Tara Ward brings you her rankings for Shortland Street last week, including Bella’s massage, Warner tears and Kate with the good hair.
1) Rachel has left the building
Do you ever feel like a plastic bag, drifting through the wind, wanting to start again? That’s exactly how Rachel McKenna felt as she was ushered from the building in a heavy cloud of disgrace, the angry cries of her disloyal colleagues and the feeble wails of the sick and decrepit ringing in her magnificient ears.
The Shortland Street lift has seen some terrible things in its time, but never a day as dark as this. Look, who hasn’t been escorted off the premises at some point in their career? What’s the odd bit of financial mismanagement between friends? Who doesn’t want to work for an angry, unpredictable CEO with dependence issues?
Stay strong, Rachel. P.S. I like your new blue handbag.
2) Kate with the good hair
It’ll be fine.
3) Cam and Vinnie win the war on sausages
A hearty sausage storyline is always appreciated on Shortland Street; in fact, other soaps are much the poorer for their blatant disregard of the value of a tasty sausage-related cliffhanger.
The sausage rivalry was fierce at the Ferndale Food Show, and no wonder. A smug packet of vegan sausages went skin to skin with a bunch of sangers dripping with dead animals, and the nation sat poised for the red-hot result. Just who would claim the bragging rights as the supreme sausage of a small fictitious suburb somewhere in Auckland?
It was gripping stuff, made even more tense when Cam and Vinnie went topless in the name of fine cuisine, or popularity, or something. I’m no Food Safety Officer, but exposing this much skin near a hot plate is a health and safety nightmare just waiting to happen.
4) Bella massages her way into a world of hell
Note to self, Bella: giving your boss a shoulder massage is apparently fine, searching their office for illicit prescription drugs is not. Bad, bad Bella. Still, life on the front desk can’t be all bad, with clipboards to hand out, paperclips to steal, and photocopier toners to change. See? We feel better about this already.
When life deals her a cruel blow, Bella needs to ask herself: what would Leanne do? (Come back, Leanne. I can’t do this without you).
5) Chris faces a miserable life outside of the McKenna Circle of Trust
Feast your eyes upon the pain and anguish etched upon this stoic Warner grill. Chris may have great hair and an upbeat personality, but this week his world lay in tatters beneath his well-polished feet. Desperate, troubled, and probably hungry, Chris chose to betray his wife to save her. Oh, the humanity!
At least Rachel only demoted Bella to the administrative underworld of faulty photocopiers and contagious strangers. Chris faces a much greater world of pain and misery when Rachel discovers he dobbed her into the DHB, leading to her professional demise and making her really, really angry. #warnerproblems
6) Lily brings new life to the shrimp sausage
We saw her only for a moment, but Lily was a twinkling lighthouse in a food show fog of boredom. It was a travesty of burnt sausage proportions that an allergic reaction to the non-vegan sausages sent Lily scrambling for the nearest epi-pen, and out of our cold, dark lives.
Lily, I like your brand of crazy. Come back soon, but bring those shrimp sausages with you. They sound amazing.
7) TFW you’re super excited about eating a vegan sausage
