Do people really need to see every single reaction to the announcement?

Lets face it, not all of the cast is capable of the acting skills required for a legit reaction shot, which is why in some cases I feel they ratther do it off camera.

I noticed EE doing this years ago.
It's probably a habit all soaps are guilty of.
Just when you reach the payoff moment when they get to the dramatic point where you really want to see how they react, they cut away to a benign scene for a minute or two, then cut back to the original scene where a conversation has just taken place offscreen and they are leaving the house or something.

It's what I'd describe as 'anti-drama'.

They made sure we got Phil's reaction though. Even though he often treated both the sisters, Roxy especially, with disdain.

While I think it took guts to kill the sisters off, the show could've proved even more that it has balls by killing the tired Philth off.

Ha Ha Ha love this lol
The pie should be up for an award at next years soap awards lol

I thought Sharon's delivery (to Phil) was really good and full of emotion.
Jack was actually pretty good too.

I agree 100% though about the cut away shots - far too many. The thing is tnough Ronnie and Roxy were massive characters and their deaths would impact on the majority of the square wether in a big way (family/friends) or just the shock factor from people that knew them. Must have been hard to get that across in a 30 minute episode. I felt the Louise scene in the shop was forced as was Ben's scene. The acting was awful.
Jack, Sharon and Phil were spot on though.

Clearly you weren't paying too much attention to Stacey's mannerisms throughout the scene, you could tell she was affected. It's not always about what people say in a scene, it was written all over her face.

I didn't even mention Stacey lol 😮

OK so Glenda was a terrible mother, but she did love her girls in her own way, and its was a shame they decided it was more important to have bloody Phil being told on screen.

Since Roxy was the best one of the sisters I wish they'd put equal emphasis on her. Very few people even mentioned her, and even then it felt like "Oh yeah - Roxy died too". I get it was a tragedy that Ronnie had to die on her wedding day, but I've never really bought into this retconning of her character from a hard faced pyschopathic killer to yummy mummy.

And as for Jack... he was appalling. I didn't thing you could beat Steve McFadden for poor acting, but Scott Maslen beat him hands down in that episode.

I actually thought Jack's reaction was quite good, it was very like I have seen people react in real life

Lol at diamond dogs saying Steve McFadden is a bad actor

I agree.

and Kettering and Ongar were mentioned about 100 times per episode

It seems you didn't

Please accept my sincere apologies. I'll blame my interrupted nights sleep

As I said in another thread, I would have liked a stronger reaction from Stacey.

Roxy had been her sister in law for a while and her and Sean had been happy. She could have mentioned needing to call him. Her and Ronnie were also bonded over Danielle and Archie. I watched the scene after Stacey confessed about Archie and ended up in jail, Ronnie was gutted and tried to talk Stacey out of it. She felt that she had let Danielle down and wanted to make it up with Stacey. That kind of bond doesn't just go away.

The show made out she was just sad as she can empathise with Jack and the kids as someone who has lost a partner and a parent. Like a normal concerned neighbour. She was more upset over Peggy who she didn't have nearly the same amount of history with.

I also thought Jack's reaction was very realistic and well played by Scott Maslen. The shock, disbelief, bewilderment. giving way to grief and anger were palpable.

With people not mentioning Roxy sp much, I think it is the lack of a significant other. They are focussing on how horrific this is for Jack losing his wife and as they greet him, of course Ronnie is who they will comfort him over primarily.

Were they talking to Glenda, or Amy, it would probably be a little different.

I am not a fan of Scott Maslan but I thought he was spot on tonight .Lost, bewildered , shocked and angry all rolled into one

Another annoying instance of this today, with Donna, seemingly the last to know, and closest non-family character to Roxy, being told off screen after a few scenes building up to the moment. Really not of fan of the writer who wrote the last two episodes.

Even more infuriating, Mick confronting the man who terrorised his family OFF-SCREEN!?
Why would that ever seem like a good idea? Oz has been in the Vic taunting Lee a few times already, why not have him do that again (not knowing that Mick knows) and then have 'the bully' be shamed and humiliated in front of everyone. An offscreen beating is weak. Arrrggh.

I'm a big fan of the new producer's style, but more intervention from the script editor was needed for these two episodes, because there's been organic routes to drama RIGHT THERE, but the writer seemed to just swerve right around them!?

I agree. Why didn't we see Ronnie and Roxy for one final time when Glenda and Jack ID them. We didn't see Mick beat the living daylights out of Oz. We didn't see Jack finish his sentence with Amy. We didn't see the immediate reactions of some close relatives. We didn't see R&R's bodies discovered.

Yes, today's episode infuriated me again for exactly the same reason. Not even infuriated, just completely confused me as to why anyone would write drama this way. Like with Donna, all those scenes building up to her finding out, then they miss out her actually being told.

Don't even get me started on the Mick thing. I really hope that was intentionally not shown because we have more to find out. But going on the quality of the last two episodes, I suspect it was just another example of missing out the best potential scene in the entire storyline.

The whole Donna thing was infuriating. She was probably Roxy's only friend on the square and she didn't deserve to know?! But Steven Beale does? Mick Carter does?

Because the producer directed them to do this. They're the same writers from DTC and they didn't do this then. Script editor can't tell them to make drama routes that aren't in the storyline plan.

Oh no, absolutely with the Mick thing, I know that goes beyond the control of the individual writer, and may be a plotting, or logistical issue.

But the scenes building to characters finding out were capped before, or at the point of reaching dramatic potential (the reactions), which I assume the episode writer would have control of, as they would still hit the necessary plot points and maintain continuity, but draw more substance from the scenes.

As it was, the scenes felt like they existed to be a 'hook', when really they should have been moments of emotional payoff. The balance of EE being a business (in using hooks to keep viewers watching throughout the episode, ratings, yada-yada) and EE as an art-form (satisfying the audience) was completely off, hence, it was just irritating to watch.

Mick was best man at the wedding. Donna wasn't even invited so she wasn't obviously deemed that good a friend of Roxy's

Steven is Max's daughter's partner so obviously would be told.

It's sad that a woman dies on her wedding day, but the biggest tragedy is two children have lost their mothers, and the way things are going it looks like they'll stay with Jack, Father of the Year (you know, the one who wanted nothing to do with any of his children till St Ronnie stepped in and offered two of them a home). What should happen now is Sean and Matthew arrive together to claim their children, though I don't know what will happen with Sam's little boy (forgotten his name) because he clearly can't go back to his mum.

I can't remember that far back, but I seem to recall Sean loved Amy, but Jack only took her on to a) please Ronnie and b) to get one over Roxy.

Unfortunately, I have to agree here. While Jack, Honey and Glenda have been very well acted in the past two episodes, the rest of the aftermath has been completely flat so far. I just don't feel like enough effort has been put into it. In the end, it just wasn't worth killing them off for this since not much is gonna come out of this after the funerals. "I've got some bad news..." - cuts back to focus more on filler, Michelle, Lee etc. Not saying we should see everyone react but the constant cutting made it feel a bit disjointed and somewhat closed.

Louise and Ben's reactions were subtle yet done well but the same can't be said for the rest of the family since we hardly saw a good amount of them. Not much of a reaction from Billy and no appearance from Jay either.

In the end, not much is gonna come out of this. Jack will eventually move on or probably leave the square, Matthew will probably be taken away to wherever offscreen, the kids are too young to even react to the storyline of losing parents. In addition to that, there's no reason for Glenda or Danny to stick around with Ronnie and Roxy now gone. Can't see Glenda staying after the funeral since there's nothing for her to stick around for. It'll all be forgotten afterwards. In the end, it's just left me thinking "What a waste". Their deaths have upset me a lot more than expected. I wish they hadn't gone with this route. I never really wanted them to exit like this and I was always hoping the leaks would be false but it ended up being true. I still think it was the wrong decision but it's too late now.




I wouldn't say her acting was bad, it was just the case of the wrong facial expression being used. Instead of Stacey looking upset or devastated by the news, she ended up looking like she had just been told off by someone which resulted in an upset frown look rather than genuine sadness. It just didn't feel right and I'm disappointed with that. Doesn't seem like she's bothered about it by the next episode either.


Yeah, this is exactly how it felt like. Perfect description really.


Doubt this will happen. Danny has hardly got an amount of dialogue. No more than 3 words. He's been pushed out to the point where he can't even react to the death of his half sisters. He just seems to be hanging around in the background giving Glenda support.


I wasn't satisfied with it either.