Five Things We Learned From Corrie's Christmas

Thirty, not out.  Let's have a moment to wish a very Happy Birthday to the Street's original problem child, David Platt.  Other kids might have rebelled - I'm thinking of Tracy Barlow trying to seduce him out of the Flying Pickets, or Nicky Tilsley running off to Torquay for a few weeks in the sun - but nobody reached the truly Satanic levels of trouble the boy Platt did.  He's been in youth offenders', he's smashed up the Street, he tried to ruin his sister's wedding by attempting suicide, and he once pelted Gail with olives until she ended up cowering against her hob.  Frankly, you wouldn't have put money on him ever actually reaching thirty but here he is, on his second marriage, a family man with two kids and a giant rabbit.  Of course he's mellowed in recent years but he still has the capability to rob his grandmother or run around playgrounds staring at the local rough until they chase him and hopefully he'll be here for many more.  Although if I was Jack P Shepherd, the prospect of another ten years of wrangling The All-New Shona might have me looking for the get out clauses in my contract.

Let's also give a round of applause to Gail for enduring thirty years of David Platt.  She showed some welcome sass by giving his unwanted canoe gift to Nicky and replacing it with a soap on a rope.  Those kids don't deserve her. 

Put a Woman About The Street.  We've not had any confirmation that Paula Wilcox has been permanently added to the cast and frankly this is insane.  Sign her up immediately.  Since Geoff died Elaine has got stronger and sassier, as well as bonding with Tim and Faye, and we could do with a mature lady of her talents joining the show.  New full-time cast members this year have included Evil Todd and Sassy Daisy; let's have a character who's nice, a bit nervy, not constantly standing at the back of shot and smirking.  If nothing else Dame Paula's extensive CV points to a deft comic touch the show could use again and again.  You only have to look at the glee with which she revelled in Geoff's disappearance from existence to know what a star she'd be.

Curb your fantasies.  Do you know what the best soap opera in the history of television is?  Twin Peaks, the everyday story of a load of absolute weirdos in a small town in the Pacific Northwest.  I've been a massive fan of the show since it started and so I'm well used to the odd dose of completely out-of-nowhere insanity in my continuing drama.  There was an episode in the recent revival where it was reveal that a chopped off arm had evolved from its manifestation as a small dancing man into a waving stick tree with a foetus head and my only thought was "that makes sense", so I'm definitely not against surrealism or general insanity on principle.  But bringing Geoff back to life for a representation of Yasmeen's inner torment?  No thank you.  And the least said about Adam's spooky dream sequence the better.

Why not just rely on, I don't know, your talented cast to convey the panic and fear that the characters are feeling?  Why not let Shelly King act her way through a scene of increasing panic without some poor prop person having to nip on set to crayon red X's everywhere?  Why not trust the audience to understand that Yasmeen is still not okay without resorting to actor cameos and dramatic lighting and screeching music cues?  Yasmeen's path to recovery is going to be long and upsetting anyway without Geoff constantly lurching out of her nightmares like Freddie Krueger in a spangly waistcoat.

Incidentally kudos to the anonymous builders who apparently managed to restore every inch of number six's fire ravaged living room back to its previous condition so there's not a single sign of the inferno that swept through it a fortnight ago.  Get them to work on David's sinkhole, it'll be gone by New Year.

Drink and be merry.  Was this the first ever Corrie Christmas without a scene in the Rovers?  I couldn't decide if it was Tier 3 restrictions that stopped Jenny opening up or if she simply decided to bring a taste of the missing German markets to the Street with her gluhwein stall.  Although she wasn't doing it out of the kindness of her heart, and still managed to turn a tidy profit - well done her.  I did enjoy the Street's residents all turning up to celebrate in a line, queueing up politely two metres apart to relish in the festive atmosphere.  It ended up with a barney (no, not the rabbit) between Gary and Sarah-Lou, as so much of this show descends to these days, and I was very disappointed nobody ended up with a scalding hot glass of mulled liquid to the face.  It would've been a pleasing variation on the usual pint over the head.

Won't you come home Aggie Bailey?  In my recent piece about the year on Corrie here (still available to read here folks) I bemoaned the sidelining of the Baileys and wished they could show up for a storyline that didn't involve a teaching moment.  Well, clearly somebody at ITV heard me, because Aggie actually turned up in the Christmas show.  Admittedly this was so they didn't have to pay an extra because she seemed to be single-handedly running Wethy General's A&E but they did at least give her the gag of the hour when she asked "can everyone else see that six foot rabbit?"  

And then, when she got home, Ed turned up!  He had one line and they cut away from him pretty quick because more important characters were larking about with silly string across the road but still, nice to see you Edison.  Let's hope 2021 brings you a fun storyline or three and possibly the appearance of your elusive daughter Dee-Dee.

As he writes this the author is 50% vol-au-vent, 50% alcohol.  Please send vouchers for Gaviscon via Twitter to @merseytart.

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