We're used to seeing the stars of Corrie on the settees of the nation's TV shows plugging upcoming storylines or their imminent appearance in panto, but in the past few days a new Weatherfield-related face has been on our screens. Controversial Corrie producer Phil Collinson has been on various TV shows (including BBC Breakfast and This Morning) to try and counter the growing criticism of the show and his stewardship.
With viewing figures dropping rapidly recently, Collinson is on a full-on charm offensive and has countered claims that the soap is too fantastical, too gay and too rubbish-accenty. On BBC Breakfast he tried to deflect some of the gay criticism by claiming it only crops up because he himself is gay, on This Morning he defended Michelle Collins undeniably poor Northern accent by saying that he'd heard a lot of people saying they like the character and he said that the ratings drop was caused by Wimbledon and the hot weather.
He might have a point. He might not. The fact is that Corrie has been getting increasingly outlandish over the past couple of years and the gentle, uneventful humour which made the soap popular in the first place has been largely forsaken in the hunt for sensational storylines, many of which just don't work. The Graeme/Xin marriage plot was ill-thought out and poor, Becky and Steve's break up has been surprisingly dull and disjointed and the interminable Stape murder farce was tortuously dragged out over two years and still hasn't finished!
We at Corrie Blog say, 'Come on, Corrie, we love you but it's time to restock, reshape and return to being a simple story of Northern folk.' When the show's producer is becoming more well known that it's stars something is very wrong indeed.
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