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This guy needs to debut - please vote for Zhang Jiahao by

A) downloading the Mnet + app on your phone/tablet at https://apps.apple.com/ca/app/mnet-plus/id6443405421

Classic inability to take accountability for anything he does wrong like how he blamed Robert for the weed mess today. Like, it was him/Lewis/Mack starting the weed in the first place? I’ve never seen him onscreen and not wanted the lights knocked out of him.

What even happened to him when he shot Robert?(nothing really, Aaron was the one who served time and it was framed like losing Debbie was his consequence when he probably woulda screwed that up himself anyway in the least charming and most uninteresting way)

Sickens me that he was in Seb’s life for as long as he was and I’d bet he had a solid hand in stopping Seb visiting Aaron, being the sack of shit that he is.

With Jay’s PR, things that irked me were:

Jay trying for PR at all - like the kid already has a dad(?). Way to really bluntly say that you don’t think Ben can look after his own kid. I’ve never heard of another man applying for PR when a child already has a father.

Everyone else pressured Ben to say yes - If this was only about people respecting Lola’s dying wishes, that'd be one thing, but people genuinely thought Ben and Lexi would somehow benefit from Jay having legal rights to Lexi like Ben did which is concerning. How does a piece of paper change your role in a child’s life? I completely understand why Ben’s first thought was that they were trying to take his daughter away from him because why else would Lola and Jay even go this route? 

The aftermath - The whole storyline paying out with Jay entrenching more and more in his role really bothered me. Yes, Jay might be something of a father figure to Lexi but to see Ben’s own parenting get undermined in front of his daughter as Jay took the lead on decisions about Lexi like he had more rights. It hurt to see Ben’s reaction whenever Lexi appeared to choose Jay over him or connect with Jay. Before this whole PR thing, those same interactions between Jay and Lexi would have been sweet but after the whole legal aspect, those moments feel tainted with all this.

Ben was vulnerable - he was bulimic and trying to deal with the fact that Lola was dying and the aftermath of what Lewis did to him. He was in no state of mind to make that decision.

There are probably other sore points of this whole SL that I’ve not covered, but it tainted my views on Ben/Jay’s and Jay/Lexi’s and even Ben/Lexi’s relationships which were the one thing I enjoyed seeing hold strong through everything that these characters had gone through.

Spending months experiencing firsthand the consequences of having an extremely lacklustre “empty” nut inside someone he didn’t even much like, the guy definitely learned his lesson.

I mean, at the end of the day, with how Rebecca, Robert, and even Ross get to make all the decisions about where Seb gets to live, it feels like Aaron never got a say or even got to be properly angry about it?

That scene of Ross telling Aaron that his name didn’t even come up when he and Robert discussed Seb with that smug face, it just pisses me off on Aaron’s behalf. I mean, I definitely get that Robert and Aaron were divorced at that time so it might not even had made sense, but it just all adds to this prominent message that all the characters give off that Aaron was never really part of Seb’s life. He’d always get treated like a backup parent for when Rebecca was indisposed or incapable.

Every time I think about what Aaron’s lost because of the decisions that Robert made for the both of them without giving Aaron a say, I 1000000% get why Aaron is the way he is with Robert right now - heck, I think he’s being kinder with all things expected. I get where Robert’s heart was with the divorce, and he for some reason might have thought Seb was better off with some aunt, but that doesn’t in any way erase the hurt he’s brought onto Aaron.

[Exhibit A]“I know what we are Robert. We’ll get into something.” Aaron to Robert on why he should put oceans between Emmerdale and himself once he gets out of prison (with a straight and shameless face if I might add after just marrying some other guy).

Aaron has already cheated and lied about it to John [Exhibit B - Making out with Robert on the bridge and then telling John nothing happened and he had a ‘meeting’ when he was actually going to see Robert.]

^ Not even the first time as well since he almost kissed Robert when he was with Alex and lied to Alex several times about where he was when it was about Robert [Exhibit C]

Something has gotta set John off and properly have him lose his marbles. Hearing that Aaron kissed Robert on their wedding day didn’t do that. Having Robert in just about every part of his life didn’t do that. I can only imagine what will.

Robert isn’t exactly going to be idle about this. He’s already tried to make Aaron jealous and tried to start some kind of communication between them. Sure, right now, he’s got other fish to fry but any time he has run into Aaron in town so far, it’s never not been a meaning-filled interaction.

These two are probably like a live wire right now - Aaron who has tried really hard to bottle up everything he’s felt for Robert since everyone told him he should, and Robert who might have been celibate for the last six years because he couldn’t stomach the thought of being with anyone but Aaron consenually. I think the closest we saw of that tight-string tension was the comeback episode - Aaron had more emotion on that bridge than he seems to be capable of with his character now, and Robert low key losing it with John even though he just got out on probation.

So far, they’ve made a lot of callbacks to parts of Robert and Aaron’s story. The next most obvious parallel would be an affair with the roles reversed. It wouldn’t be out of character for either of the characters because it’s them - Aaron isn’t a cheater unless it’s Robert like Robert isn’t faithful unless it’s Aaron.

It’s a soap. It would violate some kind of unspoken soap rule to have this kind of material in front of you and not make an affair happen. There’s usually at least one pair going through a cheating storyline on any given day and Emmerdale is kinda running dry on that front at the moment.

It’s Robert Sudgen and Aaron Dingle we’re talking about here! Would it even be them if they were good boys who slowly bonded over conversations and forced family dinners and became “just friends”?

They literally are not capable of being “just friends” or “just acquaintances”, and will not be able to do “ just bros in law” either. Sure, there are things that will take time - namely, communication and trust - but not everything.

What I love/hate about how everything went down about Robert going to prison and cutting Aaron off is that there’s no clear bad guy here. I can’t hate Robert or Aaron for the choices they made then, or the choices they are making now.

Why am I hearing Robert and Aaron in every song? The brain rot is real lol.

I was just thinking back on their whole relationship and I mean, I really get why Aaron hasn’t climbed Robert like a tree yet. Aaron had his whole relationship ripped away from him. On some level, Robert understands that it must have hurt him (“I still see your face when I have you the rings back” and “I know I have no right to just walk back into your life”). While Robert probably worked out his choice logically in his head, he hadn’t gotten to see what removing himself from Aaron’s life did to Aaron. I don’t blame Aaron for not wanting to put himself in that position again.

But, everyone and their mother knows that no one is going to love Aaron the way Robert does. We’ve got a million receipts - Robert willing to burn 100k to show Aaron he loves him more than money, Robert jumping back in the lake to get the rings after he just about refused to leave Aaron to die alone, Robert willing to move away to another country permanently and leave his unborn kid to give Aaron what he thought he needed, letting Aaron go when he thought he could be happier without Robert, trying to ask Paddy for his blessing, etc.

I mean, sometimes, as people grow older, they realize that they want a love that is steady rather than a love that burns. When Aaron walked back to marry John, he wasn’t settling or denying himself in his head I think. He chose what he believes he needs, something he doesn’t trust Robert to be able to give him anymore.

I understand that Robert has been through A LOT in prison. Ideally, I’d love for Aaron to be there for Robert like Robert was there for Gordon. But it’s not exactly realistic. Back then, they could pretend that they didn’t mean this much to each other, that they were capable of simple friendship. Now, as Aaron put it, “I know what we are. We’ll get into something.”. Aaron knows what the smallest gesture of kindness will be taken as, what it could turn into. Sometimes, I actually think that Aaron isn’t half as scared of losing John as he is of getting back with Robert and being in a place to get his heart ripped apart like that again.

I still think and hope affair 2.0 will happen anyways. This is Robert Sudgen and Aaron Dingle - since when have they been able to keep away from each other? Whether it’ll be physical or emotional, I don’t really know. I’d think it would make more sense for it to be physical because:

1) Parallel to affair 1.0

2) Aaron probably won’t find it easy to make himself emotionally available to Robert

3) We’ve already seen that they’re no good at keeping their hands off each other if the kiss on the bridge was anything to go by. Even when they hurt each other, are angry at each other, they still want each other.

What I hope is that we get to see Aaron want to leave John before he’s revealed to be a psycho. I want it to be clear that Aaron is choosing Robert when they get back together properly. Not optimistic on that front however given that Cain and Tracy seem to be teaming up to investigate which probably leaves little time before a reveal…

Still processing the fact that Robert Sugden is back on my screen

We know where all roads lead in this story - I don't really care if it take 10 weeks or 10 months or more to get there.

A month ago, Emmerdale was not even a passing thought in my mind. Robert Sugden was as good as dead in my mind. What a time it is now lol.