Coronation Street Episode Review; Weds 25th Dec 8.00 pm

'At Christmas time there's no need to be afraid'

Ah yes, Christmas Day, a day of the year that's as cliched as imaginably possible. Mince pies, daft hats, drunk uncles, charades, awful music... and a drunk disgruntled madman with a stolen shotgun! Hardly, but in this Netflix/ on-demand era of television, we cant surely expect Hilda Ogden singing around the piano to reach a 27 million viewing audience in 2019. Can we?

Robert and Michelle are courteous to each other (for the sake of Christmas I assume) and the ice queen seems to have cooled, now that she's selling the bistro, right from under his nose. Even hosting a Christmas lunch and not inviting him - isn't she lovely! Although Michelle appears to have thawed, Vicky is less than forgiving but accepts that Robert needs to see his child before she heads back home to Ireland.

Further down the street, it's David Platt's birthday so Shona has the key to the winter wonderland to surprise her hubby, hiding in an oversized Christmas present box.  Recovering sufficiently from her near-death by Christmas tree debacle, Rita arrives back to the Rovers, and Jenny is organising a welcome home party.

Talking of gingers, Gary goes to see Fizz after he opens the shop and realises that the gun is gone. Fizz thinks Hope has pinched the keys, but Gary seems to think its Dr Ali. It's neither as we know. Drunken Derek the disgruntled businessman is ready to shoot Gary and aims the gun at the Rovers Return. With all residents assembled, Derek enters the theatre of conflict and confronts Gary. Feigning that the gun is decommissioned, Derek decides to test Gary's theory; pointing the gun in the other direction, shooting Robert Preston who was stood outside the Rovers Return front door!! Hardly surprising as we've known for a while that the character is leaving the show. Is it a rating's winner though?

Gary's goading manages to get Derek out of the pub, but the whiskey swigging shooter sees Robert on the floor and carries on chasing his target. Aggie swings into action. I hope her nursing is better than her cooking!

With the residents realising what's happening, the Platt's (and Gary) begin hiding in the winter wonderland, to the strains of classic Christmas pop ( of course) and Derek's shotgun stalks the festive scenery. Getting shot in the arm, former soldier Gary doesn't take that lying down, and Adam decides to propose to Sarah. It's random and hardly romantic,  but still, it is Christmas. Also in the theme of romance, Daniel is relieved that Bethany has survived unscathed, and Emma and Seb are reconciled.

Deciding to scale the helter-skelter, Derek is drunk and in turmoil, with the armed police marksman having guns trained on him. The dodgy drunkard leaves his wife a voicemail but not before firing off a second time. Unluckily for Shona, Derek is a good accidental marksman and he shoots the box she's hidden in. Has he killed victim number 2? In a scuffle with Gary, Derek falls from the Helter-skelter ride. Is he dead?

Meanwhile, at the hospital, Michelle' at Robert's bedside -he's injured but conscious. He manages to tell Michelle he loves her, and then (predictably) dies. Shona appears to have survived yet faces an operation. Gary seems to have survived being shot and has resurfaced as the resident's hero but of course, it was his gun that caused the killings. Who did steal that gun? I HOPE we find out soon enough!

A few weeks ago, I mentioned in this blog that the winter wonderland could be a good setting for Christmas day action. I wasn't wrong but was this what I imagined? No, but then like I say, it isn't 1987 anymore and with fierce on-demand / Netflix/ Amazon Prime competition, the days of Hilda Ogden singing at the piano and Blanche's drunken Christmas dinner acerbic put-downs are long gone... 

Merry Christmas!


If you enjoyed this review give us a follow @rybazoxo over on twitter, your self-styled 'Cobbles. I shall be back next Wednesday.

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Coronation Street episode review Friday 10 August 2019

Having been away for a two weeks getting back up to date with events has been an uphill struggle especially as the Sky box died in my absence.  Thanks to Ms Kelstar for holding the fort in my absence.

Most of the trafficking story has largely been put to bed on Wednesday but Alina turned up with her babysitter (Rebecca above) to let Seb (who has returned to Eileen's from Hospital) know that she is in a safe house.  Given that most of the gang are still at large I fear for her family at home but apparently this is not a problem.  Alina refuses to promise to stay in touch with Seb as she believes there will be a complication over her staying in the UK.  To be honest this story has felt unsatisfactory.  If girls are trafficked then they are more often put to work in something which drives real money (not a nail bar) and the prime baddy sounded like a girl; inevitably it left a bad taste that Eileen felt she had chosen another wrong 'un and if Jan is NOT a wrong 'un at what point did he get a religious conversion to the straight and narrow, particularly as it was implied that Paula already knew he was not what he was.  I assume there is more to come - but the storytelling, like the last trafficking story, has been not been good.

Comedy tonight relied on the best the Street can deliver - Evelyn is supplied information by James Bailey on the state of fitness of the Weatherfield County squad ahead of the first fixture of the season tonight.  She is able to use this information to run an illegal gambling parlour in the Corner Shop offering some particularly good odds to Tim and later to Steve on events that evening.  Even the great Tommy O will not be appearing as a bug has struck half the team - Steve is betting on him to score the first goal.  There is a lovely little scene as Johnny tells Steve and Ty that the anticipation before the first match is the best bit of the season and thereafter it is all downhill.  (As a Southampton supporter I know exactly what he means!).  When Evelyn's deception is discovered she is called to account but refuses to refund the bets or take seriously the threat to tell Dev - as she points out (above it costs £2 a minute to phone Dev, you can see from her face she knows she has the upper hand) and bets are illegal in the shop so Dev would have problems if discovered.  Steve and Ty end up not bothering to go to the game.  All nicely done by all concerned.

Emma seems to have supplanted Aunty Emily as the go-to babysitter and gets landed with a couple of the Street children preventing her being able to pop along to the General where her father is about to undergo an operation for stomach ulcers.  Except that all along he has not told her the truth - he has cancer and it is not looking good.  In distress Emma turns to her mother in Australia - where apparently they both lived for a while after the divorce but Emma soon returned to the UK.  Her un-named mother does not sound particularly sympathetic and is not intending to return to the UK to see her ex-husband.  Maria is however very supportive when not being chased around by Ali (that seems to be definitely "on").  Meanwhile Emma looks like she is going to have to cope with the loss of her father on her own.

In one of the co-incidences which do not happen in real life Michael Bailey spots Gary looking at a blue key he has found in Neelan's books (above).  Michael recognises it as opening a storage box as he used to store vacuum cleaners in the same lock up!  Gary beetles over there and finds the storage box (lucky because the key I have does not have the locker number!).  Inside the box is a safe.  To open the safe Gary guesses that it is the year Weathy County were formed - and magically the safe opens to reveal a pile of currency.  Although it is not much use as Jenny does not want to take a £50 when Gary pays for a pint!  Three impossible events in one story line is probably one too many!  Now really loaded Gary needs to launder the money and after he becomes aware that the factory insurers have only offered £20k on an ex-gratia basis he comes up with a bright idea well above the normal level of his thinking ability.  Gary also has Ryan in his sights - he wants the money back next week which Ryan has stolen to fund his trip to Copenhagen with Alya.

Above left is Derek Milligan whom Gary has introduced to Nick.  Derek will rebuild the factory in exchange for ownership of the land for which he will be paid rent.  It is a condition that Gary is in charge of the rebuild but this will get the place back into action.  Once told Sarah is completely against the plan and the factory employee / owners are not keen on Gary's involvement in the work as it was through him that Rick Neelan caused the damage in the first place.  In the end economic necessity leads to acceptance of Milligan's offer and Nick manages to talk Sarah round into sharing running of the factory once again.  However it is not quite all as it seems.  Gary is going to use the money pile he discovered earlier to fund the rebuild, Milligan owes Gary / Rick money and his debt is reduced for the help he has provided as a front man.  Gary will be using one of Milligan's companies to launder the money!

A long standing contact of Carla's turned up at Roy's Rolls (where Carla was struggling to get a single order right as Roy was laid up with a back injury).  Jo Lafoe (above) has a new online business and needs someone to run it - and believes Carla is that person.  Notwithstanding her inability to serve a butty with the right sauce and delivering tea in place of a hot chocolate it looks like she is about to take on another high flying job.  Is she ready?

No Corrie Comicals this week - but track down Rita telling Ken and Claudia how to resolve their differences for the best scene of the week!

Writer: Simon Crowther Director: Vicky Thomas

Kosmo
@Kosmo100

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