DRW50

I do think the "light" moments at that time were silly but sometimes they worked, mostly because the actors knew how to play comedy. I really liked Joe and I thought Lee and Zara were amusing. Remember when Zara had to pretend to be Kyle Minoque and she and another Kylie lookalike got into a catfight? The main dramatic story I remember from then was the one with Justin and his stepbrother Ali being bullied, leading to Ali killing the bully and himself getting run over when Justin told him to run. This led into the Justin/Becca relationship. Kirkwood, for all the talk of how much he supposedly thought highly of Chris Fountain, did Justin no favors as a character. Justin in 2005 and 2006 basically carried huge parts of the show. It was never really the same after that story where he made Becca go to prison. Justin stayed around after that but they clearly had no idea what to do with him, made worse because he had no family on the show. Some of the stories then did have a very weird tone, like they never seemed how seriously to take Mandy's pregnancy. And then there was some filler, and some dramatic stuff which wasn't as involving...I liked Nicole and Russ and the Owen father, but as a family the stories weren't the best. The mother got on my nerves. Sam was OK, if dull, before they made him psycho. He was hot though (which is probably another reason they had all those episodes where he went around in his underwear). The drug rape story was harrowing; the woman who played Mel was very good. The guy who played Andy was VERY good. I'm surprised no other soap snapped him up. I wonder who will move into the Ashworth home when they leave. Since Lee may be coming back alone I guess it won't be him. That home is a house of horrors for young women -- Lisa, Ellie, Beth, Hannah, Melissa, etc.

Best wishes to Natalie Cassidy, who is pregnant. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1258252/Natalie-Cassidy-pregnant-child.html

Some think he is coming back to be in charge of Evissa (who's running that now?). It is weird though because he really has so few ties. I just hope he's not returning for only comedy stories because as fun as those can be sometimes, and as much as Hollyoaks sometimes overdosed on drama in 2008, I'm not sure if viewers would enjoy too much silly stuff. I think he would work better if they had his parents in. I liked his parents a lot, especially the mother. Then there was the weird treat of knowing that the father had played the detective on Hyacinth Bouquet's crime solving show. I can't believe how much Hollyoaks has changed since 2005. I know that was considered a down period for the show but I didn't think it was too bad. But part of that is due to Max and OB Some of that era did have weird stories though. I don't know if I can imagine the show as of now spending months on Tony trying to drive a gypsy caravan away from his restaurant.

Do you remember Ellie? I didn't see her worst years, I only saw her last 6 months or so, but even though I knew what she'd done to her family I still felt sorry for her and one of the reasons I couldn't stand Lisa was the endless moaning about Ellie. Ellie had one of my favorite soap exits, it was very beautifully done. I'd like to see her again.

Some at Digital Spy are thinking this is to bring back Alex's sister, Lisa. Lisa Hunter started out as a shy, long-suffering misfit. She had a very well known story where she cut herself to deal with her self-loathing and feeling like no one cared about her. As Lisa grew older, the show decided to make her a sex figure, as Gemma Atkinson also began posing in magazines. She suddenly had big fake breasts and went around seducing men, among them Jake Dean and Ben Davies (a somewhat creepy element is that they were both close friends with her dead brother, Dan). She gave Jake an STD, which he then gave to his girlfriend Becca. In late 2005 she and Ben left the show and went on to appear in several late night specials. They had their own series, called Hollyoaks in the City, where they split up and both fell into prostitution and decadence. The end of this featured Lisa being kidnapped. She freed herself, got a gun, and fired...shooting and killing Ben, who had come to rescue her. I think it's not a great idea to bring this type of character back but who knows. Alex was more of a supporting character, he was comic relief. For years he dated Ben's sister Abby Davies, until she cheated on him at college. He later left town with Zara Morgan, a shrill yet generally amusing activist figure. Many stories centered around his desperate need to get laid, and his double act with Bombhead, a weird comedic figure who was also somewhat tragic -- his biggest story involved living with his mother's corpse for weeks.

Chris never had a lot to do. His apex of stories is coming in a few years, with Courtney and Julie. Good stuff though, overall, in those stories. LML and Hamner are the ones who destroyed Kevin/Lucy and Scott/Eve for Kevin/Eve.

That's wonderful news. I'm glad they were able to speak to you and I'm glad you are enough of a fan of the show and their work that you were so interested. You have the pictures in your mind and that's what matters most.

Eve never worked as a heroine. She wasn't as bad with Ian, because they didn't have the baggage of destroying Lucy as they did with Kevin/Eve, but she was much better as a spitfire, and much better with Chris.

Thanks, that's a great tip! I'm glad he's committed to diversity. The Valentines should have been a better family than they were -- the writing was not great, but the incredibly poor acting from Calvin and Sasha (and awful Sonny when he was around) was the killer. This could be interesting.

I wonder if he can get a haircut now.

To me they stopped being a real family in late 2007 when they became Niall's pawns and everything became about damn babies and their love lives. They no longer had any of the lovely, complicated family scenes that made them special, that Jacqui/JP, Jacqui/Myra, JP/Tina et al once had. When they did speak it was only to further the plot. I haven't seen a lot of the 2009 episodes, did their relationships improve? Guardian article about the big cull. http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/tvandradioblog/2010/mar/10/hollyoaks-cull-2010 I get the feeling that the person who wrote this has never actually seen the show. Hollyoaks has had many culls in the past, and this time around, most of the people who have been fired so far are nonessential. So all this about "Will this still be the same Hollyoaks" -- what does that mean? The show as it is now is very different than it was in early 2009, different than it was in 2008, 2008 was very different from 2007, which was very different from 2006. The show has been all over the place for several years. It's just easy to overlook that because of the reputation of being about hot bodies and bad acting, or if you just watch long enough to see the wacky montages that open the episodes. I think they just wanted an excuse to write about shows going through big changes.

The problem with JP is I'm not sure what they can do with him. The character ceased to exist after about six months. He just became the mopey gay guy. The best part of JP was his relationship with his family and they gave up on that long before he left. Remember when he was close to Jacqui? Bryan Kirkwood sure didn't. I think Mercedes needs a rest. Too many affairs and self-destruction. Carmel I think needs a very long rest.

More firings on the way! No big loss there. He has some wonderful actors if he knows how to use them. I wish he'd mentioned some but I guess it's better he didn't. I think he created some decent new families in Brookside, so he might here too. I kind of wish he'd write out a few McQueens.

Jagger was generally a good guy on GH, from the little I saw of him. Rough around the edges, dark, but a decent guy. At this time Antonio Sabato Jr still had a semblance of a career so he wasn't going to go to PC. He did show up on Night Shift 2 a few years ago, as Jagger.

The Y&R role would have been a big fat nothing. She played mother to Sabrina, who was killed a few months later anyway. Besides, I was so happy to see Cynthia Sikes on TV again.

Andy has a very, very rough character history. That's one of the reasons they had him break down and have put him on the backburner since then. Andy came into the show as a young boy, his father had beaten him and was in jail, his grandmother had died and Jack and wife Sarah Sugden adopted him. He was initially close to Jack's son Robert -- that's how Jack and Sarah first met Andy. Andy's big problems started when he wanted to burn down the Sugden barn for insurance money. He didn't know that Sarah and her boyfriend (she and Jack were divorcing) were in the barn. The boyfriend made it out but Sarah died. Jack and Andy kept this a secret for years, but Robert soon found out, and never forgave Andy. When Jack and Sarah's young daughter Victoria found out in 2007, she flipped out, and Andy finally confessed. He went to prison, and when he got out, he became very dark, beating his wife Jo for being too strong-willed and allowing Debbie to see their daughter. He has never faced any charges for the beatings of Jo, the show tends to not mention that now. After she left and his little brother Daz fled town (Daz had been sleeping with Victoria) and Andy lost custody of Sarah, he broke down. The Dingles can be quite nasty, yes. There are several types of Dingles. - sweet, comic relief, touching Dingles (Mandy, Sam, Butch, Marlon, Gennie) - coarse, thuggish Dingles who want money and power or just a place to get drunk (Tina, Cain, Shadrach, Eli) - Dingles who blur the line (Zak, Charity, Debbie, Aaron, Chastity) They aren't quite as bad, or as dominant of the show, as they used to be. You probably already know this, but a year or two ago, Dingles made up about 25-30% of the cast. Dingle family tree: http://www.emmerdale.org/emmerdale/tree/10june05/Dingle/Dingle.png

Some backstory: Andy was married to Katie. He idolized her. He was devastated when he learned she had been having a hot affair with his brother, Robert. He got drunk and waited in their trailer so he could shoot and kill them. But his adoptive father, Jack, stopped by to check something, and Andy accidentally shot him. Jack nearly died. Jack lied to protect Andy, but told him to stay away. Andy had no one. Debbie came to town as foster daughter to Paddy and Emily. She was actually the child of cousins Charity and Cain, who had had a fling as teenagers. Charity gave the baby up. Debbie tried to reconnect with Charity but Charity was now married to rich Chris Tate. Eventually Charity tried to accept Debbie, but Chris died and Charity went on trial for his murder (he'd framed her, as he knew she'd been sleeping with Cain again). When Charity was acquitted, she went after another rich man, Tom King, and made Debbie keep her distance. Debbie lived with Cain, whom she had a VERY volatile relationship with. Debbie and Cain moved into Andy's farm. Cain was busy with various schemes and Debbie and Andy were alone together quite often. Eventually they became lovers, even though Debbie was underage. Debbie got pregnant. When she wanted to tell Andy, he rejected her, as he was too scared by Cain's violent reaction to their affair and he'd never cared that much about Debbie anyway. Debbie kept her pregnancy a secret from everyone for 9 months. She gave birth in the woods, with only Andy's little brother Daz and her former foster mother Emily to help her. Debbie began to hope for a life with Andy but this quickly ended badly. Debbie had little interest in her own child and Emily moved into the Dingle home to help raise the baby. Emily and Paddy had split up and Emily had nothing left -- the baby was a sign to her that life was still worth living. Cain resented her interference and became increasingly nasty to her. Debbie finally snapped and she gave baby Sarah to Emily and told her to run. Emily did. Andy and the Dingles and Cain were outraged and Debbie was all alone. This is one of the reasons she and Jasmine became so close. Months later, Emily was found living in the woods. Andy ambushed her and took Sarah back. Andy raised Sarah with his women (Katie, later Jo) for several years, while Debbie was torn between not wanting to be a mother and yearning for her daughter. Finally, when Andy was in prison, Debbie became closer to Sarah, and when Andy got out of prison, and began beating Jo, Jo eventually gave Sarah to Debbie and the Dingles before she left town. Andy got the baby back again but had a mental breakdown and when Debbie got out of prison for her part in Shane's murder, she managed to win custody of Sarah. She gives Andy extensive visitation. The Dingles don't mind cousin love. To them it's no big deal. Charity has been in love with her cousin Cain for most of their lives. Charity also had sex with cousin Marlon. Both Marlon and Cain were possible fathers of her son Noah (the father was actually Chris Tate). Chastity and Marlon nearly had sex a few years ago. Debbie and Eli had a casual sex relationship, and Eli loved her. They almost married once to help her get custody of Sarah, but when she realized he'd stolen the ring, she knew he would be a burden in any legal setting. After that she only wanted to be friends. Then after he turned her and Jasmine in, she cut him out of her life entirely.

Here we go! Debbie and Jasmine met when they were about 16 or 17. Jasmine felt unloved by her parents, who dumped her in boarding schools and on her uncle Ashley, and Debbie was distanced from her family because she had given up her baby, Sarah. Debbie and Jasmine slowly fell in love. Debbie's father Cain was furious and he seduced Jasmine. Debbie and Jasmine broke up, but Debbie got her revenge when Jasmine fell pregnant and Debbie convinced her to have an abortion. Debbie and Jasmine went their separate ways, but several years later, Jasmine was nearly raped by her corrupt cop boyfriend, Shane. Debbie burst into the room and hit him over the head. A few minutes later, he woke up and grabbed Debbie's leg. Jasmine freaked out and beat him to death with a chair leg. Debbie and Jasmine and Debbie's cousin/sometime lover Eli threw his body in the lake and made it look like he had left the country. Debbie and Jasmine became involved again. When the body was found, they became even closer, and more terrified. When Eli found out they were a couple, he was furious, as he loved Debbie. The police began to close in on Eli, and he sold Debbie and Jasmine out. Debbie told Jasmine to run and she would try to follow. The cops caught Debbie. Debbie was put on trial, and Jasmine returned, saying she would plead guilty. She got more jail time than Debbie. She told Debbie not to wait for her and that they weren't going to be together again, although she would always love Debbie and always think about her. A lot of Debbie/Jasmine scenes are on Youtube. I don't know if they have ever said what happened to Sam, but he's always been slow. Carl is an awful man but I've always found him somewhat fascinating, partially because he's so pathetic, also because the actor is hot.

Apparently Archie, Zoe's brother is also going. Can't say I'll miss him, although he had a nice butt.

That's nice. Through Hayley, Corrie did a lot to help change the public opinion of transsexuals in the UK.

Adam.

Yeah I think he will probably bring in a lot of new characters, if the budget allows. I know he did on his other shows. Hopefully it will revive the show. There's quite a bit of unused talent there. I don't think the show deserved it's "good looks bad acting" reputation, at least not in 2006, 2007, 2008. There was quite a bit of good acting. And some of those people are still around, the problem is that Frankie, Nancy, Jack, among other characters played by some of the show's strongest actors, have been painted into a corner. Still, aside from Zak and maybe Newt and Dave, I'm happy with these firings, and I'm sure there will be more soon, hopefully of the worst actors.

We must still be getting a lot of firings over the next year, and it's just waiting until contracts expire. Otherwise I don't believe Ravi, Anita, India, Archie, and others I'm forgetting would have been spared. I think it's time for Carmel to go, sadly, as she was one of my favorites 2-3 years ago. These are what I would call "difficult" characters played by good to very good actors: Dominic Ste Nancy Jacqui Mercedes Elliot I hope Marquess manages to write story for them, although of that group I would only really miss Jacqui and Ste. These are people I would shape the show around, with new blood and a few returns (Clare? OB?) also helping to improve things: Steph Malachy Myra Darren Cindy

The axe has swung! I'll miss Zak Newt also had some potential. Otherwise, good choices. I do wonder what this means for Frankie, Steph, and Jack and Darren, they'll be more isolated than ever. http://www.digitalspy.com/soaps/s13/hollyoaks/news/a207495/hollyoaks-producer-axes-11-more.html

Interview with Gavin Blythe (this has spoilers for current and future storylines). http://www.digitalspy.com/soaps/s12/emmerdale/interviews/a207369/gavin-blyth-series-producer-emmerdale.html