Emmerdale review of the week: Eric's lost everything, Jade's awful, and Moira's got lovely hair

Our Emmerdale review this week is a mixed bag. There were things we loved and things we didn’t. A few things that we thought were really cleverly done and some that really weren’t.

Here’s what we thought in our Emmerdale review of the week.

Brenda chats to Eric seriously? — Eric lost all of Brenda’s savings (Credit: ITV)

Eric’s gamble

We have been surprised by how invested we are in Eric’s impulsive behaviour and the fall out. We’ve been musing about why this has drawn us in, when it’s really a rather low-key storyline. And here’s what we reckon – it’s old school, isn’t it?

Classic Emmerdale is full of stories about money worries, scams and fraud, so in terms of subject matter this feels like something from back in the day (though back then, it would have been Pollard doing the scamming!).

But more than that, it’s been a slow burn. Eric changed his medication a while ago. It was a throwaway, inconsequential storyline that we didn’t think was important. But since then his behaviour has become more impulsive, and now his whole world has fallen apart because he’s gambled away all his money and Brenda’s too on a cryptocurrency scam.

It’s so sad to see Eric suffering and to watch Brenda’s heart breaking. We wish there was a way back for them. But it doesn’t look good, does it?

Jade in between Billy and Ross — Why is Jade so scary? (Credit: ITV)

Emmerdale review: Evil Jade

Jade continues to be a strange mix of mega-villain and petty criminal. And we do not like it. Nothing about her weird pursuit of Ross makes sense. In fact nothing about her at all makes sense.

She is a master criminal who has a team of henchmen and one henchwoman, evil enough to dangle poor April off a multi-storey carpark. She knows everything about everyone. She has a fancy car and someone to drive her round in it. And yet her line of business appears to be running half-hearted boxing matches. She’s hardly Lex Luther is she?

What was her plan when she viciously assaulted a little girl? If her minion had dropped poor April, Jade still wouldn’t have had her money.

Why are all these hard men so scared of her? Is it the beret? And WHY OH WHY didn’t Ross, or Billy, or Aaron or Mack just call the police?

Anyway given she’s still determined to get her mitts on the missing £3000 so it seems it’s not the last we’ve seen of Jade. YAY.

April is dangled over the side of the carpark — There was a silver lining to April’s ordeal (Credit: ITV)

April, Marlon and Ross

The awful cloud of the whole Jade thing though, had a silver lining. Two in fact. First of all we love the revisiting of April and Ross’s relationship. They have a sweet, quirky bond that really works.

And secondly, how good was Marlon and April’s chat about Donna? It’s nice to see them together and their relationship changing as April grows up. Plus it’s always good when soaps show the long-lasting effects of grief – just as Emmerdale is doing with Moira and Holly.

Emmerdale review: Caleb and Ruby — Caleb’s not listening to Ruby (Credit: ITYV)

Rubbish husbands in our Emmerdale review

Marlon’s a treasure, but elsewhere in Emmerdale, the husbands are definitely lacking. They’re all just useless! Cain’s moping about feeling sorry for himself after he *checks notes* slept with his sister-in-law. Poor lamb.

Caleb’s busy ignoring wife Ruby’s obvious distress about her dad’s presence and not even asking her what’s up.

Mack’s playing Disney dad but being a right wally about it (and frankly, he deserved that punch from Ross, and the slap from Jade’s henchwoman). Eric’s lost Brenda’s life savings… the men of Emmerdale aren’t covering themselves in glory, are they?

Forgotten characters

Mary’s back! Yay! And even Ivy got a mention this week. We find it really frustrating how characters vanish for weeks at a time in Emmerdale. Now, if we could just find Rhona…

Emmerdale review: Will Moira be okay? (Credit: ITV) — Moira’s got lovely hair (Credit: ITV)

Things that didn’t make sense in Emmerdale this week

There were a few things that left us scratching our heads this week, so we thought we’d lump them all together.

First of all, how quiet was that multi-storey carpark, in the middle of Hotten, three weeks before Christmas? The only cars parked in the whole place belonged to Jade, Billy and Aaron. There were no people around. No office workers, no Christmas shoppers. No one saw a thing. What luck,

Elsewhere, we were bemused by Moira’s very sweet memories of Holly leaving notes for the fairies in the bottom of a tree trunk. Except Holly was about 16 or more when the Bartons first came to Emmerdale.

But we didn’t spend too long wondering about that because we were very distracted by Moira arriving home with a toss of her luscious locks. Which, though enviable, seemed slightly out of keeping for someone who’s just had major brain surgery.

How did the surgeons at Hotten General manage to get inside Moira’s noggin without so much as harming a hair on her head? Impressive work!