Now here's something that hasn't been discussed or even thought about here or any where else for that matter!

Remember 3 years (2000 -2001) ago when Corrie was going through one of its worse patches in ages, everyone including me was saying it was cack and EE was better.

However now, in a one hell of an ironic twist, EE has gone downhil fast and to me has had the worse patch of all soaps in the HISTORY of soaps.

However out of the two biggies, which one had the worser patch?

Was it Corrie?

Or

Is it Eastenders?

I personally vote Eastenders. At least when Corrie was going down the pipes it was still keeping some of its basics intact, which was more character led, BELIEVABLE storylines. I mean take the cancer storyline and the internet chat room storylines with Sarah! And most importantly, even though Corrie was going downhil at that time, at least it was watchable

However EE at the moment is just repeating it self, parodying it self and humilating it self with more and more unbelievable storylines. And i dont really need to mention those particular storylines now do i .

Please discuss,

Have a nice day

I think I'd have to go with EE being worse, as, although Corrie was extremely awful for a while, I never actually stopped watching it. I don't seem to last more than 5 minutes of an episode of EE anymore before turning over or wandering off to do something else instead.

Yes I agree EE is the worst, at least when Corrie had a bad patch there were at least a few good stories along the line to keep you interested

thats a very good point actually, im not sure about that one, because when corrie went through its bad patch i stopped watching it, and only just started again at the end of last year.
Eastenders, is running out of storylines, and i now miss 1-2 episodes a week, but havent fully stopped watching, therefre i am lead to believe that corries patch was worse because i fully stopped watching corrie, but havent stopped watching easenders fully yet.
But saying that i still watch corrie now, i catch about one episode a week, but i fully watch emerdale.

all soaps have bad patches. Its just a shame they never let Elderado recover from its bad patch.

But why do soaps have bad patches?

And why does everyone accept it? I mean isn't the main purpose of a television soap opera is to entertain and inform its viewers?

We want entertainment...........not paint drying crap! We do pay for the television licence that pays for Eastenders and many other shows...........So really technically it shouldnt really fail us, shouldn't it? We are paying the casts wages and not forgetting the producers wages (unfortunately)

So give us what we pay for

Ever thought of going into television production yourself, lala? It might stop you being quite so critical. It's obvious that every soap or tv drama is going to have it's highs and lows. It depends on a lot of things, the chemistry of the casting and the writing team as well as the production team. Sometimes things are on a roll and sometimes not. As in life, nothing remains constant.

I think the reason that Coronation Street is having such success at the moment is that they've remembered to pepper the scripts with humour - something they always excelled at. A few years ago, during the lull, they were trying to copy the dramatic storylines of other soaps and lost their way.

But have you also considered that sometimes it may just be our perception that changes? Like thinking fondly about a much loved programme from childhood, only to watch it years later to discover it was rubbish!

It's not only soaps though that have their bad patches. Long running tv series's such as Friends and The Simpsons and The X Files all had their great seasons and their not so great seasons. You can't expect a show especially soaps like EastEnders and Corrie to be firing on all cylinders four and five days a week, month after month, year after year. Writers leave, new writers come in and new Producers come in. The bad thing is if when a Producer leaves i.e. John Yorke, who had EastEnders at the top of its game with storylines such as Mel and Steve, Mark and Lisa, Lisa and Phil, Kat and Zoe and was also there with Phil and Grant's last scenes together. When he left EastEnders was on a high and its a very tricky thing when a new Producer takes over. Louise Berridge may have brought back Dirty Den but really thats about the only highlight we can think of. Plus a lot of the characters we loved have left Walford since John Yorke so the chemistry that made it great is gone.

It's the same at Corrie aswell. They got a new Producer after the lull and it's now back on top whilst EE is going down the swanny. But thats life, nothing is ever consistant and especially for that amount of time it can't be. Corrie is great now but who's to say in two years time it won't be EastEnders which is back on top and Corrie may have hit the dauldrums again. I still haven't stopped watching EastEnders but I did stop watching Corrie for a while, so I think Corrie's was worse. Only because they tried copying EE with dramatic storylines and not enough of its humour which its so good at.

Corrie dragged themselves out of the doldrums by bringing back scriptwriters from it's classic days -guys such as John Stevenson who know the characters like the back of his hand and can write for them bringing out their northern quirks and humour.

I have to say EEs bad patch is worse. Simply because when Corrie was in the doldrums it was a case of a slip in the writing. With renewed focus it has been able to bounce back in spectacular fashion. They always had the characters and therefor the potential, with EE at the moment so many of the characters are past their sell by date. They have literally run out of steam, this means it is going to be harder to fix... But I reckon EE will bounce back. Hopefully not at the expense of the more human and currently wonderful Corrie

I think EE could struggle. Everyone seems to think they should bring back characters from the past to prop it up (in my opinion, bringing Dirty Den back from the 'dead' was a very bad idea, on a par with the infamous Dallas shower scene). Surely they should be looking to new blood? After all, there are only so many times you can watch x sleep with y who fights with z. Zzzzz....! They need to cut the number of episodes, it's the only way.

EE's bad patch is far far worse. Dull, mediocre, ridiculous, laughable and annoying.

At least during Corrie's poor spell, I still found it watchable and rarely so boring I missed it regularly. The humour was still there in some sense, the fact is Eastenders has never really had that so relies entirely on plots alone, as they don't have the characters or wit (which is usually very forced) to stay really entertaining.

As it happens, the plots in Corrie during that bad patch, while obvious attempts to be dramatic and sensational, were quite often still good, even if it wasn't the "true" Corrie so to speak. Sarah Lou and the internet perv, Alma's death and what about Toyah's rape? Yes, it was disgusting, "Who raped Toyah?" being a terrible idea and an attempt to copy "Who shot Phil?", only not as good and a rather sick ploy. But Georgia Taylor's performance was OUTSTANDING. That was some of the best acting I've ever seen in a soap, it was Oscar worthy and I'm not joking. She really made a terrible idea into something wholly compelling. MUCH better actress than Kacey Ainsworth (who is good herself, but just didn't compare).

I think EE right now is far worse than Corrie was during its bad patch.
At the moment EE is so terriable, I couldn't care less if I missed an episode. It does have good characters, but the scripwriters just don't use them enough i.e Martin, Sonia, Spencer, Kelly. If they concentrated on them instead of the obnxious Ferrera's then the show wouldn't be half as bad!

I completely agree Drifter! Especially regarding Georgia Taylor and Kacey Ainsworth.
I didn't really notice Corrie's bad patch must! Like you said though, it wasn't true Corrie style but some of the stories and acting were excellent! Alma's final death scene was brilliant and great acting was done by all. I enjoyed Sarah-Lou and the internet perv storyline, and it actually brought into like more the fact that there are people on the net who do this sort of stuff. I also thought the rape storyline was good as well and brilliantly acted!

I don't think any soap has had such a bad time as EE has since LB joined the show! The storylines are crap, some of the characters are a waste of space ie Juley, other are so unconvincing eg Andy, and some have had personality transplants eg Alfie! They need to hire a new EP, new scriptwriters and axe some of the dead wood like The Ferreiras, Andy, Juley, Spencer etc. And do not axe Brooke Kinsella aka Kelly! They should axe Zoe instead! Kelly has far more potential and is a much better actress imo!

I agree Kelly hasn't had much of chance to develop. She is a very good actress(if you saw her in "No Child of Mine" when she was about 12 you'd know what I mean). We know nothing about her other than she used to be a hooker, where are her family for example. She hasn't been given any good storylines other than being Zoe's mate. Which is shame really. Hopefully she'll go onto bigger and better things.

kelly should stay.she's probably the fittest woman in EE ,as well as being a good actress.

The main thing that makes EE so much worser then Corrie when it was bad is that;-

All the characters in EE at the moment seems to cartoony and 2 dimensional! You cant honestly believe that such a character could exist! At least when Corrie was going down under (shall i say) they kept it REAL!

I agree lala. The actors in EE look either bored (Den) or desperate (Ash), either way I am embarrassed for them having to act out these scripts. I never found Corrie an embarrassment - some of the storylines may not have been to my taste but they were still well written and well acted. I get the feeling some of the actors in EE at the moment are more or less giving up trying to inject any sense of realism, who can blame them.

There are still a couple of people giving good performances in EE -- Ian and Paul for example. But neither of them are used to their best potential.

Bad patches are a result of a combination of factors. I may be wrong, but I think Corrie's coincided with the arrival of an exec producer from Granada's entertainment division. Jane McNaught? Was that her name?

Believe it or not, there are very few producers out there with the experience to keep a huge show on its feet, 5-6 days a week, year after year. I seem to recall that a number of 'old school' writers fell out with this exec as she sought to compete head on with EastEnders, which at that time, was on a roll. She was got rid of (like Berridge will be soon) and the emphasis was put back on character/humour.

The trouble is, EastEnders is doing what it's done for the past decade, and is still failing. Where can it go from here? Except to the knackers yard, of course...

I have to say Eastenders is going through a worse patch only because I never even knew Corrie went through a bad patch lol.

lol neither did i until i started reading that people said it did, yet i have watched all my life and through this so called bad patch and didn't see anything wrong with it.