You'll never get away with it

Soapland is another country; they do things differently there. In real life miscreants often go unpunished - notwithstanding the dirty doings currently coming out through the tribunals - but in the simple, moral land of soap opera you will always be found out, and your past will always come back to haunt you. Even as the storyline writers are plotting the first stages of an illicit affair or a fraud, they are half-thinking about its denouement.

Thus it was that this week Steve Owen, the Spandau Ballet-man of EastEnders, finally came face to face in a showdown with the limp-haired, lizard-eyed Maffhew, whom smoothie Steve had falsely accused of a murder he himself had committed. Ever since the handsome baddie had protested "he done it, m'lud" and got off the rap, we knew his day would come. And so it did, after a bout of mysterious "hauntings" of Steve by the fair Maffhew - hang-up phone calls, trashing Steve's club, and blocking the lavatories (Lordy, what an odd revenge). All that was left was taking a snivelling Steve hostage and tying him up with insulating tape. And he did.

Harry, the mustachioed mechanic of Fair City, these days sans woolly hat (it wouldn't be credible indoors, what with him crippled from the infidelities), is in bits. His past, too, has come back to haunt him; proving that if your mind is on crotches you'll end up on crutches. Wife Dolores found out - as it was always clear she would - about his wild fling with Shelley the baby-voiced siren and there's been wild drama and wailing and gnashing of teeth, not to mention copious promos featuring a grim-faced Dolores and a contrite Harry, all to a booming soundtrack. Will they patch things up in the end? Maybe, but not before a great deal more angst. Last week the writing on Fair City was great, especially the scene where a tense Harry waited for Dolores to return and confront him while his daft buddy Charlie, watching a wildlife programme about insects, prattled on: "Wouldya look at that! They've just had it off - and now she's eating your man's head!"

The social has finally caught up with Les Battersby in Coronation Street, but we reckon his comeuppance as retribution for fiddling the dole is just an excuse for some funny scenes as he does the community service to which he is sentenced. And how long will it take for Linda's affair with her son-in-law-to-be, Mark, to spill into the open? Maybe not quite as long as for Alison to find out about her new husband Kevin's night of passion with his ex-wife Sally - on the eve of the marriage. But don't doubt that the beans will eventually spill, with Alison mortally wounded (again) and Kevin yapping defensively away like a demented Jack Russell terrier.

In Glenroe, Dick Moran seems to be finally reaping the rewards of, well, something (doing the dirty on Mary, or some shady business deals perhaps?). He has become betrothed to the loopy rich widow woman with the Italianate name. That prospect sounds like a punishment for some offence, and they're playing the storyline for laughs, with Dick as straight man. Also in Co Wicklow, it's taking a bit of time for Lizzie to reap the whirlwind sown when she covered up the murder of one her sons by the other, and sent to torment her is Bryan Murray, aka Trevor Jordache, fresh (well, sort of) from under the patio in Brookside.

And speaking of intra-soap movement, Natalie in Coronation Street may have a sneaking suspicion that she has seen her own sister - whom we never had sight nor sound of until she appears next week - on a rival channel. Indeed she has. She's played by Gabrielle Glaister, and up until a couple of years ago she was going under the name of Patricia Farnham, and she lived in Brookside Close. It's a small country, Soapland.