It’s fair to say that ‘Eastenders’
has had quite a time of it as of late. I mean Kush has a heart attack one day and
is walking around the square. Not to mention that Johnny has went from being
shot around four days ago to working in the pub again. It’s caused a
bit of commotion among fans that perhaps the realism which makes up a crucial
part of its appeal has been lost.
The storyline with Max does seem to have gone all a bit ‘House
of Cards’ with Fi and Josh just being revealed to be siblings yesterday. The
show has been pushing the identity of their mystery Dad hard over the past
couple of weeks and even I – a self-confessed superfan – was at a bit of a lost
as to why.
But there is an old saying that good things come to those
that wait and I think we might be about to discover that’s true. Another
storyline that the soap has embarked on as of late is the crisis of identity that
Kathy Beale has been facing. These two
storylines seem to be converging now that viewers saw a mystery man leave
flowers signed mysteriously as ‘an old friend.’
I had my suspicions that these two revelations in one
episode may be connected and so I took to Wikipedia. One of the best things
about the fact ‘Eastenders’ is a long running drama is that it can have legacy
characters and reinvest in storylines that seemed to be closed years ago. It
appears that they may be doing that very thing with Kathy.
Back in 1986 – when I was but a twinkle in my mother’s eye –
James Wilmott-Brown arrived on the scene. His backstory is what makes me think he’s the
father of FI. He was an area manager for the brewery that at the time managed
The Queen Vic. It wouldn’t be all that surprising if she followed her father’s
footsteps into the management of pubs.
His connection to Kathy is all together far more sinister.
According to Wikipedia, it appears that he went on to open a rival bar in
Albert Square known as The Dagmar. He hired Kathy and romantic liaisons seemed to
be on the cards even though she was married to Pete Beale. One night she had a
fight with Pete and then goes to James’ flat. He tries it on and is rebuffed
but goes on to rape her.
Wilmott-Brown was eventually found guilty but it irrevocably
damaged her marriage to Pete. (Wikipedia says that Pete could never convince
himself that Kathy wasn’t somehow guilt which makes me think he’s a massive
knob but that’s neither here nor there really.) It would therefore feed into
the exploration of identity that ‘Eastenders’ has been exploring that Kathy has
to face the return of someone she thought she’d dealt with decades before.
This may all turn out to be the ravings of a deranged fan
but I hope not. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again that ‘Eastenders’ is
at its best when it remembers its history. Part of this is embracing older
characters but it’s also exploring the past of its characters. It’s entirely
believable that people who we long since thought were gone from our lives
return with consequences we didn’t expect. It’ll also keep it engaging for
younger fans who thought that they knew longstanding characters only for that
to be blown out of the water. That in turn will lead to living room and
workplace conversations from older fans to younger fans explaining the history
of Kathy that we never knew. All of this will help create a buzz around the
show.
It has been hinted
that the identity of the mystery flower giver will be revealed tonight so we’ll
know either way soon enough.
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