There's a bit more detail to the storyline that we reported a few days ago about John Stape possibly committing suicide. The Mirror today is reporting that he will return to his ways as a kidnapper and will hold five people hostage while he contemplates their and his fate.The Mirror says that there will be foundation drilling at the factory and the body of Colin Fishwick is discovered! Locked in a cellar are Fiz, Chesney, Kirk and Charlotte's parents. The cellar is in the Hoyle's home.
In a nutshell: here's the first part of John's descent.
In addition: Joy Fishwick's death was pretty much the end of John's sanity and he crumbled and broke and was sectioned for a rest during which time Fiz got caught up in the whole Fishwick thing when Colin's mother left her son all her money. Fiz pretended to be Colin's wife and has used a bit of the money for things for baby Hope.
John is newly out of hospital and hasn't found out about the money yet but when he does, expect that to be the start of the slippery slope and when Colin's body is found, that will trigger his final breakdown.
The story is supposed to be "gripping" but I think it will be very sad to watch. I never liked Stape but the storyline has mostly been entertaining as he got himself in deeper and deeper. I doubt very much he will kill any of the hostages but apparently decides to kill himself. Whether he will succeed or just be sent away to a criminal psychiatric hospital is yet to be known. I do expect Graeme Hawley to excell in these scenes as he's done very well with Stape all along.
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26 comments:
This is just stupid. Why cant they leave John and Fiz alone to live a family life with baby Hope? The writers are like a dohg with a bone with this.
I agree - I think this sounds sad. I really enjoyed the Stapewick saga - thought it was great black comedy and was more than happy to go along for the ride, but I think they need to just leave it alone now. I DON'T want to see him or anyone else on Corrie commit suicide OR go into a maximum secure unit (despite what I might have blogged in the past!)- this hostage scenario is another ridiculous ratings-grabbing attempt and personally I don't like the sound of it at all. As you say though, I'm sure Graeme Hawley will put in a great performance as he has done all along. Oh dear though.
John probably wont hurt anyone, he will just be taking them all down there so that he can tell everyone the truth
If he is going to kill anybody it will be Charlottes parents. I doubt they will kill off any of the main characters. He might try and kill one (Fiz,Chesney,Kirk) but they will get sent to hospital and make a full recovery.
I think they have to do something. John has killed and cannot get away with it long term. It's more sad than stupid really, but he's the author of his own misfortune. He was so single minded and selfish. Had to do what he wanted to do regardless of anyone else. He got himself into this mess when he kidnapped Rosie and it's gone from there.
While I've never especially liked John, it has been entertaining to watch him end up in one mess after another, even if they were the result of his own actions. I was hoping they could find a way to keep him around for the long term. After all, if Tracy can get away with murder, why not?
I know it's a different storyline, but this feels a bit similar to Tony taking hostages in the factory last year. Just seems unoriginal to me. Still, I'm glad this silly Stape storyline looks to be wrapping up soon. Corrie were never going to let him stay around, he did hammer Charlotte to death after all.
I'm really miffed that he's being written out, I like John Stape.
He didn't actually kill Fishwick and he didn't "hammer Charlotte to death" - that sounds like he was on a mental frenzy. It was one panic-striken blow that didn't actually kill her. If anything, he's guilty of ABH, although the fact that they turned her machine off would bring it to manslaughter I would think.
So he could have got his come-uppance by way of a short jail term (killers literally get away with murder these days) and THEN he could've lived happily ever after with Fiz & the baby.
I will miss him, it's a bad move to get rid of him permanently.
Oh and PS - if they are happy to let Tracy Barlow swan around, even though she deliberately killed someone, I can't see why they couldn't have found a way to leave John Stape alone.
Oh another crash, bang, wallop story - no more kitchen sink story lines in Corrie anymore. Why couldn't they have just let it be. Whilst I don't condone murder, course I don’t, Stape’s a bumbling idiot that played all this as the farce it was written. From wheeling Colin Fishwick, round in a wheelie bin to eating Christmas dinner to with Charlotte’s parents, and all the ridiculousness in between we were meant to see the black comedy in it all. To go and hold people hostage (again – Mr Collinson love, it’s been done before) and then get him go and commit suicide is too much and I for one will seriously not watch this story!!
The 50th was special and was marked with a remarkable and memorable week. But time once and for all to get back to basics, Corrie has been off course for a while now and we’ve moaned and whinged. The minute I think, "aye up, this looks a bit more like it", it seems like a fluke. The Jim and Liz story is dire and now I can’t wait to see the back of her, when I only a couple of weeks ago I thought it was great to have her back. And the sooner Jim is back in the big house with the way things are the better. If Gail speaks any quieter I’ll have to get a lady in the corner of the screen with sign language and Rita..... flaming heck.... what the .... The get up she had on the other night was one thing, her hat squashed her down so much she looked like she was walking on her knees. Fat Brenda’s description of her as a Yoda a few weeks ago was spot on, giving out pompous advice to Xin and Grahame – it was the first time in the whole ridiculous story that I was actually on their side. How is Tina going to feel when this whole charade will come out? Cheryl grinds so much, she is so unlikeable, I’m going to have to take Prozac before she’s on and Maria is so far past her sell by date as a character that only in Corrie can you have a career so diverse from being a kennel maid to a hairdresser to running a factory only having been there all of five minutes. I love Audrey, she’s a laugh.... but oh, I so seriously want Gail to be right this time about the salon, another first in my book. And anyone else see Mark’s “Marcia” and Audrey look very similar??? How I long for the simple days of Hilda’s murial and the laugh of Jack’s Vince St Clair.
It all seems too much. Too PC, too shouty, shouty, manic and OTT. Not that I watch it anymore (for these kind of reasons) but it’s beginning to make EE look sedate.
Sorry to go on folks, (and yikes there is more even than that) I had to get it off me chest... will sleep better tonight now..... lol :)
Well said Beth, what a wonderful rant :-)
Agree with Beth also. The re-use of these "sensational" plotlines is getting so predictable that putting the cat out is more interesting than these "special" episodes of Corrie nowadays.
Sorry, but Stape cannot be permitted to break the unbreakable first law of all soap - NOBODY gets away with murder.
I agree, Billy. But i'm kind of suspecting the suicide won't actually happen or won't succeed. They don't like to do that.
Beth, that was an outstanding rant! :-D
And Tracy has gotten away with murder. She shouldn't be out, but she is.
~JB in Canada
Beth
You took the words right out of my fishy mouth.
Come one, writers.
More kitchen sink and less slash and burn.
More humour and less "dark side". More maturity and less yoof obsession.
But we are whistling into the wind, Beth.
If I recall correctly, then Ken Barlow was attempting suicide when Bet Lynch walked in and dissuaded him. The real suicide rate increased and there was an outcry. If it's true that John Stape is going to kill himself then that's a very bad move.
Also, I agree with Beth's rant, although the Corrie Producers will not be listening. They are slowly killing the goose that lays the golden eggs. Corrie weddings used to be an event, a place where the characters had a laugh or a feud. Now every one comes with an absurd OTT story - Peter revealing Lianne's adultery at the altar, Gail attempting to buy off Kylie... zzzzz. Down this path, there will have to be more and more sensation, until the street is populated with mass murderers, child abusers and rapists like some latter day Gomorrah.
Fantastic rant Beth! Keep it up! You should really have a blog of your own...
Now that you've said everything I've wanted to say... I can sleep better...:-).
I've always liked John Stape, the character and the excellent actor who portrays him. He's done his time, paid for his crimes... and these latest deaths were not entirely his doing -- I'd like to see him get away with it... how, I'm not sure... maybe a lifelong need for regular therapy sessions... but I'd like to see a family life of some sort grow out of Fiz-Stape coupledom...
Meanwhile, Dozy Webster, who let's not forget started the whole drawn-out saga by setting her sights on John, not because she fancied him but purely for a laugh, is still swanning around Weatherfield totally oblivious to the trail of devastation and destruction she has caused. Hang the bitch, I say!
And what about David, who by deliberately hiding Gail's husband's pills, started him on his slippery slope. Soap characters may not get away with murder, but by God they often get away with far worse.
Dozy also instigated the horrible LiaMariaCarlaTony saga, by videoing Carla and Liam in a clinch (as the tabloids would call it) and kicking off Tony's murderous rage. Four lives ruined -- five if you count the baby and I guess six if you count Tony's jailbreak buddy who he shot.
Another thing that occurred to me about Stape is, whenever someone is in hospital (Weatherfield General or whatever) there's usually a dramatic bedside scene, with tubes everywhere - I'd like to have seen Fiz, Chesney etc. visiting John in the Psych. ward. Just because it's a psych. ward doesn't mean people can't have visitors.
Yes Seapenguin, good point. Psych wards don't have to mean people shuffling round in their pj's dribbling in their cornflakes or having to be tied down in strait jackets! This was a very wasted opportunity to deal with a sensitive and believe it or not a very much more common 'every day' subject than we realise. The John Stape saga was a black comedy, too stupid to believe. Now the edges are so blurred, I don’t know what it’s meant to be. The way Julie and Sean or even Fiz and Chesney speak of it is even mocking. Julie speaks to John though he's a child. I think it's meant to be 'funny' - I don't find it so myself.
I myself suffer badly with depression, not that John suffers with depression, he's a murderer that brought on stress with a guilty conscience . Not that the others know that he is a murderer, they have made him out to be "odd", "different" because he was hospitalized for depression. So it's hardly a good effort or example on their part from a soap is it to tackle sensitive issues like this? The story is now being pushed further to reap in more viewers with another big siege, hostages and then suicide, .... and hopefully a longed for much needed award....
But, again tackling depression PROPERLY, it's not in Mr Collinson's PC agenda is it? (I dislike him so much these days, I'd blame him for the weather )
What I'm astonished by is that John has not 'fessed up to what he's done during therapy sessions. He was teetering on the edge of speaking out when they sectioned him. Surely therapy is all about talking issues through and that means dealing with his guilt issues. A competant therapist would surely have got the truth out of him. Are we to assume that his current sunny disposition is the result merely of the the medication?
I agree with you Beth & Cobblestone. There's been a sniggery, mocking kind of flavour to much of the dialogue around Stape/medication/"letting him out". I thought they were going to handle this properly - they haven't.
Stape did deliberately kill Fishwick's mother with a pillow to her face. I agree about the law of soaps for murderers. Some of his evil deeds were just short of that, but these days the soap laws say they can take fooreeeever to resolve the comeuppance. This has been building up for so long.
I seriously doubt they'll write in a suicide. Not good ever, but especially now with all the cuts to social services in the UK.
As for the hostage scene - I can just see his pasty white smiley face as he politely asks them to sit down. Rarely does Stape express raging anger. He boils under the skin, then reacts like a psychopath. Yep, another hostage storyline - too soon.
As much as this type of thing mimics EE, I've been watching the "other soap" now that it's back in Canada, and I have to say - does anyone - ever - smile on that show? Corrie at its most dire always has normalcy surrounding the stunt storylines.
That's my feelings exactly, Maggie. I don't think John will do it or will survive the attempt. It's rare on Corrie that someone succeeds intentionally though it does happen. However, with John suffering a breakdown and not really recovered yet, it might actually happen as he cracks again.
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