The past week seems to have flown by in a matter of minutes, I simply cannot believe I’m back here writing another weekly round-up already. There are just a few main storylines to recap this week, but I have a lot of thoughts about some of them, so let’s get into it.
Sadie Struggles
Sadie is still struggling with her physical and mental recovery after the fire. She’s pushing Byron away because, however rational she tries to be about the impossible choice Byron had to make between saving her or Nicolette, she can’t get it out of her head that he left her there. Poor Byron is doing his best to be there for her, and Wendy even steps in to meddle, which is what Wendy does best, and try to patch things up between them.
Weirdly it’s mega creep Darcy who comes up with a way for Sadie to help herself, by going to the site of the fire and “reframing” what happened in her mind, which apparently involves simply closing her eyes and pretending it all happened differently – and she only needs to do it once for it to work too. I’m no psychologist, but this seems like an over simplistic load of nonsense to me. Just when I think we’re starting to get some more realistic portrayals of trauma on Neighbours, we get characters starting to just imagine their way out of trauma. I’m going to call absolute BS on that one.
Fallon Tries to Make Amends
This is the biggie of the week. Fallon is still trying to make some sort of relationship happen with Krista despite the fact that she’s just blown up her entire life, ruined her marriage and landed her husband in the middle of murder charges. Krista blows up at her (FINALLY) and Fallon is so devastated by how angry Krista is that she goes to the police and tells them that she killed Seb.
The police are pretty easily convinced because this is Erinsborough and I think you only need to collect six coupons off cereal boxes to become a police officer there. The fact that Fallon’s alibi was fake, and a bit of footage of them arguing, is enough for them to drop Leo’s charges and charge Fallon instead. No further investigation needed.
Taye believes in Fallon’s innocence, so he enlists Cara to help prove that Fallon couldn’t have killed Seb. By some incredible coincidence, Cara has a text message on her phone sent from a colleague who was having IT troubles which shows that Fallon’s personal wifi hotspot was in the vicinity of the hotel around the time of Seb’s murder, therefore proving she can’t have killed him. They also know Seb’s precise time of death because of his fitness watch, as it stopped working at 11.03. So Fallon is in the clear, which puts Leo right back in the firing line.
Paul is absolutely furious with Cara for helping put the spotlight back on Leo, but eventually apologises to her for his outburst because as well as proving Fallon’s innocence, she also uncovered a whole load of dodgy antics amongst the Lassiter’s staff, so he offers her a job as a professional snitch, rooting out any other bad behaviour she can find.
Is Cara the Neighbours equivalent of Miss Rabbit from Peppa Pig? For those of you who don’t know, Miss Rabbit somehow does every single random job in Peppa Pig from selling tickets at the theme park to being a helicopter pilot. Cara is the general handy person, who also does IT, and now she’s going to be a compliance officer as well?
Honestly I think her talents would be put to way better use setting up a detective agency with Aaron. Aaron could do all the leg work while Cara does all the IT wizardry – could we get a spin-off series? I’d watch it.
Cara Causes Concern
Staying with Cara, she is causing some worry for Remi because of her attachment to Thomas. When the two of them are out in the complex with Thomas, Darcy strikes up conversation and makes the assumption that Cara is Thomas’s mum. When she doesn’t correct him, Remi is very concerned. And so she should be, because that is incredibly weird. It takes a few seconds to say, “I’m his auntie, actually.”
Remi confronts Cara about it, and Cara admits she’s still struggling with having to let go of the idea of having another baby after her emergency hysterectomy. Again, it’s actually really nice to see grief and loss not portrayed as a simple linear process where after a few weeks you’re all good again. Feelings of loss come and go, and I enjoy the way this is being explored.
Agnes Moves Into Eirini
Agnes decides to move into Eirini, providing that Harold gives his blessing. He does, and the two of them start to strike up a friendship. Agnes confesses to Harold that she is related to Madge, which she should have done before he was asked if her moving into Eirini was going to be a problem for him. The poor guy agreed without having all the facts.
While the two of them seem to be getting on well, Harold is clearly still struggling with the Madge-but-not-Madge vibe of it all – as am I, because it’s stupid. I just cannot get on board with this one at all, it’s so daft.
I Don’t Trust Darcy
Darcy is still trying to help Karl get off the painkillers – in fact he’s trying to help everyone. He’s like an eager little puppy, trying to get everyone to forgive it after it soiled the new carpet. But there is still a whiff of the old Darcy if you ask me, particularly in the way that he tries to worm his way into working at Eirini by suggesting he takes on some of Karl’s hours while he gets back on his feet. Karl is also annoyed by this, and it makes him throw away his pills in a fit of rage. While I can see why he doesn’t want to be under Darcy’s care any more, I can’t imagine that going cold turkey is going to work out well for him either.
Darcy very much has the dozy, amenable vibe that Felix had after he reinvented himself as a good guy – and clearly this is what the Neighbours team think a reformed criminal acts like, as Chelsea also has the glassy eyed, bland personality of a former cult member now too. Call me cynical, but I don’t trust either of them, especially not if they’re going to join forces.
The two of them meet at the pub and presumably they immediately form a bond over the way they both viciously attacked a pregnant woman in their criminal past – only in Erinsborough could you meet someone and confess to pushing a pregnant woman down the stairs, only to have them respond, “No way! I locked a pregnant woman in a sauna and her baby died!”
I’m finding both of these characters very, very boring at the moment, so I am kind of hoping that they form an alliance and go back to their evil ways, because that would be super fun. Do some crimes!
A Few Random Notes
As usual, here are a few random notes I took while watching Neighbours this week:
- What’s Darcy expecting? That nobody will remember he pushed a pregnant lady down the stairs?
- Getting smashed in the park is a really tacky way to memorialise someone who had a drinking problem.
- Is the murderer going to turn out to be a complete stranger? It better not do, or I’m going to be mad.
- Smart of Cara to enlist Holly in her new role as corporate snitch. Holly has alllllll the tea.
