EastEnders: Discussion Thread

[cassadine1991]

I like that

[LondonScribe]

http://www.digitalspy.com/soaps/eastenders/news/a831548/eastenders-confirms-producer-sean-oconnor-is-leaving/

 

Well, this is unexpected. The timing will make people believe that this came off the back of the Soap Awards and the general criticisms, but assuming it is as he has said, then the fact he is leaving on his own terms will probably annoy a lot of the DS rabble. You know a lot of (us) Brits love a sense of punishment or retribution.

 

Of course, The Sun (who appear to have been the original breakers of the news item) are reporting he WAS effective told to go. We may never know exactly what the true reason is, but I know which version many people will 'prefer'.

 

So John Yorke returns (again) as a temporary safe pair of hands presumably as a permanent replacement is sought.

 

It would be 'something' if someone like Oliver Kent or even Bryan Kirkwood ended up back at the show, in the ultimate case of being careful what you wish for. Whoever it is, I don't think the Eastenders viewers will be happy.

Edited June 23, 2017 by UK LAW

[hsfolk]

maybe Steven can return to being gay and Johnny & Ben can show up in something other than a throw away scene

[Skylover]

I really really really hope Bryan Kirkwood doesn't come back. I mean, he did some good things like re-casting Ben and Lauren, though he did miscast Lucy (at least I think it was him) and wasn't he responsible for Vanessa and Jodie Gold, and Michael Moon? I had to stop watching the show entirely because I hated Michael Moon so much.

 

I know people slag off SOC but the show couldn't carry on the way the previous producer was taking it. He was all about 'big' episodes and it was months of filler in-between every single time. I've liked SOC's style even if there are issues. I'm gonna be so p***** if Michelle gets axed, bet she will be.

[hsfolk]

is it too soon to get rid of the Taylors?

[LondonScribe]

It was Kirkwood who introduced the 'David Essex-branch' of the Moon family and the Gold family. As well as the killing of Pat which people may never forgive him for (even if he did manage to get Nick Berry out of retirement for 30 seconds and Michael French to return).

 

The good he did do, such as the year-long terror Dr Yusuf Khan (the brilliant Ace Bugatti) brought upon the Masood family will never be remembered to the above.

 

Moving the E20 cast to the main show yielded mixed results.

 

To be honest, I'm not sure how much he would want to return, given that fact he gets to call the shots at Hollyoaks and as I pointed out when he joined the first time, the BBC is a heck of a machine he has to work within, with more people to answer to, including Piers Wenger (formerly of Doctor Who) and Oliver Kent.

 

The 4 people I would advocate (Myar-Craig Brown, Kathleen Beedles, Johnathan Young and Tim Key) sadly no longer work in soap/drama and the only other I would say is good at giving shows a shot in the arm (initially) is heading up Coronation Street.

 

Paul Marquess? I'd say no. His last chance has probably come and gone with the chaos he wreaked on Hollyoaks (even if he created the Brendan Brady character that so many loved). After the damage he inflicted on both Brookside and The Bill.

 

For some reason Alison Davis is always gone as soon as she arrives at Eastenders, even though she has shown over the years to be a good hand.

 

Liza Mellody (who I didn't even know was back at the show) is a no-chance, no-brainer. She's too closely associated with Sean O'Connor, and as a tandem, they were canned from Hollyoaks about 13 (?) years ago. Even though I didn't mind the changes they brought to the show, I think something didn't click and they didn't last too long. Even if she was the perfect candidate, she is one of O'Connor's people and I don't see her staying.

 

Simon Harper, current Executive Producer of Holby City, and soon Casualty. He's just got those gigs and it's his first executive job so it may be soon? Plus, he's seemingly in the mould of Oliver Kent, who I can't stress enough, I can't trust with a show like Eastenders after the mediocrity he inflicted on Casualty, both as Series Producer and latter as EP. Kent is still pretty young and obviously a schmoozer, hence his promotion within the BBC.

 

I'm not saying they would or should, but apart from promoting from within the show (and I know how 'popular' Alexander Lamb is) there is the option of 'left of field/statement' appointments such as current writer/storyliner/editor(?) Jerome Buchan-Nelson (young, black, and yes that would be a 'thing') Or Vikki Tennant, who in about 10 years went from River City in Scotland to Hollyoaks as a writer, to Emmerdale as a storyliner/editor. I believe she is back at Hollyoaks as one of the Series Producers. Or maybe even former writer and consultant, Simon Ashdown? 

 

Dare I suggest that former acclaimed writers Tony Jordan and Sarah Phelps have outgrown the show?

 

Whoever it ends up being, great care is to be taken. 

Edited June 24, 2017 by UK LAW

[BetterForgotten]

Wait, so John Yorke is back on a temporary basis? As much as I love the early 00's, the show has tried and has never been able to recreate it. Yorke keeps coming back in some capacity...

Edited June 24, 2017 by BetterForgotten

[NothinButAttitude]

So who does everyone think that they should get to takeover? 

 

It'd be stupid to bring back anyone who has been a producer on this show the last ten years, as none of them have been stellar EPs. All of them have been dreadful if you ask me. The last time the show was truly perfection was about '06. 

 

I'm hoping they take a risk and hire some new blood. Sucks they can't woo Mal Young back to the UK as he's over here on Y&R. 

[DRW50]

 

Some think Alexander Lamb, who helped destroy the show a few years ago (he was behind ideas like Mick being Shirley's son and Bobby killing Lucy, I think). Others say Phil Collinson, who ruined Corrie years ago. I would rather have someone new. 

[NothinButAttitude]

 

Hell naw to someone who loves the Carters. Alexander Lamb--whoever the hell he is can stay in the background. CarterEnders was the worst time of the show for me throughout the past ten years. I find the Carters to be more grating than the Moon Bros., who unlike most I didn't mind. And seeing as you pointed out he had a hand in Bobby killing Lucy, he can most definitely not be it. 

 

Collinson... meh. He wasn't great but he was horrible (at times). At least his Corrie was a bit watchable compared to Blackburn. 

 

But I am with you where I want someone new and unheard of to emerge as the leader of EE. 

Edited June 24, 2017 by Nothin'ButAttitude

[DRW50]

 

I have a hard time believing it was on his own terms. Most soap producers don't just pop in for a year, and he was giving big interviews about the show only a month ago. 

 

Everything with Steve McFadden's break from the show has been odd so I can believe he may have had something to do with the departure.

 

He was horrible to me and he made the show very crude and nasty, but we can agree to disagree.

 

Lamb was also a big egotist and repeatedly showed his ass on Twitter. He's just not a good choice.

[NothinButAttitude]

 

Is there someone from the show's golden eras that is still alive that can come in and takeover permanently? 

[DRW50]

 

Most of their '90s producers are still around although I guess they probably wouldn't return. 

 

I know some want Diedrick Santer (he was producer in the late '00s) to return. I would rather not. 

 

Did you watch any of that Redwater show?

[NothinButAttitude]

 

Hell no to Santer too. While he gave me my precious Masoods, he also brought up the trashy Mitchell sisters, who I liked at first but were eager when they died. He also brought on Jack too, who still grates my nerves despite me pitying him earlier this year. 

 

I didn't see Redwater but I read up on it. I read about the so-called shocking finale. 

Please register in order to view this content

 They should've just left Kat and Alfie on the damn Square even though Alfie was getting on my last damn nerve. 

[DRW50]

 

He also did the whole psycho Steven story I hated (that is back now...) and wrote out Yolande, a very good character, and made Lucas, another good character, a serial killer. And never gave Chelsea anything to do...

 

I've been catching up on Redwater. The acting is very good but the plot is mostly meandering. Kat and Alfie, especially Kat, feel like bystanders on the show - she is only ever there to worry about her son the psycho murderer priest. 

 

The best thing I can say about the show is that one of the main guys on the show has a black wife and kids and it's not just treated as tokenism - she gets a big role in police work and mystery-solving even tough she's heavily pregnant, and their oldest daughter gets a lot to do. There was a good scene where her grandfather wanted to know what was wrong with her and when she didn't want to tell him, he said, "You're too old for secrets." Then when she told him not long after that about her father's affair, he says he knows, and asks her not to tell anyone. She says, "I thought I was too old for secrets."

 

As DTC always has to overegg the pudding, her father starts up an old love affair with his male cousin, making this the third time he's done a story with gay men having an affair while one is closeted and with a wife who is pregnant or pretending she's pregnant. 

 

This was actually the first of this cliche where he managed to not make the wife/girlfriend look like a bitch, and where the two men involved didn't come across like assholes, and were actually quite a believable couple, in spite of, you know, being cousins. 

 

(if the show ever comes back, which I doubt, I have a feeling they are going to undo them being cousins) 

 

There are a lot of people on there who would have been good additions to Eastenders, not that it's ever going to happen. And they'd just sit around talking about Ian's diabetes anyway.