Modern love

EastEnders is on a roll at the moment in its ongoing project to make every conceivable disastrous permutation of modern love as unattractive as the next.

Being the fiancee of a single parent is tough. But when innuendos start flying amongst your own kids that you have killed your husband's ex-wife, that's just not going to help. Especially when he was the (acciental) killer all along.

And new relationships are tough. Your family seem jealous because you've found the perfect man, but then you have a big secret (your secret daughter was mowed down by the Square's resident angel of death a few months ago) that you can't bring yourself to tell him, but which they might blurt out to your perfect/dodgy fella at any moment.

And being the comedy support character having a mystery baby is tough. Especially because the whole storyline is a bizarre homage to Michelle's predicament when the show first started.

And being a gay muslim who's engaged to a woman while secretly being in love with the local stud is tough. But then what do you fucking expect?

Stacey's got the hardest acting job in the world at the moment, and she's managing her mental breakdown a whole lot more convincingly than Claire did on Corrie. I am, of course, totally in love with Syed, but then who wouldn't be with the mixed-up muppet. And the whole thing is still worth watching for Nina Wadia, who brings the kind of inspired comic timing to the show that it so often lacks with its reliance on medodrama.