Sylph

The Debbie/Jasmine story was soap at its absolute best.

What was it about?

Another awful PZ video, but amazing song, I Am Here:

Now — no. I am interested in how is Home & Away doing?

Are you still following the Oz soaps?

I think you can say the same for US soaps - they'll constantly drag thinks out for weeks, without anything really happening. I don't have time to watch Y&R, religiously, so I end up skipping episodes. The last ep I saw, was when the bomb exploded. I then tuned in again last week, and really, things were pretty much still the same. I skipped all the in-between and watched the wedding, which was awesome, but I really didn't need to see every moment of Billy and Chloe faking it, or Jill banging on that Kay's an imposter, when I got all that before, and after.

Yes, Ben, you definitely can. However, British dialogue is very good-to-fantastic in almost every episode, rarely does one hear atrocious dialogue, whereas in America — that's the norm. Dialogue in daytime — sucks. Except on GH. Furthermore, no matter how much of a dreck, I find myself much more attracted, almost glued to UK soaps, whereas US soaps rarely elicit such a reaction. I mean, I do watch even when the shows are plain awful, but with UK soaps... there's something more that makes them better... Perhaps they are less dumb or something. I can't really put my finger on it.

LMAO! Turns out - in GR everyone's so approachable! Never seen that before...

This is recent, even if you hate it, it's catchy, you can't resist it at times.

No. 1 in GR right now:

What, and how much

LMAO!

I'd have to think about it, too... I know I've seen a few good ones, but they all escape me now.

Yeah, it is difficult. I wonder why that is... The production generally sucks.

Right, right: no matter what she drinks, it won't help.

Hm... I'd have to think about it... Any suggestions?

So true!

The translation is kind of confusing, especially

How will it help me whatever I drink

How will it help me one kiss and one cigarette

but hey... Haste hasn't helped.

That's not a bad translation at all! But, yeah, Greek videos absolutely suck! And, I must tell you, this is not even one of the worst

On the other hand perhaps I'm being impatient. Diederick Santer has obviously plotted several years of story and likes to take his time.

What makes you say that?

A big problem I have with all British soaps is that no matter how good a particular episode is and how excellent the dialogue pretty much always is, usually after two months of great storytelling comes a period of two years of absolute, inimitable dreck: yes, you can watch day-by-day, but there's just nothing in there, just sporadic episodes or scenes which are superb and then fifty other episodes of... Blah. Sad.

Yes, I've read about that mysterious woman story. But I just cannot believe it that any soap I touch seems to be crap — I so want to watch something intriguing and compelling, but turn out — such a soap does not exist. Or it does — but it's in Greek.

LMAO! at that potato phobia!

I think he's the new series producer who's taken over from Anita Turner. As I've stated before and feel the need to do so again, I loathe the show but I'm intrigued by the recent backstage reshuffling.

If I'm not mistaken, Gavin started his career as a script editor for Corrie.

So any hopes it might become watchable?

Incidentally I noticed Daran Little in a bar this weekend. I wonder whether he's back for a visit or his American dream has crashed and burned...

Green card/visa issues.

This would be a literal, unpolished translation, with mistakes probably...

The last sunset

My last evening with you

It's strangely turbid, like a lie

How will it help me whatever I drink

How will it help me one kiss and one cigarette

I want to put you in one embrace

This summer will be lost in the rain

And the dream you saw won't come true — the two of us together

This summer will be lost in the rain

And the dream you saw won't come true — the two of us together

The last sunset

My last evening together with you

I want the sea to get the form of you

You left so suddenly

And I remembered our first night

And the tears came again, in the darkness

This summer will be lost in the rain

And the dream you saw won't come true — the two of us together

This summer will be lost in the rain

And the dream you saw won't come true — the two of us together

And the dream you saw won't come true — the two of us together...

So sad... And the video... Greek videos suck. Sorry, I had to say it. Such a beautiful song, ruined with this awful, awful video. Something much more sophisticated and elegant was needed. Same goes for her song I Am Here.

Who is Gavin Blyth?

A soap should be like this Greek song... Full of longing and dreams that did not come true...

After the truly bizarre preceding episode featuring Peggy Mitchell leading the women of Albert Square in a rapturous booty shake with pom-poms (shudder, never again), obviously something terrible was about to happen on her wedding day to the loathsome Archie Mitchell. The trailers had Peggy being assembled in her wedding outfit by a robot, symbolising his controlling nature. This story collided with the most drawn-out “reveal” in soapland.

It’s a rare treat that a single EastEnders episode features Peggy’s hair, Pat’s eyeshadow, Max and Stacey stalking each other like horny polecats and Janine spitting excessive venom, and added to that a bellowed revelation (“You’re my muvvvver”) with a tragic death cherry on top — but that’s what they gave us, the floozies.

For seven, long months, viewers have been wishin’ and a hopin’ that Danielle would tell Ronnie, Archie’s daughter, that Ronnie was her mother. The evil Archie had found out Danielle’s true identity and had lied to her that Ronnie knew the truth and wanted nothing to do with Danielle. To bring this to a climax the writer Simon Ashdown opted for mad crescendo after mad crescendo. You may well have spent the hour shouting loudly and gripping nearby cushions.

Danielle (Lauren Crace) has spent most of her sentence in Albert Square, and nearly all of last night, on a permanent crying jag, at the whim of an implausible storyline. Quite why Archie is so evil and intent on making Peggy and his daughters so unhappy isn’t clear. Quite why he stole his daughter’s baby and gave it away, and claimed it was dead, isn’t clear. Control, maybe. Larry Lamb is brilliantly creepy and whatever twisted logic lies inside Archie is conveyed through his cadaverous face and swirling-black pupils.

The pom-pom madness had supposedly liberated the “real Peggy”.

But “the real Peggy” is a hazy concept: there’s Peggy the big-hearted East End landlady and Peggy the crone famous for rasping “Get ahht my pub” to anyone who crosses her path. For someone into evil mind control, Archie has brilliant taste. The wedding outfit he had chosen for Peggy was much nicer than the tatty net curtains that even Miss Havisham would have rejected that the “real Peggy” chose to marry in.

Archie pursed his lips at this act of insurrection, but the “real Peggy” hissed that he had to take her as she was. He said he did, but he didn’t. They married, with Archie creepily instructing his wife to pour him some wine at the reception. Danielle, channelling Cordelia from King Lear, finally confronted Ronnie, revealed all Archie’s lies and schemes and begged Ronnie: “You’ve got to believe me. I’m your daughter”. (Britain screamed back in return: Believe her! We’ve had ENOUGH.)

But Archie claimed that Danielle was disturbed and Ronnie — despite all his past abuse of her — believed him. In front of a packed pub, Danielle screamed: “I am the only one telling the truth”. The Vic regulars, well-schooled in dramatic revelations of affairs, secret parentages, sudden reincarnations and the identity of murderers, merely looked on, restless for their wedding cake. Ronnie threw Danielle into the street and shouted: “Who’d want a daughter like you?” (Britain cries: NOOOO!)

It came down, Shakespearean-ly enough, to Danielle’s locket that contained a picture of Ronnie. When Ronnie found it, she realised the truth and went after Danielle. Peggy tried to turf Archie out, realising what a monster he was. He’ll no doubt be grateful to his would-be partner in crime Janine, who, speeding from the Square after yet another set of botched misdeeds, knocked Danielle over. She died in Ronnie’s arms: her final word which should have been her first, “Mum”.

Just as Ronnie had begun the episode cradling baby Amy (progeny of her sister Roxy), so she ended the episode cradling her dead daughter, who she had originally called Amy. Ronnie let forth a guttural howl. You may have been similarly hysterical at home. EastEnders had hit the misery mother lode.

OMFG CLARE IS COMING BACK! EEEEEEEEE

Sorry, I'm too excited to hold it in.

It is so much fun to see the otherwise phlegmatic Alvin lose it!

Thank you!

Is there a "biography" of Sydney Chase somewhere?

Toni Braxton - Melt