Hits
Reunited
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eighbours 2015 started back in the UK with some pretty dark scenes. Not only did we have the fantastic and nail-biting Sonya plot but the last we saw of Terese was her being locked in the room with Ezra. Thankfully we learnt that a shaken Terese managed to get rid of Ezra, but we were really pleased that after a bitter and sad end for The Willises in 2014 was changed with Brad FINALLY coming to his senses. With Brad actually listening and supporting his wife they both grew stronger and we were thrilled to see the family coming back together again. It’s been a difficult twelve months for the whole family but we’re very happy to see them as a strong unit again.
Sibling Silliness
Bailey and Paige teamed up this week for some really enjoyable scenes. Out of all of her siblings it seems to be Paige’s bond with loveable nerd Bailey that we love the most. They’re funny and endearing together and you get the sense she’s very caring and protecting of him, even if this week he did try and get involved in her virtual love life. We hope these two continue to give us the fun sibling factor which is missing from the Bailey and Amber relationship.
The Kennedys + Chrate
It
was a great week for the Kennedys as they continued to receive the strong, comedic material that made a welcome comeback in 2014. Karl and Susan never fail to make us laugh and even better was the fact that the usually somber Nate and Chris finally got in on the act and felt at home in the Kennedy household. After a somewhat rocky start and an unfortunate incident where Susan was nearly buried alive, the new Kennedy family unit is becoming fun, warm and a pleasure to watch. That said, it’s great to see Nate’s PTSD issues continuing to be explored, even if the rushed conclusion and explanation to last year’s burial cliffhanger wasn’t the strongest plot.
Misses
Bail Out
This week of Neighbours gave us so many great moments (the one notable exception below) that it’s hard to pick faults in what has been a dramatic and welcome return to our favourite Aussie soap. But we couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed to see Sonya fall into a naive bad habit and pay for Erin’s bail. We love the plot and our Scene of the Week proves how good it’s been but this just seemed a little bit much, even from the sometimes OTT Sonya. After everything Erin’s done to her and her family would she really have paid Erin’s bail? Not convinced.
Feeling Sleepy
‘Danber’ began 2015 as they ended 2014 – being one of the sole poor points of the entire show week after week. It was more of the same as the Rain story met its undercooked climax and Amber moronically was swayed by some mild meditation sessions into breaking up with Daniel. Unfortunately for us, not for good. They had reunited by the end of the week and normal business resumed. The only highlight of the story has been poor, lovelorn Imogen’s supporting role and the home truths Rain brought up before her departure. Let’s hope the audience was supposed to agree with her deductions – we certainly did.
It’s been a terrible week for poor Sonya as she struggled with her addictions in light of the ongoing poison pen letters but an absolutely fantastic week for the actress behind her, Eve Morey. One of the show’s finest, Eve never fails to play Sonya perfectly. Her nuanced and realistic portrayal of her character is powerful and moving – and we have to credit Neighbours for the brilliant depiction of an addict struggling to stay clean. This plot has afforded us a great opportunity to see this darker side of Sonya and the stark realities of her daily struggle. Eve is a true talent and we can’t praise her enough for turning Sonya into one of the all-time greats in our opinion. She has us hooked and we can’t wait to see where it goes next but we can imagine, whatever twists the plot takes, Eve will continue to give her all in the role.
It was a big week for the Canning family as they dealt with the shock return of Kyle’s wayward father, Gary. For characters that are normally involved in the more comic side of Erinsborough life, it was refreshing to see Colette Mann and in particular Chris Milligan receive some meaty material and they totally delivery. We’ve loved the various rows and arguments but above all we love that they’ve managed to come through it as a family. It’s also great to see the unusually stable Georgia and Kyle relationship continue to go strong. Yes, Kyle may have been a bit too quick to buy Gary’s obvious lie as an excuse for his absence but we’re intrigued to see what he’s hiding and hope Naomi is back soon to stire things up!
This continuing saga of Elvis, the porcelain pig, had us smiling all week. It goes without saying that actors Alan and Jackie clearly relish every minute of the fun and humour and that’s so clear in their performances. They can make us smile with a single facial expression and because they’ve been their so long, the characters’ quirks feel real and all the funnier – Karl’s tightness with money and Susan’s exasperation at his latest notions. Not only that but it was nice to see Chris and Nate get involved with the comedy and gave us a chance to see a lighter side to their relationship. More please!
This is a superb plot – don’t get us wrong, we adore it – but we have a real problem with Brad’s behaviour right now. He is well aware of Terese’s feelings and that she has struggled to accept his kiss with Lauren and their closeness lately but still he seems to spend every waking moment around Lauren and is forever asking her for marriage advice. Er hello! What a stupid decision. We understand him wanting to spend time with his daughter Paige but he’s not even trying to be mindful of Terese’s feelings. If there’s one shining light it’s that Brad made his feelings about how much he loves Terese clear to father Doug whereas recently you’d have believed he was sabotaging his marriage by choice! We love the Willis family so we hope some time apart works to mend their relationship.
The one poor plot in a great week of Neighbours drama unfortunately falls to another Amber and Daniel plot – this time with Daniel’s ex Rain. It’s incredibly difficult to find any enjoyment in characters who talk about ‘zen’ and have dreamy ideals when in real life we’d stay well away from these flaky people! This sustainable New Eden community development isn’t an interesting plot to watch and Rain is nowhere near charismatic enough for us to believe that she can win Amber over. The guided meditation sequence was creepy rather than enchanting but if Rain steps up her creepy hynoptic powers we might like her a little more.
Our number one this week simply had go to the continuing saga of Sonya’s mysterious poison pen letters which has had us gripped in speculation. Kicking off at the end of episode 7000, Toadie spent the week on the hunt for the culprit along with armchair detective, Brennan. It’s a good old-fashioned soap mystery and has given us all plenty to talk about. Moreover, Toadie telling Sonya the truth and get quietly powerful reaction as she feared all her secrets could be exposed to the public at large was a great moment. We love when Sonya’s past is explored and this is no exception and for our money, the culprit must surely be someone Sonya knew in her drug-fuelled past back for revenge!
Karl and Susan have been on a roll lately with their plots and it was another strong week today. After such brilliant comedy last week, it was great to see some friction between the couple as they disagreed on the best course of action with Nate. Don’t get us wrong, we hate seeing ‘Kusan’ disagreeing but it led to some fantastic scenes as Karl pushed Susan to admit her failings in his bid to protect her from further putting others before herself. In a typical Karl snd Susan style, this was done with honesty between the pair and a great wit even when arguing that puts the pair above all else in the pantheon of soap couples.
Here at this blog we’re a sucker for continuity references and this week it was the turn of Terese to spill more info about her past with Brad – and finally reveal what she meant when she once referred to Brad and Beth’s messy break-up. For weeks now it has been clear that Terese has had a real stumbling block on her road to forgiveness and it was interesting to see it confirmed that she was once the other woman in Brad’s first marriage. It was a twist that made sense of all of Terese’s recent actions and we couldn’t help but feel sorry for her. We can only hope the Willis marriage pulls through but it continues to look like it won’t be that easy.
Daniel’s ex arrived this week, the infamous Rain. We soon learnt more about her past with Daniel as she gushed about living in a commune with him and wandered the fields dressed as an extra from Xena: Warrior Princess looking for a new place to build a hippie community (please god no). Not only was her enchantment with Amber a bit creepy but we just found her plain weird and irritating. Her only saving grace is that we sense she’s going to become a bit of a crazy villain. We loved Georgia’s evil cousin Gem so we hope Rain will turn out to be just as good.
Every week we hold out hope for Amber doing something that will change our opinion of her, but – sigh – it didn’t happen this week. She insisted on revising in the kitchen and bitched about the noise levels when no sane person would revise in a busy family room and then when Paige accidentally punched her, she didn’t recognise it for the error it was – she tried yet again to get her family to take sides. Not on. Our only moment of sympathy this week was having to deal with Daniel’s ex and his complete lack of understand. Come on Amber, it’s about time you grew up.
Erinsborough 