The proverbial hits the fan as Joe Tate (Ned Porteous) learns the true depth of betrayal from his bride Dawn Taylor (Olivia Bromley) as she packs up her things and prepares to leave Emmerdale – on their wedding day!
After Dawn learned Joe was the one to leave Billy for dead (even though he wasn’t), she has been desperate to escape Joe’s clutches. She has been making hurried plans to flee for a life in Spain with Billy Fletcher (Jay Kontzle) and the kids, but Joe is set to find out before she can safely close the car door.
Has Joe been totally clueless to Dawn’s plotting? He was reasonably unbothered by Gabby Thomas’ (Rosie Bentham) suggestion weeks ago that Dawn and Billy were getting a little too close.
Admittedly, Caleb Miligan’s (William Ash) glee at telling him that the pair also kissed put a dampener on Joe’s mood, but a quick word with his fiancée put his worries at bay.
When Billy was walloped over the head and left for dead, Joe was miffed to be accused, but he maintained his innocence and got off the charge.
It doesn’t seem to have bothered him at all that Dawn has spent every day at the hospital by Billy’s bedside, secretly plotting her escape.
It’s the suggestion that Joe has had little to no idea. Or has he?
His reaction to catching Dawn at the hospital without having told him where she was seemed a little too nonchalant for our liking.
That said, he does seem very nervous on the wedding day that all will go off without a hitch. More nervous than a man who knows of the betrayal and needs Graham Foster (Andrew Scarborough) to reassure him. Graham tries to, but he is suspicious himself and sets off to find out what Dawn is up to.
While Graham goes on the hunt, Caleb is handing Billy wads of cash to start him and the family up on their new life.
In the Woolpack ahead of the nuptials, Joe gives a toast to ‘happy endings’. It irks Caleb, but Ruby holds him back from spilling the beans of Dawn and Billy’s escape plan, insisting that he waits for the wedding itself.
But Caleb is like a child with an unfunny joke, he can’t keep it to himself, particularly as a smug Joe rescinds Caleb’s invite to the wedding – and thus his front row seat to the carnage. Caleb drops the bomb there and then, revealing to Joe that Dawn has already done a flit.
But actor Ned Porteous gives Metro some juicy little titbits that perhaps Joe is more aware than we think.
‘Do we even know that Joe is privy to what’s going on?’ Ned shares. ‘That’s the main part of it. Is he planning some horrible revenge story which is going to take over? Is he completely clueless to what’s going on?’
Imagine! Oh the plot twist! That black veil Dawn is wearing in the promo could be for her own funeral!
Are we surprised? Revenge is baked into Joe’s character, and Dawn has always known deep down she’s playing with fire.
‘It’s family. It’s the things that he holds really dear,’ Ned reveals, speaking of the one soft spot Joe has. ‘And if you were to take that from a man who is outwardly volatile and dangerous as is, unable to regulate his emotions, if you were to take the final thing tethering him to a life of moral good, what could that man then be capable of?’
And there you have it, one big fat teaser that Joe is going to lose his mind over the betrayal and do something very Joe Tate-like.
Though we know Joe doesn’t like getting his hands dirty, what will he have Graham do? Graham discovers Dawn packing suitcases and preparing to leave.
How far will he go to stop her?
