An EastEnders baby arrives kicking and screaming, plus the rest of the month in soaps

http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2015/may/25/eastenders-carter-baby-world-of-lather

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“I’m like an extra from that Call The Midwife,” screeched EastEnders’ Sonia. Uh-oh. It’s happened again. Someone’s gone into labour in the Queen Vic. Those poor cleaners have barely had time to mop Kim’s waters off the toilet floor and there’s another baby on the way. So many women have crowned in the Vic that the pub should offer a lunchtime deal to the overdue females of Walford. A ploughman’s, a pint and an induction for a fiver.

This time around, the baby is a Carter, whose arrival was hastened by Linda falling down the stairs in fluffy pink boots. Lovely Linda, who only has to frown to spark the nation’s tears, hasn’t had the easiest of pregnancies, what with the spectre of her latest offspring being the spawn of rapist Deano hanging over it. Still, the faaa-mily always pull together and they were soon at her side, which is just as well because who wants Kat as a birthing partner? “I’m not pulling her drawers daaaaahn,” she warned, as Sonia readied herself to catch the premature goods. Kat may have had something of a rebirth after meeting June Whitfield dressed as a nun, but the surreal experience has done nothing to soften her inner Kathleen. “Get your baps out then Sonia, get in your paddling pool, play plinky plonky music while you pass a bowling ball,” she screeched. “You call that natural?” Kat likes her childbirth like she likes her makeup: in no way natural.

In the great tradition of soap births, Linda was a wailing foghorn of a labourer, prompting horror from the assembled young’uns hanging around outside the hospital room. “They can’t be letting her go through that,” shuddered Nancy. “That’s not normal.” And lo, a baby boy was born, as loud as Shirley Carter and almost as bald as Phil Mitchell. Fortunately, the little one didn’t pop out with a full beard, which would have confirmed Dean as the daddy. The lower that scoundrel scoops, the more hirsute he gets and he hit his hairiest lurking in the hospital corridors, suggesting Linda called “their” son Kevin. Dean looked as sinister and glassy-eyed as the teddy bear he was clutching. Somebody call security!

Where was Mick while all this was going on? Ah yes, Mick, king of the closed-eye speeches was wielding a giant, inflatable emotional wrench. The big daddy had turned into full-on Athena poster man, stripping to the waist and administering kangaroo care to his “little sort” in scenes that could even move the likes of Kat. He did threaten to call his little boy Slinky as he was born out of a tumble down the stairs, but Mick’s not one to rush names. It took him two weeks to come up with the word “Lee”, so gawd knows what he’ll be like distracted by a paternity test.

Causing a commotion down Emmerdale way is Laurel, who’s gone from prim vicar’s ex-wife to vodka-quaffing hellraiser. She’s already proved she has a sharp right hook, but now she’s hit rock bottom. Lovable Marlon’s on the receiving end. The long-suffering chef could take having his eye poked out, but now Laurel’s committed the ultimate crime. Yes, she’s run over his dog. And tried to bury the body without him noticing. Poor Daisy. That dog’s felt more tyres than she’s had hot dinners, but it was Laurel who finished her off. “Maybe this is a good thing,” she simpered, all wide-eyed innocence, claiming she’d get help for her alcohol problem. Unfortunately, the only help she was off to seek was financial as she begged the whole village for cash before storming into The Woolpack and covering Marlon in chips as she raged. Where will Laurel’s quest for booze end? It drove her to do the unthinkable: leave the village and seek comfort at a faceless bar, where she blagged drinks off creepy men, pretending she was a widow. One illicit bunk-up later and that dead dog was the least of her worries.

Over in Corrie, Tracy was plotting to slay Liz McDonald and steal The Rovers, Tony and her dignity. By her own admission, Liz has been around the ginnel more times than most, so why the miniskirted legend hasn’t noticed Tracy sneaking around with her man is beyond baffling. Tracy has taken out many enemies over the years, but her random camp-insult-generator reached new heights as she branded Liz everything from a “two-faced, backstabbing tramp” to a “nagging, spongeing, life-sapping old tart”. It’s a wonder she has time to come up with these one-liners now she’s busy polishing Tony’s bald head in the back of Barlow’s Buys. After each encounter she emerges looking flustered and more evil than ever. Tony’s gleaming head has been turned so much he put the wrong bin out. What’s even more wrong is he tried to make a discussion about it sound sexy. Unsurprisingly, he failed, just as Tracy failed to claim her place as queen of the Rovers. Her fury at Tony when she realised she wasn’t the new part-owner was just the start. “Do you honestly think I’d be interested in you, with your sweaty builder’s armpits?” she raged. Next on her list is Liz, whom she’s going to tear down, sequin by sequin. Stay tuned.