It's all about the money, money, money tonight as Kev has drawn down some cash from the garage to pay for Sophie's medical bills (Eh? Did I miss something? When did Sophie hurt herself? Why didn't she take out travel insurance?). Tyrone comes up with the idea of car valeting but Kev's not interested, more bothered about having a go at Tyrone for "dipping into the petty cash last year for a kid that's not even yours", which leads to Tyrone throwing down the garage keys in disgust. Phelan is still after Andy to pay his debt so Andy steals a bag from the garage in order to get the new pick up truck.
Dev is also after money, namely the £14K that Sharif took. Zeedan doesn't have it, so Rana suggests that she and Zee help out at the gym in Gary's absence (the recipient of said fourteen grand (Alya) doesn't seem to have made any money from the "vintage" range to help pay back the debt). In his other business, Dev's profits are up 12% (no, not the same as fractions) and he gives Chesney and Gemma a free can of Lilt (each) to celebrate.
Beth's off visiting her mum, who has fallen over, although fortunately she had been shoplifting so the stolen items broke her fall. It's Beth and Kirk's wedding anniversary/date she committed bigamy, so Sinead suggests a night on the town, but Chesney is not impressed with the idea of "going mad in a tiki tiki bar" and swaps shifts with Gemma to get out of it, which climaxes in a kebab shop row with Sinead in which he calls her "embarrassing" and gets a faceful of ketchup for his trouble, whilst she gets an admiring glance from Daniel. I wonder when Sinead is going to Do A Katie Armstrong? Chesney, on the other hand, needs to Do A Kirk and go out with an older woman, one who likes staying in and knitting. And kebabs.
The main story of the night is the baby shower, which features (in no particular order), Robert in his country gent outfit confessing his love for Michelle, a baby stripper, baby bottle cocktails (but no eating chocolate out of a nappy, thankfully), much bitching between Toyah and Eva,which culminates in the revelation that Eva knows about Peter and our Toyah. In the ladies, Eva rhetorically asks: "You do know she won't forgive you" - I seem to remember Eva forgave Leanne for reigniting her relationship with Nick just after Eva'd been dumped by him.
Who are you backing in an Eve/Toyah slap-fight, readers? Eva's got the height but Toyah's got the Battersby genes. Eva's also got low cunning - after finding out that the Barlow Bros. claim on the factory could mean curtains for knickers, she uses the info to blackmail Peter. Drop the suit else she'll tell Leanne about his relationship with her sister.
And of course the most momentous event of the ep is not Gemma's big pants but that Michelle feels that something is wrong with the baby and is admitted to hospital after having lost some amniotic fluid. Everything's OK - but for how long?
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20 comments:
I'm having a hard time believing most of the storylines right now. Firstly Sophie is over 18, therefore an adult and her father is not responsible for her debts, a hospital in the US, by law, must treat everybody regardless of insurance and if she had an emergency appendectomy then it would have cost a heck of lot more than a measly 14,000. rather more like $140,000.us. So having to dip into the tax acc't at the garage just doesn't wash.
Also it is hard to believe that Yasmeen & Sharif only managed to put aside $30,000. with them both working and then retiring. $14,000. taken from the gym may have been a quick was to get the money, but surely there would have been other personal savings along the way, even if he did put down a deposit on the flat for his lady friend and they just had the house redone. I doubt they would have emptied out their savings just to build an orangery and other redos in the house.
I just realized that both debts - the garage and the gym are 14,000. Isn't that remarkable.
After the way Kevin had a go at him,I wished Tyrone reminded Kevin how he used the garage funds to book hotels for him and Tyrone's wife Molly!
I also agree with comments about Sophie,why didn't she take travel insurance and why isn't Sally her mother helping to pay the bill?
I completely agree. Sophie's debts are her problem at that age. Kevin and Sally could help her out but risking financial disaster like Kevin is doing? No.
I also don't understand how the money Sharif took is the last they had. Originally, Sharif was portrayed as so well off that I think Kal needed money from him to open the gym. He and Yasmeen came to Corrie to bring the family together, not because they were in dire need. So, where's the money from the other businesses that were hinted at, where are their retirement funds? No one stops working with only 30 thousand pounds in savings. Besides, the money for Sharif's mistress' flat was only a down payment, if that was all he had, what was he planning to use to pay for the rest of it when it was completed?
If money was so tight wouldn't he assume Yasmeen would notice mortgage payments?
Hello!! Really? Reality check required here. "No one retires with less than 30K in savings". I wish. Some people really don't have that luxury. Also, yes, Sophie is responsible for her own debt. Yes, she should've had insurance, but she didn't and as a parent to an adult child myself, if my son needed money in that situation, I would do my utmost to help him, as I'm sure any loving parent would. I'm not au fait with American healthcare. What would the hospital do if Sophie couldn't pay at all? Ask her to borrow it of friends and family, maybe
I thought the ugliest bit was Kevin referring to Hope as "a kid that's not even yours." Is that just nasty dialogue, a reflection on Kevin's character, or an unpleasant reminder of how Tyrone threw off responsibility for Jack when he found out Jack "wasnt even his." At some point, doesn't the rap sheet on past stuff get too great? Bygones can't always be bygone.
It's been a while since I've been to a baby shower but drinking games and strippers? Really??? My favorite bit last night was Steve acting like an adult. It's rare but so good when it happens. And no, I'm not in favor of Daniel and Sinead. Even something as basic as movie night will be the clash of RomComs vs German Art Films. Better then the dull as dust pairing with Chesney but still not good.
I thought I'd drifted into .'the only way is Essex' in that baby shower, stripper, baby bottles, talk of chocolate nappies! what a load of rubbish!
And Michelle and Robert, 'do you have feelings for me?' How old are they? Fourteen?!!!
Who's writing this garbage, it's getting rediculous.
Plenty of foreign nationals rack up healthcare debts in Canada. There's little to be done about it except to impact their immigration status, preventing them from entering the country again until the debt it paid. However, the US government might have a policy whereby Sophie stays in some detention centre until the debt is paid and/or she's deported? The fundamental difference in our legal systems/human rights guarantees is that Canada's is based on the preservation of human dignity, while the US is based on the preservation of liberty... or at least it's supposed to be.
All right then, some people retire on next to nothing, but, no one who is in good health as the older Nazirs are would retire with only 30 thousand in savings.Even if their first careers were over, they'd embark on new ones.
Besides, by buying his mistress a flat Sharif was certainly not acting like someone spending his last savings. This is just something the writers putting new elememts into the script while ignoring what was said and implied about characters in the past.
The hospital would put Sophie's debt in the hands of a debt collector. Since she doesn't seem to have much of anything to seize, it would force her to declare bankruptcy so that they could declare the debt as a loss in the books and have a tax write off. Bankruptcy is quite unpleasant and forces you to rebuild your credit from scratch but at Sophie's age, she must just be starting out with that anyways. For example,in the near future her mother or father would have to cosign any application for a car loan, etc. since her credit rating would be dismal. Not fun, but certainly a better and, considering she's the one who didn't get insurance, fairer option than risking that her father's business or his credit rating be affected, since he needs that to be pristine right now, not someday.
I doubt you can be detained over a debt:prison costs money and imagine all the sick people the US would get stuck with.
Uninsured Canadians regularly rack up huge medical debts from American hospitals that our government refuses to cover and they come back home free.
Now, whether or not they can enter the US again until they settle the debt one way or the other, is what never gets discussed.
Is £14,000 some kind of magic debt amount tossed around by the soap opera writers? Eastenders also has someone owing the same amount... the writers must be peeking at each other's story drafts out of sheer desperation. I agree the storylines are total rubbish... really fragile plotlines with holes as big as tunnels...
Have been watching while vacuuming ... and still dissatisfied... may have to stop watching for a while again...
We could try to analyse why Sophie didn't have insurance, or how the system works in the USA if you hurt yourself, but it just boils down to the script writers wanting a debt for Kev, to give him a motive for burning down the garage. Reality doesn't seem to come into it, and that can apply to so many plots these days.
I really don't know why the ptb think that dying babies will boost ratings. Without having to think too much, in recent years there has been Katie McDonald, Paul Connor jr, Billy Grimshaw, Jake Webster and Shannon. Plus numerous miscarriages. Just wrong in my opinion.
You have to have the ability to suspend your disbelief with 'soap' otherwise it becomes unwatchable . For example the notion that the Corrie houses have soooo many bedrooms for all the folk staying there is very irritating ( currently the Barlows , Devs and Eileen all having there share of over crowding) . Even if you imagine they are using the front room as an extra bedroom , that doesn't count for Devs open plan house . So one bedroom for him and his current squeeze , the two children in another - surely too old to share now ? And Mary in a third - plus a bathroom . Ridiculous ! Don't tie yourselves up in the details - just enjoy it for what it is !
Here here! I'm getting the same feeling of so many people taking the situations so seriously. E.g. How can you retire on less than 30K a year? When I'm watching, I don't think about things like that. For me it's light escapism after a day at work. Live and let live
"Escapism" is exactly the point. Most people watch tv drama for the escapism, but lately all we have is misery on the cobbles. I guess the only escapism we can get right now is "better them than me" How entertaining - NOT!!!!!
PS as a footnote US hospitals don't hold you hostage until a debt is paid - most of the time they just right it off with no chance of collecting, that's why the costs upfront with no insurance are so high.
I'm all for suspending disbelief but I'd like the writers to figure out what it is they want us to believe and stick to it.
I accept the elastic walls that explain overcrowding because it just exists.
But, after having Sophie walking around for the last year like a practical girl and always being the sensible one: why is she uninsured? That's a Rosie kind of thing. Kevin could have a debt by more realustic means like damaging a priceless car somehow, if that was necessary.
The Nazirs arrived on the street looking at least middle class and now 30 thousand pounds is their financial undoing? If so they should have been shown as struggling at an earlier point. You'd still have to suspend disbelief that a couple of presentable and intelligent adults couldn't figure out their finances, but it wouldn't be a sudden twist the writers toss at us. The affair was already a bit of a stretch.
If the audience is meant to just accept everything why do soaps bother with continuity at all? Why establish characters in our mind and then have them act out of character for no good reason?
The last year has been really dark; Callum killed and under the annex, Kylie murdered in broad daylight, Phelan turning up with his scheme, Jenny returning obviously still unstable, no Emily, Anna getting burned,and the list goes on.
I agree that it feels like gawking at an accident and being relieved you're not involved. These people can't catch a break.
Kevin gave Sophie 21% of the garage when she turned 21, if I remember correctly (this is what prompted her to start changing her wardrobe and clomping around with a clipboard). I wonder if anyone will remember that particular asset?!
Did he now? Then it really was up to Sophie to pay her debt. All she had to do was borrow against that asset and slowly pay the loan back.
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