There are some family threads at the moment on Digital Spy - one dissing the Mitchells and another wondering why there was so much Branning hate in abundance.
The reason behind the Branning hatred at the moment can be defined by the word "abundance." Take tonight's episode, for example. There was hardly a scene in tonight's programme that didn't feature a Branning or a Branning satellite. Even the mini-subplot concerning Janine indirectly featured a Branning as Alice was involved; and even if she were not, Janine is related by marriage to Bianca, who is part of the Branning set-up.
As someone pointed out, no single family in the show has ever been as large and as dominant as the Brannings have been, especially during the past three years, when the overkill was established in earnest. Even with the departures of Tanya and Derek, the Brannings and their satellites comprise 19 characters, and now that Masood and his family have been peripherally brought into the fold, that ups the number to 22. They are multi-racial, multi-national and now multi-faith.
Jack leaves shortly, but the Branning are indelibly linked to the Mitchells with Ronnie being Jack's ex-wife and the mother of his late son, who was the "only child who mattered" to Jack. Amy, his daughter by Roxy Mitchell, is also a Mitchell; and Richard, the son he never sees in Portugal, is the son of Sam Mitchell.
The Brannings are hated by their very presence, by the fact that they are booted, suited, scrubbed up poor white trash, who cannot hide their white trash behaviour behind designer fashions. Carol has four kids by as many men, and even now she can't keep her knickers on for any male who shows an interest. Bianca is a retarded, agressive chav with a criminal record. Max is a serial adulterer. Lauren, her mother and her grandmother are drunks. They sleep with their relatives. They have appalling table manners and they snort. One is a mouth breather.
The entire clan could be pared right back to Max, Kirsty and Carol, and no one departing would be missed. The Branning plethora is one good example of too much of anything is bad for a show.
As for the Mitchells, they are many things, but it has to be said that whenever that family is down or in small numbers, the show suffers. They are the only family, bar the Watts family, who can hold the pub, and they were created to transition the only surviving Watts family member to another level in her life. Sharon is as much a Mitchell and part of the Mitchell set-up as if she were born to the clan, herself. Forget Ronnie (retconned) and Dennis Rickman (an even bigger retcon), Sharon, Grant and Phil are the real thing.
When Steve McFadden and Barbara Windsor left the programme to the Watts Family 2.0 in 2003, the ratings (and the show, itself) tanked. The Watts family will forever and always be remembered as Den, Angie and Sharon. The pisspoor effort to integrate the appallingly acted Vicki into the fold, the creation of Dennis the pretty boy son of Den Watts's fifteen year-old statutory rape victim, and certainly Zombie Den the Pervert didn't work. A dynamic of Den and Angie may have been as successful as Grant's second marriage to Tiffany, but once again, the show went too far in recreation.
In order to re-set the equilibrium and get bums back on seats, the Mitchells had to return with Grant in tow.
People calling for Phil and Sharon to exit from the show at the moment simply don't know what they're talking about. Who would replace them? Max Branning?
Think about it. Critically and spatially.
Until then, we've got to put up with the Brannings' own putrid Supergirl.
The Amazing Adventures of Saint Lauren Branning and Her Doctrine of Good Works.
There's a story in the news today about Jennifer Lawrence, the young and genuinely talented actress whose look has been appropriated by Jacqueline Jossa ...
THE. WORST. ACTRESS. EVER. TO. APPEAR. ON. EASTENDERS.
Lawrence, who's only twenty-two and who's got an Academy Award to her credit, admits to being in meltdown mode recently because of excess paparazzi action following her every move, including her weekends spent with her family. This girl isn't an exhibitionist in any way. She doesn't populate the red carpet on every occasion and she doesn't parade around with various male arm candy in the shape of the latest male celebrity.
Jossa, on the other hand, is a celebrity who calls herself an actress. She's a soaper, chosen for her looks and without any previous acting experience or any discernable talent. She attended a fame school, paid for with funds her father had stolen from taxpayers in Enfield Council district, stolen in his capacity as Chief Financial Officer for that body. A fame school is not a drama school. It's not even a qualified high school. And when Jossa's not gurning, performing arm windmills and screeching her lines, she's sashaying down the red carpet in some D-List celebrity do on the arm of another EastEnders' inexperienced beefcake wannabe actor whose existence on the show she's been told to validate. First we suffered two years of Tony Discipline due to a romance contrived by TPTB; now we have to watch the off-screen drama unfold about her new "comfort" romance with David Witts.
Anyway, Lauren is the current go-to girl of the moment on EastEnders, and the current lot in charge are more intent on repairing Lauren's self-obsessed, selfish, entitled, whining image than they are in repairing the almost irreparable damage they willingly did to the iconic Sharon Watts.
So, we see Lauren running about the Square - and not breaking a sweat. At least, Ronnie had the realism to return from her runs with a large square of perspiration in the middle of her appropriately tight teeshirt. She even looked as if she stank afterward, but not Lauren. Her very shit smells like Christian Dior's Diorella.
And she's so intent on proving to all and sundry that she's a changed person, she even offers help to Grandma Dot, who's suddenly being called "Gran."
Stands to reason.
"Grandma Dot" was largely ignored by Lauren. Her home was abused by Lauren when she and her cousin Joey committed incest on the sofa in the lounge, leaving all sorts of seminal fluids ingrained in the upholstery. "Grandma Dot" was disrespected at the time of Billie's death. "Grandma Dot" was nothing to Lauren.
Now "Gran" is there to be helped and appreciated, especially since today just happens (coincidentally) to be Grandad Jim's 80th birthday.
Let's have a party, a surprise party for Gran, just to show her how much we appreciate Grandad's birthday - ne'mind, we won't even think of visiting him in the care home.
This is just another variation of the old "Let's put on a show" routine, with nothing of the talent.
So, guess what?
We get yet another Branning get-together. How many does that make this year alone? And we're only in August. That's their specialty.
More importantly, it's not only for "Gran" is this party, it's Lauren's way of making it all about her as well - because the sub-context of the do is to show everyone in the family just how well Lauren is doing. So well, that she left rehab in record time.
Bragging to Carol about how the key is to keep busy and develop other interests to help her cope with her desire to drink ...
I have my running! She trills - and I do hate the way Jossa, when she doesn't end a sentence with that fake wide-eyed smile, she sucks in her lower lip to emphasize her collagened upper one. Just another device used by an actress who is always 100% conscious of the camera being on her.
The party was all about Lauren and all for Lauren, and even though Lauren really meant for the occasion to highlight how much she'd progressed - when has Lauren never been only about herself - she got upset that everyone present at the party seemed to be talking, within earshot, about her.
So Lauren's in a bit of a Jennifer Lawrence meltdown and reaching for that drink - maybe subconsciously hoping that she would be driven to drink again, so that she could shift the blame onto the people at the party, itself. Nothing is ever Lauren's fault, you know. And, of course, we are all shown that the crux of Lauren's problems is all to do with the fact that her cousin doesn't want to fuck her anymore.
One of the craziest reactions to a romantic association came in the blase' reaction of both Max and Tanya to the fact that Lauren was fucking around with her first cousin. Max went ballistic a few years ago when tall poppy syndrome Peter Beale kissed Lauren, but he batted nary an eyelid when he found out she was sleeping with Joey.
Kinda poor white trashy, ya know ...
All that inbreeding ...
On a couple of other notes, it looks as though Max has moved Krusty into the Branning abode, which means they're living there now with the hoary old drunken toad, Cora-the-Bora, who wastrs no time in making snide remarks about Krusty, who's really a cut above Cora-the-Bora's fat slut of a home-wrecking daughter, who's probably in Devon right now sizing up the wallets of the doctors at Lauren's exclusive clinic before admitting her own alcohol addiction to the dumbest and handsomest one.
Cora now, officially, has no right to live in that house, and Max shouldn't tolerate her, not when she insults his wife like that. She contributes nothing, and she's an alcoholic, herself. It's not as if she's without a place to stay either. She can turn up and beg the Magic Negro, her oldest daughter for some help, or seek out free room and board at the B and B, courtesy of her fancy man, Patrick.
She's insufferable, and whoever thinks her matriarch material should be taken out and smacked.
On a final note, Masood is introduced to the Branning clan as their Pakistani branch chairman. To say he looked like a fish out of water was an understatement, especially in that brood of boozers. Speaking of which, when did MyAlice start to drink? This time last year, she was completely teetotal, but Lauren forced a wineglass into her hand.
No wonder Dot reacted the way she did. She recognised this was a pisspoor excuse and an appropriation of Jim's birthday to give Lauren a chance to prove herself, and also to expatiate any sense of guilt Jim's children for the fact that they really can't be bothered to visit the old codger.
The Brannings were at their worst tonight. Complete overkill. Yet hidden amongst that scurcy lot of poor white trash were some subtle hints of days of future past ...
Roxy gets a phonecall from .... ta-DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA ... Ronnie. And now we sense that she's not far off, just there over the horizon ...
And that same distracted Roxy wouldn't let poor pitiful Jack take Amy to the birthday party, whic prompted a big moan to Max. (Could this be the beginning of the end for Jack?)
Here's a question: Bianca begged time off the stall to go to Jim's party, leaving Kat in charge; but Kat spent the bulk of the afternoon geeing up Michael's dilemma about Janine. Who minded the stall?
Anyway, the bulk of tonight's Branningapalooza was the first step in the propaganda exercise in getting the older, more discerning and critically thinking viewer to love Lauren, because no one loves Lauren more than Lauren loves herself ... which makes he a wanker ... innit?
Dot Serves Up Green Eggs and Ham.
I understand the fanatical following June Brown has as much as I understand how much there are fanatics for Gillian Wright, even though I think Jean is a village idiot compared to Dot.
I've never been the biggest Dot or June Brown fan. On the rare occasion Brown is good, she's excellent; but 75% of her repertoire is pure ham, the likes of which a sleep-walking Fatboy stole from her refrigerator.
In fact, a few weeks ago, when she and Cora-the-Bora got into a bust-up in the Branning kitchen, in the reconciliation scene, Cora offered Abi some "nice ham that Dot's brought us." I wonder if that were a subtle dig by whoever wrote that episode? Tipping the wink to Brown's particular acting style, which was in evidence tonight.
Over-dramatic body language populated her first scene, which saw Dot icing Jim's birthday cake as if she were weilding a heavy hammer, which symbolised her heavy heart.
Dot wasn't grieving Jim being cooped up in that home for yet another birthday. Nope ... this was all about Dot. She was finding visiting him every day a chore, just like she found having him at home, in a disabled state, too much for her, even though she made a martyr of herself by refusing all help.
And since when has Dot visited every day? Dot's the sort of person who broadcasts her good deeds audibly, in a less-than-subtle plea for approbation and praise. For a Christian, Dot is very, very vain. And she'd also not think twice about pointedly remarking to all of Jim's children on any occasion that she'd been to see their father, yet again, without their presence. Besides, Dot's been too busy lately, cosying up to the Vicar, campaigning to become church warden, raising money for the church roof and the vicar's organ (pun intended) and fending off snakes to visit Jim every day.
This is an obvious retcon.
And it's meant to shame Jim's thankless brood of children into assuming their filial duties. Some of the home truths were self-evident.
I love the fact that she deemed Lauren's party "misguided." She recognised that the party effort was as much for Lauren to be seen and recognised as "better", even moreso than it was to honour Jim. Besides, Joey and Alice didn't even know Jim; nor did Krusty or Masood. And Jim wasn't on anyone's mind at that get-together; it was all about Lauren.
The piece de resistance in Dot's summation was her critique of Carol's absence from Jim's bedside.
Carol: I've been really busy.
Dot: You've been really busy gallavantin' about.
True. Max has been consumed with his wives, his ex-wives and his own thankless children, who won't be seen for dust by the time Max is in Jim's shoes; Jack's been licking his own wounds and feeling sorry for himself; and Carol's been ... busy.
Dot called out the single most defining characteristic of the Branning family tonight, in what was the show's best scene - their innate selfishness defines them. Every. Single. One. Of. Them.
Alice may have a genuine interest in Scarlett Moon, but that's all to get into Michael's y-fronts again. Joey thinks nothing of the fact that he's slept with his own cousin and her two best friends, and I haven't heard him tell Lauren yet that he's had Whitney. Max, Jack, Carol, Abi, Bianca ... they're all about themselves. Bianca commits a crime and then whines about having to pay the penalty because going to prison is all about her. Liam's truancy was, again, all about Bianca.
Is it any wonder that this family unit is so unloved by the viewers? Anyone who does like them probably exhibits the same selfish life tendencies also.
Janine Butcher is viewed as a bitch, and she owns that; yet she offers Bianca, Carol and their brood, Janine's nieces and nephews, virtually free accommodation, and they treat her generosity like shit.
As I said, I'm not the biggest Dot shipper, but I like that she, and only she, can dish the selfish shit this family exudes right back in their gobs and shame them for it.
That doesn't mean they shouldn't be pared right down.
The Magic Negro, the Walford Mattress and Miss Piggy.
I am convinced that Lorraine Newman knew well in advance that her days were numbered; and I think she knew as much when Letitia Dean approached her with concerns about how Sharon was being written this time around, subtly implying that TPTB should sort Sharon out whilst Dean took a short three-week break.
The reason I surmise this is because I think Newman and Ashdown have, effectively, washed their hands of Sharon, allowing her extremely damaged character to fester on the backburner, only emerging to be portrayed pejoratively, until DTC arrives.
Sharon is, supposedly, his favourite character, and he'll have his work cut out in damage limitation and repair.
Tonight's episode was written by one Richard Lazarus, a writer who began his EastEnders' tenure truly at the beginning of what is now known as EastEnders 2.0 - 2006, or the foundations of Branningville. The brief snippet we saw tonight of Sharon, dashing into the community centre to drop Denny (who looked as though he'd been having his hair lightened at the salon) and then to return to have it out with The Magic Negro and the Walford Mattress, who's such a brilliant handler of children, was one of the worst scenes in the piece, for obvious reasons.
First of all, it was highly unprofessional for Whitney to be supervising either Bobby or Tiffany. They are family, and in most educational instances when a family member is in a professional supervisory capacity, it's not mete to put family members under their supervision. It's too easy to play favourites.
Secondly, no matter what that dumbass Ava the Rava might say, Whitney did not handle the situation with Denny properly. Last year, Whitney was all too ready to diagnose three-year-old Amy's biting of George as a reaction to tension between Jack and Roxy. Surely, they know that Sharon is a single mother, living in a bed-and-breakfast accommodation. Her son has known no stability. If Whitney were so ready to interpret Amy's actions psychologically (and incorrectly), maybe she should have stopped and thought about Denny's circumstances. She did the other week with the child Frankie, whom she shouldn't have hugged - again, that's deemed unprofessional.
Yet Ava was impressed with her singular command that the child should "MOVE," and later gossiped to Whitney that Denny could be a "handful."
Hang on ... this isn't just a professional, this is a fucking deputy head teacher. A child is acting out for some reason. Even if they didn't know the child previously, then maybe they should sit down and have a talk with him, or even try to point out to Sharon, not in a public context where all three were on their guard, that Dennis was acting out. As a former teacher, myself, yes, there are parents who refuse to see that their children do any wrong ... Bianca, anyone, with Tiffany?
Bianca and Whitney have defended Tiffany's vandalism of Zainab's property on several occasions. Bianca was quick to blame the school for Liam's truancy; yet both these "professional" women were quick to condemn a child today. And the way Sharon was written was no better.
Look, one of the major problems with Sharon this time around is that she's come back as a mother with a small child. As any long-term viewer would tell you, Sharon was never a maternal character. Sharon's baby was the Vic; it was this which caused tension with her and Grant, and it would have and did cause tension with her and Saint Dennis.
Sharon doesn't work as a mother. I don't know if it's the cack-handed way she's been written, but I also suspect a lot has to do with the appalling Harry Hickles as her son. One of the things DTC is going to have to address is either a possible recast of Dennis Rickman Jr or biting the bullet and - yes - killing the kid off. That's drastic, but if Brookside can kill off Matthew and Emily Farnham in a traffic accident, and they weren't much older than Denny, they can do the same here.
Sorry for the harshness, but the kid's gotta go. Baby Justin Bieber can leave the building. And while he's at it, Richard Lazarus can rise from the dead to re-write Sharon, after getting off his arse and researching the Sharon from the 80s and 90s, instead of this limp biscuit, whom the combined efforts of Ashdown and Newman have skewered.
Too Much Hard Fucking Cheese.
I love Janine. Charlie Brooks has more class than any woman on the show. She's beautiful and sassy and Janine works as an independent woman.
But - oh, does she rile male ego!
A man can sleep with a woman for one night and discard her - as Michael did Kat or Alice - as damaged goods, but a woman's not allowed to do that with a male.
When a woman's discarded, she's discreet but makes her displeasure known to the man only. Tonight, we saw that men are bigger bitches than the female of the species.
Yes, Michael is jealous, and like a man, he's all too ready to believe Danny's lie about him rejecting Janine as true, because Michael wants to believe Janine is so bad; and he'll probably use this manipulation against her, with Danny joining in as his male pride was hurt.
As much as Michael, Danny wasn't interested in Janine at all, only getting up close and personal in order to get what he wants. Now, he'll probably declare himself Team Michael in order to scam her even more.
I hope she squashes both of their sorry arses.
All this was played out against a stupid backdrop of Kat and Bianca debating whether or not to attend a singles night a R and R. (And I still cannot believe that, between Roxy and Kat, neither have thought to apprise Alfie that Ronnie is being released.)
As tiresome as these two overlapping vignettes were tonight, the juxtaposition did give us a brilliant line from Michael Moon, which proves that maybe - just maybe - the writer in question recognises the pitiful state of femininity in the Twenty-First Century as insultingly portrayed by EastEnders.
Unlike you, Kathleen, I don't have to be in a relationship in order to define my person.
That line, alone, was worth the rest of tonight's tripe.
Less than three weeks, and counting.
The reason behind the Branning hatred at the moment can be defined by the word "abundance." Take tonight's episode, for example. There was hardly a scene in tonight's programme that didn't feature a Branning or a Branning satellite. Even the mini-subplot concerning Janine indirectly featured a Branning as Alice was involved; and even if she were not, Janine is related by marriage to Bianca, who is part of the Branning set-up.
As someone pointed out, no single family in the show has ever been as large and as dominant as the Brannings have been, especially during the past three years, when the overkill was established in earnest. Even with the departures of Tanya and Derek, the Brannings and their satellites comprise 19 characters, and now that Masood and his family have been peripherally brought into the fold, that ups the number to 22. They are multi-racial, multi-national and now multi-faith.
Jack leaves shortly, but the Branning are indelibly linked to the Mitchells with Ronnie being Jack's ex-wife and the mother of his late son, who was the "only child who mattered" to Jack. Amy, his daughter by Roxy Mitchell, is also a Mitchell; and Richard, the son he never sees in Portugal, is the son of Sam Mitchell.
The Brannings are hated by their very presence, by the fact that they are booted, suited, scrubbed up poor white trash, who cannot hide their white trash behaviour behind designer fashions. Carol has four kids by as many men, and even now she can't keep her knickers on for any male who shows an interest. Bianca is a retarded, agressive chav with a criminal record. Max is a serial adulterer. Lauren, her mother and her grandmother are drunks. They sleep with their relatives. They have appalling table manners and they snort. One is a mouth breather.
The entire clan could be pared right back to Max, Kirsty and Carol, and no one departing would be missed. The Branning plethora is one good example of too much of anything is bad for a show.
As for the Mitchells, they are many things, but it has to be said that whenever that family is down or in small numbers, the show suffers. They are the only family, bar the Watts family, who can hold the pub, and they were created to transition the only surviving Watts family member to another level in her life. Sharon is as much a Mitchell and part of the Mitchell set-up as if she were born to the clan, herself. Forget Ronnie (retconned) and Dennis Rickman (an even bigger retcon), Sharon, Grant and Phil are the real thing.
When Steve McFadden and Barbara Windsor left the programme to the Watts Family 2.0 in 2003, the ratings (and the show, itself) tanked. The Watts family will forever and always be remembered as Den, Angie and Sharon. The pisspoor effort to integrate the appallingly acted Vicki into the fold, the creation of Dennis the pretty boy son of Den Watts's fifteen year-old statutory rape victim, and certainly Zombie Den the Pervert didn't work. A dynamic of Den and Angie may have been as successful as Grant's second marriage to Tiffany, but once again, the show went too far in recreation.
In order to re-set the equilibrium and get bums back on seats, the Mitchells had to return with Grant in tow.
People calling for Phil and Sharon to exit from the show at the moment simply don't know what they're talking about. Who would replace them? Max Branning?
Think about it. Critically and spatially.
Until then, we've got to put up with the Brannings' own putrid Supergirl.
The Amazing Adventures of Saint Lauren Branning and Her Doctrine of Good Works.
There's a story in the news today about Jennifer Lawrence, the young and genuinely talented actress whose look has been appropriated by Jacqueline Jossa ...
THE. WORST. ACTRESS. EVER. TO. APPEAR. ON. EASTENDERS.
Jossa, on the other hand, is a celebrity who calls herself an actress. She's a soaper, chosen for her looks and without any previous acting experience or any discernable talent. She attended a fame school, paid for with funds her father had stolen from taxpayers in Enfield Council district, stolen in his capacity as Chief Financial Officer for that body. A fame school is not a drama school. It's not even a qualified high school. And when Jossa's not gurning, performing arm windmills and screeching her lines, she's sashaying down the red carpet in some D-List celebrity do on the arm of another EastEnders' inexperienced beefcake wannabe actor whose existence on the show she's been told to validate. First we suffered two years of Tony Discipline due to a romance contrived by TPTB; now we have to watch the off-screen drama unfold about her new "comfort" romance with David Witts.
Anyway, Lauren is the current go-to girl of the moment on EastEnders, and the current lot in charge are more intent on repairing Lauren's self-obsessed, selfish, entitled, whining image than they are in repairing the almost irreparable damage they willingly did to the iconic Sharon Watts.
So, we see Lauren running about the Square - and not breaking a sweat. At least, Ronnie had the realism to return from her runs with a large square of perspiration in the middle of her appropriately tight teeshirt. She even looked as if she stank afterward, but not Lauren. Her very shit smells like Christian Dior's Diorella.
And she's so intent on proving to all and sundry that she's a changed person, she even offers help to Grandma Dot, who's suddenly being called "Gran."
Stands to reason.
"Grandma Dot" was largely ignored by Lauren. Her home was abused by Lauren when she and her cousin Joey committed incest on the sofa in the lounge, leaving all sorts of seminal fluids ingrained in the upholstery. "Grandma Dot" was disrespected at the time of Billie's death. "Grandma Dot" was nothing to Lauren.
Now "Gran" is there to be helped and appreciated, especially since today just happens (coincidentally) to be Grandad Jim's 80th birthday.
Let's have a party, a surprise party for Gran, just to show her how much we appreciate Grandad's birthday - ne'mind, we won't even think of visiting him in the care home.
This is just another variation of the old "Let's put on a show" routine, with nothing of the talent.
So, guess what?
We get yet another Branning get-together. How many does that make this year alone? And we're only in August. That's their specialty.
More importantly, it's not only for "Gran" is this party, it's Lauren's way of making it all about her as well - because the sub-context of the do is to show everyone in the family just how well Lauren is doing. So well, that she left rehab in record time.
Bragging to Carol about how the key is to keep busy and develop other interests to help her cope with her desire to drink ...
I have my running! She trills - and I do hate the way Jossa, when she doesn't end a sentence with that fake wide-eyed smile, she sucks in her lower lip to emphasize her collagened upper one. Just another device used by an actress who is always 100% conscious of the camera being on her.
The party was all about Lauren and all for Lauren, and even though Lauren really meant for the occasion to highlight how much she'd progressed - when has Lauren never been only about herself - she got upset that everyone present at the party seemed to be talking, within earshot, about her.
So Lauren's in a bit of a Jennifer Lawrence meltdown and reaching for that drink - maybe subconsciously hoping that she would be driven to drink again, so that she could shift the blame onto the people at the party, itself. Nothing is ever Lauren's fault, you know. And, of course, we are all shown that the crux of Lauren's problems is all to do with the fact that her cousin doesn't want to fuck her anymore.
One of the craziest reactions to a romantic association came in the blase' reaction of both Max and Tanya to the fact that Lauren was fucking around with her first cousin. Max went ballistic a few years ago when tall poppy syndrome Peter Beale kissed Lauren, but he batted nary an eyelid when he found out she was sleeping with Joey.
Kinda poor white trashy, ya know ...
On a couple of other notes, it looks as though Max has moved Krusty into the Branning abode, which means they're living there now with the hoary old drunken toad, Cora-the-Bora, who wastrs no time in making snide remarks about Krusty, who's really a cut above Cora-the-Bora's fat slut of a home-wrecking daughter, who's probably in Devon right now sizing up the wallets of the doctors at Lauren's exclusive clinic before admitting her own alcohol addiction to the dumbest and handsomest one.
Cora now, officially, has no right to live in that house, and Max shouldn't tolerate her, not when she insults his wife like that. She contributes nothing, and she's an alcoholic, herself. It's not as if she's without a place to stay either. She can turn up and beg the Magic Negro, her oldest daughter for some help, or seek out free room and board at the B and B, courtesy of her fancy man, Patrick.
She's insufferable, and whoever thinks her matriarch material should be taken out and smacked.
On a final note, Masood is introduced to the Branning clan as their Pakistani branch chairman. To say he looked like a fish out of water was an understatement, especially in that brood of boozers. Speaking of which, when did MyAlice start to drink? This time last year, she was completely teetotal, but Lauren forced a wineglass into her hand.
No wonder Dot reacted the way she did. She recognised this was a pisspoor excuse and an appropriation of Jim's birthday to give Lauren a chance to prove herself, and also to expatiate any sense of guilt Jim's children for the fact that they really can't be bothered to visit the old codger.
The Brannings were at their worst tonight. Complete overkill. Yet hidden amongst that scurcy lot of poor white trash were some subtle hints of days of future past ...
Roxy gets a phonecall from .... ta-DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA ... Ronnie. And now we sense that she's not far off, just there over the horizon ...
And that same distracted Roxy wouldn't let poor pitiful Jack take Amy to the birthday party, whic prompted a big moan to Max. (Could this be the beginning of the end for Jack?)
Here's a question: Bianca begged time off the stall to go to Jim's party, leaving Kat in charge; but Kat spent the bulk of the afternoon geeing up Michael's dilemma about Janine. Who minded the stall?
Anyway, the bulk of tonight's Branningapalooza was the first step in the propaganda exercise in getting the older, more discerning and critically thinking viewer to love Lauren, because no one loves Lauren more than Lauren loves herself ... which makes he a wanker ... innit?
Dot Serves Up Green Eggs and Ham.
I understand the fanatical following June Brown has as much as I understand how much there are fanatics for Gillian Wright, even though I think Jean is a village idiot compared to Dot.
I've never been the biggest Dot or June Brown fan. On the rare occasion Brown is good, she's excellent; but 75% of her repertoire is pure ham, the likes of which a sleep-walking Fatboy stole from her refrigerator.
In fact, a few weeks ago, when she and Cora-the-Bora got into a bust-up in the Branning kitchen, in the reconciliation scene, Cora offered Abi some "nice ham that Dot's brought us." I wonder if that were a subtle dig by whoever wrote that episode? Tipping the wink to Brown's particular acting style, which was in evidence tonight.
Over-dramatic body language populated her first scene, which saw Dot icing Jim's birthday cake as if she were weilding a heavy hammer, which symbolised her heavy heart.
Dot wasn't grieving Jim being cooped up in that home for yet another birthday. Nope ... this was all about Dot. She was finding visiting him every day a chore, just like she found having him at home, in a disabled state, too much for her, even though she made a martyr of herself by refusing all help.
And since when has Dot visited every day? Dot's the sort of person who broadcasts her good deeds audibly, in a less-than-subtle plea for approbation and praise. For a Christian, Dot is very, very vain. And she'd also not think twice about pointedly remarking to all of Jim's children on any occasion that she'd been to see their father, yet again, without their presence. Besides, Dot's been too busy lately, cosying up to the Vicar, campaigning to become church warden, raising money for the church roof and the vicar's organ (pun intended) and fending off snakes to visit Jim every day.
This is an obvious retcon.
And it's meant to shame Jim's thankless brood of children into assuming their filial duties. Some of the home truths were self-evident.
I love the fact that she deemed Lauren's party "misguided." She recognised that the party effort was as much for Lauren to be seen and recognised as "better", even moreso than it was to honour Jim. Besides, Joey and Alice didn't even know Jim; nor did Krusty or Masood. And Jim wasn't on anyone's mind at that get-together; it was all about Lauren.
The piece de resistance in Dot's summation was her critique of Carol's absence from Jim's bedside.
Carol: I've been really busy.
Dot: You've been really busy gallavantin' about.
True. Max has been consumed with his wives, his ex-wives and his own thankless children, who won't be seen for dust by the time Max is in Jim's shoes; Jack's been licking his own wounds and feeling sorry for himself; and Carol's been ... busy.
Dot called out the single most defining characteristic of the Branning family tonight, in what was the show's best scene - their innate selfishness defines them. Every. Single. One. Of. Them.
Alice may have a genuine interest in Scarlett Moon, but that's all to get into Michael's y-fronts again. Joey thinks nothing of the fact that he's slept with his own cousin and her two best friends, and I haven't heard him tell Lauren yet that he's had Whitney. Max, Jack, Carol, Abi, Bianca ... they're all about themselves. Bianca commits a crime and then whines about having to pay the penalty because going to prison is all about her. Liam's truancy was, again, all about Bianca.
Is it any wonder that this family unit is so unloved by the viewers? Anyone who does like them probably exhibits the same selfish life tendencies also.
Janine Butcher is viewed as a bitch, and she owns that; yet she offers Bianca, Carol and their brood, Janine's nieces and nephews, virtually free accommodation, and they treat her generosity like shit.
As I said, I'm not the biggest Dot shipper, but I like that she, and only she, can dish the selfish shit this family exudes right back in their gobs and shame them for it.
That doesn't mean they shouldn't be pared right down.
The Magic Negro, the Walford Mattress and Miss Piggy.
I am convinced that Lorraine Newman knew well in advance that her days were numbered; and I think she knew as much when Letitia Dean approached her with concerns about how Sharon was being written this time around, subtly implying that TPTB should sort Sharon out whilst Dean took a short three-week break.
The reason I surmise this is because I think Newman and Ashdown have, effectively, washed their hands of Sharon, allowing her extremely damaged character to fester on the backburner, only emerging to be portrayed pejoratively, until DTC arrives.
Sharon is, supposedly, his favourite character, and he'll have his work cut out in damage limitation and repair.
Tonight's episode was written by one Richard Lazarus, a writer who began his EastEnders' tenure truly at the beginning of what is now known as EastEnders 2.0 - 2006, or the foundations of Branningville. The brief snippet we saw tonight of Sharon, dashing into the community centre to drop Denny (who looked as though he'd been having his hair lightened at the salon) and then to return to have it out with The Magic Negro and the Walford Mattress, who's such a brilliant handler of children, was one of the worst scenes in the piece, for obvious reasons.
First of all, it was highly unprofessional for Whitney to be supervising either Bobby or Tiffany. They are family, and in most educational instances when a family member is in a professional supervisory capacity, it's not mete to put family members under their supervision. It's too easy to play favourites.
Secondly, no matter what that dumbass Ava the Rava might say, Whitney did not handle the situation with Denny properly. Last year, Whitney was all too ready to diagnose three-year-old Amy's biting of George as a reaction to tension between Jack and Roxy. Surely, they know that Sharon is a single mother, living in a bed-and-breakfast accommodation. Her son has known no stability. If Whitney were so ready to interpret Amy's actions psychologically (and incorrectly), maybe she should have stopped and thought about Denny's circumstances. She did the other week with the child Frankie, whom she shouldn't have hugged - again, that's deemed unprofessional.
Yet Ava was impressed with her singular command that the child should "MOVE," and later gossiped to Whitney that Denny could be a "handful."
Hang on ... this isn't just a professional, this is a fucking deputy head teacher. A child is acting out for some reason. Even if they didn't know the child previously, then maybe they should sit down and have a talk with him, or even try to point out to Sharon, not in a public context where all three were on their guard, that Dennis was acting out. As a former teacher, myself, yes, there are parents who refuse to see that their children do any wrong ... Bianca, anyone, with Tiffany?
Bianca and Whitney have defended Tiffany's vandalism of Zainab's property on several occasions. Bianca was quick to blame the school for Liam's truancy; yet both these "professional" women were quick to condemn a child today. And the way Sharon was written was no better.
Look, one of the major problems with Sharon this time around is that she's come back as a mother with a small child. As any long-term viewer would tell you, Sharon was never a maternal character. Sharon's baby was the Vic; it was this which caused tension with her and Grant, and it would have and did cause tension with her and Saint Dennis.
Sharon doesn't work as a mother. I don't know if it's the cack-handed way she's been written, but I also suspect a lot has to do with the appalling Harry Hickles as her son. One of the things DTC is going to have to address is either a possible recast of Dennis Rickman Jr or biting the bullet and - yes - killing the kid off. That's drastic, but if Brookside can kill off Matthew and Emily Farnham in a traffic accident, and they weren't much older than Denny, they can do the same here.
Sorry for the harshness, but the kid's gotta go. Baby Justin Bieber can leave the building. And while he's at it, Richard Lazarus can rise from the dead to re-write Sharon, after getting off his arse and researching the Sharon from the 80s and 90s, instead of this limp biscuit, whom the combined efforts of Ashdown and Newman have skewered.
Too Much Hard Fucking Cheese.
I love Janine. Charlie Brooks has more class than any woman on the show. She's beautiful and sassy and Janine works as an independent woman.
But - oh, does she rile male ego!
A man can sleep with a woman for one night and discard her - as Michael did Kat or Alice - as damaged goods, but a woman's not allowed to do that with a male.
When a woman's discarded, she's discreet but makes her displeasure known to the man only. Tonight, we saw that men are bigger bitches than the female of the species.
Yes, Michael is jealous, and like a man, he's all too ready to believe Danny's lie about him rejecting Janine as true, because Michael wants to believe Janine is so bad; and he'll probably use this manipulation against her, with Danny joining in as his male pride was hurt.
As much as Michael, Danny wasn't interested in Janine at all, only getting up close and personal in order to get what he wants. Now, he'll probably declare himself Team Michael in order to scam her even more.
I hope she squashes both of their sorry arses.
All this was played out against a stupid backdrop of Kat and Bianca debating whether or not to attend a singles night a R and R. (And I still cannot believe that, between Roxy and Kat, neither have thought to apprise Alfie that Ronnie is being released.)
As tiresome as these two overlapping vignettes were tonight, the juxtaposition did give us a brilliant line from Michael Moon, which proves that maybe - just maybe - the writer in question recognises the pitiful state of femininity in the Twenty-First Century as insultingly portrayed by EastEnders.
Unlike you, Kathleen, I don't have to be in a relationship in order to define my person.
That line, alone, was worth the rest of tonight's tripe.
Less than three weeks, and counting.
I like Janine. I hope she wipes the floor with Danny and Michael. They are both after her money and she knows it. She should be with another millionaire. Poser Danny with his hired Ferrari isn't good enough for Janine.
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