Five Things We Learned In Corrie This Week

I see dead people.  Back when I wrote a rundown of 2020 in Corrie, I suggested the rest of the Street were really, really racist, because none of them seemed to want to go anywhere near the Baileys.  They exist as an island, separate from the rest of Weatherfield, only ever talking to one another.  But now, as they endure their latest crisis, I'm starting to wonder if it's worse than that: maybe everyone else in Coronation Street just can't see them.  Maybe they're ghosts who think they're people, floating around having all their traumas, not knowing that number 3 collapsed due to Ed's bad building shortly after they moved in.  The rest of the street is looking at a gap in the terrace with a bench in it while the Bailey family wonders why nobody visits.  Maybe Aggie's already crossed over and that's why she only ever appears on screens now with a blinding white light behind her.  It'd certainly explain how Michael managed to become a new father and nobody seemed bothered.  In the old days, they'd have barely cut the cord before Emily Bishop was nipping round with a pair of bootees and Annie was giving the dad drinks on the house.  Nobody else in the Street has even mentioned the baby, probably because Glory actually looks like Casper the Friendly Ghost.  

It'd also explain why Asha, when pressed to name a Weatherfield County player who wasn't Tommy Orpington, couldn't come up with the footballer who lives two doors down from her.  Mind you, I think everyone's forgotten James exists, even the writers; there was a moment in Wednesday's episode when he let himself in the house...

...suggested that Michael's doubtful paternity was an issue that would "blow over in a month" and wow, that's very sensitive of you James...

...then he walked back out the door again.  And that was it for him for another week.  David the dog has had a bigger role in the show and he hasn't been onscreen for a year, but at least people talk about him.  James is the most ethereal of the whole family, and is in serious danger of simply floating off into the distance.

Relaaaaaax.  I need to know this lady's story.  She really wants a brew and a bun and she's decided the absolute best place would be a table placed in the middle of the road.  There are cars either side of her honking their horns, revving their engines, belching exhaust fumes in her face, Seb and Nina are having a flat out row beside her, and she's just checking her e-mails and playing Candy Crush.  "Yep, this all seems perfectly normal.  Can I have another cuppa?"

Seb and Nina's arguing naturally overflowed into simmering sexual tension, because that's how soap operas work.  He shared the heartbreaking story of how the big bullies at the building site called him Rapunzel because of his hair and Nina told him to stand up for himself and be whoever he wanted to be.  No, Nina, the bullies are right, Seb's hair is awful and needs to be cut immediately.  They also bonded over their mutual love of Cradle of Filth's Byronic Man.  I now want these two to get married because I'd love to hear that played on prime time ITV for their first dance.

End the Pride parade.  Look, I'm not homophobic - some of my best boyfriends have been gay - but I'm going to say it; there needs to be less homosexuality on the Street.  I am so beyond bored with the Todd/Billy/Paul love triangle, especially as Billy seems to change his mind about who he fancies literally from hour to hour.  I can't be with you Todd, you're too manipulative!  I love Paul!  I can't be with you Paul, you're too manipulative!  I love Todd!  How about you instead devote yourself to your daughter and your faith and you parishioners for a while and stop trying to get some penis 24/7?  

Even Todd seems to have changed his mind about all this, pulling a regretful face as he closed the curtains before a night of red hot passion that I'm sure Billy shouldn't have rushed into.  It was a bit unrealistic, as we all know that in reality the minute Todd spotted Paul in the Street he would be very much more like Jill from Friends.  

Paul has finally joined the dots and realised that Todd may not be a nice bloke after all.  Well done Sherlock; with brilliant analytical skills like that you should probably join Weatherfield Police.  You can't be any worse than Craig.

And I just need to take a moment to rant again: Todd's tram wasn't due in three minutes, it wasn't timetabled or scheduled, trams are not trains.  You go on the platform and within ten minutes or so a tram turns up.  That's how metro systems work.  Can somebody on the writing staff please use public transport at some point?

Sharing is caring.  With a prison sentence hanging over her head Sally and Abi took Faye out to talk to her about being in prison.  Sadly it was lots of sensible advice and not that thing about punching the biggest thug on the wing on your first day to let everyone know who's boss.  I'd have loved Abi to have demonstrated how to make a shiv out of a toothbrush while Sally explained how to conceal drugs in your bodily cavities so the screws didn't find it.  Faye didn't seem impressed with their words of wisdom, but maybe she needed to hear advice from someone else.  Perhaps Yasmeen could have a word.  Or Gail.  Or Tracy.  Or Maria.  Or Izzy.  Or Peter or Steve or Kevin or Paul or heck, even Ken spent a week in the cells back in the Sixties.  You could probably form an entire prison support group just out of the residents.  At the very least, if Faye is imprisoned, it might mean Gary is finally released; he seems to be getting a longer sentence for perverting the course of justice than Tracy got for murder.

Obsessions are irrational.  I'm not saying that Natasha's handsome witty surgeon who had to run off to perform a life-saving miracle was completely fictional.  I'm just saying that she was apparently having a romantic dinner with him at about three in the afternoon, which is very odd indeed.  Natasha did of course become obsessed with Nicky once before - God knows why because he's so boring he could be used to dig tunnels for HS2 - and now she's given him her spare room her obsession will probably only increase.  I hope Sam hasn't got a pet rabbit.

There is a solution to all this, of course, which nobody seems to have thought about.  When Leanne explained that she'd moved on and they were no longer a couple I really wanted Nicky to reply "Fair enough.  So when are you moving out?"  Paying the rent while Leanne got her head together after the loss of Oliver is a very generous act.  Paying the rent so Leanne can use it as a filthy love nest with her new boyfriend?  Stuff that for a game of soldiers.

The author was fascinated to see Maria present herself as paragon of sexual virtue and innocence to Alina as she disapproved of her having feelings for a man in a relationship.  This is totally in character.  Follow me on Twitter @merseytart for other totally realistic character developments, such as Evelyn becoming a topless dancer, Rita going teetotal, and Sean saying something that didn't make you want to push him out of a moving vehicle.

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