Mothers, Children, Manipulators - Review: 26,07.2013

I watched the show later tonight. I thought watching it, tired, might give me a new perspective.

It didn't.

Oh, woe is me, EastEnders! This week saw the show's viewing figures plummet to 4.8 million viewers. On a night when it wasn't in direct competition with Emmerdale (its main competitor now), Emmerdale still beat EastEnders' ass.

Let's get the excuses out of the way - ne'mind the hot weather, the royal brat or the fact that it was a "special week" for Emmerdale. The fact remains that EastEnders are struggling - and I mean seriously struggling here - to maintain 5 million bums on seats, much less the rarely occasional six. 

Look, I know that viewing tails off during the summer months. That's a given for all four of the major evening soaps, but the autumn "fixture" list, when the weather turns bad and the nights draw in, should be able to attract reliable viewers. Corrie recoups. So does Emmerdale, and probably HollyOaks as well.

But EastEnders ...

EastEnders is bleeding viewers. Hemorrhaging. Three million viewers have wandered off since last summer, and many probably won't return. If I had a pound coin for the number of commentators I've read on various fora who've said things like ...

Haven't watched in months. Don't miss it.

I turned off after Christmas. What a load of tripe.

Stopped watching in 2006. Just caught a couple of eps recently and was appalled at how much worse the quality has got.

2006 is the operative year. That's the year when EastEnders 2.0 started in earnest. The people praising EastEnders at the moment, apart from paid plant dan2008 and assorted village idiots who know who they are and need no naming, are people who started watching in 2006.

They're the ones who drooled obsessively at The Stacey and Ronnie Show, who beg for the one-trick pony known as Lacey Turner to return, who are creaming their knickers at the fact that Sam Womack's being paid what is probably a bitch load of money for a six-month stint and a shot at being forgiven for committing a heinoous crime. They're the Tanya-shippers and Sharon-haters. They're the ones who consider Phil a thug and hate Alfie.

Hell, let's be honest ... They're the lowest frigging denominator of viewer, and they're being mercilessly pandered at the moment.

The flagship show of the BBC is floundering into the no-man's land between CBeebies, a bad teen soap and the sunken ship known as ...

Before The Stacey and Ronnie Show, there was The Emily and Lindsey Show, AKA Tits and Ass.

And that, good people, as well as shoddy writing, bad research and retcon is what sank the good ship Brookside.

Children Should Be Seen and Not Heard.

The current crop of moppets on the show at the moment make me cringe. It's not just EastEnders. The likes of dippy Faye and Simon the Mancunian Midget on Corrie make me want to gouge my eyeballs out. But ranking right alongside our friends in the North come Tiffany, NuBobby and that minime Justin Bieber, Denny.

(I kid you not about Denny. Cop this!)

Professional kidults like all of the above make me yearn for the days when Martin Fowler didn't speak until he was twelve, when Vicky Fowler didn't sprout hair until she was nine and couldn't figure out that she was supposed to call Sue Tully "mum" so she came out with "Mumshelle."

Or when Kylie Stanlow, the awful Lindsay Corkhill's child sounded like the worst kid reciting lines at a Nativity Show.

They make me long for more of the silences of Amy, the gurnings of Oscar and the babblings of Kamil.

The writers either subsrcribe to the age-old myth of kids saying the darnedest things and write cutesy-cutesy dialogue for them, making them act too young for their ages, or they make them seven going on seventeen. I mean, in Coronation Street, Anna is reading bedtime stories to her eleven year-old adoptive daughter, who's really 13 in real life. Go bloody figure.

I wondered how long it would be before we got the ubiquitous Dennis-Goes-Off-the-Rails storyline, and I can see where it's leading. Phil saw the little bastard nuisance hanging around the Arches with an undue interest in an old slingshot, an apparatus that was too dangerous even for Jay and Dex-TAAAA to be handling. Those things are weapons, you know.

This is a key moment, as it's patently obvious that Sharon's initial representation as an over-protective mother, followed by her second coming as an indifferent mother, coupled with the fact that this lot of storylining clowns have completetly ignored any characterisation from the past and sought to re-present Sharon as a desperate, pathetic, clinging shitheap of a woman crazy to hang onto any man who'll put a roof over her head, now present her as the doting mother of one of the worst whining spoiled brats I've yet to see on the show, bar Tiffany.

Dennis demands, he's a sneak, a liar and all he has to do is pretend to cry and Sharon would swear to God that his shit doesn't smell. As someone else observed, we're entering the realms of Nick Cotton territory now, as Dot aptly remarked tonight. 

But fear not ... Dennis won't descend to the depths of Nick, because sooner, rather than later, Phil will put Sharon right about what really happened in the Arches to spark Ava Wars - honestly, the prospect of two fortysomething women built like brick shithouses scrapping over the attitudes of a seven year-old and an adult son is totally pathetic. (Remember, Dennis referred to Dex-TAAA as a "man," something Dex-TAAA rarely behaves like). What's next? Sharon and Ava mud-wrestling in the middle of the Square, Alfie selling tickets and Big Mo doing the odds?

Dennis's problem, as Phil will surely point out and as evidenced tonight in his first scene with Fatboy, is obvious. He's craving male company and a male role model. Cue Phil to the rescue. This will be the key to his reconciliation with Sharon. That's where this is leading.

I have to say this: I think the role of the kid could do with a re-cast. Harry Hickles is pretty, and was probably hired on that basis because - hey, we have to pander to the Shannisites in memory that fey Dennis Sr was a pretty man; but the kid is one of the worst stageschool brats on the show, and motherhood is one of the downsides of Sharon as a character.

I know, for the long-term viewer at least, the concept of Sharon returning from a six-year absence as a mother was never going to be easy, especially since she showed no interest in going down that route when she was Grant's wife, and she'd resigned herself to being childless with Dennis. The Vic was always Sharon's baby, but this 2012 model Sharon is just as fucked up as the 2010 version of Kat or Bianca post-prison.

Newman is committed to repairing Kat, yea unto the point of making her a saint; but she needs to remember that Sharon needs fixing also and badly. Whatever you think of her, she's an original character, far more iconic than Kat will ever be, and the daughter of Den and Angie. That shouldn't be forgotten. At the moment, I'm hating her, and as much as I hate the insignificant Magic Negro and all who gather around her, she was in the right tonight, apart from eye-balling a little kid, even if he were lying. That was threatening and menacing behaviour.

Like Tiffany and NuBobby, Dennis needs a smack and a re-cast.

On second thought, Brookside wasn't afraid to kill off a kid or two when their characters had reached the end of their tethers (or when the audience had). Just watch this.

Oh, and here's something to ponder for all ye who have forgotten or never learned to think critically ... Peggy's back for one episode. With Phil. And Sharon. Peggy is the only other person, bar Grant, who knows what Phil said to Dennis on the night he died.

Duff-duff moment much?

Lolita Revisited.

Of course, Whitney's bound to have confusing and conflicting feelings toward Tony, just as Kat had toward Uncle Harry or Ronnie had regarding Archie. But the difference between Whitney and the other two women is that Whitney was actively groomed, even believing she loved Tony King, and it's obvious now he was reaching out to her yet again, although I'm surprised, because during the child abuse storyline (which was more about Bianca than about Whitney), the gist was that Tony was losing interest in Whitney now that she'd turned sixteen and was legal. Instead, he was trying to insinuate himself with Lauren, who was a year younger and proper jailbait.

But I'd feel a lot more sympathetic to Whitney and her emotional plight if she didn't go off to the prison looking like a hooker selling her wares. Seriously, Shona McGarty's face really annoys me. Talk about the roar of the greasepaint and the smell of the crowd. Too much make-up, too much eyeliner and false eyelashes and the exaggerated lip gloss really makes this girl look like a whore.

However, in austerity times, the economically strapped EastEnders is using this as a lead-in to not one, but two storylines - Kat's redemption and Tyler's departure. Notice the standard Whitney line was in play tonight as the ubiquitous current Dependable Bloke followed her home, seeking to avenge her honour.

Whitney (arriving home): Ge'off me! Don't touch me! Get'im outa here!

Ever the victim, ever seeking to cast the blame on someone else (especially a male), making it seem as though Tyler - who's her fiance' - has been behaving inappropriately toward her.

Whitney was off to see the Wizard for one reason and one reason only - Tyler had morphed into the dependable bloke, someone who was working all hours and sleeping on the floor of the Vic in order to scrape together enough money for a deposit for a flat for them to rent. He'd become boring. Tony's letter, yes, messed with her head; but don't think it didn't cross Whitney's mind that she was now legal and maybe he still loved her. Tony was the bad boy again.

Same old same old.

Meanwhile, back at the Butcher Ranch, Bianca throws a party to celebrate coming off probation. Kudos to Kat, who gets line of the night tonight:-

Kat: You'avin' a party? I take it Jean's not invited then.

Bianca: No, and neither are you.

Kat: Comin' off probation! If they only knew the 'alf o'wot you done. You see, Jean, she's a bit different from you. Some people'ave consciences ... and some people'ave parties.

I'm still off Kat, but that was a cracking line, and it shamed Bianca, who - like Lauren - gets off a felony with the blink of an eyelid.

Now here's food for thought: Remember when Tony was discovered to have been a paedo? Cast your mind back to Christmas 2008. She and Bianca had a long talk in the wake of his arrest, because Whitney couldn't see that she'd done anything wrong. Bianca pointed out to her that Whitney had been having sex with Tony before she was sixteen and anything before sixteen is (in Bianca's words) rape.

This was the same Bianca who tried, a few months before, to pimp a fifteen year-old Whitney out to 21 year-old Callum Monks. When Whitney wasn't interested, Bianca wittered:-

Oh, Whit .. yer ain't afraid because 'e's twennyone now,are yer? Becuz when I was your age, I was mucking about wiv much older blokes ...

Or something to that effect, and she was. Who remembers that Bianca was fucking around with Dan Sullivan when she was fifteen, and Dan was a married man in his thirties.

And that, as Bianca would say now, is rape.

So why has no one ever referenced that, other than the fact that this would make Bianca the fourth victim of sex abuse currently living on the Square.

Overgrown Children.

Ian Beale.

I'm Team Janine, but even she is participating in this playground farce with her interminable mind games with Michael. He tries to undermine her confidence, she knocks his remarks back. Good, however, to see that she doesn't trust Danny as far as she can throw a stick. He's talking about executive high-rise flats in the area in a time of austerity?

But Janine is right to remind Ian that her money's invested in that restaurant. She removes the funding and Ian's up shit creek without a paddle. If he thinks he can get one over on her by threatening to reveal her past stints as a prostitute, does he not think she can reveal that he was her punter? He was none too good to take her money when she offered to invest in his venture. 

But Janine's going to get him where it hurts the most - by hiring Lucy to work for her.

For someone who knows the business game, Ian certainly knew better than to parade around the eatery advertising his staffing and family problems. 

And Abi Branning as a waitress ... is she even old enough to serve booze? And stop giggling.

Carl and Kirstie.

I like Carl, and I like the way they're easing him into the show. He's a good actor and an interesting character, but whilst Kat's semi-coming onto him to try to prove to herself that she, like Alfie, can move on, Carl is reciprocating because he wants to make Kirstie jealous, which is working also and will continue to work until Max returns and Kirstie starts whining about getting back with him again.

Please. Grow up. Just grow the fuck up.

Yet another filler episode on a Friday night.

Update: Silly me. I forgot the Masoods. And Fatboy. And Poppy. The Masoods are just biding time, as is Fatboy. But I see a light at the end of the Tunnel for Poppy now that the Salon's being sold. Ta-RAH, TOWIE-BRAIN.