Show, don't tell. Tim finally, finally, realised that his dad was a wrong 'un this week, and it was wonderful to see. Partly because if he hadn't realised soon I was going to pay for a skywriter to fill the skies over Weatherfield with "WAKE UP TIM". Partly because it meant that Joe Duttine turned in a marvellous performance as he wrestled with the knowledge that Geoff was, in fact, awful, and everything about his life may have been a lie. This blog could've just been a series of screen grabs of Joe's face as he allowed confusion and regret and horror and sadness to wash over it - to whit:
Whoops, sorry about that, uploaded a picture from the wrong folder at the end there.
Geoff's downfall coming from a video on his laptop was very satisfying - I think we all realised it would come back to haunt him when he made it - but the fact that Faye couldn't get any CCTV footage underlines how weird and pointless that whole subplot was. Hopefully now he's been found out Geoff will vanish off into the distance and never be seen again and we can put this whole miserable affair behind us.
Kill your darlings. Of course the reason Nicky was at the hospital in the first place was Oliver had suffered another fit - offscreen, of course, because they can't have any children on set. I bet the producers are wishing they didn't keep getting characters pregnant now. The high point of this was a plot about Lily running away where they didn't actually show her at any time - in a way you have to admire the gall of the producers. Perhaps all the children are upstairs listening to their tapes. I'm assuming this dearth of child actors is why Oliver's suddenly got a lot worse. They must've been glad to be able to write one of the kids out; don't be surprised if Jack is suddenly spirited away to a Paralympian training camp in Dorset while Hope and Ruby get their letters from Hogwarts and vanish off to boarding school. Between Toyah fostering a child and Nicky suddenly acquiring a son, it's becoming increasingly obvious that they're going to send Leanne doolally when Oliver finally dies, surrounding her with moppets until she finally caves to the inevitable and kidnaps one of them. It's five years since Jenny Bradley went mad with grief and kidnapped a child so I suppose we're due another run of it.
Look how relaxed they are! You can see all the way to Australia through the lawn, and they could've all plummeted to their death, but sure, just wander inside and yap about parakeets. Even David seemed more grumpy than distraught that his home was literally falling to pieces about his ears. That must've been some really strong stuff they all ingested; the comedown will be a nightmare.
Of course a mildly diverting sinkhole plotline was immediately ruined when they revealed that Ray was behind it all, for some reason. The logistics of this were truly baffling - has he been secretly pumping water under the garden of number eight for months? Where's the real man from the water board? - as was the reasoning. Presumably he wants to own all the houses so he can build another of his "five star" hotels.
Talk to yourself. Weirdly, for a show about a community and the way people interact, this week's Corrie contained a fair few monolgues. There was Cathy, practicing her part as a woman in love with a cyborg called Kurt as part of Brian's new theatrical piece. It sounds dreadful, and so I naturally demand that we get to see the entire production being performed at the Palace Theatre.
Then there was Dev behind the counter at the kebab shop, forced to juggle a load of mistaken orders and deal with chicken-loving customers called Hutch and Peck. Although technically that one wasn't a monologue since it also included a second character in the form of Dev's Beard.
This blog post was written from underneath a giant lacy parasol. Pictures can be seen on Twitter @merseytart.
