Corrie fans brace themselves for bloodbath on the cobbles
CORONATION Street is to get even darker with a week of violent episodes scheduled for 9pm.
Murderer Pat Phelan returns to the cobbles one last time in search of bloody revenge.
In scenes to be broadcast next week, Phelan guns down two residents, including Street favourite Michelle Connor.
She is shot in her wedding dress at the Bistro after being caught up in the gunfire.
The episodes, thought to contain some of the most graphically violent scenes in the show’s 57-year history, come as the soap faces mounting pressure over its increasingly dark plotlines.
Last year broadcasting regulator Ofcom received 541complaints after a shocking double bill in which Phelan forced hostage Andy Carver to shoot fellow captive Vinny Ashford, only to be murdered himself by Phelan who disposed of the bodies in a lake.
But actor Connor McIntyre, who plays psychotic builder Phelan, defended the episodes, which led to his departure from the show. He said: “What other way could it have been?”
The bloodbath begins after Gary Windass brings Phelan back to the street and ties him up inside the builder’s yard.
Hostage
Kevin Webster’s son Jack later wanders in and Phelan promises him £10 if he unties him. Jack agrees and when Gary and his girlfriend Sarah come back to the yard, Phelan breaks free and, producing a gun, ties them both up.
Phelan can later be seen brandishing the gun at Eileen Grimshaw and Nicola Rubinstein after bursting into Eileen’s home. After a shot rings out he makes his way into the Bistro, carrying his first blood-soaked victim who he leaves groaning on the floor of the restaurant.
Phelan then grabs Michelle Connor, played by Kym Marsh, who is at the Bistro to marry Robert Preston. He takes her hostage but, as the siege escalates, she is shot. With armed police outside, Phelan’s reign of terror comes to an end during Friday’s episode with viewers having to wait to see if he loses his life or his liberty.
The decision to transmit after the 9pm watershed allows much more graphic content. But producers are bracing themselves for a backlash over the episodes – the culmination of the Phelan plot, which has attracted criticism from diehard fans.
Veteran broadcaster Michael Parkinson has complained the show now makes him “recoil”.