Dion

Thanks for that. I watched the whole thing, I had forgotten how brutal Craig's death was @ 6:02. Also should point out that my friend's sister and another classmate of mine were extras in Sarah's infamous scene, appearing approx @ 3:38 and 3:45. My mum and I were watching an old rerun of an approx 1995 episode of Shortland Street some time ago and a rare scene with Chris and Rachel (in a group) came on. My mum was like "When on earth did those two get together?" It was so weird. While Chris had plenty of scenes with Rachel's peer Nick (who saw Chris as a role-model), usually giving him (bad) love advice he never had any reason to interact with Rachel - she was merely the boss' daughter. When they both returned in 2001 that was when the character's started being together more, particularly as Chris' only ties were Nick, Waverley and Rachel (and Rangi and Minnie, but they soon left). Rachel had only been gone a year so she still had ties (unlike her 2009 return where she was in the position Chris was in 2001). Chris and Rachel started appearing together more often as they supported Nick through the loss of his partner Ange and Rachel began working under Chris at Shortland Street during it's transition from Private clinic to public hospital. The lyrical version of the theme is so bad it's good. I used to get a kick out of the mismatch of metaphors and faux biblical allusions all contorted to rhyme with 'Shortland Street'. I missed it when it was dropped from the end credits as the first change made during the 2001 revamp (well actually fourth change as Chris' return was first, though that happened in the last episode of 2000 - I keep saying 2001 but he did make a brief appearance in the 2000 finale, the other two changes being that the opening credits became more generic instead of having character shots and the show was also broadcast in 16:9 for the first time).

Yes and Boyd is another who is holier than thou as seen many times during his marriage to Brooke. Him and TK are not that dissimilar making their rivalry all the more interesting. You're right about Harper and it's interesting to note the difference between her and Sarah's early years where Sarah did eat the show with triangle after triangle. Sarah's nadir came in 2006 at the conclusion of the Sarah-Craig-Huia triangle with Sarah's infamous line "You and your baby can go to hell!" mere moments before Huia (and her unborn child by Craig got blown up in the car bombing, leading to Sarah's hysterical rant at Huia's funeral (I forgive you!). It's a wonder TK and Aunty Kuini ever forgave her (Huia was TK's cousin and Kuini's daughter) but within weeks Sarah and TK were sleeping together leading to a special four-hander episode where Sarah told Toni (Harry's mum, Sarah's then best friend) about her dates with TK and Craig on the same night (shown in flashbacks) before making a final choice between the two men. After Sarah choose TK and married him the show fortunately dialled her back a bit at which point I started liking her - a good thing otherwise the storyline with Sarah's initial MS symptoms (which went on for more than 6 months) would have been unbearable. It's funny to think about Chris' interactions with Sarah during the above period as it was clear that he (somewhat hypocritically) disliked her quite intensely because of all the triangles she kept landing herself in (Craig was his best friend). They became good friends later on though, particularly as Toni and Craig died within weeks of each other, their deaths being caused by the evil Pharmaceutical company Scott-Spear (Who also blew up Huia). Chris and Rachel used to be able to hang out with the hoi-polloi but over the years have moved out of that social circle. Of course this is quite realistic as they have gotten older and moved into positions of power. It's also interesting to note that this break from the 'lower' social circles came after they left and came back (Chris in 2001, Rachel in 2009), all the regular characters they used to hang out with had gone and they both never fit in with the newer lower social circles that replaced them. I think this is in part why they stick to each other like glue. It's also interesting that they never really interacted with each other until they were paired up in 2001. Lucy's apartment has been around since 2010. I remember that Rachel once owned it as an investment property but I'm not sure if she sold it or still owns it. I think she did sell it though.

I wasn't sure if you got the version with the promo or the version with the actual end credits (I should have guessed that it was with the version with the promo as you usually up to date whereas the version with the end credits is the repeat the following day) so that's good to know. I hope TK suffers lol - while he usually has a point, he does get carried away with his holier than thou attitude. I remember a storyline where TK and his then boss Callum McKay got sent off to a Maori cultural sensitivity course and TK called out Callum for constantly challenging the kaiako (teacher) but then the kaiako called out TK as IIRC she recognised that Callum was actually trying to understand the principles she was talking about whereas TK was merely blindly following them. Its interesting how Pania has isolated TK from nearly all his friends in only six months. The TV Guide edition is for July 11 - 17 so maybe that week? They are on the cover. The last Shortland Street TV Guide cover was Bella on the week she found out she was pregnant. Ben may look a bit tired for his few weeks on the show as hes' been doing both Dancing with the Stars and Shortland Street at the same time (and still hasn't been voted off). Luckily for him they're both done in the same studio despite screening on rival networks.

I finally remembered how to do spoiler tags Anyway,judging by next weeks previews: Also in the latest NZ Tv guide some casting news:

Yeah I'm surprised at myself for forgetting Wendy's abortion as I do remember the other five times a major or recurring character has had one. I still want Murray and Wendy to stay on the show, but you are right about their relationship woes feeling a bit forced. I've always thought they introduced discord into their marriage a bit too early - first with Murray's attraction to Vasa and later with him leaving Wendy for Kat. Regarding the living arrangements, whatever happens I hope TK's house remains on the show (Looks like Pania will be living there) as it's the only place thats been there since the beginning - even the hospital shifted premises at one point. Sam Aleni lived in TK's house for the first four years of the show (but I don't recall him mentioning that during his return stint last year),

I forgot Wendy had an abortion, even though it was only two years ago. I'm still of the thinking that somehow Nicole is being scammed because I think if she did have schizophrenia like her brother, we'd have seen her go to the ATM and take out that money and forget about it, but I could be wrong. Yes I think Victoria is heading for a breakdown, she's clearly a bit unhinged, but at some point i'm sure she and Mo will hook up. Caleb - wouldn't be surprised if they killed him off or he leaves, characters in his position (being the husband of a newly introduced major female character) never seem to last more than a year unless they are a doctor or nurse, Murray possibly being the only exception. (Granted Caleb is working at the hospital but Mo performs the same job and has a whole family of his own to boot).

According to a family tree I've seen of the Dingles albeit 10 years old, Cain and Charity are second cousins, Charity being the daughter of Zak's first cousin. http://emmerdale.org/emmerdale/tree/10june05/Dingle/Dingle.png

Yes that's always irked me too. Imagine my surprise when after years of Coronation Street being referred to as the world's longest running serial/soap opera/drama/whatever in every magazine article or TV programme about Corrie, I suddenly find out that ATWT started in 1956 (and an even bigger surprise when the GL 60th anniversary edition of SOD came out in 1997, with GL having started on radio in 1937 switching to TV in 1952).

Oh I'll post it here: The Shorty Street curse strikes again! Courtesy TVNZ http://tvnz.co.nz/shortland-street/shorty-street-curse-strikes-again-3417939 Some notes for further context: *Starship is New Zealand's largest children's hospital * In 1995, Rachel married her best friend Nick (an original cast member that I still miss even though he was unfortunately axed in 2005, at the time he was the longest running cast member as Chris had left for four years) as a protest against the student allowance system. * The Neo-Nazis storyline was in 1997 around the same time some such organizations were making the news. *Serenity CHurch was inspired by the real life Destiny Church who protested against the Civil Union bill. Thankfully there were no car bombings in 2006 or serial killers in 2007.

Yes with the Pixie storyline the Shortland Street curse has struck again! http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11465013 http://tvnz.co.nz/shortland-street/shorty-street-curse-strikes-again-3417939 (an old article from 2010 with some info on the curse)

He was a stabilising force for the show. He was very fortunate in that by the time he arrived, the newer characters introduced under Park had bedded in. I think his most significant plots were Sally and Greg, Breaking up Mike and Alma and revealing Fred as Ashley's biological father.

While we're on that topic, I'd settle for a nice little terrace near Shepherd's Bush Green myself (Just a bit further down from Notting Hill and Bayswater), handy to the Overground, Circle, Hammersmith & City and Central lines as well as markets, shops and Westfield . I do wish EastEnders would shoot more on location in London though. I actually prefer London location shoots to when the show films abroad.

David Hanson had a year long stint in between Park and McNaughton.

I think the baby will be fine as I don't think the show would have a pregnant actress or an actress with a newborn play out such a storyline (though I know of at least one show that has). (EDIT - forgot to mention all the uneasiness that occurred when the show planned a SIDS storyline back in the 90s, two storyliners fell pregnant and the baby in question itself was played by the newborn daughter of one of the the show's medical advisors, which meant the storyline was delayed until the producers felt comfortable to go through it). I do wonder how they'll handle everything though. This I think is only about the third time they've had to write an actress' pregnancy into the script and both of those last two that I recall were off-screen births. My prediction is Bella will leave for a little bit while Amelia is on maternity leave and come back full term ready to pop for an on-screen birth.

Three month old story but the right time to post since my earlier prediction about Bella becoming pregnant to Jimmy (though I was very subtle about it lol): http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=11418588 She's due next month. Be interesting to see if next week they start showing her baby bump which they've been at great pains to hide for months now.

Back in 2010, Scotty (director of Nursing at the time) was kidnapped by Penny, the vengeful daughter of a dead ex army colleague. This army.colleague had raped Scotty's then girlfriend (never seen on the show) when they were stationed in East Timor (sometime in the early 2000s), Scotty and his batallion then somehow caused the rapist's death in a possible fragging incident. Long story short, Penny had already killed the other guys in the battalion and was now after Scotty. Tracey (Scotty's current girlfriend) and Sarah then drove all around West Auckland Ferndale looking for Scotty. A confrontation ensued and poor Scotty ended up shot when he revealed that Penny's father had been a rapist but survived and ended up with PTSD. Penny eventually was caught by police. After some months, Scotty and Tracey began planning their wedding, but Scotty's PTSD (combined with the stress of reconciling with his estranged mother and also dealing with residual guilt over re-marrying so soon after the death of his wife Shanti) developed into Capgras syndrome so he became convinced that Tracey had been replaced by an impostor leading to the 2010 finale where he ended up trying to strangle her. But he eventually recovered and he and Tracey eventually married.

Lol. I don't think the show has don't think that the show has done a D.I.D storyline (at least not that I remember). Which is a surprise since they've done lesser known stuff such as Capgras syndrome and Hero syndrome.

Just realised you might have been talking about the porn industry and Curtis before, not the meth industry lol Gabrielle was extremely popular, played by a talented actress who made the character believable (particularly important as she had aspergers), and of course she was brought back after her initial year long stint to do another year stint. I still miss her. Harry does drive me mad too but It's been good to see him grow up with minimal sorasing (I think currently he's only about a year older than he's supposed to be). I especially like his relationship with Rachel. Interestingly back in the day, one of the first things Rachel did when the paternity test confirmed that Chris was Harry's dad was take a secret trip to get her tubes tied!

Is it just me or does Aaron look a lot like Stu Parker (without the soul patch and with a more square jawline)

I did notice that line and wondered if it was a subtle dig at Jonathan's six month guest appearance four years ago (when Jonathan came back after 15 years away and jumped into a relationship with a woman Gabrielle and viewers criticised the writers for taking several weeks to acknowledge that he'd almost solely been with men in his earlier stints). Nice location shooting at Massey University Albany Campus tonight (has always been used as the University in Ferndale even way back when Rachel was a student 20 years ago). Its a nice campus but far away from a lot of things (except Westfield Albany shopping mall, some big box retail and a stadium - Albany is one of those weird places where all the roads are developed but everything is still mostly empty fields because development got stalled during the GFC), i'm glad I went to (both) the universities in the city. Looks like Boyd might be in for the requisite "surgeon's hand gets injured - oh no! Can he still operate?" storyline. Haven't had one of those for a while (well there was Chris' heart problem and his eye problem - at least I think it was an eye problem - and his flying fox brain injury last year...but those weren't to do with his hands).

But the Brennan Boys are Beth's nephews! (longstanding NeighboursFans.com joke) But yes, it would be good to see if they could get Natalie Imbruglia back for a short stint with Ned. All they'd need to do is briefly acknowledge the same surname (and of course point out that Beth is not related to the Brennan boys lol).

Still waiting for Piper Willis though. I can understand they maybe saving her for if/when Imogen and Josh leave but preferably I'd like there to be some overlap. Plus the length of her exchange trip has become ridiculous! Oh and Ned should turn up at some point too.

I'm sure Curtis will be doing something dodgy sometime soon - he's already (almost) had his hand in the cash register at the IV, so it's a possibility. A long long time ago - end of 2001 they did have a character start manufacturing P in his house. The plot culminated when his mum threw him a surprise 18th birthday party in the end of year cliffhanger and the chemicals ended up blowing up the house with half the hospital staff in it (no one died though, but Toni Thompson was briefly seriously injured and her pregnancy was revealed to the world, an absolutely catastrophic event that continues to have repercussions to this very day! lol).

So Chris and Rachel get rid of the P (Meth) dealers only to be stuck with a porn director...lol. Still, the house wouldn't have been sold that fast!

I just feel he's out of place physically...and while some teenagers of course are more grown than others, usually it's because they've always been that way. it's hard to believe the more scrawny Jett once bullied him. It's as if V.J recieved a heavy dose of steriods or something.