The Rovers Return continues to defy physics. The Rovers Return, famously, cannot exist. The living room should be halfway into Rosamund Street, the toilets are in Ken Barlow's living room, and there seem to be about fourteen bedrooms upstairs even before Peter finishes his loft conversion. This week we got yet another twist on its Escher-like architecture: the staircase that turns left on the landing, not right, meaning you'll somehow end up outside the back of the pub, floating above the yard. Perhaps it enters another dimension, where you reach that secret flat Steve and Michelle lived in for about six months in 2008? (My apologies to Georgia Taylor, incidentally, for picking a screengrab where it looks like she's auditioning to play the Joker. I just needed a picture of the wall).
Todd is on the run... for some reason. The mess of trying to accommodate Todd's sudden departure rumbles on, as he apparently punched a policeman and legged it into some woods, leaving Summer to just wander off. I can't even remember why he vanished in the first place, but I am enjoying the convoluted nonsense the writers are having to spin to try and explain why he doesn't just come home. It hasn't quite reached the utter insanity of when they had to cover for Sharif's disappearance (remember that? When they filled the gap in the plotlines by having Maria accused of murdering her lesbian stalker, except she was hiding in her stair cupboard, or something?) but there's still plenty of time. Perhaps Todd got abducted by elves in that wood, or he's secretly an alien. I'm looking forward to a shoddy caption telling us he died on his way back to his home planet.
Tassels used to be an Italian restaurant. The ongoing "Bethany as a lapdancer" storyline continues to frustrate. If everyone hates her doing it so much, why don't they just report the club to the police for employing an underage stripper? She'll be sacked and won't be able to get a job anywhere else until she's 18 and that'll be the end of it. This line of attack didn't even seem to occur to her policeman boyfriend. Meanwhile, the rules of what you can show before the watershed mean that this filthy sexpit seems to be nothing more than Nick's Bistro except with a stage for a woman to do sub-Legs & Co shimmying in a BHS basque. Thank heavens for Audrey livening it up, then, who as the Street's resident lush couldn't pass up another opportunity to get hammered and started knocking back the bottles of wine before lunch. She was mad keen to visit Tassels purely because she's been barred from all the other pubs in town for being drunk and disorderly. Not content with turning her daughter into an author (Dancer!, with an exclamation mark to make it sexy, now available for pre-order on Amazon), Audrey also revealed that Bethany's stripper name (Madison) is the same as Claudia Colby's Alsation. She then reminisced at length through an overpriced chardonnay haze about how Tassels was once Angelo's... or maybe Figaro's. It was apparently the first place she had a courgette, which is appropriate, because I'm sure there's still a lot of courgette swallowing going on backstage even today.
Webster's Garage is not known for its professionalism. The very best place to hold a job interview is definitely outside. In a pub back yard. In January. Josh should get the job just for managing to form a coherent sentence through chattering teeth. Leaving that aside, I'm pretty sure you're not allowed to ask a potential employee "boxers or briefs?" Inquiring about the underwear of applicants is the kind of behaviour that leads to sexual harassment suits and slaps across the face.
Cooking inspiration can strike at any time. Yes, Gail's corned beef sandwich was one of the saddest meals ever served in the show. But Sarah-Lou's decision to make her a lasagne - from scratch, using ingredients she had to go out and buy - means that poor Mrs Rodwell is going to be sitting there with a rumbling tummy for at least another hour. She'll be gobbling up the discarded baby food from Harry's high chair tray before Sarah's even finished the white sauce.
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