Coronation Street fans furious at soap for ‘wasting’ favourite characters
FURIOUS fans of Coronation Street have hit out at soap bosses amid a worrying trend of major characters ‘going missing’.
Viewers of the ITV soap opera have noticed certain characters are being ‘underused’ and appear to have ‘vanished’ over the past few years.
It has left them asking questions as to why and how this has occurred and if there are any deeper reasons for this.
Among some of the notable absences they have listed are Simon Barlow, played by Alex Bain, and his on-screen father Peter (Chris Gascoyne).
Peter has seldom been seen over the past few months after heading out on a ‘sailing trip’ despite his wife Carla still in recovery from her presumed psychosis and his niece Amy’s rape.
Contrasting, Simon has failed to be mentioned on-screen and viewers have not been informed why his character isn’t around with fans even pointing out that he was the most used child star at one point in the show.
Writing online, one fan wrote: “With Peter randomly off at sea with unnamed/ unknown friends for weeks on end. Despite his wife recently coming out of a treatment centre for (as far as they know) the return of her psychosis) and looking after her traumatised nephew who’s living there following an acid attack.”
As another added of Simon: “I’ve found Simon Barlow’s absence to be the most bizarre in a long time. Ever since Alex Bain announced at 17 (?) he was to be a Dad his screen time was gradually reduced.”
They continued: “t’s just very odd how he went from the most used child/teen character to absolutely nothing, yet the character hasn’t supposedly left so is in a weird state of limbo, last heard of ‘staying with friends’ somewhere non-specific.”
Other characters have suggested that have vanished include Nina Lucas, played by Mollie Gallagher, Gary Windass (Mikey North) and David’s daughter Lily.
A viewer wrote: “I’ve been rather confused as to why Nina has had absolutely nothing of value since then. She’s been dropped into the café, barely making appearances, for around 2 years now.
“Considering she had that story, I thought she’d at least carry another story after that or even have some level of valuable input into one?”
They then added: “Noticing the same thing with Gary and Maria as well. Both are pretty big characters (15 years and 20 years respectively) that usually will have something to do, but they’re completely absent. We don’t even get to pop into their home life for a moment.”
Someone else penned: “Gary has gone from being very overused and involved in everything to absolutely nothing, which probably makes his absence even more noticeable recently.”
As another fan declared: “Lily Platt is similarly invisible; only 11 appearances this year.”
Labelling the soap as having “very strange character usage”, another disgruntled fan added: “I’m not sure of it’s just a case of the show being too overfilled and there not being enough room, but I find it a bit odd that a lot of these characters are essentially written to be guest characters, when they could head up storylines.”
Coronation Street airs Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 8pm on ITV1 and ITVX.