Post by Deleted on May 27, 2009 15:04:06 GMT
Found this in next week's RT - nothing new, but nice to see some of our views given some publicity at last!
'Village Woes
Is too much of a good thing weakening Emmerdale's attraction?
All soaps have their ups and downs, but Emmerdale has lately had more downs than a bucket of vallium. It's lacklustre year was recently topped off with it winning just one trophy at the British Soap Awards, and that was for best spectacular scene, hardly a ringing endorsement of its storytelling or characters.
So what ails it? Most obviously, the families that so long formed its foundations have been allowed to become disjointed, distant. The glue that has bound villagers together has come unstuck.
While there are signs that this issue is being dealt with - the Dingles and Sugdens are being reconstituted as units - this lack of focus is a visible symptom of a structural problem. Making, in effect, six episodes a week means not only that an extraordinary volume of story is being used up, but also that Emmerdale is constantly "triple-banking" (ie there are always three units filming with the cast divided between them). And that means that there are few occasions when many of the villagers can be seen together.
Compare the sparsely populated scenes set in the Woolpack with Eastenders' scenes in the Vic, in which many of the Square's residents can be seen all together.
Unless and until new ways are found to address this issue - either by altering the filming structure and/or reducing the number of episodes - Emmerdale may be lacking energy for some time to come. GB'
'Village Woes
Is too much of a good thing weakening Emmerdale's attraction?
All soaps have their ups and downs, but Emmerdale has lately had more downs than a bucket of vallium. It's lacklustre year was recently topped off with it winning just one trophy at the British Soap Awards, and that was for best spectacular scene, hardly a ringing endorsement of its storytelling or characters.
So what ails it? Most obviously, the families that so long formed its foundations have been allowed to become disjointed, distant. The glue that has bound villagers together has come unstuck.
While there are signs that this issue is being dealt with - the Dingles and Sugdens are being reconstituted as units - this lack of focus is a visible symptom of a structural problem. Making, in effect, six episodes a week means not only that an extraordinary volume of story is being used up, but also that Emmerdale is constantly "triple-banking" (ie there are always three units filming with the cast divided between them). And that means that there are few occasions when many of the villagers can be seen together.
Compare the sparsely populated scenes set in the Woolpack with Eastenders' scenes in the Vic, in which many of the Square's residents can be seen all together.
Unless and until new ways are found to address this issue - either by altering the filming structure and/or reducing the number of episodes - Emmerdale may be lacking energy for some time to come. GB'