Options
Corrie: They need to build up more stable marriages
Corrie is very weak at the moment due to a lack of long term couples and marriages. The 'affair' or 'heartbreak' storyline is only explosive when it's the last thing anyone would expect. In order to create this sort of storyline, some serious investment in building up strong marriages needs to take place, so they can be blown apart in the future. Eg. Ken & Deirdre, Kevin & Sally. There's only so many times those two 'strong' relationships can be impacted by either one having an affair or a baby on the side.
The entire soap is built on flimsy relationships, people being dumped at the altar etc etc. Peter and Leanne, Peter and Carla, Nick and Leanne, ad nauseum.
Slow steady long term character investment and a long term view of characters needs to take place. Also they need to partner characters for their chemistry and sparky relationships, not as plot devices for other characters - eg. Steve & Karen - brilliant, Derek and Mavis - brilliant.
It's probably a symptom of writers and producers maybe only getting short term contracts these days. No one gets a chance to really develop the characters over time, pity.
The entire soap is built on flimsy relationships, people being dumped at the altar etc etc. Peter and Leanne, Peter and Carla, Nick and Leanne, ad nauseum.
Slow steady long term character investment and a long term view of characters needs to take place. Also they need to partner characters for their chemistry and sparky relationships, not as plot devices for other characters - eg. Steve & Karen - brilliant, Derek and Mavis - brilliant.
It's probably a symptom of writers and producers maybe only getting short term contracts these days. No one gets a chance to really develop the characters over time, pity.
0
Comments
Corrie does need a younger family.
Stable? Ashley had an affair with Casey only a few years before they were axed.
When compared against most soap marriages theirs was more stable than a Japanese skyscraper.
Of course it does, no real families on the show and no real relationships. It's hardly realistic is it.
What about Roy n Hayley? Dennis and Rita?
But for me Corrie has been inconsistent for a while and I don't think the real problem is the relationships, I think the writing in general has been a bit messy. You can expect it from time to time but a small issue in a soap can lead to a bigger problem, if it's not being dealt with that is.
I don't mean to attack EastEnders at all but I think it was in a very bad place last year and that didn't just happen overnight. I think Lorraine Newman has had a great effect on EE and I hope the same can be said for Stuart Blackburn with CS.
The random couplings - with everyone having had a relationship with everyone else vaguely in their age range - cheapen real love IMO.
There's too little warmth and precious little feel-good about Corrie atm, with even Roy and Hayley strained. Deirdre and Ken work well sometimes. I have hopes for Rita and Dennis. That's about it.
Do you really think it would be interesting to watch a stable family go out to work and school, come home and eat their tea, watch the telly and go to bed? This thread is so pointless as everyone knows the reason there are no stable families in soaps is because that would be dull and characters need storylines. If a family was constantly stable with no cracks people would be complaining that it was boring and unrealistic
And yet Roy and Hayley are the most universally loved couple on the show...
Probably because they're in the show less than other characters and are mostly just involved in comedy storylines, if all the characters were like this it would be a very dull programme.
It has got to the point though where a couple cannot walk past each other in the street without falling into bed 5 minutes later. By trying to be "shocking" all the time soaps are getting incredibly predictable.
No, but it is nice to have a few stable couples who aren't always splitting up and having affairs
To be quite honest, affairs are the most boring thing to occur in soap. I don't understand how people in here justify them by calling normal families "boring" when affairs have been done literally to death.
The ironic thing is that Corrie is more boring now than ever before, yet rewind to the early 90s and each episode would have me in stitches without even trying, in addition to providing realistic drama that did not insult my intelligence.
The Croppers have been on the sidelines lately but that's more because of David Neilson living abroad combined with Julie Hesmondhalgh and Stephanie Cole's breaks. Go back two years to when Sylvia arrived and you have some great drama with Sylvia finding about about Hayley's past and Roy telling Sylvia what he really thinks of her and how she treated him as a boy. It does seem at times that ideas for them are a bit thin on the ground, but I'm glad the writers respect their characters enough not to make one of them have an affair (proving in turn that such a thing is possible).
Err.... no, it probably wouldn't be interesting, but then no one is asking for that. But it's funny that you use the words dull and boring so much, and yet seem to have no problem with the most tiresome soap cliche of the lot (affairs).
The reason we see so many affairs isn't anything to do with stable families being boring, it's because they're a stock plot which fills up time and is easy to write. Likewise, the reason the likes of Karl/Sunita and Molvin are unpopular isn't because all affairs are bad (Deirdre/Mike would beg to differ), but because the actors have no chemistry, the characters' motivations are either unclear or change from one episode to the next, and they consist of the same scenes repeated ad nauseum.
I'd love another couple like the Duckworths or the Wiltons but they take years to nurture and soaps nowadays use up characters too quickly. Plus comedy doesn't seem to have the prestige in Corrie that it once did.
Or, to put it more succinctly, what Helicase said