Five Things We Learned In Corrie This Week

Stu's daughter is a murderer.  After all these weeks, we finally got the truth: Bridget was the one who killed Stu's girlfriend.  And I have only one thing to say on this:

Moving swiftly on.

Women: Know Your Place.  We reached Peak Barlow on Monday's episode when Daniel and Ken plonked themselves in the front row of a talk by a feminist author.  You don't think maybe one of the ladies behind you might have liked those seats, fellas?  Of course Ken then compounded his entitlement by asking the very first question, and on top of that, it being one of those "not really a question, more a statement" ones that is only there to show the author that he's really clever.  If I had been Persephone "100% Not Her Real Name" Braxton I'd have told him to pipe down and let the women do the talking.  (By the way can we take a moment to appreciate Daniel's arms?  Rob Mallard has definitely been working out lately).  

Fortunately Tracy turned up to remind us all that women run the world by berating her dad for hooking up with a trollop.  Ken begged for forgiveness, on the basis that he was lonely; it is, after all, an entire two years since he was shacked up with Claudia.  In Barlow Years that's an eternity.  I have every sympathy with Tracy.  She's been supportive of Ken's poodlefakery since Deirdre passed on, and hasn't objected to his other dalliances.  It's just this woman that she objects to, and since we can pretty much carbon date the decline of Tracy Barlow to the moment Ken shacked up with Wendy Crozier, I don't blame her.  She had a perfectly nice life of eating fish fingers and listening to her tapes until Wendy appeared on the scene and ever since then it's been betrayal, murder and missing kidneys.  If it had been me I'd have served that stuffed marrow with a side dish of arsenic.

Bad people are bad.  For several years now the Baileys have been used as a Racism Delivery Device, encountering nasty white people in various different professions who horrify all the regulars of the Street with their prejudicial ways.  The Baileys would then tell everyone how bad racism was and the Nasty Day Player was handed their cards and sent on their way, only returning to apologise for being a horrible person and to say they'd learned their lesson.  It's all been a bit rubbish to be honest and difficult to engage with.  It's why Max lashing out at Daryan carried so much more power than every Bailey plot put together.  Suddenly we saw racists for what they are: inadequate little men who blame the nearest person of colour for their own shortcomings.  Max was expelled from Wethy High for being utterly repulsive; it doesn't matter how many spaces Mrs Crawshaw's got he's always going to be bottom of the list.  She'd rather admit a slightly damaged stuffed turtle to her class before this little brat.  (Notice that Max immediately laid into Daryan, rather than, say, Dylan, who also turned up in Weatherfield and got a place at the High School at a moment's notice.  I wonder why he made that distinction, eh?).  The rest of the week Max was mainly embroiled in a trolling plotline with Maria but don't be surprised if he returns in a couple of weeks gushing about Nigel Farage and saying he's no objection to these people but he can't see why they can't just claim asylum in the first country they come to.  He'll have his own YouTube channel called StreetPatriot and a slot on GB News by the end of the year.

By the way one of my favourite parts of the week was when Max expressed his deep sadness and ennui by taking a picture of himself.  How can you experience an emotion if you haven't immediately broadcast it to your Insta followers?

Talk it over.  Last week I got this blog into trouble with Google Ads for mentioning the contents of Tim's trousers too much.  I'd like to remind you that I only ever used the correct, anatomical term for his member, despite the English language positively overflowing with alternatives.  It's doubly unfortunate as I hadn't realised That New Character I Was Banging On About would have such a prominent role in this week's episodes too; truly, we are living in a bountiful time for underwear-based storylines.  Anyway, after Tim rose to the occasion, he took Sally to the Bistro for a slap up meal, and we finally got that "Tim and Aggie are having an affair" storyline we knew was coming.

There was absolutely no reason for Tim and Aggie to keep their friendship a secret, not one, other than for there to be a mix-up later on.  In fact it's harder work to not mention someone you had a nice chat with than to simply come out with it.  "It's weird!" exclaimed Ed, and maybe I've lead a charmed life full of lovely opposite- and same-sex friendships, but why is it weird?  Why can't men and women be friends without the sex part getting in the way?  Did we learn nothing from When Harry Met Sally?  Tim was forced to sleep in the spare room as a result, and let's hope Rosie and Sophie never do return from their Asian travels because with the amount of time he spends in there they won't have anywhere to sleep.

Praise Xenu!  Billy casually introduced this pair, who are apparently running some kind of clothes exchange for the church.  They look like decent, wholesome, chirpy people, and therefore you should run as fast as you can in the opposite direction.  Never have I seen such obvious cult members in my life.  Summer agreed to volunteer with them and all I can say is, take a flashlight and a personal alarm Summer, and make sure somebody knows where you are at all times.  They'll ask her to nip into the van to get some more stock and next thing she'll be in a field wearing a floor length smock while she tills the earth and worrying it's going to be her turn to go in the Special Shed with Our Glorious Leader.

The plus side of a little compound time would be that Summer wouldn't have to deal with Aaron or his dad or her gay dads any more.  They all twittered around casualty while Aaron's dad said he wanted to die and honestly, go for it, you seem to have zero redeeming features so you're just taking up oxygen that could be more usefully passed on to someone else.  And can somebody take Billy aside and explain why manspreading isn't cool, particularly in a man of the cloth?  It's like had a T-square stuck down the legs of his trousers, meaning his knees could never be anything less than eighty centimetres apart at all times.  Imagine turning up to arrange your nana's funeral and the archdeacon is sat there being all sympathetic while making sure you get a good look at his bulge.  (Oh dear, that's me talking about a man's groin again.  There goes some more monetisation!)

Regretfully there wasn't the space to discuss Mary rapping, mainly because I'm saving that for a 50,000 word essay that's absolutely chock full of exclamation marks.  Preview copies can be obtained by contacting me on Twitter @merseytart.

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