What the living hell was that?
For starters, it was a seriously good episode - for the most part - if you like schmaltzy, sentimental feel-good American sitcoms, and I say that as an American. But this is EastEnders. They don't do sitcoms or romcoms or bits and bobs of feel-good Christmas drama.
Unless this is the false sense of peace on earth and goodwill to men before the shit hits the fan on Christmas Day and afterward, what was the purpose of this episode? And it even had the feel of being the actual Christmas episode - no dramatic duff-duff, a rolling credit reminscent of the sort put on for a significant episode and a fade-out to Christmas music - specifically the awfully maudlin All I Want for Christmas Is You.
What is happening to this show? I get the community spirit and feel - that came in spades tonight, but what I saw tonight was not EastEnders. Good programme, but not EastEnders.
That was filled with Newmanesque love and warmth.
Let's get the shit out of the way, first.
He's Just Not That INTO You: RedNose and TurdHead. This is so laughably awful and trite, it's almost criminal. It's the classic stuff of teenaged angst from the 1950s. Still, since the Brexiteers and the Trumpsters seem hell-bent on propelling society back to that time, it's almost normal.
Shakil is looking for a Bexit, not a Brexit. That much is obvious. This is what happens when you give yourself to the first boy you fancy. I don't like Rebecca, and my dislike of her was confirmed tonight when I saw the self-obsessed and selfish way she treated Louise, as they walked to school - and I'm no great liker of Louise.
But Louise's father is dying, and Rebecca is banging on and on about the pathetic Shakil not calling her, not even putting in an appearance, and making up excuses about why she hasn't seen him - maybe he was helping his obsessive mother, or maybe he was rehearsing his lines for the play, maybe he was doing a lot of things. Even Louise's succinct and meaningful line (Or maybe he's dead) in an obvious reference to the actual seriousness of her situation as compared to the relative triteness of Rebecca's, was totally lost on Rebecca.
The only time Rebecca's interest is sparked is when Louise tells her that Shakil had texted her, Louise, about meeting up to rehearse their lines. Louise's advice to Rebecca is to call him, confront him about his behaviour, talk to him about how he comes around for a bonk and then she hears nothing, but it's couched in the absolute worst line of dialogue ever assigned a fifteen year-old character ...
You're a strong and independent woman, Rebecca Fowler ...
Seriously, what 15 year-old girl talks like this to her friend? This is the sort of line someone like Lauren would say to Whitney, but Lauren and Whitney are 21 and 22 years old, respectively. This is what I mean by the fact that Tillie Keeper, even scrubbed of make-up and clad in a school uniform, still looks her age, and get lines ear-marked for a character in her late teens/early twenties ... or even older.
Shakil, meanwhile, is hunkered down in his mother's office, hiding out. He doesn't want to go to school because he's frightened of Rebecca pestering him. As he informs Kush, who is a sexual predator, himself, he's already "done it" twice, and Rebecca's eager for some more.
The scene in the park was bum-clinchingly awful, from dowdy Rebecca, with her prominent probiscus, hunched over the picnic table munching on chips to a visibly uneasy and grunting Shakil.
Look, Shakil is horny. He doesn't want a relationship with Rebecca, because - apart from the fact that she's spread her legs a couple of times for him - he doesn't fancy her. However, if she offers it to him on a plate, he'll take it; because as a 16 year-old boy, he'd be a fool not to do so, He's actually quite pointed in telling her that they don't have to be all over each other and hang out with each other. If Rebecca had any nous, she'd take the hint. He only wants you when he's horny for sex, love, and that type of relationship, you do not need.
Later, she attempts to talk to Stacey about this situation, and actually, what Stacey said was good common sense ... it's just that Rebecca is too stupid to understand Stacey's meaning. For someone not even out of her twenties, having to deal with something like this so early on must have been difficult for Stacey - her face was actually a picture. This is the sort of thing she should be talking to Lily about in ten years' time, yet there she is, sitting on the sofa in the NuFowler front room, talking to Rebecca, who's afraid she hasn't "done it" righth with Shakil.
Dumbarse, there is no "right" or wrong way to have sex, but like Stacey said, intimacy is more than just the sex act. If you can't talk to someone with whom you've been intimate enough to share your body, then the sex act becomes something simply hormonal. Sex, or as Abi would have put it making lurrrve is an extension of and an expression of real love between two people. Rebecca was so stupid, she totally mistook Shakil's interest to be fondness and affection. He was only ever interested in her when he was either directly or indirectly pressuring her to have sex. Countless numbers of people told her that if she felt unready for this, then she didn't have to do anything, but she rushed headlong into this situation, and now she's paying for it.
She thinks she loves him; he wants sex. He as good as told her, they'd only hang out for that purpose, and she should have taken the clue, at least, from his body language, and he was purposefully avoiding her. He wants a fuck buddy, nothing more, nothing less.
She furthers her own stupidity by barging in on the rehearsal where he's playing a young Scrooge, who's being dumped by his girlfriend for being too greedy and stingy. It just so happens that the dialogue between the two, in Rebecca's silly mind, mirrors her own dilemma, and when Louise, in character, turns away from Shakil, RedNose makes a fool of herself, crying out to Shakil to explain to Louise, in character, why he's changed. It almost seems as if Rebecca is jealous of Louise in that scene, but later she's made to find out the scope of Shakil's involvement with her when he posts his status on Facebook as "single."
Dumped on the Internet.
Maybe she'll use her red nose to guide her to her putrid mother.
The Miracle of Christmas. There were three, and this was pure sitcom. In fact, it could have been a British sitcom episode.
1, The Kind Policeman. The Secret Santas who'd stolen the tree from the Council, have been rumbled by CCTV camera. Mick's face has been caught on camera. He's fed Linda's ego by allowing her to believe that her incessant e-mailing resulted in the Council providing them with a better tree.
In true sitcom style, we had the ubiquitous policemen, a detective no less, who knows in advance what's happened, appear at The Vic, just as the grotto is about to start. We have the usual lie - the agency didn't send a Santa, but an elf (Tina) - only to have Mick show up decked out as Santa Claus.
There follows the epiphany scene, with Linda, Mick and Tina arguing the toss about the tree, and the kind policeman agrees to look the other way as long as the tree is returned to the Council in its proper place. Cue a male bonding exercise, directed by Mick - if they have to return the tree, they all return it - Mick, Martin, Jack, Kush and Shrimpy - dressed as Santas and in Billy's hearse.
And cue the unfunny scene of Carmel, playing Angry Mamma and slapping Kush about the head.
Embarrassing.
2. Ian Beale Is Snookered. Again, this is totally something from the script of a sitcom. Faced with having no tree, Linda and Stacey pay a visit to the man who just happens to have a forest of them. Classic sitcom scene where the gruff protagonist is upended and outsmarted by by two women. When Ian refuses to budge about donating trees to the Square for free, Linda comes up with the idea of using these trees as a display to advertise Ian's Christmas tree sideline. If he allows them to decorate and display the trees, with a sign advertising Ian's enterprise.
Miracles of miracles! It happens, complete with decorations and festive music, and the Secret Santas returning home to gaze in wonder at what Stacey and Linda had accomplished. We see the principal couples lovingly reunited - Mick and Linda, Stacey and Martin and Jack and Ronnie. We see Carmel reunited with her sons, and oddly standing directly next to Martin and Stacey and paying no attention whatsoever to Arthur.
Then there's the single scene of Jane wheeling onto the Square to remark to Stacey that "they" didn't do so badly after all - so was an off-screen consultation held between Linda, Stacey and Jane about how to approach Ian and stoke his ego?
3. Ollie Walks. The one thing that's preying on Linda's mind is Ollie's assessment coming up in the new year. She's worried about his developmental process, but, again - miracles of miracles - Mick comes on the scene with Ollie walking solidly toward Linda.
The Drama Bits. Well, there was Dot, whose eyesight hasn't seemed to respond to the treatment. Her loneliness and vulnerability was heightened by the presence of the little black cat, which seems to hang around her front door. Abi's told Ronnie about Dot's problem with her sight, and Ronnie approaches Dot in the launderette. Dot thinks she's come to invite Dot to spend Christmas with her and Jack and the kids, but Ronnie's only offered what she's been offering a lot of to various people lately - money. She and Jack have offered to pay for an innovative operation which might restore Dot's sight. It's a Chrismas gift, but Dot takes offense.
Then, there is Lee. Whitney's only gone and decided to cook Christmas dinner for the entire Carter clan. No matter how much Linda offers to help with the expence, she assures her that Lee is "doing really well" at work, so they'll cover everything. Of course Lee is doing really well at work - he's just worked over Billy's flat and came up a cropper. But now he's got to do what he always does - take out another payday loan to cover Whitney's Christmas caper. Hang on ... doesn't Whitney get a wage from the Vic? Why can't she contribute to something like this, instead of rely on Lee?
And finally, Roxy, the saddest and most poignant scene of all, sat in the park watching mothers play with children. We don't know, but Roxy is waiting for someone, not Ronnie, who inevitably shows up to reiterate that Roxy doesn't have to give Amy up for adoption and to wonder why Roxy wasn't around during the weekend. Roxy insists that giving Amy to Ronnie and Jack was the best thing for Amy, and as Ronnie leaves, her butch female dealer appears. The last we see of Roxy is her sat, strung-out on the floor of Phil Mitchell's loo.
Good episode, but not your normal EastEnders.
For starters, it was a seriously good episode - for the most part - if you like schmaltzy, sentimental feel-good American sitcoms, and I say that as an American. But this is EastEnders. They don't do sitcoms or romcoms or bits and bobs of feel-good Christmas drama.
Unless this is the false sense of peace on earth and goodwill to men before the shit hits the fan on Christmas Day and afterward, what was the purpose of this episode? And it even had the feel of being the actual Christmas episode - no dramatic duff-duff, a rolling credit reminscent of the sort put on for a significant episode and a fade-out to Christmas music - specifically the awfully maudlin All I Want for Christmas Is You.
What is happening to this show? I get the community spirit and feel - that came in spades tonight, but what I saw tonight was not EastEnders. Good programme, but not EastEnders.
That was filled with Newmanesque love and warmth.
Let's get the shit out of the way, first.
He's Just Not That INTO You: RedNose and TurdHead. This is so laughably awful and trite, it's almost criminal. It's the classic stuff of teenaged angst from the 1950s. Still, since the Brexiteers and the Trumpsters seem hell-bent on propelling society back to that time, it's almost normal.
Shakil is looking for a Bexit, not a Brexit. That much is obvious. This is what happens when you give yourself to the first boy you fancy. I don't like Rebecca, and my dislike of her was confirmed tonight when I saw the self-obsessed and selfish way she treated Louise, as they walked to school - and I'm no great liker of Louise.
But Louise's father is dying, and Rebecca is banging on and on about the pathetic Shakil not calling her, not even putting in an appearance, and making up excuses about why she hasn't seen him - maybe he was helping his obsessive mother, or maybe he was rehearsing his lines for the play, maybe he was doing a lot of things. Even Louise's succinct and meaningful line (Or maybe he's dead) in an obvious reference to the actual seriousness of her situation as compared to the relative triteness of Rebecca's, was totally lost on Rebecca.
The only time Rebecca's interest is sparked is when Louise tells her that Shakil had texted her, Louise, about meeting up to rehearse their lines. Louise's advice to Rebecca is to call him, confront him about his behaviour, talk to him about how he comes around for a bonk and then she hears nothing, but it's couched in the absolute worst line of dialogue ever assigned a fifteen year-old character ...
You're a strong and independent woman, Rebecca Fowler ...
Seriously, what 15 year-old girl talks like this to her friend? This is the sort of line someone like Lauren would say to Whitney, but Lauren and Whitney are 21 and 22 years old, respectively. This is what I mean by the fact that Tillie Keeper, even scrubbed of make-up and clad in a school uniform, still looks her age, and get lines ear-marked for a character in her late teens/early twenties ... or even older.
Shakil, meanwhile, is hunkered down in his mother's office, hiding out. He doesn't want to go to school because he's frightened of Rebecca pestering him. As he informs Kush, who is a sexual predator, himself, he's already "done it" twice, and Rebecca's eager for some more.
The scene in the park was bum-clinchingly awful, from dowdy Rebecca, with her prominent probiscus, hunched over the picnic table munching on chips to a visibly uneasy and grunting Shakil.
Look, Shakil is horny. He doesn't want a relationship with Rebecca, because - apart from the fact that she's spread her legs a couple of times for him - he doesn't fancy her. However, if she offers it to him on a plate, he'll take it; because as a 16 year-old boy, he'd be a fool not to do so, He's actually quite pointed in telling her that they don't have to be all over each other and hang out with each other. If Rebecca had any nous, she'd take the hint. He only wants you when he's horny for sex, love, and that type of relationship, you do not need.
Later, she attempts to talk to Stacey about this situation, and actually, what Stacey said was good common sense ... it's just that Rebecca is too stupid to understand Stacey's meaning. For someone not even out of her twenties, having to deal with something like this so early on must have been difficult for Stacey - her face was actually a picture. This is the sort of thing she should be talking to Lily about in ten years' time, yet there she is, sitting on the sofa in the NuFowler front room, talking to Rebecca, who's afraid she hasn't "done it" righth with Shakil.
Dumbarse, there is no "right" or wrong way to have sex, but like Stacey said, intimacy is more than just the sex act. If you can't talk to someone with whom you've been intimate enough to share your body, then the sex act becomes something simply hormonal. Sex, or as Abi would have put it making lurrrve is an extension of and an expression of real love between two people. Rebecca was so stupid, she totally mistook Shakil's interest to be fondness and affection. He was only ever interested in her when he was either directly or indirectly pressuring her to have sex. Countless numbers of people told her that if she felt unready for this, then she didn't have to do anything, but she rushed headlong into this situation, and now she's paying for it.
She thinks she loves him; he wants sex. He as good as told her, they'd only hang out for that purpose, and she should have taken the clue, at least, from his body language, and he was purposefully avoiding her. He wants a fuck buddy, nothing more, nothing less.
She furthers her own stupidity by barging in on the rehearsal where he's playing a young Scrooge, who's being dumped by his girlfriend for being too greedy and stingy. It just so happens that the dialogue between the two, in Rebecca's silly mind, mirrors her own dilemma, and when Louise, in character, turns away from Shakil, RedNose makes a fool of herself, crying out to Shakil to explain to Louise, in character, why he's changed. It almost seems as if Rebecca is jealous of Louise in that scene, but later she's made to find out the scope of Shakil's involvement with her when he posts his status on Facebook as "single."
Dumped on the Internet.
Maybe she'll use her red nose to guide her to her putrid mother.
The Miracle of Christmas. There were three, and this was pure sitcom. In fact, it could have been a British sitcom episode.
1, The Kind Policeman. The Secret Santas who'd stolen the tree from the Council, have been rumbled by CCTV camera. Mick's face has been caught on camera. He's fed Linda's ego by allowing her to believe that her incessant e-mailing resulted in the Council providing them with a better tree.
In true sitcom style, we had the ubiquitous policemen, a detective no less, who knows in advance what's happened, appear at The Vic, just as the grotto is about to start. We have the usual lie - the agency didn't send a Santa, but an elf (Tina) - only to have Mick show up decked out as Santa Claus.
There follows the epiphany scene, with Linda, Mick and Tina arguing the toss about the tree, and the kind policeman agrees to look the other way as long as the tree is returned to the Council in its proper place. Cue a male bonding exercise, directed by Mick - if they have to return the tree, they all return it - Mick, Martin, Jack, Kush and Shrimpy - dressed as Santas and in Billy's hearse.
And cue the unfunny scene of Carmel, playing Angry Mamma and slapping Kush about the head.
Embarrassing.
2. Ian Beale Is Snookered. Again, this is totally something from the script of a sitcom. Faced with having no tree, Linda and Stacey pay a visit to the man who just happens to have a forest of them. Classic sitcom scene where the gruff protagonist is upended and outsmarted by by two women. When Ian refuses to budge about donating trees to the Square for free, Linda comes up with the idea of using these trees as a display to advertise Ian's Christmas tree sideline. If he allows them to decorate and display the trees, with a sign advertising Ian's enterprise.
Miracles of miracles! It happens, complete with decorations and festive music, and the Secret Santas returning home to gaze in wonder at what Stacey and Linda had accomplished. We see the principal couples lovingly reunited - Mick and Linda, Stacey and Martin and Jack and Ronnie. We see Carmel reunited with her sons, and oddly standing directly next to Martin and Stacey and paying no attention whatsoever to Arthur.
Then there's the single scene of Jane wheeling onto the Square to remark to Stacey that "they" didn't do so badly after all - so was an off-screen consultation held between Linda, Stacey and Jane about how to approach Ian and stoke his ego?
3. Ollie Walks. The one thing that's preying on Linda's mind is Ollie's assessment coming up in the new year. She's worried about his developmental process, but, again - miracles of miracles - Mick comes on the scene with Ollie walking solidly toward Linda.
The Drama Bits. Well, there was Dot, whose eyesight hasn't seemed to respond to the treatment. Her loneliness and vulnerability was heightened by the presence of the little black cat, which seems to hang around her front door. Abi's told Ronnie about Dot's problem with her sight, and Ronnie approaches Dot in the launderette. Dot thinks she's come to invite Dot to spend Christmas with her and Jack and the kids, but Ronnie's only offered what she's been offering a lot of to various people lately - money. She and Jack have offered to pay for an innovative operation which might restore Dot's sight. It's a Chrismas gift, but Dot takes offense.
Then, there is Lee. Whitney's only gone and decided to cook Christmas dinner for the entire Carter clan. No matter how much Linda offers to help with the expence, she assures her that Lee is "doing really well" at work, so they'll cover everything. Of course Lee is doing really well at work - he's just worked over Billy's flat and came up a cropper. But now he's got to do what he always does - take out another payday loan to cover Whitney's Christmas caper. Hang on ... doesn't Whitney get a wage from the Vic? Why can't she contribute to something like this, instead of rely on Lee?
And finally, Roxy, the saddest and most poignant scene of all, sat in the park watching mothers play with children. We don't know, but Roxy is waiting for someone, not Ronnie, who inevitably shows up to reiterate that Roxy doesn't have to give Amy up for adoption and to wonder why Roxy wasn't around during the weekend. Roxy insists that giving Amy to Ronnie and Jack was the best thing for Amy, and as Ronnie leaves, her butch female dealer appears. The last we see of Roxy is her sat, strung-out on the floor of Phil Mitchell's loo.
Good episode, but not your normal EastEnders.
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