Maria and Tony are circling ever closer to each other. All that's stopping them leaping into each other's arms is her recent bereavement and heavy pregnancy, and his guilt at having bereaved her of the father of the heavy pregnancy. Anyway, this week he went with her and held her hand while she had a scan. The scan confirmed that all is well, and the offspring of Liam will be a boy. Will he have his father's lush black hair and smile that could make the sun come out even in Manchester? Or will he take after Uncle Kirk? We'll have to wait and see.

Meanwhile, Tom is hankering after Maria, too, and isn't happy...

My sister thinks that Coronation Street's Gail Platt has been behaving like Kathy Bates in the film Misery, and fully expects to see her smashing Joe's ankles with a hammer in the near future. It's true that Gail did seem quite gleeful when Joe did his back in, and seems to enjoy having him in her power. I expect it makes quite a nice change for Gail, who is normally the helpless victim in her relationships. This includes her relationship with her younger son, who, despite getting his job back at t'salon, continues to be sly and evil. He's playing a long game as far as revenge on Gary Windass is concerned, and is currently pretending to be Gazza's bezzie mate.

Ken's little dream world on the canal with Stephanie Beacham from Dynasty may be over. She's hoisted her mainsail (or the bargeing equivalent thereof) and barged off to an undisclosed location. Luckily for Ken, he managed to track her down to a nearby theatre via the medium of local radio. Unluckily for Ken she wasn't interested in his pathetic apologies, and even more unluckily, he was spotted by Ted and Audrey. Now the cat's out of the bag good and proper as Audrey told Peter that Ken had been messing about with another woman.

In other news, Teresa Morton returned to the Street spectacularly drunk, and Dev has agreed to let her stay in the flat above the shop, as long as Darryl stays there with her. And Jack has mislaid three pigeons.

Romance was a rocky road for Ken and Peter Barlow this week. It looks like Ken's little on-board idyll with Martha could have sunk, following his revelation that he's neither footloose nor fancy-free. Martha felt betrayed and humiliated that he'd been keeping Deirdre a secret all this time. Meanwhile, Ken's son Peter doesn't like to be without female company for long either, so Leanne's side of the bed is barely cold before he's wining and dining Michelle Connor. It doesn't take long for her to discover he's a self-absorbed, self-pitying mess with no table manners, though.

Dev Alahan is another one who apparently doesn't like to sleep alone...

William Roache has described his on-screen family as "wonderfully dysfunctional," and they certainly lived up to that this week in Coronation Street. While Ken was canal-side scoffing pineapple upside-down cake with Stephanie Beacham, his son Peter was subsiding into a drunken stupor and dropping a lit ciggie onto the tufted rug. Fire soon raged in the flat above the bookies, and Peter, Simon and Leanne the rabbit were in deadly danger. Fortunately Simon has a calm head in a crisis and managed to summon help, and the splendidly heroic Luke Strong and Tony Gordon rescued bookie, boy and bunny. Simon suffered the most and ended up in intensive care. Peter was shattered at what his selfish behaviour had led to - and, for different reasons, so was Ken.

When Tony Gordon wasn't dragging Barlows out of burning buildings this week...

It's been an odd week in the Street. The main focus of the action has been Tony Gordon, who was seduced by Natasha the hairdresser, which has resulted in him only seeming to get more fond of Maria. He keeps having panic attacks, though, usually brought on by thinking about Carla. Apart from the love of a good hairdresser, things haven't been going Tony's way. Via her solicitor, Carla has sold her share of Underworld to Luke Strong, and made it clear she wants nowt to do with Tony. Tony would be happy if he could have nowt to do with Luke Strong, but it seems he's stuck with the smug smoothy, so he's hired a private detective to dig some dirt on him. Knowledge is power, after all.

Talking of knowledge, we always knew Amber was a clever girl...

Like every other week of every other year in Coronation Street, this was the week that Steve McDonald and Becky Grainger didn't get married. But unlike other weeks, this week they were supposed to have got married. The registry office was booked, the bride's synthetic pink dress was nicely charged with static, and the champagne was flowing. So was the brandy. So was the cheap cider - and most of it was flowing down the neck of Becky. So much so that she was too bladdered to get married, and too bladdered even to remember that she hadn't got married. But it's all sorted out now thanks to the timely intervention of a soft-shell crab, and Becky and Steve are on their way to the Maldives. They may not have had a wedding, but at least they can have a honeymoon.

The honeymoon is over for Gail and Joe. Unable to cope with Gail's pity, Joe has been lurking in his lock-up, but Gail persuaded him to come back to the luxury of Platt Towers. This has ruffled the feathers of Young Master Platt, who has packed his little bag and run off to Liverpool to stay with daddy for a bit.

It's not long since Maria Connor was accusing Tony Gordon of murder and accelerating her late husband's noisy car towards him. She's now decided he's alright, really, and has been allowing him to give her business advice about LadRags, the T-shirt empire she is apparently trying to run from her front room. Maria isn't the only one who appreciates Tony . Natasha the hairdresser has spotted that, not only does he have a lovely head of hair, but he's a bit of a hunk.

In other news, Norris and Mary went off in the camper van and came back about ten minutes later. Ryan Connor and Sian had a kiss. And Kevin and Sally embarrassed Sophie by turning up at the Christian Centre.

Peter Barlow performed magic this week by turning Leanne Battersby into a rabbit. He got back from Portsmouth, closely followed by a curly-haired woman who claimed she'd been enjoying lurve on the ocean wave aboard a yacht with the boozed-up bookie. Leanne packed her bag and headed off for her maternity leave to run a restaurant in Leeds, leaving Peter and Simon distraught. To cheer the little boy up, Peter got him a rabbit. It's a boy, but his name is, nevertheless, Leanne.

It's going to take more than a new pet rabbit to fix things at the Platts.' Following David's discovery that Joe and Len Windass had a deal about the 19 kitchens, a massive row erupted...

The fate of Gary Windass hung in the balance this week, as Tina tried to decide whether to lie in court and say he hit David first. That's what David wanted her to do, but the Windasses and Joe very much hoped she wouldn't - and she didn't. So Gary Windass is still wandering around Coronation Street looking like the Crack Fox from The Mighty Boosh, and David is not best pleased. Not before time, Tina told him their relationship was over - it can't be easy going out with someone who acts like a spoiled seven year old, after all.

Someone else who was a bit childish this week was Norris, who got all jealous because Creepy Colin had made a window box for Rita. Graeme Proctor enjoyed winding him up, but that's not sensible either when you're up a ladder with a bag of compost. Norris shook the ladder, the compost dropped on Norris, and now he's wearing a neck brace. And Rita doesn't even like the window box!

Becky was humiliated when she discovered...

Len Windass has offered Joe McIntyre a job fitting nineteen kitchens. Nineteen, mind - he's very specific. All Joe has to do is get Tina to not testify against Gary in court, then Gary remains a free man, Joe gets nineteen kitchens-worth of work, and everyone's happy except David, which is enough to make anyone happy. But how will Joe get Tina to co-operate?

Luke Strong has a way of making people co-operate with him...

Becky Grainger was spoiled for choice this week when she was proposed to by two men. Neither of them was entirely perfect, one being "slow on the uptake, and married," the other "older, losing his hair, has a kid, his ex is local, tons of baggage including his mam." But she made the right choice in the end, plumping for the losing-his-hair one, who also has the advantage of having "dead twinkly eyes." So Becky and Steve are engaged and Becky has moved into t'Rovers, but her worries about Steve's mam are already haunting her - Liz is hardly making her welcome.

Kevin Webster was also feeling unwelcome in his own home, as Sally appointed the services of Britain's top ex-jailbird gardener, Graeme Proctor, without consulting her. He sought overnight refuge in his former home across the other side of Coronation Street with Ashley. Meanwhile...

The big story of this week was the showdown between Carla and Tony in a locked-up factory on a dark, stormy night in one of the best episodes of Corrie for ages. The emotions inside were equally dark and stormy, as Carla confessed to loving Liam: "He tasted better. He walked better. He talked better. He was better in bed," she told Tony, who in turn confessed to killing the man she truly loved. Amazingly, as Carla escaped and drove off into the night, I actually felt sorry for Tony as he fell to his knees on the cobbles, crying in the rain.

So, Carla has gone Tony knows not where (while Alison King rests up at home and gets to know her new baby girl), and it's fair to say Tony isn't handling her loss very well. He turned up at Liam's grave...

At the time of writing, Carla is currently locked in the factory alone with Tony Gordon. And I'm seriously worried for her, because she's been asking questions - and she's starting to come up with answers. She's seen the strangle marks on Jed Stone's neck, and she's been to see Jimmy Dockerson, whose silence spoke as many volumes as Jed's had done. She's heard that Jed is back in hospital again after a heart attack - possibly following a "visit" from Jimmy. She's thinking maybe Maria isn't such a dingbat after all. We already know that Tony Gordon doesn't deal nicely with people who get too close to the truth, so the stage is set for a serious confrontation.

A serious confrontation between David Platt and Gary Windass this week landed David in hospital, and landed Gary with a problem...

This was the week that Coronation Street turned 7,000, and it's still looking as peachy-fresh as ever. To celebrate this milestone, we had car crashes, a dog saved from drowning, a non-pregnancy, a fake mugging and a man fulfilling his ambition to make an Airfix battleship. Drama indeed.

The big story was Tony Gordon confessing to Maria that he killed Jed Stone. Maria attacked Tony in the Rovers and everyone thought she was crazy. Then she tried to run him over in the Street, so everyone was convinced she was crazy, particularly when Tony produced Jed Stone, alive and kicking and telling everyone what a great guy Tony is. Carla, however, overheard Tony muttering threats to Jed, and now she's maybe less convinced of Maria's craziness.

Is Sophie Webster crazy? Possibly...

They haven't mentioned Barack Obama on Corrie at all this week, which is very odd. On the other hand, the good citizens of Weatherfield have been rather preoccupied with events closer to home. For a start, Michelle found out in spectacular fashion that Steve doesn't love her any more, and, even worse, he loves her fellow barmaid Becky. So Michelle has moved her stuff and the son she remembers into Maria's (as if Maria hadn't suffered enough), and has gone to Ireland for a good old dose of Mammy Connor telling her she never liked Steve anyway and there was always something shifty about him.

Meanwhile, Becky is back together with Jason. Yes, Jason. Steve has apparently blown his chance with her because of his procrastination.

Attention therefore turned during the week from the goings-on at t'Rovers to the affairs of the residents of Platt Towers...

Molly and Tyrone are now Mr and Mrs Dobbs. They'll be enjoying their honeymoon in Blackpool rather than Paris, as evil Jackie Dobbs stole their Eurostar tickets. At least Tyrone won't be starting married life in prison, as he feared he would in a rather silly sub-plot involving dodgy sunglasses and Auntie Pam's ex, "Whispering Geoff."

An X-ray of Steve McDonald would only confirm what we already know - he has no spine. For weeks now he's been trying to dump Michelle, but all she has to do is book a table at a Chinese restaurant and he chickens out again. Maybe he just loves the taste of noodles. Anyway, poor Becky was in tears this week, as he'd told her he'd already given Michelle the elbow, only he hadn't. The invertebrate innkeeper's latest tactic is to try and palm Michelle off on her old mate JD. I think we can already guess how well that's going to go.

Things are going better for Leanne and Peter...

As I didn't do any weekly reviews during the Christmas and New Year period, here it is in a nutshell: Tony tried to strangle Jed, who survived that but may or may not have survived the ride to Wigan in the Underworld delivery van. Auntie Pam definitely did survive a small explosion in Jack's back yard. And Lloyd and Liz got together.

And now for this week's fun and games in the wacky world of Weatherfield. Steve McDonald found out that his best friend Lloyd is having an affair with his mother (Steve's mother, that is, not Lloyd's - that would be a mite too controversial for prime-time viewing). It's fair to say he didn't take it too well. "I was born between those legs!" he told Lloyd, appalled. The horrible news completely threw Steve off his plan to dump Michelle...

It's always hectic in the week before Christmas, and on Coronation Street it was no exception. The Windasses have got their decorations up, with more lights on the front of their house than on Blackpool sea front. Gail isn't pleased, as she doesn't want to be kept awake by Rudolph flashing at her. Meanwhile, Eddie Windass has secured gainful employment at Streetcars, despite giving the world's worst interview. They're desperate.

Maria is pretty desperate too - to prove that Tony killed Liam. DC Ruth Fowler from Eastenders is now on the case, though DC Ruth doesn't think there is much of a case at the moment. Tony decided to have a chat with Maria, and he briefly considered throttling her with a belt...

Maria's little brain cell has been working overtime this week, and she's pretty convinced that Tony Gordon arranged Liam's death. Now all she has to do is persuade other people.

Steve's little brain cell has also been much exercised by the problem of how to dump Michelle so he can be with Becky. He can't just tell her - it would break her heart and she might break his neck. Not that he's a coward or anything.

The course of true love has gone a bit wobbly for Tyrone and Molly as well. Convinced he's having an affair with Minnie...

Carla and Tony's wedding had everything - purple wedding dress, bagpipes, sushi and of course a shock revelation. Sally's social snobbery is one of her defining characteristics, so she felt she was in her element at a posh wedding. When things started to unravel thanks to her drunken husband who is no fan of the bridegroom, and the bride insulted the Webster family, Sally was seething. She decided it was the right time to tell Maria that Liam and Carla had been having an affair. The wedding ended in chaos with Maria telling anyone who would listen about what that "slapper" had been up to with her husband - but by then the slapper in question was on her way to her honeymoon, oblivious of what had just occurred.

Meanwhile Steve and Becky were back at t'Rovers, playing a drinking game and trying to ignore Blanche. Why wasn't Steve at the wedding with his official girlfriend, Michelle? He's trying to get her to dump him by being a bad boyfriend, and it had worked to the extent that she told him not to bother going to the wedding.

In other news, Maria had her scan and the baby is fine. Peter forgot to pick up Simon from school (luckily Ken was only round t'corner at t'library). And Norris met up with fellow competition freak Mary Taylor.

It was the week of Becky's trial, but the real trial was whether Steve would turn up and be her star witness for the defence. It was touch-and-go - mainly because, whenever he tried to go, he'd feel the touch of Michelle's claw on his back as she thought of something else that needed doing for her parents' party. But he got there in the end, and when he spoke in Becky's defence, he spoke from the heart. Acquitted of the charges, Becky found herself and Steve overcome by lust and they rented a room for the afternoon.

It's a weird thing, lust. It can strike anybody anywhere - and it turns out it struck Hayley when she was in Mozambique. The object of her affection was a Swedish do-gooder called Olaf. She confessed to Roy...

Remember the Battersbys when they first came to Coronation Street? Well, picture that and double it for ugliness and you have something resembling the Windasses. You wouldn't be daft enough to meddle with a crew like that, would you? David Platt, however, has never been known for his sound common sense, so when these Windasses refused to pay for a kitchen Joe and David (of Joe's Klever Kitchens) had installed, David decided that threatening them with a lump of wood was a good plan. Next thing you know, a couple of Windasses (I'm afraid I can't really distinguish the younger ones yet) had taken Joe's tools off him by way of compensation. Now her dad was being directly threatened, Tina decided to get involved, and she, David and Graeme went round to the Windass house and wrecked the newly-fitted kitchen. Now we have to wait and see what retribution the Windasses will decide to take.

Dev's had a tricky week...

Peter Barlow started the week by asking social services to take Simon into care. He ended it by planning to buy the bookies' and take care of his son either in or out of Barlow Towers. What caused this change of heart? £250,000, that's what. A "life changing sum of money," as Noel Edmonds would say, and indeed it was. Lucy had left the money in her will, on the condition that Peter looks after Simon.

Ken interpreted the whole thing as very cynical, but I don't think it was. I think Peter genuinely felt that he couldn't manage being a single father, but having the security of the money has made him think there just might be a chance. It's all been bringing up lots of stuff from Ken and Peter's shared past, though...

I have a theory about why it took Rosie Webster so long to start trying to escape from Stape's granny's attic. I think that, as long as Stape was visiting regularly to "feed the cat," she had some confidence that he would let her go. She still felt that she had power over him - you could see that he wasn't enjoying his role of kidnapper. As soon as he left her alone, that's when panic really set in, and she made some attempts to get away. This culminated in her hitting Stape over the head with a big stick when he finally got back - but this time, Fiz was with him and Rosie escaped. Fiz called the police, and now Rosie is safe in her own bed, Stape is safely in custody, and poor Fiz is devastated once again.

She'll be needing a holiday...

It was Liam's funeral this week, and there wasn't a dry eye in the house. Carla had to rush from the church to have a private sob, and she told Tony she had to get away. She planned to visit an old college friend in LA, and wouldn't say when she was coming back. The wedding wasn't off, it was on hold, Carla told Tony, but if he kept nagging at her it would be off.

Almost as if Rob James-Collier had to be replaced swiftly by another eligible male, Peter Barlow came rolling back into the Street, complete with adorable little son Simon. Peter doesn't think Simon is adorable, and indeed would have sold him to Michelle Connor if the price had been right. (Actually, the way Ms Connor was batting her eyelashes at him, don't be surprised if those two end up together. You read it here first). It's all given Ken something to think about while Blanche and Deirdre are away. They're going to Lourdes on a trip with the One O'Clock Club, and if there was a spin-off DVD of that little jaunt, I'd have my name down for it.

How's Miss Rosie Webster? I hear you ask. Well, she's currently been left home alone in Stape's granny's attic, and her purse has been found in a pub, where Stape hid it to try and put the police off the scent.

Police don't let go of scents easily on Corrie - at least, DC Hooch doesn't. He seems to have no greater villain to apprehend, no bigger crime to fight, than getting Becky Grainger banged to rights for smashing a few windows and lifting a purse. Becky thought she was off the hook - but Hooch is not going to let it lie.

Dev's been telling a few lies recently, but he finally came clean to Prem about his affair with Nina - it was either that or Nina would have done it. Now Dev is devastated, because it seems he's lost Tara and his prestigious role in the Manchester Asian Business Network. I wonder if they'll have him in the Square Dealers?

Liam is dead. No, really, he is. Tony summed up the life and death of Liam Connor: "Son. Brother. Husband. Lover... Roadkill." He got run over, you see, by a car driven by nasty Jimmy Dockerson. He did it for the money, and the money was paid by Tony Gordon. Tony's approach to life is that if something gets in your way, you pay someone to get rid of it. He paid Jason to get rid of the bats, he paid Jimmy to try and get rid of the problem of Kevin, and now he's paid for Liam's death. The problem is that physically removing Liam from the planet hasn't removed him from Carla's heart, and Tony is realising that the world is not as easily controlled as he once thought.

John Stape is a man who is more suited to an ordered existence, but in a moment of madness...