EastEnders Gets Byankker Back

Since leaving EastEnders in 1999, Patsy Palmer has become one of the most famous human beings on Earth thanks to her red-raw, groundbreaking performances in Patsy Palmer's Ibiza Workout and that reality TV show about sad dogs.

But even though Patsy Palmer's workout DVD/ dog show-based career has seen her get deified by all of the world's religious leaders and effectively bring an end to the Middle East crisis by herself with an innovative mixture of three-legged dogs and full-arm squat-thrusts to copyright-free dance music, Patsy Palmer has decided to return to her roots with an announcement that she'll become an EastEnders cast-member again early next year.

Oh, you know, Patsy Palmer. The ginger one. Played Bianca. Shouted a lot. Google her or something.

No matter how you look at it, EastEnders hasn't had a vintage year. Its planned baby abduction storyline went awry when the whole Madeleine McCann thing happened, only for EastEnders to replace it at the last minute with a terrifying belly-slashing torture scene. The Vic is now run by hard-faced Terrahawk who looks like Alan Sugar. One episode genuinely revolved around sibling telepathy. Bobby Davro. But don't worry, because back to save the day is Patsy Palmer, the woman who won the nation's heart by being ginger and screaming the word "Rickaaaay!" four billion times an episode for six years solid like some sort of awful pikey rape alarm.

Patsy Palmer never really consolidated on the fame she found in EastEnders, with just a few stints on some short-lived TV shows, a couple of plays, the obligatory 'poor me, I took too many drugs' autobiography and a line of tanning products for ginger people to her name. But get ready to see Patsy Palmer on your screens again soon, because it's been announced that she's reprising her EastEnders role as Bianca Jackson as soon as January - and, at The Times reports, her first scene will involve her riding into Albert Square on a bright orange horse while playing circus music on a tuba:

According to the BBC the older Bianca will not be too different. She will still be having trouble with her love life and will arrive back in the East End with her son by Ricky, called Liam, and a string of children fathered by other men. The BBC said she will be "at rock bottom and struggling to survive". Palmer, who is originally from Bethnal Green in London, said: "I'm really excited about rejoining the cast and working with old friends again. I can't wait to explore what Bianca has been doing with her life and seeing what she is going to get up to next."

Maybe we invented that horse bit, in retrospect. But, still, it'll be good to see Patsy Palmer returning to EastEnders for what seems like an extended stay and not just for one confusing episode like when Phil Mitchell broke out of prison and spent 30 minutes kicking down doors and flushing Ian Beale's head down a toilet and then going back to prison at the end.

But, like Patsy Palmer, we can't wait to see what storylines the EastEnders team comes up with for Bianca. We're secretly hoping that she'll run off with Max Branning and conceive a baby so ginger that it generates electricity just by moving its arms, but that's just us.

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Patsy Palmer Rejoins EastEnders - The Times