Emmerdale

[Brekkie]

Your theory may or may not be correct but if it is it is something soaps just do far too often now.

[Jez_CymruWales]

For a 'super soap week' of episodes it was quite weak overall really. It came to life a little bit during the 2nd episode on Thursday but Mon-Wed was a snooze fest in the main aside from the bridge collapse at the end of Mondays. But overall I think Corrie did the better 'super soap week' hands down.

[Jez_CymruWales]

I have actually just heard a theory that Andrea might not be dead, she's been put into witness protection or similar. We never saw her actually dead, found by the emergency services or Kim identifying her body after all- Kim could possibly be in on the witness protection too. The way they set it up just seems too obvious for her to have died. If she really is dead, it seems incredibly lazy writing if there's no twist considering how obvious they were setting it up over the course of around three episodes, even opening Thusday's second episode with a voiceover from Meena saying she "wished she could have saved her",, before we'd even seen her supposed death I'd like to hope there's some sort of twist to come.

I really hope not! We already have Jamie missing presumed dead and probably likely to turn up alive at any time. It would make the entire week even worst if this was the case!

[James2001]

The current episodes that are showing on ITV3 were for some reason cropped to 14:9 on digital (but not on analogue) when they were first shown, looking at how tightly framed some of it is, it must have looked pretty awful at times.

Cropping 4:3 content to 14:9 on digital was one of those strange things ITV did in the 00s for some reason, though it wasn't anywhere near consistent which shows were cropped and which weren't. Corrie wasn't cropped for example. The main CD:UK show wasn't, but the late night CD:UK Hotshots spin-off was, and most bizarrely the 2000-01 series of This Morning was cropped on BOTH analogue and digital (the afternoon repeat they had on ITV2 that year went out uncropped on a few occasions though)- why it didn't just go out in 4:3 if the studio wasn't equipped for 16:9 is beyond me.

[James2001]

I wonder if that whole "Alexa" bit in last night's show was paid product placement from Amazon?

[James2001]

On tonight's show, when Meena was holding the gun up to the camera earlier in the episode, you can see the four chambers that were exposed were empty, until just before she fired at Layla where all of a sudden you could see there were now bullets in the chambers...

The details that get exposed in HD!

I'm guessing they were trying to be safe by not having anything in the chambers except for when actually needed. Particularly as this would have been filmed not long after the Alec Baldwin incident.

[JasonB]

On tonight's show, when Meena was holding the gun up to the camera earlier in the episode, you can see the four chambers that were exposed were empty, until just before she fired at Layla where all of a sudden you could see there were now bullets in the chambers...

The details that get exposed in HD!

I'm guessing they were trying to be safe by not having anything in the chambers except for when actually needed. Particularly as this would have been filmed not long after the Alec Baldwin incident.

Those are the kind things the Daily Mirror like to write about!

[Jez_CymruWales]

I'm over a week behind with Emmerdale at the moment, just haven't had any enthusiasm to catch up, the Meena storyline just makes the show look ridiculous IMO!

[Rory]

A couple of TV guides I've seen seem to suggest Emmerdale's 3000th episode, due to air on Friday, is being skipped by ITV3. I know it's on YouTube but I hope it's just an error with the programme data ITV's sent out or something, wouldn't be the first time ITV3 have skipped an episode.

[James2001]

Actually it would be. There was one episode they didn't show because of a mistake (they accidentally showed the following episode twice instead), but they did put it on the ITV hub, they haven't actually skipped any.

Unless you count the 1400-odd episodes of the "Farm" era anyway.

[James2001]

We'll be seeing the introduction of the infamous Soapstars family on Wednesday. Certainly not the smartest thing that the show ever did. From what I remember, they were pretty much confined to the holiday village and most of the rest of the cast resented them. They got given a 3 month extention to their contracts after the episode aired (would have been interesting if ITV3 did show the Carol Vorderman hosted wraparound programme which included it), but of course they all left the show after that.

[Andrew]

I recall the ‘mum’ integrated more into the village and other characters but the kids were as you say barely seen away from the holiday village having their own storylines separate from the rest of the characters

[James2001]

One thing I remember is the main Soapstars series was in 16:9, though the final episode which encompassed this episode we're seeing today was made in 4:3- due to the fact Emmerdale was still in 4:3 at this point. The first 16:9 episode was the 6th January 2002, which we should be getting in a month's time.

Emmerdale was one of those shows as well that was cropped to 14:9 on digital- one of those strange things ITV did in the 00s, which wasn't remotely consistent in what was cropped and what wasn't- for example, Emmerdale was, but Corrie wasnt. The 2000-01 series of This Morning was cropped on both analogue and digital (but the ITV2 repeat got left alone on some occasions) The main CD:UK show wasn't, but the late night CD:UK Hotshots spin-off was, the news started being cropped in May 2005 etc.

[telebox2001]

I felt sorry for the Soapstars family, they got a rough ride of it and I'm not sure it was right for the rest of the cast to resent them like they did - Malandra Burrows was very outspoken at the time ISTR. Indeed, we see her leave very soon although she does come back for Seth's funeral following the passing of Stan Richards.

I think it was just a cheap way to cash in on the Popstars pound, right down to Yvon Grace trying to be a pre-Cowell "Nasty Nigel" takeoff.

She of course went on to do that hideous second reboot of Crossroads, which worked about as well as the new family did.

[James2001]

Going by the schedules, we'll be getting the 6th Janaury 2002 edition on the 3rd June- the first edition made in 16:9.

Going to be interesting to see how they handle the October 2002 editions that originally went out with a film look, the ITV2 omnibus edition at the time showed the first 2 of those episodes without it (presumably so it fitted in with the rest of that week's editions).