The Aftermath

Friday 17th October

So, Niall captured the Mcqueen gang, he got caught, he blew them up. Voila.

You surely didn’t think that is all you were going to get?

Well, to start with, someone’s got to die. It wouldn’t be a Hollyoaks drama if someone didn’t. Plus your intrepid correspondent saw a spolier a few months ago and has been waiting for this moment with bated breath.

Let’s whittle through the options.

No point in killing off Michaela or Carmel – what sort of storyline would the death of a annoying teenager (the ‘Oaks wouldn’t be that kind to us) or a big-boobed beautician?

Mercedes isn’t going to go – she might have HIV and has slept with Jacqui’s man. The scope for mid-village rows is enormous.

Jacqui is a vital shouting, hair-grabbing requirement for these scenes.

John Paul – well, he’s obviously going to jet set back off to Dublin so that’s no drama.

Myra – she has to clean up the mess she has made. It would be a cop out if she disappeared.

So, who’s left? Tina.

Tina got pregnant in a one night stand with a man who was not her husband. Then pretended the baby belonged to her husbands brother, promising it to her husband’s brothers girlfriend, who also happens to be her sister. She was pushed down the stairs by her crazy brother. She had to have a hysterectomy and after this decided to take the baby back from her sister who is also her husbands brothers girlfriend. She made a failed attempt to make a go of it with her child’s biological father and then her mother chose her to live out of all her siblings.

I think Tina’s been through enough. Kill her off. She wouldn’t be able to take any more. She isn’t as strong as Tony.

Plus, the scope for a story after this would be unimaginable. The fight over baby Max would take the forefront of any other McQueen barney. Russ (the baby’s biological father), Jacqui (who the baby was promised to), Dom (Tina’s husband), Myra (the baby’s grandmother) Tony (Jacqui’s mug) will all be fighting over custody of poor defenceless Max.

If this is the case, I say draw straws.

So there is the usual search of bodies under rubble, names are being called, floors fall in, Jacqui leaves her mother stuck under a slab of mortar, as Tina is younger and needs more help. Survival of the fittest? Or getting your own back?

Chaos ensues. Niall and Myra indulge in a mother-son bonding moment. Myra won’t have John Paul and Niall fighting each other. She has robbed us of a full on fist fight in a collapsing derelict church. That would have got us quivering with excitement. Alas. It was not to be.

Eventually they are all out safely. Apart from Tina McQueen. Poor Tina. Adultress dying in her betrayed husband’s arms. Told you so.

As the ambulance doors close on Tina’s bagged body, we see Niall’s reflection in the dark glass of the ambulance doors.

Whoa!

We had assumed Niall had died. Are all ‘Oaks bad boys and girls blessed with all the luck of an Irish Leprachaun?

Niall is still alive. Jack’s secret is out. Dom is a widow. Baby Max is an orphan. The McQueens are bereaved. Mercedes still might have HIV. Tony is in the dog house with Jacqui. Poor vindicated Newt is in hospital. Darren’s convinced he is going to hell.

Hollyoaks is just bloody BRILLIANT.

Pigeons in a Derelict Church

Talk about SLOWLY bring water to the boil then letting it bubble over! Ten months of calculated disruption, over four episodes of chance abductions and then all of a sudden it climaxes in half an hour?

Like a lion stalking his prey, picking out the gazelles one by one, Niall has collected the McQueen gang and lined them up for his one-man pack to ravish.

Revealing to Myra and her girls that he IS the abandoned son (who would have guessed it?) of Myra McQueen, he goes on and on about his struggle through life, how he never had a role model, never knew where he came from, never had stable familial relationships etc etc.

Come on Niall. Think about where you are. You’ve entered into the world of ‘Oaks, where tragedy is unforgivingly indiscriminate: there is no point in having a character in Hollyoaks unless you are going to tear them apart bit by bit, increasing audience numbers in the process.

Yet, others don’t think it is acceptable to tie up five vulnerable women in a derelict church and threaten to blow them to pieces.

Creating the soap version of Sophie’s Choice, Myra has to chose which children to live and which children to die. In answering six questions correctly or incorrectly Myra literally holds her children’s lives in her hands. Wonderfully compelling viewing. We applaud you Hollyoaks writers. It took a long time coming, but we stuck with you and we have been rewarded. However, you could have dragged this out a bit more.

Myra answers two questions correctly and four incorrectly. Shocking. If only I was being interrogated instead of Myra, I could have answered at least four. So two of Jacqui, Mercedes, Carmel, Tina and Michaela will live and four of them will die.

Hold on a cotton picking minute. There are only five children there. For six life-changing places.

Yes, you’ve guessed it, our crying distraught ladies took a bit longer. Niall has managed to hop over the Irish Sea to Dublin, capture McQueen brother John Paul, smuggle him through passport control, get him on a plane or ferry and bring him struggling and protesting to a derelict church in Cheshire. The mind boggles, it really does.

And where was Craig Dean when the love of his life disappeared? Why did he not contact Myra asking her if she had heard from him?

So Myra makes her choice. Although not until Mercedes and John Paul have offered themselves up, martyrs that they are. Great. Two down, two more to choose.

Jacqui and Carmel you’re up. Unfortunately neither of you have a child and neither of you happened to be the baby of the family. Life’s tough.

Meanwhile, dead Jack is actually alive and almost well. Against the wishes of a pushy Darren he races to the McQueen villa and bumps into the Hutchinson duo. Questions come bubbling to the surface. What? When? How? Why?

Oh bloody hell Tony, never mind that, your missus is about to face her death and you want to engage in a confrontational conversation with a ‘dead’ ex-copper. Priorities man!

Tony and Dom race to the church with a Die Hard-James Bond-Batman and Robin style gait. Battered Jack and Darren (failing to call the police, self-confessed going to hell) are also on the case.

Lying father and gambling son burst into the church ‘it’s over Niall’.

Jack is also a contender for quote of the week. Did he think that spouting that line would convince Niall to change his mind? That he would reply ‘Jack, you are right. Now that you, an OAP landlord with a dodgy heart has burst through the door with your Chav son, it really is over. I have met my match. Take me away’.

Oh come on! Nasty Niall panics and presses his detonator. The church explodes. Bodies fly. Dum dum dum.

Pigeons flee from a broken church window.

There must be more to come.