Opinion: Latest Episode of Eastenders (Volume One)

Just about sums up the episode, really.

Eastenders is one of those shows which never really gets on my nerves enough to invoke a post; in the past few years, I've found that the soap has provided a good source of powerful and evocative drama, usually with a background moral subtext. An episode/arc has to be really bad for me to even consider writing a review.
     The episode that aired on 9/9/10 was supposed to be the climax of several arcs that had been building up for the past year: Who Killed Archie, Phil's breakdown, Stacy's child and Peggy's exit from the show. This episode should have been a complete epic. And it was, in a way, but it was also horribly written, confusing to watch, and the most recent of a bad month for the series so far.
     We carry on from Tuesday's cliffhanger, and mad teenager Stacy has just told pub landlady Peggy Mitchell that it was she, not her dead husband, that killed Peggy's ex-hubby Archie. Who Killed Archie was a powerful storyline at Christmas and afterwards, and the tension broke during the 25th Anniversary earlier in the year, where Stacy confessed to the camera. Why its taken her six months to tell Peggy I'll never know (she was off her meds, but she still sounded sane.) Anyway, Peggy doesn't believe her, even though she despised Archie, and commands her out of the pub. Regardless, Stacy has other things on her mind - it's the wedding reception of Janine and Ryan, and the groom is the father of her recently born child. Last episode Stacy somehow sneaked the child into an upstairs room in the Vic. She confronts Ryan who gets the wrong idea, and mother-in-law/matriach Pat physically assaults her.

Looks a little like a Sontaran, does Phil Mitchell.

     Meanwhile, upstairs, Phil Mitchell (The most iconic character in the soap) is bargaining with cousin Billy (who has a crowbar) for some food and water, in his drug-addled state. Peggy has gone a little mad and bordered up the windows - spare planks are left around to border up the door. Billy tries to escape, but LEAVES THE CROWBAR IN THE ROOM. Phil breaks out easily, and goes downstairs, where he breaks out some booze and sets fire to it. Naturally there is a tremendous but not life threatening explosion. Phil is a really formulaic character, and I think he has so much potential - his low points involve addiction of some kind, and just that. The angle where Peggy is inadvertantly responsible for him losing his two children is a nice twist, but his sudden jump to Coke (when Vodka was previously his drug of choice) is a little sad.
   So; here's the basic set-up; Peggy evacuates everyone outside, save herself (she stares around at her burning pub), Phil (who's in the cellar drinking and burning stuff) and then Stacy and her baby (in the women's toilets and an upper bedroom, respectively.) Who lives and who survives? Well, spoilers here, everyone lives. That's right. One of the situations where there is a viable reason for the whole building to explode, and everybody lives. 

"And THAT's for wanting to leave the program!"

If I could make a few comments on Stacey. Stacey Slater has been lauded by critics one of the most powerful characters on the show, with a realistic progression from stroppy teenager to reliable adult, and then dealing with her inherited mental health problems. However, when she is off the meds, her maddened state is always, and I mean always, cringingly written (apart from one scene back near the beginning of that story.)
     Anyway, back to the action, and here we have some of the worse scripting imaginable. It's often a complaint in drama that people don't speak over each other enough because of the nature of script, but this takes it to ridiculous heights - sometimes painful, as everyone on the screen is talking at once. Elsewhere, and in your attmepts to adress who is in the Vic and who is out, it is often a confusing matter - you're expecting someone to die, for the sheer sake of realism. As I say, they all live, although hopefully someone will die of smoke inhalation.

The woman on the right is breaking the law.

     Finally, Ryan manages to rescue both Stacy and Lily. When Lily is safe, and Ryan and Stacy are lying, ash-covered on the ground with severe wounds and burns, not to mention the horrific somoke inhalation from that amount of booze, Stacy finally finds the time to tell Ryan about his daughter. His facial expression is priceless.
     This is a bad episode. It's  full of awful characterisations (For example, most of the pubgoers ignore the raging fire until peggy rings a bell) as well as a general lack of relevance; it doesn't feel like a good send off to these arcs. Not that these arcs were anything special to begin with, but this plot could have been so much better. A little coherance, perhaps, maybe a more clear and realistic rescue plan. In this case, a rarest of cases, it's true that realism would have had a bigger effect.

It's my wedding day. I am now married to the most wonderful woman I have ever known. Then my reception caught fire and exploded dramatically, and I rescued a madwoman who has seemingly fallen for me on the day I got married. And now, when I'm brusied, ash-covern an wheezing like an old bicycle, you tell me that I have a child with that madwoman? Really? You couldn't have told me before I got married? 

Thanks.