Sometimes "bad" means "good" ...
But sometimes, it just means "awful."
Like EastEnders this week, and especially tonight.
Late last night, Lorraine Newman announced the addition of another character, Sadie Young, played by Kate Magowan. What's unusual about Sadie is that she's a single, independent businesswoman in her late 30s. She's also dark-haired, instead of the blondes EastEnders favoured so much. Four of the last five additions to the cast - Gary Lucy, Daniel Coonan, Jamie Lomas and Kate Magowan - will play characters in their early to late thirties, a demographic (especially regarding females) which has played second fiddle to the teen invasion in the past few years.
Another positive about these additions is that all of these actors have experience. They're hot underwear and catalogue models or fame academy aspirants. They've been there and done that, and whilst they're not household names (yet), they're the sort of experienced journeyman actor Julia Smith favoured at the beginning of the show's history.
And that's more than I can say about the fare we were served up tonight. With few exceptions, I'd say tonight's episode was an audition for various actors who may just be facing the axe in the near future. As for the writing, it sucked; but then, I got the general impression that the writer, Rob Gittins, who's been with the programme since God was a boy, just didn't give a monkey's about writing about ... well, less than nothing happening.
Things have got to change soon. It's going to be a long summer.
Love Among the Ruins.
This is not Patrick and Cora. They're too charming and likeable.
I like Patrick. I really do. He's one of my favourite characters - a gentleman who enjoys life, someone who always puts a smile on everyone's face. Like Alfie originally was and hopefully will be again, with Patrick, it was all about making the other person feel better about themselves.
I like the idea being mooted until recently about Patrick being the Walford patriarch, in the absence of any viable sort of matriarch. Above all, I liked Patrick's friendship with Pat. Yes, they had an affair, and that was bad - because Patrick was married to Yolande, and Yolande was Pat's friend; and Pat deserved the smack Yolande gave her as much as she deserved a similar smack levelled at her back in 2000 by Peggy, when she discovered Pat's affair with Frank. But Patrick and Pat had moved on, and they had a strong friendship and respect between them.
However, if anything can make me dislike Patrick, it's his attraction to and association with Cora.
I dislike Cora intensely. She is a functioning alcoholic, and she also encourages Patrick to drink heavily. In fact, Cora encourages everyone around her to drink heavily. One of her daughters refuses to associate with her, because Cora encourages Rainie's alcoholism. Like her other daughter, Tanya, Cora the Bora refuses to admit that she, also, has a drinking problem. This old trout has to have a drink in her hand at every hour of the day to keep her buzz going. It's no coincidence that Lauren is in a drying-out clinic, having been surrounded by the bacchanalian antics of her grandmother, her mother and her aunt.
Cora encouraged her underaged granddaughter to get drunk and then laughed it off. She hauled a drunken Lauren out of the Vic on Lauren's eighteenth birthday, only to reward herself with a huge portion of Max's Scotch. She guzzled a bottle of whiskey with Lauren earlier in the year, knowing that she had a drink dependency.
In fact, as a commentator on the Digital Spy forum once remarked, Cora isn't fit to be around young people, and I certainly am disappointed in Patrick in being attracted to someone so (in his words) "low down and dirty".
Patrick is 71 years old. There's such a thing as growing old with dignity, but that doesn't mean you have to lose your youthful outlook on life. Cora is a drunk, a hypocrite, a mean-spirited old boot, who almost caused a close friend of Patrick's to lose her home and since then, has belittled and baited her remorselessly without shame.
Fair enough, that Patrick doesn't want a relationship with Betty Spragg; but he should look long and hard at Cora and her behaviour locally, especially in the way she scammed and mistreated Dot, before he takes the plunge.
Tonight's match-making non-story was putrid, badly written and appallingly acted. Even worse than the principal characters was Abi the Dough-Faced Girl and that ridiculous giggle, accompanying her contrived lie which was obviously meant to ensnare Cora the Bora with Patrick in a romantic situation. Worse than that was the fact that Abi, who's seventeen going on ten, would find a fellow conspirator in Kim, who must be all of forty and old enough to be Abi's mother.
Wait ... I can see something similar. Abi is seventeen going on ten, and Kim is forty going on ten. Both are lazy and entitled. And the "let's lock them in a room and see what happens" storyline is one of those which has been worn to death on EastEnders. Not more than a few months ago, this happened with Denise and Ian. Earlier in the decade, Jean and Dot locked Bradley and Stacey in the Slater house to iron out their romantic differences.
I've nothing against geriatric love, but the sight of Cora kitted out as Mutton dressed as lamb, over made up and showing her wrinkly cleavage made her look more like a man in drag than anything remotely attractive or even sexy. And if the scene where she and Patrick both kiss each other's fingers was supposed to be poignant or provocative ... well, suffice it to say, it failed - as much as the joke scene of them locked in each other's arms and moaning.
And, at the risk of enraging her devoted fans, let me just say this: Ann Mitchell, as an actress, sucks. In fact, she sucks shit. I think the actress has emphysema, which would account for the fact that, in real life, she's given up smoking, as has her character. It would also explain why she's taken more to film and television appearances than the stage, which she tried to conquer. Her delivery is breathless, laboured and bad. But then, the emphysema has nothing to do with the fact that Mitchell is, at best, an ordinary actress - nothing really to write home about.
As a part of the generation which spawned the likes of Maggie Smith, Vanessa Redgrave, Judy Dench and Diana Rigg, Mitchell is on the skag end of talent, compared to those venerable dames.
As a matriarchal figure, Cora the Bora is a cold turd. She neither inspires nor is her advice anything wise. She doesn't inspire confidence. She is feckless, mean and judgemental.
I hope the character is axed, and if Patrick continues down the road of association with her, I'd say, sadly, maybe it was time Rudolph Walker called time on Patrick.
Candidates for the Axe: Cora the Bora, Abi the Dough-Faced Girl and Kim.
Family Affair.
Well, it looks as if the Beales have taken up where the Brannings left off. Now that the Brannings are down-sizing, Lorraine's storyliners will need another family with an excuse to host a knees-up for whatever reason, and the Beales are the natural successors. After all, the paterfamilias is an accomplished chef.
Ian's going weaselly again, and it's ironic that his scheming is directed towards his daughter. Who remembers Ian's most monumental lie concerning Lucy - when he lied about her having cancer to coerce a reluctant Mel into marriage.
Still, the Lucy-Ian dynamic, in recent years, has been interesting, if not frustrating, to watch. Old Lucy was the original child from hell, incapable of compassion, deceitful, cold and calculating. People likened her to her mother, Cindy, but Cindy, in actual fact, was a warm, caring and very compassionate person, especially regarding her children.
NuLucy, initially, showed promise and showed even more promise away from Brat Pack I, which consists of all the older adolescents. However, she treated her psychologically frail father atrociously, when he returned from his disappearance, forcing him to hand over his businesses and his property to her before she would allow him to remain in the house. She and Joey forced Ian to sleep in one of the children's rooms so they could romp the beds in his room. As well, Lucy's manipulations have actually denied her brothers their share of the Beale financial legacy.
When Ian confesses to Peter that he's being blackmailed by Carl White, Peter, who's stunningly become the Beale family peacemaker, suggests that Lucy should help Ian and offers to approach her, but Ian has his own ideas.
He'll cook a slap-up fancy meal, consisting of all Lucy's favourite dishes (eh?), and he'll even invite Denise and Joey, to sweeten her up.
(OK, here's a bit of odd continuity and, simultaneously, incongruity: Whenever we had big Beale meals before, for some reason, Bobby was always left out. He was never included in the meals, and he wasn't there today. Where was he? Well, one snippet of dialogue at the Butcher household revealed that the teachers were having an "Inset" day, which meant that the children were off school (when school breaks up next week). So where was Bobby? No mention of him being at a friend's house; he just wasn't there. Again).
But I digress. Ian should know better that the way to Lucy's missing heart is not through her stomach. She's a bag of bones, and he should be openly nagging her about her thinness, because this actress is, if anything, anorexic.
She's also a terrible actress.
Whatever promise I saw in Hetti Bywater didn't last. She's a very posh girl, but she speaks very fast and in a very low voice; consequently, her words are often garbled. She also affects that annoying open-mouthed pout, which - I suppose - she finds sexy, but which only serves to make her look stupid.
All of this comes as no surprise as Bywater is one of the many inexperienced younger cast members, who was an aspiring catalogue model, and thought that entitled her to a bit of acting.
As far as Ian's dilemma goes, needless to say, Lucy refuses him a loan. Her tirade at Ian was rich with irony - at least Rob Gittins was good in that regard tonight. Ian tells her Carl's blackmailing him; Lucy suggests he go to the police, which is something Lucy didn't do and should have, when Ian went missing and she was being hounded by Derek. What's shitty about all of her reactions is that she's really jealous that Ian's actually making a go of this restaurant, and she masks that jealousy behind faux concern for his mental health.
Candidate for the Axe: Bag O'Bones Beale.
Oh Danny Boy Gets a Message from Michael.
OK, we know that the enigmaticIan Brady Michael Moon isn't what he really is - that is to say, a raging psychopath; but neither do we know that Danny Pennant is what he says he is.
On first impressions last year, he appeared to be a gay investment banker, who slept with Syed Masood in an effort to get him to invest the family's savings. The BBC EastEnders' character description says he's bi-sexual, which would be innovative, since Gary Lucy's an infinitely better actor than the beefy Tony Hills, who was most unconvincing as someone who was as attracted to men as to women.
However, I prefer to think of Danny as a moral reprobate. As he, himself, said of himself earlier this week, he'll do whatever he has to do to get what he wants.
He's also unemployed, even though he's driving around in a Ferrari. It seems, according to Michael Moon's "research", that Danny was made redundant from his firm, in a down-sizing exercise, which didn't even include a redundancy package. Michael's "research" was a totally unreal situation. He phones Pennant's firm and asks for "information" on an ex-employee (Pennant), without identifying himself, his firm or his motives.
It wouldn't matter anyway, because personal information, even regarding ex-employees, is strictly confidential. All the party on the other end of the phone would be entitled to say is that the person in question was no longer with the firm. No information regarding his departure or even the size of his redundancy package would be allowed to be disclosed. That, in itself, is a sackable offence - or don't EastEnders know that.
No, I don't suppose they do, considering the fact that they were unaware that a non-EU citizen would need a viable work permit before they would be allowed to accept employment as an actor in the programme.
Danny hasn't revealed his sexual preferences nor his current employment history (or lack of) to Janine, but the fact that he's a hustler and that he achieves the task she set him to do - evict some tenants who hadn't paid their rent - puts him firmly in her good books. However, even that wasn't kosher. Presumably, she would have had to go through the courts to obtain an eviction order and then have licenced bailiffs attend and effect the eviction. She couldn't just change the locks, and they couldn't be changed by anyone - least of all, by someone who, effectively, commited a fraudulent offence in getting them out of the house in order to change the locks. That's just a little bit illegal, and tenants have rights as well. Once again, EastEnders bends reality. Badly.
Danny may be bi- and the gay community of viewers may be fuming, but I'm reckoning TPTB conveniently forget that he's bi and send him the hetero route.
One thing for sure, Michael's jealousy has been whetted. Yesterday I wondered if Michael were actually jealous of Danny's financial status and success (with all the trappings), or if he were jealous of his association with Janine. Finding out that he was unemployed today, I'd say Michael was definitely jealous of the association, but remember - he's only seeing Janine as a possession, not as an object of love. She's the mother of his child and a very wealthy woman. If Michael convinced her to resume relations with him, he'd pull out all the manipulative stops to get his hands on her money, which is what he wanted the first time.
Personally, I'd rather Janine outsmarted them both.
And now he's moved back into The Slater Arms, hotel, much to the chagrin of the resident "Monkey Boy" Joey. Joey and Alice stank up those scenes tonight. The two scenes, at the house and at the Boxing Club, where Joey confronts Michael were, frankly, embarrassing. One wonders if they were designed to show the obvious shortcomings in David Witts's lack of acting talent or ability.
The goggle eyes, the hanging mouth, and the piss poor imitation of Jake Wood went down a bomb.
Witts is a nice lad, but he can't handle extensive dialogue, and his diction has not improved. I don't know if he brought Jasmyn Banks down or if she was generally having an off day but she stank too.
Alice is stupid. Michael may not be sleeping with her again, but it won't be long before Janine finds out about that, and while, no, it's not Joey's house to determine who can and can't stay there, but neither is it Alice's either, and I'll bet Kat wasn't too pleased to have Michael return after his last trick.
Derek's children are redundant. I don't see Joey as having a long shelf life, considering his upcoming storyline featuring Fatney and the emergence, in the near future, of Lauren's association with Jake Long. Alice is good until Michael Moon "vanishes." Then Alice can just bugger off too.
Candidates for the Chop: Joey and Alice, please.
The Newman Negroes Part Quatre.
I guess since the kids had a day off, Ava the Rava went to work, because we didn't see her pineapple head or clock her pining after Sam and screaming for Dex-TAAAAAAAA at all.
Instead, we got Sanford and Son, Walford-style.
Sam's ever-changing accent is annoying. Sometimes he has the cadence of a Shakespearian ac-TOR. Other times, he be straight off de old plantation wid his "deeses" and "dats."
Tonight, he was we-ah Jam-aya-can Geordie, mun, wit his "tings". Tonight, he was not Sidney Poitier:-
Dexter continues to act like a prize putz and the epitome of a spoiled, sulky child and - like Lauren - he gets rewarded for his bad behaviour. The man he loves to hate rewards him with the car he bought.
Ava, Sam and the annoying Dexter should just go. Go. Go now. And don't look back.
The Boring Butchers.
Nothing much but a hodge-podge of frantic scenes centering around Liam's day in court, which turns out to be nothing, because as soon as the gang member in question realised Liam was turning up to testify (behind a screen), then he bolted and withdrew his complaint.
Liam's a hero.
But not as much as Shirley, who found Liam and quelled his nerves, probably with her new facial skin she's suddenly acquired.
I must say, Shirley's new wrinkle-free face was done a lot better than poor Alice's plastic veneers.
(At least, if Michael ever betrays Alice again, she can take a chunk out of him with those gnashers. Mind you, she'd probably get rabies from him!)
But I was amazed at Shirley's face. I'd heard she'd had collagen filler injections, but it looks as though she's been on the botox as well.
This is old Shirl, wrinkles and all ...
Scary, huh? I know there's some deludedtroll soul on Digital Spy who'll reckon that the beauty treatment has been done in anticipation of a Shirley and Phil reunion, but I seriously don't think that's going to happen.
Shame about the botox. She's going to have to frown some soon.
Masood's off again. He and Carol just don't work as a couple.
Candidates for Termination: Liam the Lug. The Masoods. And get Sid Owen back.
This week was dire, and although this episode had its moments, Charlie Brooks can't be expected to carry the show.
But sometimes, it just means "awful."
Like EastEnders this week, and especially tonight.
Late last night, Lorraine Newman announced the addition of another character, Sadie Young, played by Kate Magowan. What's unusual about Sadie is that she's a single, independent businesswoman in her late 30s. She's also dark-haired, instead of the blondes EastEnders favoured so much. Four of the last five additions to the cast - Gary Lucy, Daniel Coonan, Jamie Lomas and Kate Magowan - will play characters in their early to late thirties, a demographic (especially regarding females) which has played second fiddle to the teen invasion in the past few years.
Another positive about these additions is that all of these actors have experience. They're hot underwear and catalogue models or fame academy aspirants. They've been there and done that, and whilst they're not household names (yet), they're the sort of experienced journeyman actor Julia Smith favoured at the beginning of the show's history.
And that's more than I can say about the fare we were served up tonight. With few exceptions, I'd say tonight's episode was an audition for various actors who may just be facing the axe in the near future. As for the writing, it sucked; but then, I got the general impression that the writer, Rob Gittins, who's been with the programme since God was a boy, just didn't give a monkey's about writing about ... well, less than nothing happening.
Things have got to change soon. It's going to be a long summer.
Love Among the Ruins.
This is not Patrick and Cora. They're too charming and likeable.
I like Patrick. I really do. He's one of my favourite characters - a gentleman who enjoys life, someone who always puts a smile on everyone's face. Like Alfie originally was and hopefully will be again, with Patrick, it was all about making the other person feel better about themselves.
I like the idea being mooted until recently about Patrick being the Walford patriarch, in the absence of any viable sort of matriarch. Above all, I liked Patrick's friendship with Pat. Yes, they had an affair, and that was bad - because Patrick was married to Yolande, and Yolande was Pat's friend; and Pat deserved the smack Yolande gave her as much as she deserved a similar smack levelled at her back in 2000 by Peggy, when she discovered Pat's affair with Frank. But Patrick and Pat had moved on, and they had a strong friendship and respect between them.
However, if anything can make me dislike Patrick, it's his attraction to and association with Cora.
I dislike Cora intensely. She is a functioning alcoholic, and she also encourages Patrick to drink heavily. In fact, Cora encourages everyone around her to drink heavily. One of her daughters refuses to associate with her, because Cora encourages Rainie's alcoholism. Like her other daughter, Tanya, Cora the Bora refuses to admit that she, also, has a drinking problem. This old trout has to have a drink in her hand at every hour of the day to keep her buzz going. It's no coincidence that Lauren is in a drying-out clinic, having been surrounded by the bacchanalian antics of her grandmother, her mother and her aunt.
Cora encouraged her underaged granddaughter to get drunk and then laughed it off. She hauled a drunken Lauren out of the Vic on Lauren's eighteenth birthday, only to reward herself with a huge portion of Max's Scotch. She guzzled a bottle of whiskey with Lauren earlier in the year, knowing that she had a drink dependency.
In fact, as a commentator on the Digital Spy forum once remarked, Cora isn't fit to be around young people, and I certainly am disappointed in Patrick in being attracted to someone so (in his words) "low down and dirty".
Patrick is 71 years old. There's such a thing as growing old with dignity, but that doesn't mean you have to lose your youthful outlook on life. Cora is a drunk, a hypocrite, a mean-spirited old boot, who almost caused a close friend of Patrick's to lose her home and since then, has belittled and baited her remorselessly without shame.
Fair enough, that Patrick doesn't want a relationship with Betty Spragg; but he should look long and hard at Cora and her behaviour locally, especially in the way she scammed and mistreated Dot, before he takes the plunge.
Tonight's match-making non-story was putrid, badly written and appallingly acted. Even worse than the principal characters was Abi the Dough-Faced Girl and that ridiculous giggle, accompanying her contrived lie which was obviously meant to ensnare Cora the Bora with Patrick in a romantic situation. Worse than that was the fact that Abi, who's seventeen going on ten, would find a fellow conspirator in Kim, who must be all of forty and old enough to be Abi's mother.
Wait ... I can see something similar. Abi is seventeen going on ten, and Kim is forty going on ten. Both are lazy and entitled. And the "let's lock them in a room and see what happens" storyline is one of those which has been worn to death on EastEnders. Not more than a few months ago, this happened with Denise and Ian. Earlier in the decade, Jean and Dot locked Bradley and Stacey in the Slater house to iron out their romantic differences.
I've nothing against geriatric love, but the sight of Cora kitted out as Mutton dressed as lamb, over made up and showing her wrinkly cleavage made her look more like a man in drag than anything remotely attractive or even sexy. And if the scene where she and Patrick both kiss each other's fingers was supposed to be poignant or provocative ... well, suffice it to say, it failed - as much as the joke scene of them locked in each other's arms and moaning.
And, at the risk of enraging her devoted fans, let me just say this: Ann Mitchell, as an actress, sucks. In fact, she sucks shit. I think the actress has emphysema, which would account for the fact that, in real life, she's given up smoking, as has her character. It would also explain why she's taken more to film and television appearances than the stage, which she tried to conquer. Her delivery is breathless, laboured and bad. But then, the emphysema has nothing to do with the fact that Mitchell is, at best, an ordinary actress - nothing really to write home about.
As a part of the generation which spawned the likes of Maggie Smith, Vanessa Redgrave, Judy Dench and Diana Rigg, Mitchell is on the skag end of talent, compared to those venerable dames.
As a matriarchal figure, Cora the Bora is a cold turd. She neither inspires nor is her advice anything wise. She doesn't inspire confidence. She is feckless, mean and judgemental.
I hope the character is axed, and if Patrick continues down the road of association with her, I'd say, sadly, maybe it was time Rudolph Walker called time on Patrick.
Candidates for the Axe: Cora the Bora, Abi the Dough-Faced Girl and Kim.
Family Affair.
Well, it looks as if the Beales have taken up where the Brannings left off. Now that the Brannings are down-sizing, Lorraine's storyliners will need another family with an excuse to host a knees-up for whatever reason, and the Beales are the natural successors. After all, the paterfamilias is an accomplished chef.
Ian's going weaselly again, and it's ironic that his scheming is directed towards his daughter. Who remembers Ian's most monumental lie concerning Lucy - when he lied about her having cancer to coerce a reluctant Mel into marriage.
Still, the Lucy-Ian dynamic, in recent years, has been interesting, if not frustrating, to watch. Old Lucy was the original child from hell, incapable of compassion, deceitful, cold and calculating. People likened her to her mother, Cindy, but Cindy, in actual fact, was a warm, caring and very compassionate person, especially regarding her children.
NuLucy, initially, showed promise and showed even more promise away from Brat Pack I, which consists of all the older adolescents. However, she treated her psychologically frail father atrociously, when he returned from his disappearance, forcing him to hand over his businesses and his property to her before she would allow him to remain in the house. She and Joey forced Ian to sleep in one of the children's rooms so they could romp the beds in his room. As well, Lucy's manipulations have actually denied her brothers their share of the Beale financial legacy.
When Ian confesses to Peter that he's being blackmailed by Carl White, Peter, who's stunningly become the Beale family peacemaker, suggests that Lucy should help Ian and offers to approach her, but Ian has his own ideas.
He'll cook a slap-up fancy meal, consisting of all Lucy's favourite dishes (eh?), and he'll even invite Denise and Joey, to sweeten her up.
(OK, here's a bit of odd continuity and, simultaneously, incongruity: Whenever we had big Beale meals before, for some reason, Bobby was always left out. He was never included in the meals, and he wasn't there today. Where was he? Well, one snippet of dialogue at the Butcher household revealed that the teachers were having an "Inset" day, which meant that the children were off school (when school breaks up next week). So where was Bobby? No mention of him being at a friend's house; he just wasn't there. Again).
But I digress. Ian should know better that the way to Lucy's missing heart is not through her stomach. She's a bag of bones, and he should be openly nagging her about her thinness, because this actress is, if anything, anorexic.
She's also a terrible actress.
Whatever promise I saw in Hetti Bywater didn't last. She's a very posh girl, but she speaks very fast and in a very low voice; consequently, her words are often garbled. She also affects that annoying open-mouthed pout, which - I suppose - she finds sexy, but which only serves to make her look stupid.
All of this comes as no surprise as Bywater is one of the many inexperienced younger cast members, who was an aspiring catalogue model, and thought that entitled her to a bit of acting.
As far as Ian's dilemma goes, needless to say, Lucy refuses him a loan. Her tirade at Ian was rich with irony - at least Rob Gittins was good in that regard tonight. Ian tells her Carl's blackmailing him; Lucy suggests he go to the police, which is something Lucy didn't do and should have, when Ian went missing and she was being hounded by Derek. What's shitty about all of her reactions is that she's really jealous that Ian's actually making a go of this restaurant, and she masks that jealousy behind faux concern for his mental health.
Candidate for the Axe: Bag O'Bones Beale.
Oh Danny Boy Gets a Message from Michael.
OK, we know that the enigmatic
On first impressions last year, he appeared to be a gay investment banker, who slept with Syed Masood in an effort to get him to invest the family's savings. The BBC EastEnders' character description says he's bi-sexual, which would be innovative, since Gary Lucy's an infinitely better actor than the beefy Tony Hills, who was most unconvincing as someone who was as attracted to men as to women.
However, I prefer to think of Danny as a moral reprobate. As he, himself, said of himself earlier this week, he'll do whatever he has to do to get what he wants.
He's also unemployed, even though he's driving around in a Ferrari. It seems, according to Michael Moon's "research", that Danny was made redundant from his firm, in a down-sizing exercise, which didn't even include a redundancy package. Michael's "research" was a totally unreal situation. He phones Pennant's firm and asks for "information" on an ex-employee (Pennant), without identifying himself, his firm or his motives.
It wouldn't matter anyway, because personal information, even regarding ex-employees, is strictly confidential. All the party on the other end of the phone would be entitled to say is that the person in question was no longer with the firm. No information regarding his departure or even the size of his redundancy package would be allowed to be disclosed. That, in itself, is a sackable offence - or don't EastEnders know that.
No, I don't suppose they do, considering the fact that they were unaware that a non-EU citizen would need a viable work permit before they would be allowed to accept employment as an actor in the programme.
Danny hasn't revealed his sexual preferences nor his current employment history (or lack of) to Janine, but the fact that he's a hustler and that he achieves the task she set him to do - evict some tenants who hadn't paid their rent - puts him firmly in her good books. However, even that wasn't kosher. Presumably, she would have had to go through the courts to obtain an eviction order and then have licenced bailiffs attend and effect the eviction. She couldn't just change the locks, and they couldn't be changed by anyone - least of all, by someone who, effectively, commited a fraudulent offence in getting them out of the house in order to change the locks. That's just a little bit illegal, and tenants have rights as well. Once again, EastEnders bends reality. Badly.
Danny may be bi- and the gay community of viewers may be fuming, but I'm reckoning TPTB conveniently forget that he's bi and send him the hetero route.
One thing for sure, Michael's jealousy has been whetted. Yesterday I wondered if Michael were actually jealous of Danny's financial status and success (with all the trappings), or if he were jealous of his association with Janine. Finding out that he was unemployed today, I'd say Michael was definitely jealous of the association, but remember - he's only seeing Janine as a possession, not as an object of love. She's the mother of his child and a very wealthy woman. If Michael convinced her to resume relations with him, he'd pull out all the manipulative stops to get his hands on her money, which is what he wanted the first time.
Personally, I'd rather Janine outsmarted them both.
And now he's moved back into The Slater Arms, hotel, much to the chagrin of the resident "Monkey Boy" Joey. Joey and Alice stank up those scenes tonight. The two scenes, at the house and at the Boxing Club, where Joey confronts Michael were, frankly, embarrassing. One wonders if they were designed to show the obvious shortcomings in David Witts's lack of acting talent or ability.
The goggle eyes, the hanging mouth, and the piss poor imitation of Jake Wood went down a bomb.
Alice is stupid. Michael may not be sleeping with her again, but it won't be long before Janine finds out about that, and while, no, it's not Joey's house to determine who can and can't stay there, but neither is it Alice's either, and I'll bet Kat wasn't too pleased to have Michael return after his last trick.
Derek's children are redundant. I don't see Joey as having a long shelf life, considering his upcoming storyline featuring Fatney and the emergence, in the near future, of Lauren's association with Jake Long. Alice is good until Michael Moon "vanishes." Then Alice can just bugger off too.
Candidates for the Chop: Joey and Alice, please.
The Newman Negroes Part Quatre.
I guess since the kids had a day off, Ava the Rava went to work, because we didn't see her pineapple head or clock her pining after Sam and screaming for Dex-TAAAAAAAA at all.
Instead, we got Sanford and Son, Walford-style.
Sam's ever-changing accent is annoying. Sometimes he has the cadence of a Shakespearian ac-TOR. Other times, he be straight off de old plantation wid his "deeses" and "dats."
Tonight, he was we-ah Jam-aya-can Geordie, mun, wit his "tings". Tonight, he was not Sidney Poitier:-
Dexter continues to act like a prize putz and the epitome of a spoiled, sulky child and - like Lauren - he gets rewarded for his bad behaviour. The man he loves to hate rewards him with the car he bought.
Ava, Sam and the annoying Dexter should just go. Go. Go now. And don't look back.
The Boring Butchers.
Nothing much but a hodge-podge of frantic scenes centering around Liam's day in court, which turns out to be nothing, because as soon as the gang member in question realised Liam was turning up to testify (behind a screen), then he bolted and withdrew his complaint.
Liam's a hero.
But not as much as Shirley, who found Liam and quelled his nerves, probably with her new facial skin she's suddenly acquired.
I must say, Shirley's new wrinkle-free face was done a lot better than poor Alice's plastic veneers.
(At least, if Michael ever betrays Alice again, she can take a chunk out of him with those gnashers. Mind you, she'd probably get rabies from him!)
But I was amazed at Shirley's face. I'd heard she'd had collagen filler injections, but it looks as though she's been on the botox as well.
This is old Shirl, wrinkles and all ...
Scary, huh? I know there's some deluded
Shame about the botox. She's going to have to frown some soon.
Masood's off again. He and Carol just don't work as a couple.
Candidates for Termination: Liam the Lug. The Masoods. And get Sid Owen back.
This week was dire, and although this episode had its moments, Charlie Brooks can't be expected to carry the show.
Just another dire week of many dire weeks. Amusing and interesting review as usual.
ReplyDeleteWhat else is there to say? There's literally nothing of interest to talk about. We had one hilarious scene of Joey shouting unintelligibly at Alice, another scene of him threatening Michael, one atrocious scene of Sam and Dex-TAAAA sitting in the car talking awkwardly - the acting was terrible, and another atrocious couple of scenes with Patrick and Cora - probably the most forced romance on EE at the moment. Not to mention all the crap with Bianca and Liam. I mean really? Wake me up when something ACTUALLY HAPPENS. Something interesting I mean. Pathetic writing.
Talking of Shirley's face, she reminds me of Rod Stewart - only scarier :D. If Hollywood ever decide to remake Stephen King's "IT" - they should definitely cast Shirley as the IT :D. Cora is another one who scares the living the shit out of me. She looks like she's been dug up. I don't if it's aging or botox - but honestly, I'm not saying this to be mean. Cora just looks frightening - especially with makeup. My 5 year old nephew even turned around to me while I watching and said, "Who is that monster, uncle?"
I kid you not. That's what he said :D.
Peace.