Michelle Ryan is giving Barney level acting. I can't cope

What the heck was that? I have no hope for Part 2 at all

Hey at least we had drunk Kathy

The Max stuff has been good, if predictable, because it's been elevated by compelling actors. The Zoe/Anthony stuff is beyond amateur and lowkey embarrassing...!

Oh no ,,please not an Max/Cindy romantic scene.

The microphone, and the reveal.

Max and Cindy sleeping together without realising who each other is is actually pretty funny

Santa’s not climbed up my chimney yet, yuck Cindy and Max.

There is zero chemistry between Chrissie, Zoe or Sam at all, it’s like terrible fan fiction.

What a crock of shit

That was so underwhelming 😭

The Beale/Branning dinner scenes in part 1 felt like classic Christmas EastEnders but everything else missed the mark for me

That was f**king dreadful. Worst Christmas episode in forever.

Not a single redeeming factor, that was just beyond laughable. Again as I said it really does feel like fanfiction, terribly written pointless plots that go nowhere. They made a plot device out of everyone involved, Sam feels like a spare part despite the fact she be shining with an importent issue based storyline right now. Antony got brought back just to assassinate a character nobody cared for anyway, and when he could have been a bit of a camp villain they just killed him off. Zoe is still going round in circles, Jasmine is still brooding around. Nothing is resolved or has gone anywhere. Utterly woeful and a total nadir, I didn’t think this show could get worse.

Chrissie coming back and killing someone else would have been convoluted and OTT but at least something would have happened. What was the point of any of that?! Pure nostalgia slop fanfic with absolutely zero payoff. Although I suppose Zoe going to prison and ending her reign of terror would be a payoff.

I actually enjoyed the episodes and were far better than I was expecting. Not as good as the nigel episode earlier in the week as that was excellent but I enjoyed it in a different way.

I expected that anthony would have appeared alive at the end but if he is actually dead and hopefully he is it's either Christie or jasmine that done something.

The only kind of interesting callback to the 2000s for me wasn't the Sam/Chrissie/Zoe stuff and the predictable 'what's next, Den's ghost?' line, but the fact that Anthony died in the same way his mother Audrey did in 2001, by the delayed result of a blow to the head. It was obvious he was heading for an exit with the villain edit of late, but he won't be missed. So wooden and the complete character transformation was not believable.

But yeah, a crap Christmas episode (the second one more than the first) with stuff intended to be fan service that didn't land whatsoever.

The Branning family meal was quite good, and Max will always be entertaining to watch up to a point, but Nigel's episode from earlier in the week should have been the Christmas episode, that was fan service done well.

There are pockets of good stuff happening and there are very capable and talented actors in the cast, but the writing and direction is dire for most storylines currently.

2 hours ago, Liаm said:

If nothing else that was comedy gold I’m screaming 😭 the “fight” was like something off Harry Hill’s TV Burp.

"Oi, that's our brandy!!!!"

I enjoyed those ridiculous episodes!!!

15 hours ago, Scene said:

GAGGED at Chrissie coming back! I know there’s a lot of suspensions of reality here but as a kid who ate up everything EE in 2005, this is like a dream!

Just praying the writers don’t butcher this. 🥲

You definitely jinxed it 😅

I mean, if Leslie Grantham wasn’t dead I honestly could have seen them bringing his ghost into this.

Drunk Kathy is always good value and there were a couple of good one liners at the Beale/Branning dinner but that’s kind of where any praise ends.

To think I thought they brought Anthony back for good continuity for Patrick’s wedding and that an interaction or two with Zoe may occur for some nostalgia. I really wish that had been it, akin to his scenes with Kat back in 2014.

Anthony was never that interesting and has never been the most well acted. His initial story being stuck between his mother and Kat was entertaining and his initial Zoe story was misjudged at the time but they have really done him dirty with this stint. They’ve completely changed his character for the plot and it’s lead to him acting out scenes way beyond his ability which has made it comical. Even the death scene was ridiculous. And now that he is dead, what was it all for? I guess Patrick and Yolande will get some decent material out of this but honestly this was all just very bizarre.

As for Chrissie. Another waste. They just completely undid her perfect ending from 15 months ago because they really thought people would be tweeting about how iconic this all was. Except it wasn’t. She turned up to gloat and pout? Even Kat (and Jessie Wallace was doing her very best to salvage this) pointed out how backwards any motivation was. I was always in favour of keeping Chrissie in the past. She had the perfect arc and they’d always be tempted to bring her back as a two dimensional villain. They didn’t quite do that last year but now they have.

Sam was clearly only brought back to tick off her attendance. If she wasn’t there people would be saying she should have been. The cancer storyline that’s had next to no focus was only introduced to give Phil a reason to keep her in his life so she could be at the Vic tonight. The plot is driving this instead of the characters. It’s terrible writing.

I guess it’s refreshing that Zoe is finally going to be arrested for bashing someone over the head which has become like a bad habit to her. But if this is leading to a Zoe exit and this was the whole storyline they brought her back for, what a complete waste.

I've always found the boxing day episode was always better than the christmas day one but they have a mountain to climb from that 😅

I also should have put money on Max and Cindy sleeping with each other without knowing who each other are. It’s actually on my 2026 bingo card but it looks like they’re ahead of me.

Edited December 26, 2025Dec 26 by T Boy