Return Of The Living Dead!

EastEnders used to be a place where even half-decent actors could make their reputations then move on to other things. Michelle Collins (Sinful Cindy), Nick Berry (Wicked Wicksy), David French (Even More Wicked Wicksy), Tamzin Outhwaite (Man-Hungry Mel), Martin Kemp (Slick Steve Owen) and Paul Nicholls (Nutty Joe) have all left the Square and done at least some decent stuff since leaving Walford.

But that trend is in danger of becoming reversed and it’s now a place where actors go to die. Leslie Grantham started the ball rolling when he returned as Dirty Den and his one-off-the-wrist shenanigans with a webcam virtually ended his career.

And I reckon it’s a plague waiting to happen. Consequently I fear for the pretty good and pretty saucy Tracy-Ann Oberman, soon departing as Chrissie, and the ever-beautiful David Essex, who is on his way to Walford next year. And the fact that Ray Brooks has decided to rip up the legacy of Big Deal and Mr Benn and be remembered as Pauline Fowler’s sex bitch reduces me to tears (although Fowler the Growler in a basque and suspenders bossing somebody around in a gimp mask is not without its merits).

Bizarrely, though, the actor who has probably done best of all post-Enders is Ross Kemp, who made his week-long return to the Square as Grant Mitchell last night and who will be back for a longer stint at the start of next year.

Kemp is an actor of breath-takingly limited ability and his dramatic range stretches from shouting and moving quickly, to shouting slightly less loudly and moving slightly less quickly, to whispering quietly and hardly moving at all... And that’s it.

As Grant Mitchell his previous tenure in the Square saw him walk around as if someone has stuck a pole up his arse that went right to the top of his skull and glued his butt cheeks together so that any form of complex body articulation was too problematic. Consequently on-screen he was a sort of supermarionation thug, whose best attempts at looking menacing were counter-acted by the fact that he minced along like a lifeguard from a gay Baywatch.

EastEnders is utter rubbish at the moment and, like a professional footballer who now owns a bar, the only thing it has to look forward to are memories of its glorious past. So not only have viewers had to put up with Dirty Den coming and going and Barbara Windsor tottering around the Square squawking variations of ‘I’m still a Mitchell!’ every five minutes but now the show has dragged back Ross Kemp as Grant Mitchell and Steve McFadden as Phil Mitchell.

McFadden is actually not a bad actor but Kemp is dreadful and all he had to do last night was get out of a car and say ‘Hello mum!’ He did and you already know it’s going to be spectacularly bad...

If the BBC had any shame it would write to every licence payer and apologise for pissing money away on this cock-rot. Even ITV would hang its head in shame…