T Boy

It’s probably a step too far bringing Chrissie back for revenge. Especially when the motive will be weak as. Sharon would be the only one she’d want revenge on (maybe Sam but who would actually go after someone with cancer?) and that was all resolved last year. She got back with Jake who waited for her. She got a happy ending. It’s not like Zoe has lived a charmed life either? Let’s see what tomorrow brings but there’s a lot of work to do. Not sure this was worth the last 3 months of Zoe melodrama on repeat.

Ok so that was quite a good cliffhanger. I actually managed to keep myself from being spoiled. We all said we’d wanted Chrissie, Zoe and Sam back on screen together, and now that’s what we’ll get. But I am in two minds about it. Firstly, they’ll need to explain all of the Jasmine stuff quite quickly now. How did Chrissie know about her? Is she even still definitely Zoe’s daughter? The other thing now quite sitting right is why is Chrissie doing this? Zoe actually never actually did anything to her. Zoe didn’t kill Den, Zoe wasn’t even involved in Chrissie getting caught. If anything, Chrissie was the one who insisted Zoe have an abortion and then let her believe she’d killed Den for months. And also Chrissie’s last stint suggested she’d grown past this and moved on after her chats with Sharon. You can kind of tell there’s been a change in producer. Definitely a step down from yesterday’s episode. I enjoyed Sam but she feels like a background character in her own story.

That actually was beautiful. How can they get this so right when they’re failing on an almost daily basis? Can we please not go back to Zoe drama tomorrow? Bringing back Nigel and then Julie has been a revelation this past year. It’s been fantastic for Phil and it sold Grant’s return earlier this year (I still get emotional when watching his last exchange with Nigel) and aside from the silly car crash a few weeks ago, everything Nigel related has been brilliant. Pat and Barry being back was a little gratuitous but it worked and they’re both great characters. Young Phil and Grant were brilliant as always-they are such good actors and very believable. Tracy having dark hair and some lines too! But it was wonderful seeing Debbie again-always a shame she quit abruptly back in the day, I watched her episodes on Drama a few years ago and I think that really helped seeing her with Nigel again tonight. But of course, Nigel, Julie and Phil were the real main focus as they should be. Such great actors all of them and the writing was fantastic. Why can’t it always be like this? As for Pat being killed off too soon, I have two thoughts on that. Yes, Pam looks great and could have been popping in and out for years. But on the other hand, it was a good time for her character to go given who was in the show for her final episodes at the time-Ricky, Bianca, Carol and Janine. They’ve not all been in it at the same time since. Killing Ronnie and Roxy was foolish, Roxy more so than Ronnie. Killing Abi Branning was equally thoughtless, she could have been back right now. Denny feels like a misstep they’re always trying to recover from and I still think killing Martin off was a bad idea-it’s not even been a year and it’s already like he never existed!

I have a clear top 10 for 2007 given how few no.1s there were. Quite a few awful no.1s considering.

Yeah this had been heavily publicised for over a month. Got my hopes up with the hype but it wasn’t anything I didn’t already know about. But I can just imagine it was amazing to see Pat there if you’d had no idea it was going to happen. They should (and could) have kept it a secret. My theory is that they felt they had to announce it in advance to keep interest up otherwise a lot of people would have switched off by now.

Bert being ill only really had mileage for why Jay left abruptly and couldn’t keep being the excuse forever. Bert would either get better or die-either way Jay would be heading back. So a girlfriend is as good an excuse as any. I just assumed they’d never mention him again. They’re doing a lot just to keep Lexie in the show. Couldn’t they just saddle her with Phil or Kathy and be done with it?

Gutted, I wanted to see Bring It All Back top 10 here!

Gooddelta, it’s amazing how in sync our memories of this period are! I hadn’t hear Boom Boom Boom Boom before release except it was played as music on a CBBC trail. My siblings and I could tell it was a new Vengaboys song but we hadn’t heard it on the radio or anything. I had assumed Britney would fly straight in to no.1 but it was CD:UK that revealed to be that Vengaboys would win out! I love this track for all the memories, it would probably be top 10 for me. Offspring too would probably get top 10 for me as well.

I loved Good Morning Sunshine. Ironically always feels wintery to me, very underrated.

This part of 1998 always feels so Christmassy for me! I have such special memories, probably because I was just 10 years old but it really did feel like such a festive time! Still haven’t been able to watch the second episode from last night. Seems to not be loading on iplayer for me 😢

I remember when Lou Reed died there was panic on social media from people thinking he was Lou Bega 😂

Let’s not have all the soaps join up. It’s actually very tacky.

She looks more like Max than any of his kids. I always said Linda was kidding herself thinking anyone would believe she was Mick’s when she was always that ginger.

Mini Mo has had more screen time this year than Sharon. The AJ thing was weird. They’ve never called her that before. I’m a little annoyed that Rainie hasn’t been mentioned. It was always quite sad how AJ was basically kidnapped from her. How on earth did Max not figure out Annie’s parentage?

I think they may take steps if Christmas doesn’t land. Michelle Ryan is saying the scripts are up with the best she’s done-maybe they are but it seems very hard to believe right now. I guess it might feel like that if you’re playing the main character. But let’s not forget what happened last time they fired a producer. It didn’t get better.

Aren’t people excited at the prospect of us not having the same Christmas no.1 for the third year running? Something that felt like a foregone conclusion only a couple of weeks ago! Who cares if the Kylie track is rubbish (I haven’t heard it yet so I don’t know) or that, like all Christmas songs, it drops out quickly? It’s showing us that there is still some hope and that Christmas no.1 can be exciting again. It used to be the best chart of the year. It’s been boring for some time. FairPlay to Kylie for mounting a challenge.

Which is fine but why was Gina in hospital for weeks when the car didn’t touch her? And now we have this second scenario with Oscar/Zoe? There’s no attention to detail. Don’t have Gina pushed out of the way if she’s supposed to get badly injured. Don’t have Zoe get more exposure to the fire if she isn’t going to hospital too.

Yes, Lauren did ring someone who must have been Max but surely it would make more sense to ring Tanya? No matter how mad she may have been with her son, she’d surely visit if he almost died? And yes Zoe just being wrapped in a blanket after all that exposure to a fire she probably could have just put out herself makes no sense. But this isn’t the first time? Remember when Jasmine took the full impact of Nigel’s car and was wandering around a couple of days later whereas Gina was pushed out of the way and ended up in hospital for weeks on end? If they can’t even get these details right, It’s no wonder these twists are so poorly written.

What on Earth is going on? That gave us no further answers on anything from yesterday. Do the think Max being back will distract us or something. The highlight of every episode right now is Elaine snapping ‘boutique hotel’.

Great choice for no.1 m, Jade! My friendship group were obsessed with this at the time. A great track and I dare say we haven’t had another no.1 like it since! Thanks for the countdown, 2006 is one of my very favourite years.

FFS my post will probably be as incoherent as the current writing but here goes. There is a clearly something wrong when Ila big reveal lacks a shock factor or doesn’t make any sense. That is what today’s episode achieved. We all guessed Anthony fathered Zoe’s children when she clocked him at the Vic upon her return. There was also no other reason to keep him around? How did they get around us figuring it out? Zoe outrightly saying that he wasn’t the father plus neither of them acknowledging that they hooked up off screen after they’d left Walford. It’s just lazy. And why didn’t Zoe just say he’s the dad? What was she afraid of? He’s only acted like a creep in this return and only recently. Where is the danger of that reveal? Where is the drama? It’s proper damp Squib territory because no one cares. As for his wooden acting, I guess he always was a bit but it worked back in the early 2000s because it played well in the yin and yang relationship he had with fiery Kat. But now it’s plan embarrassing. As for Jasmine herself. I believe I called it before she was even on screen. But how did they try to fool us? Having her not at all interact with Zoe or even react to her or anything. Deliberately have her creepily asking questions about Cindy, wanting to live in Cindy’s room, break into the surgery after hearing that Cindy had an appointment. This is misdirection but it isn’t clever. It’s not that Jasmine seemed obsessed with Cindy, she actively went out of her way to find out as much as possible. Why was she desperate for a job in the Albert? Why did she want to live in Cindy’s house. I imagine this will all be forgotten now that we’re at the reveal. Again, she turns up at just the right time. When her mother put an advert out looking for a cat? How does she know Zoe is her mother? I guess we’ll find out tomorrow but I won’t hold my breath at this point. The problem is this story has been done better in the 80s with Kathy/Donna and in the 2000s with Ronnie/Danielle. This is a sloppy version and not engaging at all. Zoe and Anthony weren’t even characters worth bringing back for something like this. There are probably better characters to do this with. Maybe Mandy Salter has Ian’s child or something? I don’t know but the pieces haven’t even been there for us to try and put this together. We’ve dismissed most theories because they’re ridiculous and this is now a massive let down. And exactly what will happen and Christmas now? I dread to think.

A friend of mine was filming for Waterloo Road the other week, I imagine he’ll appear in the block after this one.

I love anything Arctic Monkeys to be honest. That debut album, we used to play it non stop in our sixth form common room. Those were the days.

That iconic Tragedy performance, this was the point where it was overtaking Heartbeat in everyone’s consciences. Always love the Corrs, adored So Young back that and was a little gutted it missed the top 5. Great to see that Stereophonics performance again last night too. The Power Of Goodbye is definitely one of my favourite ever Madonna songs. Don’t think I’ve heard Little Star though. The Boyzone song was utter crap, to think is scraped top 40 of the year! That was a good All Saints track though but it being the fifth single will be why it struggled.