Emmerdale: Drink From the Welly!

(Monday 6^th – Friday 22^nd April 2020)

The thing with Emmerdale at the moment is that parts of it are excellent and parts of it are really dragging and where we are understandably only getting three episodes a week at the moment, the dragging parts are going to be dragging for a long time. However, the fantastic parts, are really shining so hooray for that.

Charity causes a commotion at the hospital…

For example, Charity and Vanessa’s story is so incredibly engaging. My heart is breaking for them both. I am desperate for Vanessa to get well and I am desperate for their relationship to survive. Things get pretty awkward on Vanessa’s chemo day when she has to go alone and Kerry, who turns out to be a hospital volunteer, comes to sit with her. There are some fantastic scenes between them and you can’t help but love Kerry who remains by Vanessa’s side despite her being horrible to her, not wanting her to be by herself. By the end, even Vanessa is grateful that she stayed. I love that Kerry has clearly turned her guilt over Frank’s death into something positive by volunteering at the hospital and also not shouted about it. It’s just something she does quietly, trying to make amends any way she can. Unfortunately, Charity barges in and lays into Kerry, causing a terrible scene, upsetting Vanessa, the other patients and the staff.

The next episode shows some heartbreaking scenes where Vanessa decides to rebel, dragging Rhona out for drinks for her birthday, trying to recapture their youth. She gets into an argument with some arrogant student and ends up going viral by pouring a pint over his head. In another situation, it would be hilarious but the whole time, you can just see how broken Vanessa is and you’re just terribly worried that something bad is going to happen to her.

Charity is livid when she comes home utterly wasted but when they make up the next day, things go quickly wrong again as Vanessa senses hesitation when she asks Charity to look after Johnny if the worst happens. I mean, it seems a silly argument to me. They were about to get married, for goodness sake! Why wouldn’t Charity have expected to look after Johnny is something ever happened to Vanessa? It’s just so sad that at this awful time, they can’t seem to pull together.

Vanessa and Charity are in crisis… #Vanity

A fabulous moment came when Sam and Lydia finally got married. The girls had a somewhat raucous hen night, resulting in Mandy and Lydia ending up in the middle of nowhere (Lydia found her way to safety, Mandy ended up getting picked up by her ex in a very convenient plot device). But eventually, Sam and Lydia tied the knot in a lovely ceremony. They had a fabulous party in The Woolpack afterwards where both Lydia and Vinny were welcomed into the Dingle Family by the traditional means: drink from the welly!

However, all this murky gangster stuff with Will, Cain, Billy and DI Malone is so boring. I’m not sure I’m even following it properly anymore. Burnt out cars in the middle of the village, false arrests, all the coppers under this guy’s control, soldering drugs into cars… come on. It’s all a bit far-fetched, isn’t it? It’s turning into an episode of Mad Dogs (or something a little more up to date and trendy).

Another disappointing moment over the last few weeks has been Jamie Tate’s personality transplant. He joined the show as such a moral character, in complete contrast to his wicked mother. Now, he has strung both Andrea and Belle along, settled on Andrea, sacked Belle and now he has taken up with Belle again behind Andrea’s back. It completely goes against the character he started out as. For once, it would just be nice if a good person in the Village could stay good!

Due to the Coronavirus, Emmerdale have had to suspend filming

Emmerdale will now air on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays on ITV1 at 7pm

Doctors: Coming Out

(Monday 20^th – Friday 24^th April 2020)

I love Doctors. I always feel that because it’s a daytime soap, it’s rather underrated when actually, it’s probably one of the best. It covers a huge range of subjects, some of them very tough, which must not be easy in its timeslot. It’s also very quirky and is often extremely creative in its storytelling. If you’ve never watched Doctors, I highly recommend it. I started watching it by accident some years ago and now I absolutely never miss it. It’s clever, it’s thought provoking, it’s funny, creative and it uses its platform with a genuine sense of responsibility.

A great example of this platform came this past week during Emma’s radio interview to discuss LGBTQ+ issues and advice. At first, she was very reluctant to get personal but when one particular caller phoned in and told her that he had been attacked, Emma finally opened up about the attack on her and Jasmine. It was such a genuinely emotional moment that my Mum phoned me to talk about it afterwards! Emma was so brave and so was the caller. The whole storyline has been so powerful, from crafting a lovely relationship, to the awful attack, to how Emma and Jasmine reacted in such different ways, to beautiful friendship from Zara and now Emma’s bravery to come out about what happened to her.

Meanwhile, Ruhma’s mood plummets further when she goes to see the most useless advocate ever to discuss her case. I mean, the woman is just completely unhelpful. What is the actual point of her? Also, they break for lunch and yet she opts to bring her lunch back and eat it in front of Ruhma who is fasting for Ramadan. I think Ruhma needs someone else to fight for her…

Speaking of Ramadan, Joe’s new friend turns out not to be imaginary at all. He’s a lovely little boy called Ozzy who is fasting for the first time this year. Besotted with his new mate, Joe decided that he too wants to fast, throwing Zara and Daniel into a bit of a spin. Of course, Zara being Zara decided to ruin Joe’s fast by tempting him with donuts – which Ozzy ate, ruining his fast instead. I mean, why? Why give Joe donuts when his friend was there? That’s just irresponsible. I mean, what mother would give their kid a treat and not their visiting friend anyway? That’s just mean. But now she has ruined Ozzy’s fast on day one and also ruined her blossoming friendship with his mother. Oh, Zara…

Thursday last week was one of those very odd Doctors episodes. We started with a drunk couple, hooking up after a night out and heading back to her place. Then they heard an intruder upstairs. Calling the police, they knocked the guy out. And who was it? None other than Bear Sylvester, Business Manager of The Mill! And this is what is brilliant about this show. It can be so incredibly random and make you sit and work out for an entire episode what on earth is going on. Bear was of course innocent after all (although I still don’t trust him) but it led to quite the sad story as the episode played out.

Then, the next day, there was a saga about chairs and Sid had to remove splinters from Karen’s bottom. Yes, really.

Next week, despite Doctors ceasing filming due to the Coronavirus, the show does appear to still be airing every weekday on BBC1 at 1:45pm

Coronation Street: Behind Closed Doors

(Friday 17^th – Friday 24^th April 2020)

It’s great to see the younger cast taking centre stage in Corrie right now and Tanisha Gorey, is showing what she is made of as she portrays Asha, caught up in the most terrible ordeal of having posed nude during a video call with her boyfriend, not realising he was recording the call. Now, her spiteful friend, Kelly has spread the video around and within moments, it has found its way onto a dodgy porn site and Asha’s image has become global. Such is the power of the Internet.

Asha’s world has come crashing down around her…

It’s such a hideous but important storyline, hopefully showing kids (and adults) the awful dangers of this kind of thing. As her brother tells her, nothing is private. It’s so hard to see how broken she is. It’s lovely to see her protective her best friend, Amy is. There’s a wonderful scene between David and Dev as David is faced with telling him about the video, having found it on his son’s phone. You cannot help but feel for Dev as he charges through so many different emotions but overwhelmingly, all he wants to do is protect his daughter.

Across the street, Yasmeen is an utterly broken woman. Last Friday’s episode was one of the worst in a different way to other episodes. Geoff seems to have beaten her down to a point that she is now the shadow of her former self. And without Alya, she really is cut off from the rest of the world.

An argument with Cathy left Yasmeen more trapped than ever…

Hope arrived in the form of Cathy but while Geoff was overly nice to her, Yasmeen ended up losing her temper and pushed her away, possibly severing their friendship. I am so worried that Geoff has full control of Yasmeen now. All I can cling to is that she does have that bag locked away in the cupboard and that he hasn’t looked at the camera footage and doesn’t know it’s there. She has also reached out the police already. Please muster the strength to leave him, Yasmeen! I know you can!

In other news… Leanne and Steve continued to argue over their son; Johnny ran away from his new B&B guest, taking Jenny to France and leaving Carla and Peter in charge of The Rovers; Ken won the election at Stillwaters, handed it over to Norris, broke up with Claudia and moved back to The Street!