There's an argument raging on Digital Spy at the moment about the actual moment EastEnders went into freefall. Most people agree that the babyswap storyline was the beginning of a prolonged bad patch that's turning into a blight of cancer.
I mean, here we are, almost in mid-October. The nights are drawing in, the weather's turning bad - traditional time for the soaps to pick up the odd million or so lost to the summer holidays and the casual viewers returning for the upswing to Christmas. Instead, the night this episode was aired, EastEnders got a grand total of 4.5 million viewers for the first (and most important) sitting.
In October.
Twelve weeks before the Big One.
Emmerdale wiped EastEnders' ass. Again.
Was I offended by the babyswap storyline? Yes, I was. It was difficult to watch, and very contrived. Ronnie's actions, pre-swap, were ignorant, arrogant and entitled. Neither of the women in the saga came off smelling like roses, and the men were the sympathetic victims. Still, I stuck with the show.
Now, however, I'm more offended. I'm offended that the show is treating something as serious as cot death, kidnapping and the utterly sick act of dumping a dead child, like a broken toy, and taking a living one, simply because you think it your due, like something as trivial as lifting a loaf of bread from the local Co-op.
Twenty years ago, Sharon was shunned for sleeping with her husband's brother. Last year, Kat did the walk of shame for havning wantonly slept with Derek Branning. Max endured a year of ritual humiliation for Stax.
Yet Ronnie is supposed to have all our sympathy. Kat "forgave" her, so that makes everything all right, when we know in a month of Sunday's Kat would be screaming blue murder. Consider this: If Chrissie Watts returned to Walford, having gained probation, would Kat welcome her with open arms? The answer is no.
So in seeking to reverse an offensive act, EastEnders only offends even more - this time, the viewers' intelligence.
Oh well, at least the fanbois and the retarded teens are happy.
Sexytimessexytimessexytimes ... LOL ... Sexytimessexytimessexytimes
By the way, this was one shitty episode.
Victims of Lurve.
How old is Fatboy? The answer is that he's one year older than Peter Beale. So that's twenty-one. And he's left in charge of the Vic, after Alfie's done his annual get-out-of-town-and-run-from-your-problems shuffle.
Fatboy is an offensive racial stereotype. He cackles and capers like the offensive depiction of pickanninies of the past, because that's what the hideously white writing and production team think of minorities: They're stereotypes and tokens. Tamwar the Asian Geek. Patrick de leee-yaaad back Jamaican (yeah mon), the Newman Negroes and Fatboy the pickanniny ... Scrub me Mamma with a Boogie Beat ...
Fatboy's line:-
Alfie Moon, you da man!
Now we all should remember that Arthur Chubb is the son of a bank manager. He learned to drive in his mother's Merc, and he can speak properly and is reasonably well-educated. So why the drivel and the outdated Ali G impersonation?
That's offensive.
Still Fatboy and Patrick are running the pub, and Poopy is perceptibly impressed that Fatboy is the manager. Shallow bitch.
This isn't funny or intriguing. It's filler shit. If we cared about Fatboy as a character, then we might think about this maybe being mildly amusing, but most people want Arthur Chubb to follow Poopy-La-Dim out of Walford.
Did you ever notice how the characters all getting airtime now are characters who are leaving?
Victim of Circumstance.
Ava spoke like a chav in this episode. She used "ain't." I'm sorry, but any educated professional who chooses to use bad grammar isn't cool, au fait, or in any way relatable to the public. That person is just ignorant.
The Hartmans suck. Sam sucks. Is Cornell S John, per chance, a classical actor? Because tonight he wasn't James Earl Jones ...
Or maybe, it's just that he aspires to be a well-respected classical actor, because his. Delivery. Is. So. Measured. And. Slow.
And pretentious.
As for Dexter, the highlight of this storyline for me was when he became an ambulance chaser and did his classic Gumby run ...
No wonder Dexter's scared. One minute the Magic Negro is filling his frazzled little head with horror stories of transplants, the next, she's telling Sam the Sham that she's proud of Dexter - but never to his face, mind.
This is another nothing storyline - primarily because the majority of the viewers don't give a rat's arse about these characters. Ava and Sam will leave Walford after Sam's kidney transplant, courtesy of Dexter. But Dexter stays. Does that make sense? A mother and father swan off into the sunset and leave their son, who's saved the dad's life?
In all honesty, the spoiled brat known as Dexter should leave with his parents. His inane attempts in this episode to rectify the racist remark he made to Lola previously was even more offensive than the original remark, openly implying that he'd be doing her a favour to marry her and "take on someone else's kid."
Who made him the moral arbitre? As for Abi's inane interference, all I can say for her is that she's got a fat arse and thunder thighs.
Victims of Shit Acting.
Who else?
THE. WORST. ACTRESS. EVER. TO. APPEAR. IN. EASTENDERS.
EastEnders couldn't do a bit of integrity when they introduced singleton characters like Sadie Young and the creepy-looking dirtbag named Jake Stone, but since this lot of writers - and Sharon Marshall (normally so good) should be ashamed - love to write various versions of the same scene over and over ad infinitum, all we ever see of this incipient alcohol-influenced romance is the Gurning Girl and scuzza Jake either doing a verbal dance at the counselling session or drinking coffee in a cafe.
There are rumours that Jake is Sadie's husband, and I'm beginning to believe it. Sadie has a child, and Jake was cagey about admitting whether he had children or not when question by LipGirl in this episode.
That can only mean one thing.
EastEnders is actually consistently good at depicting generational issues suffered by some of its leading families. The Mitchells are victims of generational alcohol abuse coupled with violence. The Butchers have abandonment issues. The Beales have various sorts of commitment problems. I've already highlighted that, on her mother's side, Lauren comes from a gaggle of alcoholics, but there's something else as well, and I think EastEnders are going this route.
I'll stick my neck out and say that 19 year-old Lauren is going to be the Tanya to Jake's and Sadie's Max and Rachel. There's even a child involved, like Bradley. And what's the betting that she'll get up the duff by Scuzza Jake with his oily Manc voice and his sloppy stubble? Lauren, who's always been so quick to judge her father's sexual behaviour, will now become a teenaged homewrecker just like her mother.
Oh, but it won't be her fault. Somehow, it will be Max's.
Victim of One Psychopath.
To paraphrase a question being posed now on Digital Spy ... Just who does Ronnie think she is?
The creepiest relationship at the moment is this sick co-dependency between Ronnie and Roxy. Ronnie's fidgety because Roxy has left with Alfie, without telling her. It means Roxy's out of her domain of control, even though it means that Roxy had to take Amy away from Walford without informing Amy's sometime father Jack, another asshat whom Ronnie wants to control obsessively. This is the man whom she duped into thinking his son was alive. This is the man to whom she lied about his other son being taken away to Portugal, paying the child's mother £30K to leave Walford. Oh, and remember how she tried to break up Ricky's and Bianca's marriage by forcing Sam to say Richard was Ricky's son?
Oh, but all this is the fault of big, bad Alfie. He's punishing poor RoNostril. Awwww, diddums. All she did was dump a dead baby in his son's crib, take his living son and keep him for four months. There's no real reason for big bad Alfie to punish RoNostril.
Walking into the pub like that showed her sense of entitlement - shouting the odds to Roxy when Alfie could have been in the pub, himself. What is it she doesn't understand about her presence being offensive in the home of the man whose son she swiped?
This is the behaviour or a psychopath.
The normal reaction came from an unlikely source: Tiffany. She called Ronnie a "nutjob." Rude, but true. She gave her the evil eye. Once again, rude but appropos. Her behaviour was consistent with an episode aired when Ronnie was out on bail in 2011, and she attended a get-together at Max's home. Tiff and Morgan were sitting on the staircase at the Branning house, when Ronnie spoke to them and they blanked her. Max upbraided them about that, reminding them that their "Auntie Ronnie" spoke to them, and they ran upstairs in fright.
But this consistency also shows the inconsistency of too many cooks (read: writers) spoiling the broth. Just the other day, Jack waxed lyrical about Morgan and Tiff "loving" their Auntie Ronnie.
Yeah, sure.
Victim of Another Psychopath.
Psychopaths are like buses in Walford. You wait forever for one to appear, and in three years, three come along. One down (Archie) and two to go.
Michael Moon exhibited the classic psychopath technique of undermining and controlling Janine's self-esteem. This is mind games again.
For the record, Janine did nothing wrong. Scarlett was tetchy. She rang MeDoc and got advice. She followed it. Maybe the baby was teething, but Janine was tired and up all night - and she's on to Alice's undermining. Were I Janine, I'd be sorely tempted to knock Alice's ill-fitting veneers down her scrawny neck.
Yes, Janine dozed when Scarlett was toddling about, and she was lucky that Michael was around, but that would be no basis for awarding custody to Michael. Most days, Scarlett is with her nanny, but that day she was clingy with Janine. 99 per cent of the time, she's well cared for and well loved. There is no way in hell custody would be awarded Michael, and besides, Janine would employ the best solicitors money could buy to ensure that.
This is the beginning of the end for a singularly unpleasant character.
Fanbois and lowest common denominator teens have soft spots for psychopaths. I hope they never encounter one.
Victims of a Scam.
Trust me, David was never this dodgy. He was a charmer, yes, and a bit bent in the business department, but he was never such a barrowboy as he's been shown to be right now.
However ... good things.
Mentions of Pat and a brilliant mention of Frank for Tiffany, who never knew her other grandfather. Great credit by David to Frank, highlighting his smile and how Frank could sell anyone anything behind that. And one thing about David this time, scams aside ... for the long-term viewer, close your eyes and listen to David banter.
Now tell me whom you hear. Cast your mind back ... Pete Beale, his old dad. This time around, David's got all of Pete's banter and easy charm, something which Ian didn't inherit and which irks him to this day.
Bad episode. Worthy of the 4.5 million dead third figure.
I mean, here we are, almost in mid-October. The nights are drawing in, the weather's turning bad - traditional time for the soaps to pick up the odd million or so lost to the summer holidays and the casual viewers returning for the upswing to Christmas. Instead, the night this episode was aired, EastEnders got a grand total of 4.5 million viewers for the first (and most important) sitting.
In October.
Twelve weeks before the Big One.
Emmerdale wiped EastEnders' ass. Again.
Was I offended by the babyswap storyline? Yes, I was. It was difficult to watch, and very contrived. Ronnie's actions, pre-swap, were ignorant, arrogant and entitled. Neither of the women in the saga came off smelling like roses, and the men were the sympathetic victims. Still, I stuck with the show.
Now, however, I'm more offended. I'm offended that the show is treating something as serious as cot death, kidnapping and the utterly sick act of dumping a dead child, like a broken toy, and taking a living one, simply because you think it your due, like something as trivial as lifting a loaf of bread from the local Co-op.
Twenty years ago, Sharon was shunned for sleeping with her husband's brother. Last year, Kat did the walk of shame for havning wantonly slept with Derek Branning. Max endured a year of ritual humiliation for Stax.
Yet Ronnie is supposed to have all our sympathy. Kat "forgave" her, so that makes everything all right, when we know in a month of Sunday's Kat would be screaming blue murder. Consider this: If Chrissie Watts returned to Walford, having gained probation, would Kat welcome her with open arms? The answer is no.
So in seeking to reverse an offensive act, EastEnders only offends even more - this time, the viewers' intelligence.
Oh well, at least the fanbois and the retarded teens are happy.
Sexytimessexytimessexytimes ... LOL ... Sexytimessexytimessexytimes
By the way, this was one shitty episode.
Victims of Lurve.
How old is Fatboy? The answer is that he's one year older than Peter Beale. So that's twenty-one. And he's left in charge of the Vic, after Alfie's done his annual get-out-of-town-and-run-from-your-problems shuffle.
Fatboy is an offensive racial stereotype. He cackles and capers like the offensive depiction of pickanninies of the past, because that's what the hideously white writing and production team think of minorities: They're stereotypes and tokens. Tamwar the Asian Geek. Patrick de leee-yaaad back Jamaican (yeah mon), the Newman Negroes and Fatboy the pickanniny ... Scrub me Mamma with a Boogie Beat ...
Fatboy's line:-
Alfie Moon, you da man!
Now we all should remember that Arthur Chubb is the son of a bank manager. He learned to drive in his mother's Merc, and he can speak properly and is reasonably well-educated. So why the drivel and the outdated Ali G impersonation?
That's offensive.
Still Fatboy and Patrick are running the pub, and Poopy is perceptibly impressed that Fatboy is the manager. Shallow bitch.
This isn't funny or intriguing. It's filler shit. If we cared about Fatboy as a character, then we might think about this maybe being mildly amusing, but most people want Arthur Chubb to follow Poopy-La-Dim out of Walford.
Did you ever notice how the characters all getting airtime now are characters who are leaving?
Victim of Circumstance.
Ava spoke like a chav in this episode. She used "ain't." I'm sorry, but any educated professional who chooses to use bad grammar isn't cool, au fait, or in any way relatable to the public. That person is just ignorant.
The Hartmans suck. Sam sucks. Is Cornell S John, per chance, a classical actor? Because tonight he wasn't James Earl Jones ...
Or maybe, it's just that he aspires to be a well-respected classical actor, because his. Delivery. Is. So. Measured. And. Slow.
And pretentious.
As for Dexter, the highlight of this storyline for me was when he became an ambulance chaser and did his classic Gumby run ...
No wonder Dexter's scared. One minute the Magic Negro is filling his frazzled little head with horror stories of transplants, the next, she's telling Sam the Sham that she's proud of Dexter - but never to his face, mind.
This is another nothing storyline - primarily because the majority of the viewers don't give a rat's arse about these characters. Ava and Sam will leave Walford after Sam's kidney transplant, courtesy of Dexter. But Dexter stays. Does that make sense? A mother and father swan off into the sunset and leave their son, who's saved the dad's life?
In all honesty, the spoiled brat known as Dexter should leave with his parents. His inane attempts in this episode to rectify the racist remark he made to Lola previously was even more offensive than the original remark, openly implying that he'd be doing her a favour to marry her and "take on someone else's kid."
Who made him the moral arbitre? As for Abi's inane interference, all I can say for her is that she's got a fat arse and thunder thighs.
Victims of Shit Acting.
Who else?
THE. WORST. ACTRESS. EVER. TO. APPEAR. IN. EASTENDERS.
There are rumours that Jake is Sadie's husband, and I'm beginning to believe it. Sadie has a child, and Jake was cagey about admitting whether he had children or not when question by LipGirl in this episode.
That can only mean one thing.
EastEnders is actually consistently good at depicting generational issues suffered by some of its leading families. The Mitchells are victims of generational alcohol abuse coupled with violence. The Butchers have abandonment issues. The Beales have various sorts of commitment problems. I've already highlighted that, on her mother's side, Lauren comes from a gaggle of alcoholics, but there's something else as well, and I think EastEnders are going this route.
I'll stick my neck out and say that 19 year-old Lauren is going to be the Tanya to Jake's and Sadie's Max and Rachel. There's even a child involved, like Bradley. And what's the betting that she'll get up the duff by Scuzza Jake with his oily Manc voice and his sloppy stubble? Lauren, who's always been so quick to judge her father's sexual behaviour, will now become a teenaged homewrecker just like her mother.
Oh, but it won't be her fault. Somehow, it will be Max's.
Victim of One Psychopath.
To paraphrase a question being posed now on Digital Spy ... Just who does Ronnie think she is?
The creepiest relationship at the moment is this sick co-dependency between Ronnie and Roxy. Ronnie's fidgety because Roxy has left with Alfie, without telling her. It means Roxy's out of her domain of control, even though it means that Roxy had to take Amy away from Walford without informing Amy's sometime father Jack, another asshat whom Ronnie wants to control obsessively. This is the man whom she duped into thinking his son was alive. This is the man to whom she lied about his other son being taken away to Portugal, paying the child's mother £30K to leave Walford. Oh, and remember how she tried to break up Ricky's and Bianca's marriage by forcing Sam to say Richard was Ricky's son?
Oh, but all this is the fault of big, bad Alfie. He's punishing poor RoNostril. Awwww, diddums. All she did was dump a dead baby in his son's crib, take his living son and keep him for four months. There's no real reason for big bad Alfie to punish RoNostril.
Walking into the pub like that showed her sense of entitlement - shouting the odds to Roxy when Alfie could have been in the pub, himself. What is it she doesn't understand about her presence being offensive in the home of the man whose son she swiped?
This is the behaviour or a psychopath.
The normal reaction came from an unlikely source: Tiffany. She called Ronnie a "nutjob." Rude, but true. She gave her the evil eye. Once again, rude but appropos. Her behaviour was consistent with an episode aired when Ronnie was out on bail in 2011, and she attended a get-together at Max's home. Tiff and Morgan were sitting on the staircase at the Branning house, when Ronnie spoke to them and they blanked her. Max upbraided them about that, reminding them that their "Auntie Ronnie" spoke to them, and they ran upstairs in fright.
But this consistency also shows the inconsistency of too many cooks (read: writers) spoiling the broth. Just the other day, Jack waxed lyrical about Morgan and Tiff "loving" their Auntie Ronnie.
Yeah, sure.
Victim of Another Psychopath.
Psychopaths are like buses in Walford. You wait forever for one to appear, and in three years, three come along. One down (Archie) and two to go.
Michael Moon exhibited the classic psychopath technique of undermining and controlling Janine's self-esteem. This is mind games again.
For the record, Janine did nothing wrong. Scarlett was tetchy. She rang MeDoc and got advice. She followed it. Maybe the baby was teething, but Janine was tired and up all night - and she's on to Alice's undermining. Were I Janine, I'd be sorely tempted to knock Alice's ill-fitting veneers down her scrawny neck.
Yes, Janine dozed when Scarlett was toddling about, and she was lucky that Michael was around, but that would be no basis for awarding custody to Michael. Most days, Scarlett is with her nanny, but that day she was clingy with Janine. 99 per cent of the time, she's well cared for and well loved. There is no way in hell custody would be awarded Michael, and besides, Janine would employ the best solicitors money could buy to ensure that.
This is the beginning of the end for a singularly unpleasant character.
Fanbois and lowest common denominator teens have soft spots for psychopaths. I hope they never encounter one.
Victims of a Scam.
Trust me, David was never this dodgy. He was a charmer, yes, and a bit bent in the business department, but he was never such a barrowboy as he's been shown to be right now.
However ... good things.
Mentions of Pat and a brilliant mention of Frank for Tiffany, who never knew her other grandfather. Great credit by David to Frank, highlighting his smile and how Frank could sell anyone anything behind that. And one thing about David this time, scams aside ... for the long-term viewer, close your eyes and listen to David banter.
Now tell me whom you hear. Cast your mind back ... Pete Beale, his old dad. This time around, David's got all of Pete's banter and easy charm, something which Ian didn't inherit and which irks him to this day.
Bad episode. Worthy of the 4.5 million dead third figure.
Janine is a Psychopath. She was poisoning Ryan with a clear mind of murder. Normal people do not poison anyone.
ReplyDeleteYou're slipping in your views.
Don't think so, Sunshine. Janine's actions and reactions are determined by her environment. Ryan was lying and cheating on her with Skanky Stacey, another one with entitlement issues who never took responsibility for her actions. People have been driven to kill when faced with infidelity. Google "crimes of passion" and "honour killing." It's not justified, but it does happen. The difference between Janine and functioning psychopaths like Michael and RoNostril is that Janine is capable of compassion and empathy. That's been shown and proven. If anything, she is a sociopath, with abandonment and trust issues - and that's down to the circumstances of her childhood.
ReplyDeleteSociopathy can be cured and sociopaths integrated into society. Janine cares for and provides for her family and friends - the Butchers live in her house for a peppercorn rent, she's helping David and she provides for Billy and Lola. Psychopaths are incurable. They're egotistical, manipulative, obsessive, detached and show no sense of remorse. They are also prone to violence. They can kill easily without compunction, and in the unlikely event that they DO commit suicide, it's accidental - like Michael's mother wanting to control Eddie through suicide attempts, until one failed and she died. She didn't intend to die.
It's not coincidental that both Ronnie and Michael are children of functioning psychopaths as well. Many experts think psychopathic tendencies may be genetic.
Thanks for this reply.
ReplyDeleteIt was a trick so I could work out how many accounts on DS belonged to you.
Damn you are using several. lol
Why do people care if the author has 1, 5, 10 or 0 accounts on DS ?
DeleteWhat's the difference ? If she does [which she clearly & consistently states she doesn't] then so what ? Why is it your problem or anyone's else's for that matter.
Why can't other people agree with what she says? Or are only Ronnie Worshippers allowed on DS now? Does everyone have to have the mental age of a gnat and be awe struck by the great actress that now regrets getting her kit off for lads mags in the 90's - which paid her bills and for that awful nose job(Darcey Bussell has the same sort of nose I have noticed). Should we all be routing for Michael even though he has psychologically abused Janine, conned a lonely lady out of all her money, got his cousins wife pregnant, ignored his child because Tommy can't get him what Scarlett can (Janine's money).
DeleteOh and if she had an account on DS it would be much more interesting but as she doesn't any more your argument is flawed.