beau_t

Alf was in his element when he ran the store. The writers should never have taken that away from him. Having said that, I still think Ailsa was better running the store than in the Diner. #cantmoveonfrom1988

Alf was out of town, leaving Ailsa to cope on her own (this would gradually lead to her breakdown, exacerbated by the Diner break-in). I'm pretty sure Shane had forgiven him by this point. From memory Angel never held a grudge. I think people change over the years. I certainly don't stand by everything I said when I was 18.

Haha! I noticed that too, was going to comment the same. I heard the "doom piano chord" strike and thought something majorly explosive was about to happen. Turns out it was just a little disagreement. I love Mike Perjanik's underscore but occasionally it can verge on the melodramatic!

Entirely believable to me. I never had a problem with it, in fact I always imagined they would get together off screen which is why I was so happy the writers confirmed it years later. I felt that of ALL the possible exits they could have given Tug, to have him go and live on Sarah's dad's farm, was very much hinting at this possible future development. Even as a youngster I remember thinking this. This is the first I've ever heard of Sarah and Tug acquiring in retrospect a reputation as a "back up" couple to Shane and Angel. I never thought anybody saw them that way, least of all me. As for Tug growing up and maturing a lot over the space of 8 years from a late teenager to a mature mid 20's adult, I think it's less a case of "maybe" he did and more a case of "in all probability". I also love the fact that Alf and Sarah got a happy embrace in episode 4000 (even if it was dialogue-less). It was a little moment of closure for me, because it shows that since their unhappy parting of the ways (which I HATED), they had either patched things up off-screen, or it had just become water under the bridge.

I believe the first we learnt of it was in Episode 4000, when Irene noticed Sarah arriving and wasn't sure whether she was Thompson or O'Neale since she'd married Tug. Actually, I believe it was first mentioned in early 2002, in Episode 3215, when Nathan comes back and asks Alf how Sarah is. Oh yes, of course. Alf mentioned they were expecting their second kid - though it wasn't confirmed in that scene whether they were actually married (though I guess we can presume they were), unless it came in a later ep. Oh, really? I thought Alf did say they were married but I'm obviously remembering it wrong.I'm pretty sure it wasn't mentioned again until 2005, it was just a throwaway line. I love the fact that the writers put Sarah and Tug together offscreen. I was always gutted they didn't end up together in the 90s. The writers of the 2000s episodes obviously felt the same!

I agree. I enjoyed the storyline simply because I love Morag but it could have been so much better and it was way too repetitive. We didn't see enough of the "real" feisty Morag until the very last episode. We should have seen more of that over the weeks, and less of Ailsa saying "she's been after Sam since day one" every 2 minutes.

I agree, although I don't think the mistake was putting her with Ross. IIRC it was Bevan Lee that wrote that storyline, and I'm sure had he stayed on, he would have had Morag and Ross as integral characters, even if they were recurring. It was after he left that the next team of writers gave Ross altzeimers and wrote them out.

Ahhh the fancy dress party. I remember Irene's costume!!

Is it really suitable for school janitors to come to work dressed like someone out of a gay porn movie?

Crossing the road without looking was pretty stupid... But yeah I agree. LOL! How efficient.

You can understand why Dieter Brummer got fed up with the Shane/Angel saga! I enjoy watching them as they have such good chemistry but my god they don't half go on and on!

I was thinking back to the time when Ross got arrested for murdering Charlie's rapist. At the very least, this was a cop-out so that it could all be swept under the carpet off-screen. But more-so the way Morag was written was awful. She barely reacted to this news and was quickly rushed out of the show minutes after this was revealed. Her Alzheimer's suffering husband went out and committed a murder - this should have been a massive blow to Morag. It could have involved some really emotional and powerful material for Cornelia to play. But she hardly blinked. And with her being a judge, we could have had a powerful storyline with her fighting tooth-and-nail to make sure he wasn't convicted for his crime due to his condition. But we never saw any of that. We have no idea what happened, and the writers weren't in the least bit interested either, because the next time we saw Morag, Ross has conveniently died off-screen, meaning they never had to explain any of it. There's no way I could have believed Bevan Lee or even Dan Bennett writing Morag in such a feeble, non-important way. And then what happened after Ross' convenient death? She came back to the Bay to heal, but I think there was one scene of her crying, followed by months of her folding sheets at the caravan park and doing very little else. Since then there's really been very little interest shown in Morag by the writers and I'm not surprised, since they clearly demonstrated they can't actually write for her. This is not the Morag who blossomed as a character throughout the 00s. The writers completely dropped the ball with her, and so much time has passed, I don't know she can be redeemed, certainly not by the current team.

I do! Irene is a hoot. Well done to the writers back then for deciding to bring her in full-time. There have been so many characters in more recent years that could have been the "new Irene" if the writers had seen the potential the way they did back then. Jazz for example. Or Brodie's mum (forget her name). I also loved when Irene took the chair at the bowling club and was talking using all the professional terms. It was so unexpected And then she kept poking her nose into the rule book every time someone said something! I know things move on and they can't keep mentioning Bobby every day but it just seems weird the way Ailsa has carried on in the Diner without her. I think they should have a storyline with Ailsa wanting to leave the Diner (feeling that Bobby was the soul of the place) and the community convincing her that she is wanted there.

Haha, whenever Ailsa closed that screen over the kitchen door in the Diner, you knew things were getting serious.

That's nothing compared to Vera/Celia!! Nick writing notes from a Stephen King book sounds like a nod to the cop from the Stephen King book Misery which would have recently been released as a movie at this point. There was a cop in that who was working on a crime by taking notes from the novels of a famous writer.

Love your avatar Old H&A Fan.

I wonder if Gloria (Sally's friend) went on to become Nurse Gloria.

Ailsa's almost obsessive hatred of Morag makes it all the worse that Alf lets Duncan go and live with her in 2001 without so much as a mention of the fact Ailsa wouldn't like it - she would have been FUMING. If I remember rightly there is some brief mention of it during the Brain-tumour-Ailsa storyline - and quite rightly so). I did enjoy the fact that even Ailsa as a figment of Alf's imagination hates Morag just as much as the real one did.

Sadly not. Sadly not.

Yes I've wondered before about the original caravan park before, and what purpose, if any, it served in real life. As for the laundry, we saw (I think it was around 2011) that there is actually a separate laundry building located somewhere in the park, as we saw Morag taking sheets in there when she looked after the park for a while. Of course the park has changed so many times who knows if that's still the case as it was never originally the case.

I specifically remember them mentioning in 2008 it had been 12 years since they last saw each other, this would be 1996. This doesn't mean they necessarily broke up at this point, but I'd imagine that was why it was put into the script otherwise why put it in there? She was still in love with Richard and keen to get back with him towards the end of her 1989 stint (after Danny sent her a bunch of flowers pretending to be from Richard) so I strongly doubt she was seeing Ross at this point, although she did admit she wasn't fully over Richard when dating Ross, and also that their relationship lasted 2 years, so it could fit between her leaving at the end of 1989 and her return in 1993, except for the fact she told Alf in 1993 that she hadn't had any relationships. She does state that she first met Ross when she "cross examined him" during a case. We know she wasn't working in this field during 1989. I've rewatched the early part of 2008 many times I guess there are arguements to support their relationship being both before and after 1993 but personally I just think after fits better.

She had a busy 8 years off-screen though. During that time she would have cared for her and Alf's father with Alzheimer's until he died. She also would have dated, fell in love, and eventually broken up with Ross Buckton during this time. We learn both of these things later and this is the only time period they could have occurred in. She also (somehow) makes her way back to being a judge again. I'm not sure why they didn't bring her back for so long during the 90s. I can only assume that as the show evolved, her character was simply lost and forgotten about, and they probably weren't aware how popular she was with viewers.

The most annoying part of the whole Ailsa v Morag storyline for me: Pippa. If she'd sat on that fence any longer she'd have to get it surgically removed.

My point was that Clarissa's contract was up (regardless of whether it was her choice to leave or not) before they actually wanted her death to take place. They wanted it to coincide with Kit giving birth, which wasn't due for a few months yet. After Beth left for her "holiday" she was removed from the opening credits despite not actually dying until months later.

I think Clarissa's contract was up so they had to let her go, but they really wanted Beth to die at the same time as Kit giving birth, because they wanted to a birth-and-death episode like they do in hospital dramas. So they had to delay Beth's death and that meant writing out Clarissa before Beth died. From memory she was also removed from the opening credits months before her death. The whole thing was a bit sloppy and ineffectual in my opinion.