands, suddenly sussing what the bronzed baby feet and the happy family picture really meant. Seeing a photo of herself, Michael and Scarlett en famille made Janine suddenly realise just who Scarlett's father was and of what he was capable.
Quite sensibly, she ran from the situation, but not before telling Michael to call before he came to visit.
Once more, Michael doesn't love Scarlett. She's the ultimate means to an end. Michael seeks to control and manipulate fragile females for his own end, and who's more vulnerable than a helpless child. Prior to Janine's return, Scarlett wasn't even referred to by name; for Michael, she was simply "the child."
He's an overgrown spoiled kid about to lose his toy.
I suspect that the person Janine rang was Danny Pennant, and that he'll be getting Billy's old position, since Billy decided to heed chavvy Lola and refuse to go to the South Coast to inspect properties. OK, it was Lexi's birthday the following week, but why not take Lola and Lexi with him?
The Poor White Party.
Lola wants to remember who pays her Pops's wages. She also wants to lay off the tanning machine and taking advantage of the place where she works, especially since it's about to be sold.
Everybody decides to have a spur of the moment birthday party for three kids, and not one of the Mitchell numpties thinks to buy any food? And white trash Cora-the-Bora, eating corn flakes - corn flakes - out of the box was just too common for comment. Not only were they just corn flakes, but unflavoured ones (as they usually are) and the cheapest sort from Aldi's.
I can see eating sugar-coated cereal dry, and I've seen children snack on this from the box, but eating ordinary corn flakes? Cora-the-Bora liked them and so did Lola. There's no accounting for the tastes of white trash.
And how apropos that this lot eventually managed to furnish Lexi's party with food and fare stolen from Scarlett's party.
Another thing to remember ... Billy using Janine's credit card to kit out Lola's nursery, which is really stealing (Billy's lucky Janine refused to press charges) and later Lola stealing bum cream and nappies from Scarlett for Lexi. You can't tell me that Phil Mitchell couldn't have rustled up buying a cake and putting out a spread at a moment's notice.
As for Lola, treating Sharon like shit, whilst accepting Shirley's (stolen) present, Lola's done worse to Lexi, herself - plying her with industrial paint and adult skin cream, amongst other things, whilst lately, lumbering "Pops" with Lexi's care whilst she trolls Walford in the company of Jay and Abi the Dough-Faced Girl, or "Scabby" as Lola calls her. Some friend.
The Beales' Deal.
Round and round in circles we go with Lucy in a sulk and Peter sullen with Ian.
Once again, why doesn't Ian just tell everyone - Peter and Denise, in particular - exactly how Lucy came to have control over the chippie, the cafe and the house. And tell it in the presence of Lucy, just to watch her skinny, anorexic arse squirm and try to deny it. Let him remind her, in front of her brother and Denise, of how she and Joey spoke to him and treated him. Alfie Moon will certainly attest to the fact that, when Lucy first saw Ian, she slammed the door in his face.
Are Peter and Denise so pigshit thick that they don't understand that Ian was mentally ill at the time? That he wasn't responsible for his actions in the days leading up to his disappearance and, certainly, for sometime after returning. Peter may not have been around, but Denise certainly was. There's no excuse for that.
As well, Lucy's fake concern for Ian's mental health when he opened the restaurant was as phoney as a three-pound note. She was jealous. And greedy. She saw the boost that working in that place gave to Ian's self-esteem and morale and she was afraid that he was right on the right track either to re-take his interests (which he did) or buy her out, eventually. She wanted him to sell up, but probably to her.
I still marvel at how Peter's forgotten something he sussed so early on after his return - that Lucy's possession of the Beale businesses, effectively cut him and Bobby out of any sort of inheritance ... and now he's happy to work as her employee on the fruit'n veg stall? Hello?
I will say this about Ian. They were utterly consistent in his character in this episode. We know, from the past, that Ian wasn't above manipulating his kids or using them in order to achieve the end that he wanted. Sometimes this became a massive fail - as when he lied about Lucy having cancer in order to convince Mel to stay with him.
He wasn't above using Bobby tonight, albeit without Bobby's knowledge, to attain the aura of family he so craved.
Why should Ian want Lucy's forgiveness anyway? She never apologised for scamming him of his businesses, and in the past, Lucy's treated Ian abysmally.
Remember this?
And, by the way, Ian didn't "drive Lucy's mother out," Lucy's sainted mother chose to be unfaithful to Ian, not once, not twice, but three times - the first time, she left him for Simon Wicks, Steven's biological father, who promptly dumped her and the sprog and went to New Zealand. The second time was with a toyboy lifeguard at the local swimming pool, and the third time was with Ian's older brother David, the selfsame David Wicks, people are pining for this very moment.
Except the last time Cindy strayed, she actually paid a hitman to kill Ian, and he almost did just that.
Ian's worst parental feature is apologising to his children after they - meaning, usually Lucy - have done wrong. Just like Tanya used to make Max do.
So there you go. Lucy Beale has struck Ian. And Ian isn't her "dad", just her biological father?
Please.
Lucy forced Ian to lie to the police, covering for Steven's shooting of Jane. He lied to Jane about Lucy having an abortion, saying she'd had a miscarriage. It was that lie, more than Ian's infidelity with Glenda, which convinced Jane that her marriage to Ian was a sham. So not only did Lucy bust up Ian's relationship with Mandy Salter, she effectively did the same for him and Jane.
Lucy's acting like a spoiled little brat who's just had her favourite toy taken away from her as a punishment, and Peter is acting like a wimp.
Another consistency TPTB have remembered is that Ian was always throwing high-calibre expensive presents at his kids, and when he wasn't doing that, he was throwing money at them. He did it with Peter, and he did it with Lucy. And now, he buys Bobby the latest top-of-the-range mobile phone, most likely a SmartPhone or an IPhone, when he should be thinking about the money he owes Carl and how he's going to pay him off.
As for Bianca, who's scared shitless of Ian at the moment, for obvious reasons (i.e., her criminal activity), it's obvious Ian's making a cack-handed effort at acknowledging her as family, by inviting her and her kids to Bobby's party, only to discover that it's Bobby and Tiffany who are having a childhood romance - or, as Carol is wont to put it, "the real thing."
Couple of things here ...
- Bobby is ten, and Tiffany's supposed to be ten also. As unbearable as these two stageschool kids are, and even though girls do mature quicker than boys, it's so obvious by her height and the fact that her face is losing its childhood proportions, that Maisie Smith is her real age of twelve, even though the kid who plays Bobby is probably ten, or at most, a young eleven.
- The stupid excuses Bianca and Ian gave their kids as reasons not to get romantically involved were lame. Bianca trying to frighten Tiff into believing Bobby would turn into Ian in thirty years, whilst Ian implied that Bobby was so much better than Tiffany.
The most obvious reason to give these two as to why they shouldn't have any sort of romance, now or ever, is thus: They're cousins.
Ian: Bobby, Tiff is your cousin. I know we don't act like it all the time, but you see, Bianca is my niece. She's your Uncle David's daughter. You remember Uncle David? He was here when Nana Pat died. Bianca's my niece and she's your cousin, and that makes Tiffany your cousin too.
Bianca: Tiff, yer cahn't have a romance with Bobby Beale. 'E's fairmly. I know 'e's a right prat, but Ian's me uncle, yer see. 'E's yer granddad's lil bruvver. So me'n Bobby - an' Lucy an' Pe'urgh, we're cousins, see. My granddad was Nana Pat's first 'usband. 'E's David's and Ian's dad. So Bobby's Granddad Pete is your great-granddad Pete.
But, of course, all that shit's flown in the face of convention with Lauren fucking Joey and both being first cousins, and the white trash Brannings accepting it as normal.
Who am I kidding? Tiffany and Bobby are bright and bratty enough to throw that relationship right back in the faces of Ian and Bianca.
Jeesh!
Sharon the Bitch.
One person Katie Douglas definitely didn't get right tonight was Sharon. She swans in with Denny to Bobby's party, just as Ian was trying to explain to Bobby why he shouldn't hang out with Tiffany, suggesting that he play with Denny instead.
Previously, Bobby the Cute (pre-NuBobby) and Denny quite happily played together, even though Denny was six and Bobby the Cute was nine. Denny also played with Gurning Oscar, who was four. But now Bobby's moving onto girls and romance, and he just might not want to be seen in the company of a seven year-old.
Sharon took Bobby's refusal personally? Really, Katie Douglas? The old Sharon would have asked, with concern, what had happened with Bobby, as it was obvious Ian was talking to him about something serious. She'd be more concerned with that than the fact that a ten year-old didn't want to play with a seven year-old.
Old Sharon would have brushed this off with:-
Ne'mind, dahlin'. There's Mowgan over there. See if he wants to play.
Instead, she demands an apology from the youngest child of her oldest friend and swans off in a huff, with Denny slyly stealing the remote control to Bobby's birthday present.
OK, I know this is a lead-in to Denny acting out, probably because he misses having a male role model in his life (meaning Phil), but people like Douglas, who neither know nor care for the icon that is Sharon Watts, should not, not not write for this character.
I'm the first to admit that annoying kid hampers Sharon and really isn't the sort of son she'd have or raise, but the writing for this character positively sucks shit.
Good thing Douglas is on her way home, och aye.
Hidden Agendae Brings Karma.
Here's a real tart with a heart for Kat.
Alfie loves Kat.
Boy, does he love Kat, and he'll use any excuse to spend time with her and Tommy as what they are - a family.
Yet he's gone and proposed to Roxy. This is Alfie trying, both to be too nice and to move on, to prove to himself that he can walk away from Kat. Alfie has to hurt Kat to be with Roxy, and ultimately, he'll hurt Roxy to return to Kat - but I suspect that the catalyst that returns Alfie to Kat is Ronnie, and Roxy's divided loyalties to her sister and the man whom she loves.
The chemistry was again present tonight, when they attended Scarlett's party as a family, only to have it shattered when Alfie chose to end the perfect day by telling Kat he'd decided to marry Roxy.
OK, I know Newman has been begging us for months to see Kat as the victim, more sinned against than sinning; but I think, I have a soupcon of suspicion, based on Kat's wordless reaction, that this might have been the moment she realises what her past actions and her inability to accept responsibility for them have now wrought.
As long as Alfie was just living with Roxy, as long as there was no commitment between them, Kat always felt, she knew that Alfie loved her and that one day he would return to her. Now he's proven to her that he means to move on by marrying someone he feels will be true to him, and who'll love him for what he is.
On viewing her initial reaction, I thought she'd run away and be physically sick, but the scene where she runs inside and stares blindly with a stricken face, I think, forces her to realise that Alfie's chosen to move on because of everything she's done to him in the past.
This just might be the epiphany of Kat.
One thing for certain is that it sets up the reunion storyline beautifully.
I know a lot of the younger numpties don't want to see these two together. But, written correctly, they work, and the characters are portrayed by two of the strongest actors the programme has. It's just - as per recently usual - the writing for both Alfie and Kat has been abysmal.
Get them back together, and let the cheating stop.
The Loser.
There's Shirley, hanging around Walford like a bad smell, trying to cadge drinks off Phil Mitchell in his own teetotal home, whilst smoking around a table laden with food at a party for a one year-old.
But what is it with Denise? Denise wants her to move back to the B and B? Shirley chose to leave, most likely because she can't pay the rent. She has money for booze and cigarettes (eight quid a packet now), but she can't budget for her rent. And she throws gratitude back in Denise's face by quitting her job.
The only party that would have suited Shirley tonight was one that wasn't thrown: a pity party.
Cack-handed but watchable attempt by Katie Douglas.
This writer won't be missed.
It would be great if YOU could write a year's worth of episodes for this show. That way we'd have character consistency and storyline continuity (among other things). EE would get back on track and be a pleasure to watch again. At least for a year.
ReplyDeleteHey, I can dream, can't I?
Can't you get the BBC to employ you so you can try and save this once excellent show?. You certainly have your finger on the pulse and could only revive a very tired, dying patient!.
ReplyDeleteI don't watch this crap anymore, but always read thi blog. That says something!
ReplyDelete