On April 3rd 2009 EastEnders aired a controversial episode in which Danielle Mitchell (the long lost and secret daughter of Ronnie Mitchell (Samantha Womack)) was killed off just mere moments before being reunited with her onscreen mother.Since then fans have rallied on various Facebook groups and signed pettitons to attempt to persuade executive producers to bring this character back from the dead.
EastEnders has only ever brought back one character from the dead, and that is the dastardly evil Dirty Den. Considered to be one of the biggest mistakes in EastEnders history, Dirty Den rose from the ashes to reclaim the Vic before being killed off once again.
So why then would fans want the realistic soap to break all of the rules to bring back a character that was only on for less then a year? I believe the reason is the vast amount of potential that the character of Danielle had. With actress Lauren Crace in the role, we were able to see the character overcome many struggles within the short period that she was on the series, but the fact that fans truly wanted a HAPPY ending for the 'Secret Mitchel' storyline and were instead treated to months of tears and sadness, many viewers feel the only way to move forward is to resurrect this character.
However my stance is this: What is done is done. The character of Danielle while having years of storyline potential is dead, and there is nothing that can be done about it. EastEnders made the choice to kill the character off, and unfortunately that is all that there is to it. If the character was to return it would be a horrendous slap in the face to the millions of fans that watched Ronnie grieve and eventually move past the death of her daughter. It would also negate the 'lasting' effects that the denouement of the 'Secret Mitchell' storyline had.
But that is only my point, what are your thoughts? Would you want Danielle back on EastEnders, or do you think that she should just stay dead and buried? Let me know what you think in the comments below.
J, you *know* how I felt about them killing off Danielle. I was royally pissed and thought it was incredibly short-sighted of them. Sure, killing her was great for shock value, but that wouldn't have compared to the years of storyline potential for Danielle and the Mitchells. Instead they killed of a popular character and turned Archie (a great villian) into a cartoon character. I'm not opposed to killing off characters, but this decision was idiotic.
ReplyDeleteBut like you said, what's done is done. Bringing her back now would be ridiculous and a waste of time.