Under DTC Shirley was a leading lady in EE not so under SOC.

Is Shirley safe from the axe? or could SOC axe her? SOC doesnt appear to care that much about the Carters!

She needs a Big story of her own next year. Linda Henry is always great
Also she needs more material with Mick.

Agreed, Linda was apparently close to leaving before DTC arrived but i have a feeling that SOC is more interested in the Beales & Fowlers.

Babe & Lee have both been axed

Shirley, Tina & Sylvie are hardly used

Johnny is a shell of a character with Ted Riley playing him and Linda is leaving for six months - this leaves us with Mick and as landlord of the Vic he is used more often than the others.

Yeah she's defo been sidelined this year, or maybe as others have said, is that because she's been on her annual break (alright for some isn't it,getting a long break every year!)

Hopefully they'll be more scenes with Shirley and Mick next year whilst Linda's away as the Carters are diminishing quite a bit now. I think they should've got rid of Johnny instead of Lee though. That decision makes no sense to me. Actually the decision to bring back Johnny in the first place makes no sense either to me. He's done nothing useful since he came back and has the personality and acting ability of a wooden chair!

They should get Shirley back behind the bar more, especially now Linda will be leaving for half the year.

They should be giving Linda Henry their A material, the last time it felt like she did anything was when Stan died.

Although in defence of the producers, doesn't she take a long holiday around about September/October?

I don't think you can attribute Shirley's lack of material this year to Linda Henry's hiatus, or SOC not being interested in her. Shirley hasn't really been used well for over a year now. She's another toy that DTC got bored with, and to be honest the rest has probably done her character some good. Now people are calling for Shirley to be used more, whereas before people were complaining she was being used too much, so that can only be a good thing.

But she really, really does need a decent storyline now. I don't think SOC is against the Carters at all; he's given them one of the biggest stories since he arrived in Lee's depression, as well as the first 'OMG' moment under his tenure. Linda and Mick feel revitalised under him, and Tina got some great development in the weeks leading up to Sonia's departure, though admittedly she's gone very quiet recently.

Hopefully SOC will continue giving the Carters the decent storylines he's started with them, and with there being less of them maybe Shirley (and Johnny) will get more of a focus next year.

I hope Shirley and Johnny get some better material in 2017. We know what a great actress Linda Henry is and the actor playing Johnny needs to be given a chance.

I think Sharon may help out in the Vic when Linda leaves.

I don't think we can judge how SOC will treat Shirley as his taking over properly a few months ago coincided with Henrys annual break. Shirley is never featured in October or November, the only difference is many other years they've made a plot point out of it so she was featured heavily in September before disappearing and then again on her return in December.

Personally I prefer the way they did it this year with her being supposedly around in the background, us just not seeing her between Buster leaving and her fetting involved with convincing Phil to go on the Transplant list.

I'm not sure I'd say that SOC hates the Carters. He's had no choice re temporarily writing Linda out, and I believe that Lee is gor plot purposes and he, and the Carters, have been featured heavily for the exit. Babe and Tina have always been background characters and Babe was taking so far down the dark route that I can see why SOC feels it's not worth the troubke trying to redeem her to make her a viable character. Especially when he's already got to bring everybody involved in the Bobby coverup back to being sympathetic.

Let's not forget he has also taken out members of the Mitchell, Slater and Hubbard clans so I'd hardly say he's only focussed on the Carters. I suspect he just sees them as another family, rather than being untouchable as DTC did and previos producers have with other families.