The day that Coronation Street fans have waited for is finally here, as the ITV soap returns to airing six episodes a week from tonight (September 14) onwards.
The long-running serial drama was forced to ration out its instalments at three a week as opposed to regular six, after the Covid-19 pandemic resulted in production shutting down.
In an effort to ensure that Corrie didn’t go off the air, producers decided to ration out of the episodes filmed prior to the shutdown — hoping that filming would resume before said episodes ran out.
Production did, in fact, resume and thus the Weatherfield-set soap stayed on our screens amid the pandemic, but in order to get back in a stronger position, the weekly output remained at three instalments a week.
However, Corrie returns to its usual format of six episodes a week from here on out, beginning tonight with two new episodes.
The first, as per usual, will air at 7:30pm, while the second will air at 8:30pm — allowing those who watch EastEnders the opportunity to flick over to BBC One inbetween episodes!
Discussing the move back to six episodes, show boss Iain MacLeod told Metro.co.uk: ‘I think people were gagging for it – I know I was. 3 eps a week has been brilliant but when it’s chopped in half its frustrating. We were in the midst of Geoff and Yasmeen, we still are, and people were desperate for the next instalment.
‘Coronation Street has become a bastion of normality for people at home in lockdown – having characters they recognise every night was comforting. Everyone is enduring this, it’s important to give them their full complement of Corrie as soon as we can.
‘People have been getting in touch to thank us for transforming them out of lockdown and a moment of escapism.
‘Anecdotally it seems to have been very important to people – if you look at the numbers watching, the lockdown counted for an uptick for most shows but people really returned to Corrie when there was uncertainty in the world.’
Coronation Street continues Monday September 14 at 7:30pm AND 8:30pm on ITV.
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