2022 Season - UK Episode Discussion

[Red Ranger 1]

Well, after all that fuss, Theo and Kirby go public and kind of get grudging acceptance at worst.Leah handles it pretty well and even lets them think she heard it from them, so all that stuff with Justin being sworn to secrecy (which he turns out to have been really bad at!) really does seem unnecessary.I do wonder if Remi having a grown-up date with Bree made him more receptive to the idea:He might not have been so keen a day earlier.I chuckled a bit at him pretending to be in love with a clearly freaked out Eden.And also at Leah winding Justin up about her "ideas" for the band.

I'm beginning to suspect that the snark-to-snark combat between Dean and Remi is because, now that Dean and Tane are getting on better, they need another alpha male type to butt heads with Dean.That said, Remi's a very different character to them:He'll give as good as he gets with the sarcasm but he's less likely to get physical.

So, one beach consultation (and Bree's first Obligatory Bikini Scene) later, and Ziggy realises she's pregnant.I was against the idea when she and Dean first got together because it seemed too soon after she'd been dead against it with Brody, but enough time has gone on, and Dean has had enough parenting with Jai to allay his own fears, that I guess I'd accept it.

[atrus]

Eight episodes in two days - hard to break the habit of a lifetime and so watching it in massive binges still, but I might try again from tomorrow.

Well, Marilyn, Roo and Heather becomes the most interesting storyline by default, on account of it featuring something actually happening to characters I care about. Marilyn does seem to have caught the genre-savvy bug, seemingly sensing that Heather's a proto-villain but having no idea why - at least, possibly, until Roo relayed Heather's backstory, which seemed to shake Maz to the core judging by her reaction. Interesting cliffhanger today as well. Agree that there's a distinct Nicole Franklin vibe about Heather, which got me thinking about how long ago Nicole was in it and whether Heather could be the baby that Marilyn tried to abscond with - but quickly realised after refreshing my memory that this theory falls flat on its face in terms of both on timeline and gender. Never mind.

Continuing to warm to the band when used in moderation. Eden remains the most charismastic but seems to get the smallest share of the storylines so far. It feels like Remi and Dr Bree could yet turn out to be something, even if she's playing it cool for now. Did anyone think it was really creepy when Remi pretended to be in love with Eden and got right up in her space? She looked genuinely unnerved, although the lack of a final wary scene-end glance as it was revealed to be a joke made me think there's probably nothing to be read into it. The Theo and Kirby reveal to Remi and Eden, and their 'meh' reaction despite having banned the relationship previously, felt massively anticlimactic given how much it's been built up (somewhat unconvincingly) as a major issue for the last few weeks.

Glad that Dean and Ziggy are getting a storyline with the pregnancy.

So, the Beach House left empty once again as Cash vacates - sigh. Looks like Irene is back to failing to 'mind her own beeswax' behind the coffee machine for the foreseeable future, then. Nothing else to add about Cash, Cash's existential crisis, Felicity, Rose, Xander and especially not about Xander's tattoos.

Oh, except... anyone else wondering if Xander's being lined up as a possible gay character (only later to be likely 'straightened out' at the demand of the network like Brody Morgan allegedly was)? It just seems striking that he hasn't really been given any kind of love interest yet, whereas most newcomers get launched headfirst into either a relationship or an unrequited crush within a matter of screen-minutes - although I did wonder if there was a bit of a look between him and Bree which is what made me think about this.

[c120701]

4 hours ago, atrus said:

Marilyn does seem to have caught the genre-savvy bug, seemingly sensing that Heather's a proto-villain but having no idea why - at least, possibly, until Roo relayed Heather's backstory, which seemed to shake Maz to the core judging by her reaction. Interesting cliffhanger today as well. Agree that there's a distinct Nicole Franklin vibe about Heather, which got me thinking about how long ago Nicole was in it and whether Heather could be the baby that Marilyn tried to abscond with - but quickly realised after refreshing my memory that this theory falls flat on its face in terms of both on timeline and gender. Never mind.

Definitely Nicole vibes with Heather, which might explain why Marilyn was so invested in Nicole & George as Nicole wouldn’t have been too much older than Heather would have been at the time. 
 

Marilyn’s reaction makes sense if you explain it due to her issues post the chemical attack, but she’s acting very un-Marilyn like and I’m not used to Marilyn being so untrusting of people, but she was unusually savvy with Tex as well. 

I just don’t know if Heather being older than Byron makes it better,  I couldn’t see Marilyn giving up a baby post Byron, but Marilyn working as a nanny presumably sometime between 1992-1995? I guess it makes sense she’d run back to Summer Bay, maybe there was something then which left her needing the surgery to help her conceive Byron?  
Marilyn was also concerned about Irene acting as surrogate for Finlay. Some of it isn’t a stretch, but Marilyn is one hell of a liar for it not to come out when she was struggling to conceive, when Byron died, in London (which would’ve made most sense) or after George.

Also, presumably Heather was named after Marilyn’s mother and I’m now wondering if George was named after her father.

 

 

[j.laur5]

1 minute ago, c120701 said:

Definitely Nicole vibes with Heather, which might explain why Marilyn was so invested in Nicole & George as Nicole wouldn’t have been too much older than Heather would have been at the time. 
 

Marilyn’s reaction makes sense if you explain it due to her issues post the chemical attack, but she’s acting very un-Marilyn like and I’m not used to Marilyn being so untrusting of people, but she was unusually savvy with Tex as well. 

I just don’t know if Heather being older than Byron makes it better,  I couldn’t see Marilyn giving up a baby post Byron, but Marilyn working as a nanny presumably sometime between 1992-1995? I guess it makes sense she’d run back to Summer Bay, maybe there was something then which left her needing the surgery to help her conceive Byron?  
Marilyn was also concerned about Irene acting as surrogate for Finlay. Some of it isn’t a stretch, but Marilyn is one hell of a liar for it not to come out when she was struggling to conceive, when Byron died, in London (which would’ve made most sense) or after George.

Also, presumably Heather was named after Marilyn’s mother and I’m now wondering if George was named after her father.

 

 

But Donald wouldn’t of stayed with Marilyn if she told him and so therefore I can understand why she kept her mouth shut. 

[Slade]

So admission by Heather that she's...bad, comparing herself to Nikau.  At least the situation with Marilyn has...progressed.  She could only keep giving her evils for so long.  I actually didn't blame Marilyn for having a snipe at her given how Heather's been acting but that also seemed to be passive aggressive like Heather.  I don't know enough about Marilyn's backstory to know why she reacted like that when Roo told her about Heather's past but really looking forward to seeing what happens next.

[Red Ranger 1]

Again, I found Marilyn hard to sympathise with here, as she stands around sniping at Heather in a way that seemed less about defending Roo (as she claimed) and more about getting a childish dig in, for no better reason than "She looked at me funny." Mind you, it seems Heather was being less honest than I thought, as she apparently has no interest in either a job, a law degree or paying her way, given the conflicting stories she told Roo and Nikau. No point trying to guess who she is or what that photo was about because the promo gives everything away (although you have to look quick or pause it to get the full story!). I'll wait until tomorrow before unpicking the continuity, but it's hard to see how this makes Marilyn, who already has a reputation as a serial child-snatcher, seem like anything other than a sociopath.

Ziggy takes pretty much the entire episode to tell Dean she's pregnant, spending most of her time avoiding drinking and not really looking queasy at the sight of prawns, but I guess she got there in the end.I can definitely see her point of view, so that's good, and it's pretty much the first vaguely interesting thing to happen to them in at least a year so...

I liked the sibling bonding between Cash and Felicity with their house of cards, otherwise Cash was pretty much literally trying to run before he can walk: Try leaving the house before trying to go back to work! It's a shame that, as usual, he overheard exactly the wrong part of Tane and Felicity's conversation!

[pembie]

I’m not sure im quite buying into the Heather stuff but it’s the best story out of some really boring ones im finding I quite fancy Heather so that helps lol But I’m wanting for some reason for to cause them all trouble maybe I just want something interesting to happen I’m not so sure about Marilyn reasoning upto getting the photo of her baby son like seeing it in the cards seems laughable especially when we are meant to take it seriously but who knows this could get bonkers 

 

[H&Alover]

People do get 'feelings' about someone which you can't explain. The look on Marilyn's face when she realised that the story Heather told Roo was her story! I did mention this some pages back and it was all confirmed when we saw Heather's birth certificate dated 1995, meaning Heather is 27, older than she looks and Marilyn was 25 at the time which makes her 52.  Trailer did give a lot away, I'm thinking the couple did allow Marilyn to give the baby the name she wanted so would give her her mum's name.  That photo was Heather.   Was it by chance Heather has rocked up in the bay or had she tracked down her down?  Oh wait, she couldn't have known what Marilyn looked like as when she first saw her in the Diner she was OK.  Does Heather think Marilyn just abandoned her, the way she has told it to Roo telling it from her 'story', she didn't have a choice so she must know Marilyn didn't.  Things were a lot more different then, Marilyn was a bit more ditzier than she is now.  Marilyn did develop fibroids later, is that possible and how come the doctors at the time when she had them which caused her miscarriage not ask her (privately) about the baby she had before? 

Heahter does seem a bit indifferent about her tutoring, not the most convincing of arguments she gave Roo and what about the job she was supposed to be going for at SALT?   Her getting stroppy with Nik when he asked if she could help with the court date was understandable, she's not even in uni yet!    She did tell Roo her parents' did send her to boarding school, to get her out of their way maybe, then later left her to her own devices? 

Of course it had to be Bree to come across Ziggy and ask her the right questions.  Must have got Ziggy thinking though as she brought a pregnancy testing kit.  She would be stunned to put it mildly.  It may have taken a day but at least she did tell Dean.   That is one big decision to make, of course it does always happen this way in soaps, just as things are going along fine and dandy there is a great big boulder to be dropped on you.   Though wasn't Dean's big no to her and him having a baby before due to his worry about developing the same condition as Karen and passing it on, but he then found out had Jai so that seemed to go out of the window.   It's not only to going to throw her dreams of being a champ surfer out of the water - sorry, but it'll impact her job at the garage eventually.

I said Leah would react the way she did!  Did like the way she teased Justin about it later. First it was all off with Theo and Kirby, that would be tricky seeing as they are in the same band, now it's back on and official.  I think it might have been what Theo said about Kirby that changed her mind. 

I can see why it would be awkward having Cash in the same house as the guys that were 'arrested' for their involvement in the bikies raid if it got back to them.   Cops, like docs and nurses, always want to go back far too early.   That was a lovely scene with Flick and Cash building the house of cards and him telling her how he understood how bad it was for her. Of course he only heard part of the talk between Felicity.  He couldn't really move into a van, he does need looking after. 

[Slade]

Sometimes I'm a fan of the lying and manipulation with certain characters but at the moment with Heather and Marilyn, I'm not really enjoying it.  I would rather Heather just openly confronted Marilyn about what her issue with her actually is.  Although I'm guessing when Heather told Roo about being forced to give up her baby, she was in fact talking about Marilyn giving her up.  The stuff has been pretty minor so far so it will be interesting to see how far how Heather goes.  I actually don't dislike Heather so hope there's a redemption arc somewhere.

So over this Biker storyline although I never really liked it anyway.

[Red Ranger 1]

So, yes, we've now got a proper look at Heather's birth certificate (which spells her surname differently to the end credits, do these people not talk to each other?!), revealing Marilyn as her mother.Which is a pretty big "Huh?" The date for Heather's birth is just a few weeks before Marilyn returned to Summer Bay in 1995, except she was meant to have been married to Philip during her time away (and we know she married him because Bobby was at the wedding) and when she came back she told some big sob story to Alf about how Philip had cheated on her and claimed he'd rung her wanting to get back together but she'd chosen to stay with the people that cared about her...which I guess we're now meant to assume was a pack of lies, since she was apparently off having a baby with someone else only to promptly walk out on them and spend the next 25 years playing the role of the tragic childless woman and trying to take children from other families to make up for it. So...yeah, Marilyn's a sociopath. It seems very unlikely she named Heather and George after her parents given that she couldn't stand them (and neither could anyone else who met them) and dubbed them "horrible people" that she wished she'd never met. I mean, she might have done it out of some sort of deluded attempt at sentiment but...would she? She said she liked the name but Heather claimed her father named her.

Okay, that's the continuity out of the way, what about the storyline? Well, to be fair, Marilyn actually came up with information beyond "It's in the cards" and "She's bad news" and Roo didn't seem to notice.Marilyn showed her the photo, even if she did dodge Roo's questions about who it was, and pointed out Heather had been telling different stories to different people (...not sure how Marilyn knows that but it's true), and Roo just kept on insisting Marilyn wasn't making sense even though she finally was.Almost.

What else? Cash continues to try and go from 0 to 100 and back again.I guess at least he left the house, but he still seems convinced he's just days away from returning to work.It seems he's okay with hanging out with Xander, so it's just Rose he has a problem with? After her concern about being the strong one a few weeks back, Felicity actually did a pretty good job here.I'm not really interested in the bikies being after revenge but it is good that Rose is getting involved.