EastEnders’ Executive Producer Ben Wadey has lifted the lid on an exciting autumn in Albert Square.

As the cold, dark nights draw in, us soap fans spend more time cosied up in front of the telly with the fire blaring.

Which means all the exciting storylines kick off in the lead up to Christmas!

 

 

It’s already been a thrilling week for viewers, who tuned in this week to see Zoe Slater (Michelle Ryan) return to Walford after two decades away.

Shortly after an awkward reunion with mum Kat Moon (Jessie Wallace), she was accidentally shot by either Jack Branning (Scott Maslen) or Ravi Gulati (Aaron Thiara).

Zoe’s life was left hanging in the balance, and as she faded in and out of consciousness, we were dealt a number of flashbacks to her past.

 

 

The first of these, in 2006, showed her in a traumatic labour, giving birth to twins. After claiming that her son was born with ‘bad blood’, she asked for him to be placed under adoption.

Rushing out of the hospital, Zoe didn’t learn the fate of her daughter, who appeared to not be breathing after being born.

The second glimpse took us back to earlier in the year, and her chance meeting with Max Branning (Jake Wood). During a brief relationship, he offered her financial support to pay off a private investigator to look for her son.

Things turned disastrous when she whacked the PI around the head with a lampshade, leaving him for dead.

But what lies ahead for Zoe and Max, and the other East End residents? Here, Ben and the cast tell us more…

A Branning-Slater bombshell is about to drop
Zoe’s secret relationship with Max is still under wraps – but it won’t be for long, Ben tells us.

‘When you’re lucky enough to come in and exec one of these shows, you have a list in your head of characters you want to bring back,’ he explained.

‘Zoe Slater and Max Branning were up there with who I wanted at the forefront of the show. There’s quite a lot of history between the Brannings and the Slaters.

‘We thought, “Let’s do it in the biggest possible way, with the biggest twist and reveal.” They know each other and have this relationship off-screen that nobody knew about.

‘You have the Brannings and the Slaters to discover that. What’s Stacey going to think? It’s just this bomb that we wanted to put at the forefront and let it blow.’

Vile Joel’s story ramps up
‘We’ll have seen a few stories really building recently,’ Ben explained.

‘We’ve got Joel’s story that will come to a head in the next couple of months.’

Over the last few months, viewers have seen the character, played by Max Murray, show more troubling patterns of behaviour towards women.