Latest UK Episode Discussion (2006-2017 Seasons)

[Red Ranger 1]

Nate does seem to have a preference for the dark haired, dark eyed variety though.

It took me a few seconds to remember Sophie: I was momentarily confused because my brain first went to Ricky who doesn't really fit the description.Good point though, guess I was right to link him with Sasha in one of my fics...

I did think that Spencer should have wound his head in over Oscar, he's made his point, time to move on.But then when Evelyn started whining and Oscar followed suit, I kind of stopped bothering.Still, I'm glad that Spencer was the one who was the bigger man and apologised.I thought Oscar could have been a bit more gracious and acknowledged Spencer was well-intentioned, rather than just saying "Yeah, you were a tool":He's lucky Spencer didn't seem to mind.And Oscar does seem to have gained the wrong lesson from this, since he's considering dropping out of the colour run after all. Spencer and Chris' room wars shows promise.

The retooling of characters continues:I'm glad that Josh is in on Andy's problems and is the one helping him, that works a lot better than the focus being on Andy and Hannah.So, Josh still isn't 18, which means he must have been 16 at most when we first met him and should make him younger than Maddy, assuming her age hasn't been messed about with, but possibly older than Evelyn who would have turned 17 near the end of last year.Again, there's a logic lapse here:If we assume Matt's 18, which seems likely when he's repeating Year 12, then why not offer him a job behind the bar and give Josh the delivery job?Oh well, Josh has got the job now anyway.

You know, I wasn't sure if I'd accept Maddy and Evelyn as friends, since the show made it impossible to like both of them last year (and some people settled for liking neither of them), but those last scenes were the first time I've seen Evelyn be genuinely empathetic in a very long time, so okay, I'm onboard. Someone predicted late last year that Maddy's cancer storyline would be over by Easter, and I didn't think there was any chance they would be wrong, but Easter's been and gone and the storyline's still here, so the show should be applauded for exploring this properly and not having her cured in an instant.Of course, I still want her cured and for that reason the ending struck a real blow.

[Angelica]

I did find Oscar irritating - yes Spencer should have let sleeping dog lie but he was, after all, looking out for Maddy. As I am still not sure why Oscar broke up with Maddy. I can't exactly blame any character for being confused by Oscar following Maddy like a puppy dog for months, only to break up with Maddy once she reciprocates. Perhaps if Oscar verbalised his feelings, rather than just saying "it was for the best" then he might garner more sympathy.

It is funny how all the teenagers only seem to have one friend, at most two. Look at how isolated Maddy and Matt are feeling

[H&Alover]

I did love Irene sending Chris to his room and he went! Seeing as that other room at the front of the Beach House is no longer used/exists makes sense that Spencer or Chris uses Sasha's old room, it may seem soon but it's not as if she's died. Irene may have hit the nail on the head about Spencer's attitude to Oscar over him dumping Maddy was it more to do with the fact she had turned to Oscar rather than him rather then him dumping her after all those months of mooning around after her. As Irene and Chris who she was surprised to find herself agreeing with it's NOT about him or Oscar it's about Maddy. My take on him ditching her is they didn't become girlfriend/boyfriend until after her diagnosis whereas if they had been dating before it may have seemed more normal, if that doesn't sound weird. I think to Oscar it seems the cancer is the only reason they hooked up. Maybe Oscar felt it wasn't anyone else's business but his and Maddy's as to why they broke up. I'm glad Spencer did see sense and apologise, though Oscar may have been halfway to doing it himself.

Think you are right there Angelica none of the youngsters seem to have more than one, two at best good friends. We only see the usual crowd at SBH, all the others are just faces. I did like seeing Evie who had come to just that conclusion go to see Maddy, ,just at the right time as well following the news she'd just received. All past wrongs forgotten, they pale into insignificance, Maddy just needed a hug from someone other than Roo or Alf. I agree Red they are treating Maddy's storyline realistically with no quick fix.

Matt, if anything, is feeling ever more isolated, he wasn't that friendly with any of the other kids, especially his old Mangrove River cronies. Looks like he's blown his job now as well. Kyle did give it good thought and didn't allow family (or near family) to interfere with his decision to give Josh the delivery job over Matt. I was a tad confused though because he said to Josh Matt had been with them forever. Matt is 18, I'm sure he said as much to Leah a while back when he suggested Sasha move in to her place. Would it be possible for Josh to work as a waiter, take any drinks orders, but not serve them, getting whoever is behind the bar to deliver them to the table? We certainly wouldn't want a repeat of the Ruby/Indi incident. Nice to Phoebe back and good she is almost back to her old self, did like her impersonation of Brax when Kyle asked her what would Brax do.

Looks like Josh is going to be a busy boy, doing shifts at Angelo's, school work and now helping Andy. It was as I thought Andy felt uncomfortable with Hannah, his girlfriend, helping to get through his not being able to read very well so he can do his instructor exams. He certainly managed to keep it a well kept secret from Josh. Not sure how well it work out with Josh coaching him, aren't they too close, if it does prove too much there is always Oscar.

[Homeandawayfan.]

I am noticing a gradual improvement in the show now, mainly the balance. Nice to see Leah wake up. At least many things turn out alright in the end.

Although Maddie is the fittest cancer patient lol. I am quite liking Oscar more instead of him sitting around wallowing in self pity over Tamara last year.

[c120701]

I'm actually liking how this colour run is uniting all three factions of the bay (Summer Bay Proper, Farmhouse Bay and Braxton Bay) normally we only get two of the three. I can't remember the last time the entire community were involved in something.

The show is also really benefitting from having the Summer Bay House exterior back. I just hope we get some transition scenes as so far the exterior seems to be in place of the interior.

[Slade]

I did find Oscar irritating - yes Spencer should have let sleeping dog lie but he was, after all, looking out for Maddy. As I am still not sure why Oscar broke up with Maddy. I can't exactly blame any character for being confused by Oscar following Maddy like a puppy dog for months, only to break up with Maddy once she reciprocates. Perhaps if Oscar verbalised his feelings, rather than just saying "it was for the best" then he might garner more sympathy.

The actual reason IMO is inconsistent writing. There's no way an inexperienced teenage boy would be hopeless head over heels for months chasing the object of his desire clinging onto the hope that she would change her mind about him then when she does, suddenly decides he doesn't want her after all. Oscar's just isn't the type of person to only enjoy the chase. If we put the writing aside then I can only assume he thought he was in love with her and when they were official perhaps felt that something wasn't right or realised he wasn't in love with her so decided to do the right thing and end it.

I still found myself quite annoyed with Spencer (and as much as I ate to admit agreed with Chris) about his attitude to Oscar helping out with the charity event. I'm not convinced Oscar is the bad guy in all of this. Maddy treated him just as bad, if not worse and if we take the cancer out of the equation nobody would have bat an eyelid. The cancer actually makes his decision more understandable as at least he thought it was the reason Maddy wanted a relationship (again even though if the writing had been better he wouldn't have cared if the cancer was her primary motivation, if he was prepared to be at her beck and call for months trying to get her to fall in love with him why would he care why she's changed her mind, if anything he would be in a much stronger position than he was previously because it's an opportunity to allow her feelings for him to become more natural). I actually disagreed with Hannah about Oscar being the bigger person. Why should he? although I accept that Spencer apologised even though I wasn't entirely convinced it was genuine and he only did it because of pressure from Irene and Chris.

I was actually quite frustrated at some of the writing of Oscar today as it felt like he was going back to Maddy again even though she clearly wanted space from him and he knew that. Not sure how I felt about him blowing the secret of the fun run as I would have preferred to see her reaction. Still I suppose he was only trying to do the right thing by her.

Chris was annoying again. The way he wouldn't take no for answer with Spencer earlier on and when he moved Spencer's stuff out of the room although Spencer annoyed me when he broke Irene's window and just left Chris to deal with it.

I really liked the way Evelyn was looking out for Maddy yesterday. Strangely quite excited at the prospect at a friendship with these two. With Sasha gone and only two high school female characters left, what else? Given that they were sworn enemies before and with Maddy's cancer, friendship is the natural progression with their relationship. It's a shame Maddy had bad news because I was hoping she would have been more eager when Evelyn invited her round but hopefully plenty of time for that if she recovers. Again I liked the way Evelyn looked out for her even after she left with Matt.

Like Evelyn/Maddy, Oscar/Matt seems to have been formed because there aren't any alternatives. They are so different that I actually think this could work (although I don't think it will be as good as Axel/Jai). I actually think Oscar could be a good influence on him.

Found Phoebe slightly annoying the way she was trying to order Josh around.

Oh and Leah wakes up just as Zac decides to call it a day with VJ.

And things have now ended for a while just when they were getting interesting...

[CaptainHulk]

I found the Chris/Spencer bedroom wars funny.

If this was Neighbours in the mid-2000s they'd probably wrestle for it while a befuddled Irene walks in! "Don't let me stop, you boys..."

[Red Ranger 1]

Alf's episode count this week:Four.Roo was also in four, Leah managed a solitary episode and still hasn't had any dialogue this season but did at least have her eyes open.

After the rather annoying way that Matt just hung out with Oscar to aggravate Spencer last week...yeah, I enjoyed their scenes together as well.It does seem to be blossoming into a genuine friendship and could be interesting.I also liked the little moments that show how Maddy's changed, the way she apologised to Evelyn for assuming they could hang out and the way she stopped and thanked her even when going to the farm didn't work out.The brief Maddy/Matt beach scene was interesting:In a strange way, I think she liked that he was rude to her, it made her feel normal for a moment.And then we get another Maddy/Oscar scene, which was simply beautiful and I think does show that he does still love her: As H&Alover said, I think because they never got a chance to be a normal couple Oscar convinced himself they never could be.That said, I don't think it was his place to tell her about the colour run and I don't think it served any purpose:He could have waited a few hours and then she'd have seen for herself how many people care, and I think Spencer could be justifiably upset that after all the work he's done Oscar blows the surprise on a whim.We've not really been given enough info on Maddy's condition to judge her "giving up":With my limited medical knowledge, it sounds like she doesn't exactly have cancer in the sense that the tumour's gone but it'll come back if she just leaves it.But what exactly would her life expectancy be without treatment?Because there does come a time when you have to decide between quality and quantity of life, and at the moment she's getting neither:She got sick because of the chemotherapy and it hasn't helped at all.

While I found Chris moving all Spencer's stuff amusing (especially the Spencer's Room sign), it wasn't really his place and he's lucky Spencer accepted it.And unlucky that that window was shut for once: There's usually someone climbing through it.

There seemed to be a fair amount of bad advice at work in this episode.Yes, Phoebe was throwing herself into training up Josh a bit too hard, but I don't think she needed Marilyn getting dictatorial with a load of nonsense about "You're destined for greatness." This isn't the same as with Matt where his reason for not performing was no longer valid (he didn't want to leave Ellie alone with Gray and she wasn't living with him anymore), Phoebe's had some pretty bad experiences and decided it's not for her.And I didn't think Alf gave Zac very good advice either.Zac was obviously trying to do the right thing by Leah and VJ, he needed encouragement, not Alf basically telling him to give up.You can tell that the decision hasn't made him happy and he feels like a failure.And now it's going to be a moot point...

And that's it, I really want to see what happens next but Channel 5 aren't going to show them.Only 9 weeks of the 2015 season gone, 30-odd to go but for some reason they're taking a break now.It's disappointing but that disappointment was alleviated slightly by that great promo at the end of the episode, with lots of 90s clips that I hope are indicative of what we're going to see...but that's another thread.

[Brian]

yes, I'm disappointed by the break as well Red. Just as storylines were getting interesting. Have to rely on Neighbours during May. They've got Kyle and Josh as well and things are getting more interesting there now. Back again next month.

[Angelica]

I did love Irene sending Chris to his room and he went! Seeing as that other room at the front of the Beach House is no longer used/exists makes sense that Spencer or Chris uses Sasha's old room, it may seem soon but it's not as if she's died. Irene may have hit the nail on the head about Spencer's attitude to Oscar over him dumping Maddy was it more to do with the fact she had turned to Oscar rather than him rather then him dumping her after all those months of mooning around after her. As Irene and Chris who she was surprised to find herself agreeing with it's NOT about him or Oscar it's about Maddy. My take on him ditching her is they didn't become girlfriend/boyfriend until after her diagnosis whereas if they had been dating before it may have seemed more normal, if that doesn't sound weird. I think to Oscar it seems the cancer is the only reason they hooked up. Maybe Oscar felt it wasn't anyone else's business but his and Maddy's as to why they broke up. I'm glad Spencer did see sense and apologise, though Oscar may have been halfway to doing it himself.

I presume that was Oscar's reason - that he felt that the cancer was the only reason they were a couple. But the problem is that it has been so badly played out on screen that the whole storyline makes Oscar seem very fickle (as opposed to say the Matt/Sasha storyline where the build up made it obvious why they chose to break up). And since the break up, despite promising to be there as a friend, he seems reluctant to do so. I wasn't impressed with him blurting out the news about the colour run either - it wasn't necessary to prove his point, and now we all know that Maddy is going to freak out and not turn up.

I don't think Alf gave Zac the best advice either. Yes, Zac has gone way beyond what anyone would expect someone in his situation to do (and I think it has done a great deal of good in terms of Zac's characterisation to show how he has struggled with looking after VJ, and yet, has always been spurred on by what he felt was right). I have mentioned it before, but Zac's conflict has been most refreshing, and true to life (as well as true to his characterisation) in comparison to say Andy agreeing to stand by Hannah without any seeming hesistation.

So so happy to see Leah waking up (although of course true to soap medicine, she apparently is fully conscious without any real neurological deficit). It is a pity that we could not see more of Leah before the break.