This article contains spoilers for tonight’s episode of EastEnders, which airs on BBC One at 7.30pm or can be streamed now on iPlayer.
Cindy Beale (Michelle Collins) demonstrated how incredibly important it is to exchange names with your lonely Christmas bunk-up, lest you accidentally spend the night with the man who killed your son.
In tonight’s EastEnders, she and Max Branning (Jake Wood) finally came face to face and realised who one another is after said-Christmas hook up.
As Lauren Branning (Jacqueline Jossa) and Peter Beale (Thomas Law) back-and-forth’ed over which of their troublesome parents would be invited to baby Jimmy’s Christening, they initially settled on Cindy, though Max’s sweet gift prompted Lauren to U-turn on banning him, on the proviso that he apologise to brother Jack (Scott Maslen) after their Christmas Day punch up.
He attempted to enact his mandated apology, although Jack was hardly in a listening mood, having rang Tanya Branning (Jo Joyner) to find out why she wasn’t attending, and received a fresh dose of tea in the process.
Tanya was furious with Max, as he’d left AJ (Abi Junior), the daughter of their deceased daughter, Abi (Lorna Fitzgerald) alone while doing what he always does…attempting to seduce a woman. As things between the brothers seemed to be heading toward violence, Lauren again banned Max from the funeral.
Sorry, Christening. You can forgive my confusion as Cindy is dressed in her best funeral regalia, with it being her late son, Steven’s (coincidentally, the father of Abi Junior) birthday, you know, the son Max killed? More on that later…
After Max tries (and fails) to pull Marie (Elizabeth Sweet) in the café and scurries to the bathroom, Cindy, the bombshell in black comes in for a latte and, upon receiving a call from Peter with confirmation that Max is (again) banned, she heads to the service alongside them.
After a rousing chat from Linda Carter (Kellie Bright), Max decides to attend the Christening, too, and the duo finally learn of each others identity. Duff duff, indeed.
Actor Jake Wood had previously teased the face off: ‘There’s Cindy, who blames Max for her son Steven’s death and his involvement with Lucy, and they’ve never come face-to-face before, so there has to be a showdown between the pair which we will see at Jimmy’s Christening. They were great scenes to film.’
At the time however, we didn’t know that the showdown would come after a very different kind of ‘showdown’, that being the one they shared on Christmas Day.
Though long-time fans remember Steven’s demise, some newer viewers may be scratching their heads, so let’s revisit, shall we?
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What happened to Steven Beale? Max’s role in his death
In 2016, having been successfully framed for the murder of Lucy Beale (Hetti Bywater) before Bobby Beale’s (Eliot Carrington) confession, Max emerged from prison with a serious thirst for vengeance at the same time that Steven returned to the Square alongside Max’s daughter, Lauren, with the two having formed a relationship.
Steven had always battled mental illness in his initial stints, and remained unwell upon his return, desperate to keep hold of Lauren while envying her prior relationship with his brother, Peter, and work colleague, Josh Hemmings (Eddie Eyre).
While Max manipulated his way around the Square, working with historic villain (and Josh’s dad), James Wilmott-Brown (William Boyde) to buy up the entire place and knock it down to build luxury flats, Steven battled his jealousy and even engaged in an affair with Lauren’s sister, Abi, who later became pregnant.
In 2017, while on a personal mission to destroy Jane Beale (Laurie Brett), who, for a long time, was the only person who knew who’d really killed Lucy, Max turned to Steven. Steven was faking a brain tumour to keep Lauren with him, and, after discovering this incredibly useful piece of information, Max insisted that Steven kill Jane in exchange for his silence.
Steven set Ian’s restaurant on fire with Jane inside, but had an almost-immediate change of heart and tried to go back into the burning building to rescue Jane, leading to a fatal confrontation with Max, who violently shoved him into a counter top, causing severe injuries to his liver.
Steven was rushed to the hospital in the aftermath of the fire, where he suffered a fatal cardiac arrest and died, leading to the later reveal that the internal bleeding caused by Max was the actual cause of death.
Cindy, of course, was living under witness protection, having faked her death after grassing on her gangster cellmate. With Max’s involvement in the deaths of two of her children, Cindy’s hatred of the lothario continues to burn bright.
