Cosy crimes and gritty sagas by Corrie Blog editor Glenda, published by Headline. Click pic below!

Tuesday 30 November 2021

Spoilers for next week's Coronation Street, December 6 - 10, 2021

Here are the major storylines for the week ahead on Coronation Street, all wrapped up nicely in 50 words or less.

Monday 6 to Friday 10 December


Phill's sparkle begins to dim for Fiz, Max casts shade on Daniel, Paul vows to get the truth from Summer, Yasmeen's suspicions are ignited, Hashim has a change of heart, Amy falls on her sword for Emma, Max is in self destruct mode and Curtis spins his web of lies.
 
See the full week's preview with pictures at Corrie.net 

Note: If you still see last week's previews when you click through to Corrie.net, please refresh your browser.

Glenda Young
Twitter: @Flaming_Nora
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Paddy Bever interview: Max, the new Corrie rebel


When we get to the day of the ice ball, what is it that is making Max suspicious of Daniel’s intentions towards Summer?

Max is filming and he sees Daniel put something in her backpack. Summer hasn’t been eating properly, Daniel’s concerned because of her diabetes and puts a bar in her bag. Max sees him to do that and when he looks through Summer’s bag, which is of course an invasion of her privacy, he also finds the poem which Daniel has written for Summer’s application and takes it the wrong way. Max is really concerned about it because he’s become very protective of Summer, she represents something really positive in his life, at the moment she’s the only person giving him that sort of positive attention. He’s not only very protective of her as an individual but also of what she represents in his life.

Do you think he has got a bit of a crush on her?

I think he has a huge crush on her which has developed because she’s the only person who’s giving him the time of day at the moment, everyone else is quite dismissive of him. His crush is developing on Summer because she believes in him, she sees good in him whereas everyone else just sees a naughty little boy. He sees Summer as this positive female role model and having lost his mum that’s huge and another reason why he’s so protective of this relationship.

Summer is very wholesome and quite pure in Max’s eyes, is this why the thought of what might be happening with Daniel angers Max so much?

He sees Summer as this whiter than white, special person so in Max’s mind for Daniel to be taking advantage of her and taking her away from him is so hurtful. He’s so much older than her and so pure in Max’s mind that even Daniel having conversations with Summer gets to him.

How does Max feel after jumping to the conclusion that Daniel is taking advantage of Summer?

As we’ve seen already this year Max has a lot of misdirected anger due to what’s happened in his life. He tends to act very quickly without thinking and because it’s Daniel, who he’s not shied away from conflict with before, this influences Max’s reaction. There is jealousy there but he’s so frustrated that Summer doesn’t see him like that, why Daniel who’s so much older. Because Max sees the best in Summer he would never assume that it’s her who has feelings for Daniel, he just presumes that she’s being taken advantage of, when the viewer in fact knows that it’s Summer who has the crush and it’s not reciprocated. 

Max already has very little respect for Daniel, does his problem with seeing him as a figure of authority influence his reaction?

Max is very rebellious, he has a lot of frustration in his life, every time someone in authority tries to tell him what to do his instinct is to lash out at them. He’s also incredibly stubborn in his reaction towards school after the incident. When Summer tells him to stay away from her, that's soul destroying for Max and he then feels like he’s got nothing to lose. He’s lost Summer and he’s not at all bothered what happens with school. He’s never been excited about school, possibly because he’s struggled with his ADHD and Daniel just represents that figure of authority that Max hates and he lashes out at that. It’s the same with Mrs Crawshaw, she represents the authority that Max hates.

Max has had a really difficult upbringing, do you think he's still struggling with his family set up?

For most of his life Max hasn’t had a stable family, he’s been moved around, he’s suffered the death of two parents, he’s had David come into the picture and then Shona after he lost his mum and that’s confusing for any child. It’s not been easy for Max and I think that’s where this misdirected anger comes from. Anyone in his situation is going to have a lot of frustration and anger and find it hard to process things.

Is that something that drew you to this role, that Max isn’t just your average teenager?

He’s far more complex than your average teenager and that was something that was exciting when I looked at playing him. People say to me ‘he’s a naughty boy Max’ but I think anyone in his situation would be, he’s had a really tough start to his life and there’s a lot of frustration there.

So how happy were you to get the role?

I wish I had a really exciting story to tell of where I was when I got the call but I was just sat in my room on my own. I remember thinking about how different my life was going to be and I just couldn’t believe it. To be part of something that’s so much older than me and to be from Manchester myself is so exciting because it’s iconic, you think of Manchester you think of Oasis, Manchester United, Manchester City and Coronation Street.

What have you done previously, where did you train?

This is my first acting job which is crazy but I have been into acting for literally as long as I can remember. I used to do little shows for my family, when I started school I did school plays, I started at a local drama class when I was 7, I went on to join a local theatre, then when I was 14 I joined Manchester School of Acting which is one of the best things I’ve ever done. They’re so good and I still go there now. It was there where I got picked up by my agent in March of this year and started doing auditions and self tapes. I got asked to tape for Coronation Street, I had an A-level the next day so I made the decision not to revise for the A-level and focus on the tape. I then didn’t hear anything for a month so I presumed I hadn’t got it and then I got called for a screen test which was so exciting. I was so nervous but when I got there it just struck me that everyone was so lovely. I did my screen test with Jack Shepherd then a week later I found out I’d got the role which was amazing. I also somehow got an A in the A-level I didn’t revise for so it all worked out ok in the end!

Are you enjoying working on the show?

Everyone has been so lovely, it’s such a great environment, it became so easy for this to be my first job because everyone has been so welcoming. I’ve been working a lot with Jack and Julia, Helen, Sue, Rob and Harriet and everyone has been so friendly. It’s amazing to be working at a place in your first job where you don’t feel intimidated by all these fantastic actors just totally welcomed in.

How does it feel to be a Platt?

It’s amazing because the family dates back to before I was even born, to be part of such an established family instantly makes you feel like you’re part of the history of the show.

How has it felt taking over from Harry who used to play the role of Max?

When you’re taking over a role you really hope you can do it justice for that person as well, in the way that they’ve done the character justice previously. It’s really important to me and I really hope that I can do Harry justice.

What can we expect from Max in the coming months? Is he going to calm down or is this just the start of his turmoil? 

Unfortunately we’re not going to see him calm down, we’re going to see his confusion and his frustration at life, I think we’re going to see more of his trauma coming out. There’ll be more of him lashing out at people until I think people understand what he’s going through. There are moments where he’ll have some reconciliations but for the most part I think he’s going to rebel.

Glenda Young
Twitter: @Flaming_Nora
Fancy writing a guest blog post for us? All details here!  
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Monday 29 November 2021

Coronation Street Episode Review Monday 29th November

 
Zee hides some pre-laundered cash in the Speed Daalmobile, which Ryan takes and confronts Zeedan with it. I suppose he had to be found out eventually and it had to be dopey Ryan who did the finding (Ryan#2 would have blackmailed Zeedan and Ryan#1 would have written a song about it). Zeedan 'fesses up but threatens Ryan, saying he'll give Hashim his name if he interferes. "This is the stupidest plan I've ever heard," says Ryan - and he was involved in that Dr Ali/gangster plot. Alya discovers them, because of course she does, but Ryan keeps schtum - for about 5 mins and then tells all. She confronts Zeedan, who tells her to butt out, but of course she doesn't. I know Zee thinks he is the patriarch of the family, but he has met his sister, hasn't he? She doesn't butt out of anything. She challenges Hashim, who seems a bit more interested in his walking football game, than dealing with Alya.
 

Well we all suspect Curtis by now, don't we? I thought the storyline was gonna be that Tracy accuses him of just being after Oliver's fund, but in the end he turns out to be kosher, but now I'm wondering if he has Munchausen's (which I believe has not been done before on the cobbles). It seems an awful long con if he has been planning to get money by going out with Emma for the past 6 months. Anyway, they chat about their upcoming nuptials and Emma wants to invite Curtis famille, but Curtis is not keen, making up some lies about his dad being dead and him not getting on with the rest of them, and also his friends all go to different schools, she wouldn't know them. Emma says she's going to invite them anyway.

Am I in a  minority of one of loving Double D, Daisy and Daniel? He has softened her, she has toughened him up a bit - he's not the same with her as he was with Bethany or Naughty Nicky the cardigan-wearing sex-worker. He's even stopped banging on about Sinead all the time. So it's a shame that he calls her a self obsessed clothes-horse and they bicker about who is the worst. The hunky footballer turns up at the pub, which Jenny then tells a jealous Daniel about. They split up again, for reals this time, as Danny-boy discovers that she originally wanted to go out with him because of the house his mum mysteriously gave him, which he hasn't mentioned since. But I guess they had to split up in order to facilitate the next part of the storyline with Summer.

] don't think the writers know what to do with Grace. First of all she was the wronged woman, then the slightly bonkers love interest for Michael, then the twist of being the unhinged child-snatcher, then jailbird, then Michael's girlfriend again, now she is just....a terrible bitch? She wanted a child so much she was prepared to kidnap one (as every woman on Corrie has to do at some point) but now she's leaving her natural born baby at home to go out on the lash? Just because Michael didn't want to marry her?? Anyway, whilst Gemma and Chesney take Aled to the hospital for his cochlear implant operation, Bernie takes delivery of the sofa that Aggie bought for Grace, which Aggie finds out about because it's a pretty small street. Should've ebayed it, Gracie!

In Kelly news, Gangsta Gazza and Eco-Maria offer her a job at the barbers, which Kelly immediately scuppers by letting Stu sleep there. At least she's not forgetting the person who helped her when she was homeless unlike some people *cough*Sean*cough*.

Oh and Sally's new eggshell-blue door is very nice! Muy Andalusian. 

Rachel Stevenson - on twitter







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Five Things We Learned In Corrie This Week


Put the blame where it belongs.  We bid a sad farewell to Roy, as he departed for one of those convenient Third World charity endeavours that pop up whenever an actor's decided they don't like the plotlines they've been given.  Hayley went to Mozambique for a year after Julie Hesmondhalgh registered her displeasure at the "secret son" storyline; Emily departed for Peru after years of being generally overlooked.  Now it's Roy's turn to go and cook for the needy in South America; for some reason I'm picturing him in the Amazon with a load of half naked indigenous people, still wearing his raincoat.  


Roy was leaving in the Black Cab Of Significance (why not StreetCars, Roy?) because he blamed himself for Natasha's death.  Elsewhere, Abi blamed herself for facilitating Natasha's death by bringing a gun into the Street, while Sam still suffered, meaning Nicky blamed himself for bringing death into his son's life.  I think we need to stop all this and blame the person who's really responsible: Oliver.  If he hadn't died, Leanne wouldn't have got depressed, so Simon wouldn't have become a drug runner to pay the bills, so Harvey wouldn't have known Coronation Street even existed.  It's all Oliver's fault for being selfish enough to pass away, and with any luck everyone will realise this and stop banging on about him.


The other advantage of everyone forgetting about Oliver is Jane Danson might be able to finally get some time off.  She sounded like she had terrible laryngitis or at the very least a rotten cold and ITV still wouldn't let her stay at home.  I think you need to have a word with HR, Jane, or perhaps the police, because this is starting to feel a lot like modern slavery.


Spielberg has nothing to worry about.  Troubled kids always have a secret talent, don't they?  They might appear to be horrible little scrotes but it usually turns out they're actually brilliant at sport or art or something and they can then channel their passions into this rather than being awful.  Just once I'd like a Demon Child to be simply evil for the fun of it with no redeeming features; I have my fingers crossed that when Hope hits puberty she'll start strangling cats or kicking walking sticks out from under old ladies and there won't be a single hint that she's actually a brilliant trombonist on the sly.


In the meantime, Daniel - who is apparently Barry Norman in his spare time - spotted genuine filmmaking talent in Max's libellous conspiracy theory video and suggested he parlay those skills into a documentary about Billy's soup kitchen.  Can't wait for that; YouTube will be aflame with the heartwarming tale of a vicar doing his job.  Perhaps Max can combine both his camera skills and his taste for lurid speculation to look into the phenomenon of the strange graffiti under the arches where Billy works?


For some reason the wall is covered with complex mathematical formulae.  Are these really homeless people?  Are they servants of the illuminati?  Are they calculating how to bring about the end of the world from beneath the Manchester-Liverpool line?  Or is this the work of a set decorator who realised there should probably be something scrawled on the wall behind Billy but realised he couldn't put dirty language on telly at 7:30 of an evening?


You wanna live like common people, you wanna do whatever common people do.  Speaking of homeless people, we must of course address Kelly's descent into the lowest rings of Hell.  We all know why poor Kelly is being made to suffer like this - it's so that the viewers and the people of Weatherfield will feel sorry for her again, even though she, you know, belted Nina for no apparent reason, and was an accessory to Seb's murder.  They need to send her to the murky depths so we can feel happy when she comes back up.


She ended up taking some Spice, which feels very five years ago; even Summer's taken Spice, and she's a massive goody-two-shoes.  This was despite the intervention of Railings Boy, back from whatever plot cupboard he was hidden in, and there to give a meaningful speech about being trapped in a life you can't escape from.


The trouble is: Kelly could escape it all at any time.  It was only her own bloody-mindedness that was stopping her.  There was a queue of people willing to help her, starting with Aadi, Toyah and Imran, and including social services and the police.  All she had to do was contact them and the whole nightmare would end.  It meant that it was hard to ever feel she was properly at rock bottom and desperate - she was just being stubborn.


Still, she's back on the Street now, following a flashback-strewn encounter with some deeply unpleasant scallies.  I imagine when Susan Oudot wrote the scenes where Kelly got a beer poured over her she imagined a dark urban hellhole, a truly nightmarish location to amplify the terror.  She probably didn't imagine that the director would instead say "nah, I can't be bothered going all the way to Moss Side to film - let's do it outside the studio then I can be in the pub by six."


Kelly's ordeal therefore played out against a backdrop of immaculately tended lawns, luxury apartment blocks and the Imperial War Museum North; if the camera had tilted up a little bit above their heads it would've caught the massive CORONATION STREET sign on the side of the building.  It was hard to feel like anything bad was going to happen to her when she was a three minute walk from a Wagamama.  The experience has now caused Nina to start to experience traumatising anxieties, mainly in the form of dramatic zooms on props in the cafe; my favourite one was when we got a big terrifying close up of a horse brass.  What she should really be scared about is the fact that Roy has left her in charge of a business at the age of 19.  Roving gangs of thugs are nowhere near as terrifying as having to file a VAT return.


Go west, young woman.  Faye was freed from prison on Monday, as we all knew she would be; you can't fight an unstoppable force like Debbie Webster.  She returned to number 4 and was met with an enormous outpouring of passion from Craig, the love of her life.  Nah, just kidding: in reality the two of them never went near one another, not even sharing a sofa.  I'd blame Covid protocols, but in the exact same scene Gary walked straight up to Faye and hugged and kissed her:


Perhaps Faye's time in prison has made her realise that she has literally zero sexual chemistry with Craig and that she'd have a better and more passionate relationship with a sock with a couple of googly eyes stuck on it.  She's clearly in an emotionally fragile state, anyway, as we discovered when she went back to work at the Bistro and immediately broke down.  Who knew that returning to the place where you were sexually assaulted and committed GBH would be triggering?  Not to worry; Tim intervened and got her a new job in the sales team at the factory whether she liked it or not.  I'm not sure why she couldn't take the valuable skills she'd learned at the Bistro and presented her CV to any number of restaurants in the Greater Manchester area; I'm sure Debbie would've been amenable to a little white lie to cover up the gap in her résumé, and the hospitality sector is currently desperate for well-trained staff.  But that would've meant Faye would've had to work more than fifty yards from her front door, and obviously, that cannot be tolerated.


Politics isn't for everyone.  Sally pressganged Maria and Mary into a meeting to discuss the very important matter of the Christmas Market.  Maria claimed she couldn't make it because she had an appointment to do a graduated bob; given she works in a male hair salon, I have to congratulate whatever gentleman was getting that cut for his progressive attitude to styling.  What actually happened was Maria and Sally exchanged barely veiled insults while Mary sat in the corner muttering "bratwurst"; it was of course incredible.


We learned that a councillor had been suspended for dodgy behaviour, because of course he had; you didn't think they were going to make us wait until May for this political storyline to play out?  At the moment, Sally seems to have the upper hand, persuading Maria that she can simply turn up at public appearances for her as a kind of Politics Barbie.  Sally is still wildly overestimating Maria's talents if you ask me, but Gary seemed to think that his wife would make a great politician and should still go for it.  Maria and Gary really are a meeting of minds, aren't they?  I'm surprised it took them a decade to finally get together.

Out of respect for Sam's trauma, I have decided to maintain a similar silence about his plotline.  Unless you DM me @merseytart on Twitter, where I have all sorts of bitchy comments to make.







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