Coronation Street: Simply The Best

This first appeared on the Coronation Street Blog in April 2010 but is a reposting from another blog elsewhere and was posted with permission.

Reposted with permission from the best TV blog in the world, PauseLiveAction

Coronation Street is not every person’s cup of tea but, what struck me when watching an extremely uneventful episode last night, is that it’s probably the only show which I can still enjoy even though literally nothing happens.

Corrie pulls off the risky formula of simplicity is best. Soaps tend to be over the top, unrealistic and hectic (Corrie included, if you look at the ongoing Tony saga) but sometimes it’s just as enjoyable to watch the characters you know and love just going about their normal lives, without sleeping with eachothers’ friends/relatives/pets or stabbing eachother when they bring you the wrong flavour of crisps.

Take last night. What exactly happened? There were no major storylines, no window shaking showdowns, no punch ups, no sordid bunk ups. Audrey went to a party with Rula Lenska to find Rita cosying up to the same man she likes (and by cosying up, I mean sharing a drink and fluttering one’s eyelashes, this is no passionate, every-position affair) Becky asked a friend’s advice on adoption. Rosie searched Ebay for a tracksuit. Graeme wound Norris up a little bit, for a laugh. A chocolate egg went missing.

That was it. As always, with Corrie, the episode was character and dialogue driven instead of plot driven. It’s the little things that matter when it comes to Coronation Street. It’s an institution, people all over the country know these characters better than their own neighbours so when the team of marvellous writers pen a witty line and the character delivers it you can sit there and say ‘oh that is so typical of Liz!’ (Don’t say it out loud if there are others in the room).

That’s the beauty of Corrie. In an episode where Audrey and Rita sniped cattily at each other, Norris’ hunt for gossip over a chocolate egg was fruitless and Hayley was just being lovely Hayley, nothing needs to happen. You’re just spending half an hour with some characters you know.

Posted By Our Man In The North