Emmerdale fans sat down to watch tonight’s sad episode with a fair amount of trepidation. We all knew Chas was going to give birth to baby Grace, and that the tiny girl wouldn’t live more than a few minutes.
And we also knew that the episode was going to approach the tragic story in a new, innovative way featuring flash-forwards about what Grace’s life could have been like.
Would the brave approach to telling the story work?
The answer is… sort of.
The episode started well with Grace’s birth.
“You are beautiful and you’re here,” said a tearful Paddy.
And emotional Chas gave their baby girl a cuddle, telling her she was going to break their hearts, before Paddy wrapped the tot in a special blanket.
“Nice and tight,” Chas urged. “I want it to smell of her… after.”
Lucy Pargeter, who plays Chas, is a brilliant actor and she really pulled it out of the bag as she said: “I knew it was going to be hard, but I didn’t know it would be this hard.”
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Meanwhile the family gathered outside. We even got to see Granny Faith’s vulnerable side as she sobbed. It was heartbreakingly understated.
But after the ad break it all went a bit off-piste.
Chas said their baby would never feel the sun on her face, or ever get to go to her parents’ special place where they exchanged wedding vows in the summer, and the flash forwards began.
We saw Chas and Paddy taking baby Gracie to the woods and Paddy singing the little girl a song he’d made up for her.
As the clock ticked loudly, the scene moved to toddler Grace, then to Grace as a small girl learning to ride a bike, and as a bigger girl – with her mum’s hair and her dad’s glasses – enjoying days out with her parents. It was a brave way to tell the story, but it didn’t really work. Not least because it was all about Paddy with mum Chas firmly in the background.
Finally Paddy heard Chas saying it was time, and we were back in the hospital. As the baby girl’s life slipped away, her parents cried and viewers’ hearts broke for our fave Dales couple. The end of the episode was just as good as the start.
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With actors as strong as Lucy Pargeter and Dominic Brunt (aka Paddy) it would have been better to tell the sad tale without gimmicks.
In fact, it almost feels like they have been cheated of their moment in the spotlight. It’s clear from the the way they’ve approached this storyline from the start that they would have nailed it. I wish we’d had the chance to see it.
Do you think this different way of telling the story hit the mark? Let us know by commenting on our Facebook page @EntertainmentDailyFix!