On the day Phil Mitchell makes his return to Albert Square, we’re getting just a teensy little bit excited at the prospect brother Grant could soon follow suit.
He’s made a few appearances back in Walford in the past year or so, but his visits have all been way too brief.
And that’s been cool. We get that Ross Kemp is a busy fella when he’s not being everyone’s favourite soft-centred soap hard man – he’s got cartels to hang out with in the most dangerous places on the globe to deliver us all some extraordinary documentaries.
But it seems the telly fave could be getting ready to hang up his investigation hat.
In an interview with Fabulous magazine, he revealed that he is not making any more docs with long-standing broadcast partner Sky.
During the same chat, he talked about how much he enjoyed his last stint back at Elstree, where EastEnders is filmed.
“I’d just been in Mozambique doing a story about wild elephants being killed and four days later was in a dressing room in Elstree thinking: ‘Have the last 10 years been a dream?’,” he explained.
“It was good to work with Steve [McFadden] again and see Adam [Woodyatt], Tish [Letitia Dean] and other members of the cast.
“Would I return again? Never say never.”
Never say never? That’s about as committal as Ross ever gets, so we’ll take that.
There is currently a lot of upheaval on the soap, as returning producer John Yorke replaces the reportedly unpopular show runner Sean O’Connor, who made a very speedy exit last month.
It’s been reported that Yorke wants to bring the old favourites back to the fore – and they don’t get much bigger or more popular than Grant/Ross.
And while the soap legend might not have been keen for a permanent fix under O’Connor’s tenure – he described him as “a sort of schoolteacher of a kind of third-rate public school” who worked certain members of the team “into the [expletive] ground” (OUCH!), it’s all change now!
Indeed Ross, 52, appeared to dangle a little carrot earlier this month as he was quoted in The Sun as saying: “It’s great they haven’t killed Grant off.
“I’m very happy the Mitchell brothers are still alive and hopefully they will ride again at some point.”
Well, with Phil back and looking on his game, what better time than NOW?