THE RETURN

It’s been a while, but the other week I actually watched an episode of EE that made me want to blog about it! Yay! I don’t know how regular this will be so don’t get too carried away, dear readers, but we’ll see how it goes. The event that encouraged this Return was none other than the Return Of Sam Mitchell! Dun dun dunhhh!!! As we all know, Sam used to be a teenager played by Daniella Westbrook, but after Daniella had some well-publicised drug shame hell type goings on, Sam Mitchell was sent away ‘to Spain’ and later returned with a completely new head to be played by Kim Medcalf, who, not to put too fine a point of it, seemed less thick than Daniella and so her Sam (aka Sham) occasionally put on a Business Barbie style New Look power suit and gibbered on about “business plans” and so on. She left too after getting embroiled in the Dirty Den Comes Back From The Dead But Not For Long storyline and now Sam is back again, having transmuted back into Daniella Westbrook. WTF? Now I am just waiting for a kafka-esque storyline where Sam is pursued by a stalker played by Kim Medcalf. Come on, EE, that would be awesome!!

I haven’t watched it properly for a while but was amazed at how many old timers are back on the square – Rickay! Bianca!! Juh-neen!!! I’m not sure who some of the new ones are yet though.

Anyway, it turns out that Rickay was sent to Brazil to launder some money for the Mitchells or something, and while he was there he met Sam who persuaded him to bring her home. Apparently Sam met some bloke in a bar who persuaded her that her crimes (preverting the course of justice re Dead Den) would have been like totally forgotten about by now. As I said, this Sam is thicker than we are used to. You can tell she lived in Brazil because she is covered in fake tan and wears scanty outfits in retina-searing combinations of orange and fuschia. Also her hair is gigantic and back combed to hell - she looks like Angie Dickinson! - and her teeth are so white that in some shots they actually look as though they are made of metal! Yikes! Her faintly goblinish aspect and wide range of sour expressions are still the same as ever though, thank God.

Babs is pleased to see her of course, but they are worried she will be collared by the filth, so she is supposed to be in hiding. Sam’s idea of hiding is to go down to the bar of the Vic and dance on the table in a vaguely robotic fashion. They make her hide properly while Fill talks to his brief. It turns out that she is still wanted and so will have to go back to Brazil (though clearly this is not going to happen). She decides to make the most of it and annoy as many people as possible before going back though – she annoys Roxie by impugning her motherhood skills and calls her baby retarded (possibly). She annoys Ronnie by aiming her breasts at Ronnie’s simple minded oaf of a boyfriend/husband or whatever. Ronnie and Roxie pretend they have known her for ages, even though they hadn’t been invented yet when Sam was last in it.

She annoys Jay by being a bit flirty with him (and giving him her undies – which (a) EWWW!! and b) is probably illegal in paedopocalypse UK) and then telling him to “leave me alone, you stupid childy child”, the next minute. She annoys Silent Tracy because obviously she is going to end up working at the Vic and thus giving her even less shifts/screen time/chances to say “I’ll go and change the barrel” once every two years. She annoys Archie, by just existing apparently. She annoys Bianca in classic fashion by immediately mesmerising Rickay with her barely concealed funbags and luminous teeth. By the end of two episodes they are engaged. Pat and Wuh Wuh Whitney* tell Bianca that she has to fight for her lurve, so Bianca goes to the engagement party to suck her teeth and look disapproving and ends up calling Sam “a peroxide chav”. Sam calls Bianca a “ginger mug” (V poor repartee. Must try harder) and bam – they are pulling hair and whaling at each other in classic fashion. Mreowww! Wuh Wuh Whitney is also annoyed as she is going to steal Rickay from Bianca and also deprive Wuh Wuh Whitney of the only father figure she knows who doesn’t indulge in Wrong Touching and call her a Dirty Whore all the time.

There is a classic montage of the people what Sam has annoyed, all staring thoughtfully at the their mobile phones, considering grassing her up. We never find out who makes the call, but before long a very tall detective and some shorter uniforms show up. Sam (wearing a heinous bacofoil batwing jacket she must have stolen off La Roux) runs away. She steals a car from the Arches, not realising that cars are taken to the Arches because THEY DON’T WORK. FAIL!!!! She makes it to the tube station on foot when some cops grab her and Sam screams “Nooo! nooo!! nooooo!!!!” while crying really badly and pulling unfortunate faces. “Someone grassed up my dortah!” hisses Babs, wig spinning with wrath. It is, as they say, ON.

In other news:

Juhneen has hooked up with a handsome young man who looks a bit like Paddy Considine. They are victimising Chelsea by having Paddy Approxidine rob her and then pretending to be nice to her. Juhneen expresses her gratitude by surprising Paddy whilst reclining naked, clad only in a pile of grubby £20 notes. I’m sure it isn’t the first time.

Minty has a love interest played by Josie Lawrence; a Guardian-reader type hippie with a kaftan woven of muesli and a son in a wheelchair, who is played by a real life bloke in a wheelchair. EE = bringing the issues!

Duhnise has acquired a love interest played by that handsome black bloke who has been in lots of other things. He has an annoying badly acted stage school kid, whose mother is decomposing in a shed in the allotment if the well-directed flies/vomitting scene means what I think it does. Ruh roh.

* this, of course is a reference to Bring It On, one of the Greatest Films Ever!!

THE FINAL COUNTDOWN PT II: WHEN TWO TRIBES GO TO BORE
After Monday night’s vague enjoyableness (maybe I am kidding myself and just have fond memories of Mickney falling over a lot) not much happens on Tuesday.

The Tanyettes find out about Tanyah’s be-bunned oven and bicker, carry on and act authentically bratty. Dadley takes out a big life insurance policy on himself and Nurse Tanyah jokes about greasing the stairs so she can make a claim. I hope that isn’t foreshadowing as any fule kno that the only way to kill your husband on EE is to batter him with a novelty canine-themed doorstop.

GADawn hangs around outside the cop shop waiting for her precious Mr Smarmypants to be released. Meanwhile Chez Dolescum, Keef and Mickney start squawking about how Smarmy is an evil wife batterer who can never darken their doors again. When GADawn finds out she tells them all to shut up and hustles Smarmy into the kitchen. I am finding GADawn wholly dislikeable at the moment, even when Dr Fox is pushing her down flights of stairs. Smarmy goes to see Dr Fox at the surgery but she summons Naomi and Smarmy runs away at the sight of strapping black lesbian. He goes back when Naomi has left and Dr Fox is all “so what are you going to do? Hit me again?” Smarmy makes an evil/ambiguous face. Hmm, maybe EE is trying to mess with our expectations and make Smarmy the baddy, but I think the message the audience is going to get is more like “No wonder he’s beating his wife when she’s so crazy!” And this is the same show that once ran a v good wife beating storyline with Psycho Trevor and Drippy all those years ago. Sigh.

@@ is all set to meet her Cyber-nonce. She tries to borrow some clothes from Chelski but Chelski says no and calls her “Ugly Betty”. @@ borrows them anyway (even though she looks stupid) and gets Yolande to braid her hair up. @@ then takes her sad little picnic to the park and there are some “tension building” hedge-cam shots of the nonce staring at her through a shrubbery. Yolande and the Bennetons are all “ohs noes, Where has @@ gone? She is probably being abducted by paedophile scum right now!!” but it just turns out to be Dasbo, who couldn’t think of another way to say he lurved @@. Awww. @@ runs off in a strop.

DVDLi makes Mickney put on a suit and practise being charming to ladies and then is all jealous when he does it. Oh whatever. Wake me up when he’s chained to a barrel with Atkins or Pat approaching him with a strap-on.

Dot does her peace brokering thing and arranges a tea party for the Mitchell/Beale feud to be resolved. Fill is very late and Ian prints out a list of all the Mitchell wrongdoings which he wants them all to sign so he can scan it and put it on his myspace page or something. They are all bickering (or else standing in the background saying “rhubarb rhubarb”) until Ben remembers that the whole row was over an unpaid for saveloy at the caff and an unpaid for drink at the Vic. They try to get comedy mileage out of the word “saveloy” but my heart is dead to such blatant pandering. Ben offers to pay for the items if it will make the madness stop. Ian and Fill are shamed into making up, shake hands on it and then the blokes and kids agree to go all camping together and the women agree on a mass hair-patting session. As they all leave, the Bealemeister makes a face like “Yes, Mitchell, we’ll go camping! Camping in HELL!!!”

SOMETHING KINDA "OW"!

Smarmy and Dawn have one day to get out of their love shack – Smarmy goes to draw out some money to get a deposit on a new place but Dr (Crazy like a) Fox has already emptied their joint account. She says she did it to help Smarmy so he would realise that GADawn is just a gold digging vixen. Meanwhile Dole Scum Keef has some money of Dawn’s (benefits or something, I dunno) but he has spent it all on cans of Special Brew. The love birds have to move in Chez Dole Scum. Later on GADawn has a dramatic confrontation with Dr Fox and the Dr pushes her down a flight of stairs. Heh.

The baby is OK and Dr Fox is all contrite and tearful, not wanting to be grassed up to the fuzz. She pops some pills (yes, Dr Fox, that’s all you need with your robust mental state – more drugs!!) and asks Smarmy round to patch things up. She gives him a list of their assets so they can share them out but then starts putting sexy moves on him. Smarmy notices that the nursery is still set up and there is a big circle on the calendar marked “the day my baby is born, bwa ha ha.” He realises that Dr Fox is still loony tunes and has to fight his way out of the apartment.

Dasbo and @@ fall out over Gus (??? Does Dasbo fancy him too, I don’t know…) and then @@ starts chatting online to a mystery boy. This will be Important For Later.

There is flu going round and Bradley, a Tanyette and Tanyah all succumb to it. JoJo looks after Bradley but is then annoyed when Duckface barges in with a klingon wordsearch book or something for Bradders to do. JoJo hassles Dadley to divorce Nurse Tanyah and move in with her. He arranges a rental of a showflat with horrid tan coloured fur wallpaper (that’s what it looked like to me) and gives her a vomtastic yellow nightie thing to wear. It is Dadley’s birthday and Jojo demands that she spends the evening with Dadley in the Fur Flat. Hateful Dadley engineers a row so he can ditch Tanyah and re-explore joJo’s ladygarden, even though Tanyah has cooked a nice meal and bought him a watch and made a cake etc. Tanyah is understandably annoyed and goes on a rampage of suspicion – finding evidence that Dadley is playing away. She marches down the street (past JoJo, who makes an excellent “gulp!” face) and starts laying into Carly, even though Dadley was just trying to sell her insurance. Of course, if I found my partner was cheating on me, I’d be more interested in talking to my partner than the bit on the side, but what would I know? I’m not a badly written soap opera character. In the aftermath, Tanyah announces that she’s pregnant. Gasp!

They have a discussion and Tanyah wants to get an abortion as she doesn’t trust Dadley. Dadley tells a story about how when he was a kid, Jim beat up a black mate of his and then locked him up in a coffin! Don’t ask me. Tanyah accepts this bizarre anecdote as an excuse for his shiftiness and they agree to keep the baby. Meanwhile, Bradley finds the telltale yellow nightie and JoJo says she is seeing some other married bloke who in no way resembles Dadley, oh no.

Ian complains to some Polish (though the accent is more like French/Boratistani) builders that they are too noisy. They tell him to sling his hook so he goes into dickhead overdrive and starts filming them for his dossier to the council and refusing to serve them at the caff. They mock him by taking photos of him with their phones and later have a five way gang bang with Parkwife.
The tiresome feud between Ian and Fill continues re the late license application. Fill gets the Polish Builders to brick up Ian’s gate so Ian pours cement down the Vic toilets so they have to shut the pub and get plumbers in. When Ian refuses to pay for the damage, Fill goes round and tries to drown him in a bowl of washing up (“Fairy liquid may be kind to your hands, but has does it feel on your FACE, Beale!!”). Fill is rescued by Pjane, or possible baby bobby, all of whom are harder than Ian. The womenfolk get involved too when Cruestella sees DC Lucy drinking alcopops in the park with a bunch of hoodies and grasses her up to PJane, who tells her to mind her own business. They spend a lot of time telling each other that this isn’t finished yet – no, it’s finished next week with a shocking Death Crash Tragedy tm every soap mag ever.

MOTHRATKINS VS GOGGINZILLA

I'm off on holiday tomorrow and an't think of anything to top Sarah's ace post - so here's a quick rundown of last week's so-called action...

1. News starts to spread about Dot and Jim’s stupid plot baby, who spends all Monday’s episode crying non stop, the poor little thing. They have the family round for dinner and Jim quickly explains that it is Nick’s son that he sired by knocking up a nurse whilst in cancer prison hospital. That makes about as much sense as the real plot. Abi notices that baby “George” looks a lot like baby Tomasz so Dot tells her to shut up. Everyone is a bit non plussed/sceptical. Dadley mocks Jim fro being paternal finally. Jim says “Shut up, haven’t you got a barely legal trollop to be messing round with?” not really.
2. But it’s still true! Jojo comes back from her holiday and starts canoodling with Dadley. He tells her that his marriage is in trouble but JoJo later discovers that this is a lie.
3. DVDLi chucks all of Gus’ stuff out of his cupboard and put a padlock on the door. Gus is all “Hey! That’s my plot cupboard where I live for most of the year!” Mickney discovers that she has set up the world’s smallest weed farm in the cupboard and has a dramatic confrontation. DVDLi whines that she has to do anything – ANYTHING – for money now that she has to support herself, her old ma and Mickney. Mickney says he will get a job and is interviewed by Bradley’s firm. I’m not sure what job he is going for – do banks actually need Jesters/Motley fools?
4. Cruestella tells Ben that “address” only has one “d” so he fails a test. Bwa ha ha. Fill buys him a lap top and Cruestella is cross because she wants Fill to buy her shiny presents instead!! Ben tries to talk to Fil about Cruestela’s reign of terror but Fill has a hilarious EE type misunderstanding and thinks he is talking about puberty instead. Fill is all “It’s art of growing up and becoming a man!”
5. Fill says he will propose to Cruestella properly and gives her a wad of dirty bloodstained £20 notes to buy herself an engagement ring. Classy! Why didn’t he just drop an Elizabeth Duke catalogue in her lap and be done with it! He wants them all to go away together but Stella tells Ben to make sure he is left behind, so he smashes up the bogs at school so he has to be punished by Fill. Fill and Stella go away and Fill proposes by hiding the ring in a bacon bap from a white van in a lay by. Ha ha ha, oh Stella can’t you find a nice middle class man to terrorise! They end up going back for Ben anyway as Fill misses him.
6. Annoying Deano moves in with Atkins but says he will go to Parklife’s stag do and wedding anyway. Mrs G says she doesn’t want a hen do but all her family/friends (they don’t actually need to rope in a bunch of extras as Mrs G actually has friends OMG!!) chuck a few triple vodkas down her neck and she is all systems go (her drunk acting is not bad actually!). Goddess Pat sees that Atkins is at the bar making hacky faces and goes and tells her to git out of Walford and no one wants her and Parklife has moved on and wants to be happy with Mrs G etc and so on. Atkins says that Pat is a dried up old slapper and will have no family once Parklife and Mrs G get married and move out. They carry on arguing and eventually go outside and have an awesome catfight with slapping, throwing onto car bonnets and kung fu kicks (from Atkins, though I would love to see Pat lay down a hefty axe kick). A handily passing police van breaks them up and while they are on the way to the cells Atkins mentions that she shagged Parklife recently, so there.
7. I miss the actual unfeasibly quick wedding but there is the usual will they/won’t they bollocks without which no soap wedding is complete. Pat warns Parklife that Atkins is in marriage wrecking mode so in the end he tells Goggins himself, adding that he was “depressed” when the act of joyless carnal hoo-ha took place – excellent excuse there, Parklife. Mrs Goggins says (a) Ew! And (b) She’ll have to think about it. While she’s wandering round in her non traditional maroon outfit, Atkins comes over to spill the beans and is such a cow that this somehow makes Mrs G decide to go through with the wedding. Don’t ask me… Atkins is all ”Bah, you might have foiled me this time.. but I’ll be back!”.