Dion

Jane actually had an emergency hysterectomy after Steven shot her (ie: her fertility problems aren't just the usual run of the mill can't conceive or have trouble carrying to term type thing that soaps usually go for so they can have the miracle pregnancy option still open to them) so unless Jane's uterus miraculously grows back (and that's one thing which you can be sure will never happen) they'll be writing around her pregnancy I imagine. I'd have Jane decide to leave Ian and Walford (Although that might be too close to what they did with Tanya) and then come back having (or at least appearing to on the surface) completely put her marriage behind her (aside from anything to do with the kids, Bobby especially). Jane needs to be separated from Ian for at least two to three years to give her a chance to develop at least some independence as a character. Long term Ian and Jane could get back together but in the meantime Ian could be paired off in a short term marriage to Mrs Ian Beale #5 (she could turn out to be psychotic or perhaps die tragically) or they could even keep him single (though I fear he'd just end up pining over Jane if he stayed single).

I never thought about it that way but yeah that's actually true. You can even go through various Sharon storylines and see which Mitchell sister it'd suit best eg: Sharon wants to go on the pill - Roxy The Banned - Roxy Sharon goes out with a Vicar - Ronnie Sharon's cheated on by Wicksy - Ronnie Sharon cheats on Grant with Phil - Roxy Sharon mourns Tom and later Dennis - Ronnie To analyse a bit further Roxy is early Sharon (1985 - 1995) while Ronnie is later Sharon (2001 - 2006). But while the Mitchell sister's seem doomed to stay in their prescribed roles as Fire (Roxy) and Ice (Ronnie), IMO Sharon actually more or less evolved from fire to ice (and then started thawing out again!) and yet always retained enough of both qualities to feel like a well-rounded character.

Wasn't it Marlon who helped Eric save Kathy from Graham? Biff was already gone by that point (one of the reasons he jilted Kathy was because he felt that she was more attracted to Graham than him and Kathy and Graham started a relationship after Biff left).

If they want Syed and Christian to be gay parents then Syed's already got a child with Amira that they could bring into the show to achieve that goal in a more realistic fashion - at this point it just feels rushed to have them go down the whole surrogacy route. And I'd much rather Roxy carry the child too (though they'd have to spend sometime building a Roxy and Syed relationship - be it friendship or at least a strong respect for each other). Jane and Ronnie's reaction would be quite interesting too. Jane seems to have calmed down after adopting Bobby but after having lost three babies (four if you include Tommy) I'd imagine Ronnie would be quite rankled to realise that even a gay couple are having a baby when it seems she can't - plus they're having said baby with her mother! Speaking of Jane though, I wonder if the real reason they've quietly wrapped up Jane's issues with babies and Lucy's abortion is because of the baby switch? Perhaps the writers felt it was too much to have two characters in separate storylines agonize over their lack of children.

On the surface of it, Ian turning out to be Bobby's father always seemed to be a bit odd to me as Ian had just received the results of his first sperm test (and they were clear) when he resumed having sex with Laura (I think he faked a bad back for several weeks to avoid sex before that as like Jane, Laura also had baby rabies). So when Laura turned up pregnant it seemed that it couldn't possibly be Ian's (and only a few weeks before discovering she was pregnant Laura had had a convenient ONS with a mystery man that later turned out to be Garry). Of course when Bobby was born and Laura found out that both she and Garry did not match the baby's blood type, she was told there was a chance that it could be Ian's and a year later when Ian finally found out about being listed as Bobby's father on the birth certificate, he went to a clinic and they told him he should've waited a bit longer and then had a second test just to make absolutely sure. While this is certainly plausible its also somewhat contrived and everything always seemed to fit better with Garry as the father so it makes me wonder if the writers decided to change direction with that story mid-stream or whether Ian was always planned to turn out to be the father and the execution was just clumsy. The show was transitioning at the time so both scenarios were likely.

I'm not actually too bothered by the suddenness of Marcus returning to marry Sean, after-all the show has a bit of a tradition of rushing characters to the altar (Ken and Val after the 1961 strike, Ray and Deirdre when Billy Walker abruptly quit, Alf and Audrey when Audrey became a regular and Derek and Mavis when Derek became a regular) and for those couples it actually worked out in the long run. However since it seems that this is somewhat of a political statement I'm thinking within a month Marcus will cheat on Sean with James and then leave the street with both of them broken-hearted and blaming each other leading to a rivalry where they both fight over men who aren't really bothered with the both of them for a few years to come. Or perhaps they want Sean married and settled so they can focus on James as a single. Sean's never really worked as a single himself (probably because with the exception of Marcus Sean's romances have gone down the same cliched path with Sean being interested in someone who is not really interested in him or is interested in someone else - Michelle and Jason) so marrying him off into a double act might actually work out.

Thanks for the compliment Carl I would post more, but in New Zealand we are still seeing episodes from August last year which makes it hard to post. Thanks also for the link, as the documentary was quite interesting, although the presenter's delivery was quite stilted!

The new set should be quite an exciting development (7.7 acres! ) and its fun to speculate on what will change and what will stay the same. I'm thinking Coronation Street itself won't change that much although the Corner Shop and the Kabin would hopefully be slightly different taking into account what happened in the Tram crash. Also perhaps the Rover's street frontage could be widened a bit so it matches the size of the interior sets better. There's really be no need to retain the Rosamund Street Viaduct as it's only there to hide the Granada Television buildings and it's obvious that it doesn't continue behind the terraced houses. Of course for continuity purposes you could have it in the new set and just acknowledge it onscreen and explain it away as being a remnant of an old railway viaduct that was mostly pulled down when Coronation Street was built in 1902 (a bit like Weatherfield's version of the High Line in New York City lol). They could open up the viaduct again and have a Jubilee Terrace facade on the other side as part of the set...although extending the set that far might be getting a bit too far west (I assume its west, since the Terraces are north and Underworld is south) from the Rovers and you'd really want the Rovers to be roughly in the geographical centre of the new set Other options include having more generic locations such as street frontages (another terrace facade and/or a small street with facades of semi-detached houses) to use to cut down on location costs or a park area to represent the famous Red Rec.

Go Claire! You get her! lol

Ah ok, there was no source on the DS so I wasn't sure. To a certain extent the DS fanbases have always been a bit competitive (especially back in 2004 - 2005) but it really does seem to gotten a whole lot worse this year

interesting rumour about Kat, Ronnie, Jack and Charlie posted on DS, bare in mind that there's no source but I thought it was worth posting anyway.

I do hope they remember just how close Tommy was to Tyrone (though I think that's a given) AND Maria (and they better not pair them off either coz that would be gross) back in 2000

I had heard of that one and it should be quite interesting. As for baby switches on UK soaps, while there have been baby switches before, I think its important to note that

Ah yes, my favourite Carol moment...and it's followed by the jail scenes where Carol and Lorraine are both dissing David, with Cindy trying to defend him!

I hope so...according to Bill Roache the two have actually spoken (by phone at least) about their longevities on their respective soaps.

That is a shame that Zeke and Rebecca are being written out. At this rate by 2014 (assuming the show hasn't been cancelled by then but I do think it will be given a few years on Eleven) there will be no characters left over who joined during the 2000s just like how by 1994 all the eighties characters except Helen, a recast Julie and a recast Cody were gone (not including Lou in that list because his first stint in 1988 was short). Although at least this time we still actually have some characters left over from the nineties and Paul is back from the original cast. I guess what I am trying to say is that Neighbours has really struggled with developing long term characters in the past few years after having great success with the likes of the Kennedys and the Scully's. So it really is a shame that Jane Hall (who seemed happy to stay put) and Matthew Werkmeister (who I'd hoped would stay for a bit longer as he has been there for five years despite making noises about leaving some time ago) Won't really miss reacst Declan though

I was wondering if they were going to deal with the racism angle. I do remember Jim referring to Billie as "that black kid of Carol's" or something to that effect when he was introduced and Carol saying that her father and all her brothers (even though Max and Jack hadn't been invented yet then) were all racist, a point which seems to have been quietly brushed under the carpet (aside from when Jim and Patrick first became friends). So while Jim, Max and Jack aren't racist anymore, its good to see Carol still remembers how she was treated when she got together with Billie's father (mostly by Jim and the other Branning brother not on canvas as Jack and Max would have still been a bit too young).

Definitely Carl...she was amazing in the storyline when Jim beat her up and though I haven't seen it myself, was praised for the storyline when Jim and Liz's premature daughter died

Yeah that happened here in NZ too. Eventually we were more than three years behind but now they play double episodes so we are now 2 and a half years behind.

Tonight was Gerald's last episode. His exit storyline involved him marrying his best friend Libby (who left the show back in March but returned for a guest stint to wrap up Gerald's storyline) as Libby needed to get a US green card and Gerald conveniently turned out to be an American citizen! (I would have bought that particularly detail if they'd mentioned it when his parents came on during one of their recurring stints). Oh well, at least this marriage is heavily implied to be based on real feelings (a strong friendship that will actually turn into true love) and not just a scheme to defraud the INS! Just a shame we won't get to see their relationship play out onscreen! But it is a somewhat fitting end to the arcs of both characters (Gerald gets a wife who won't mind the whole asexuality issue and accepts him for who he is and Libby finally got a wedding and a husband).

It's called a Newton's cradle...for some reason I've always wanted one of those! lol. I don't know if she cut the strings off either.

Kinda old news now but it seems Adam Rickitt's departure in the 90 Minute special on August 2 scored an Impressive 837,000 viewers, making it one of the highest rated episodes of Shortland Street since it began! (and also it was the highest rated episode of any show that week) And since then the show has rated quite well, remaining in the 500,000 to 700,000 range. Fridays often do relatively poorly with figures down in the low 500's but on other nights the show can get more than 600,000 or even 700,000. Here is a link to NZ ratings on Throng.co.nz NZ Ratings

I agree and I always thought it was a shame they decided to dress her up like a modern day Queen Victoria for most of her 00's stint.

Its not the EE theme tune, although the arrangement is very similar (the handclaps!) and thats not actually Chris with them either...its a NZ actor Simon Praast(who actually does resemble Chris, I thought it was Chris at first too until I realized who it really was). I think Chris and Leeza were at the Christchurch venue while this one was at the Auckland venue. oh and I do think Letitia's actually quite talented at the poi lol.

Saw this and just had to share: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvOziT29Hqg&feature=related I never realized that EastEnders was that popular in NZ to warrant flying Susan Tully and Letitia Dean all the way from the UK. Though EE was in a primetime slot here until around 1990, so I guess maybe we lost interest after Dirty Den's first death (and another network did try EE in a primetime slot again when he came back...) And if the date is correct its from the same Telethon that Christopher Quinten (Brian Tilsley on Coronation Street) met Leeza Gibbons...which led to him being killed off.