Played by Darren Blagden
Steve was the man that we all loved to hate, he was a cheat, liar and convincing at loving his wife Carol, but we knew... and so did Alex.
Although Steve was mentioned in the first series he was never seen. He had already split up with Carol and was living elsewhere. However, at the very end of the last episode Carol received a knock at the door and uttered the immortal line �What are you doing here?� It took us until the beginning of the second series to find out that it was her husband, he had come back to her, but for what reason?
By the time Steve appears on screen there has been sometime between his return and the whole family moving back together. Carol is very much happy with the situation, but there is that nagging feeling that because Steve had left once before, could he do it again? The answer was yes.
Steve had already started another affair before the second series began and although not obvious at first it doesn�t take Steve�s boss Alex long to figure that something is up. That�s not to say that he didn�t try his best to cover himself. At first he states that he wishes to leave early from work to go into town to get Carol something nice, a true romantic. But that never happened, in fact when he did get home it was late and he tells Carol that he was busy at work. This was the major flaw in his plan as his boss Alex lived over the road from him and it didn�t take long for Carol to confront Alex and ask why she was working him so hard.
�If it�s anybody� Alex replies, �It�s defiantly not me�. That conversation confirms Alex�s doubts about Steve and starts checking up. Steve uses the office phone one day and Alex tries the last number redial, a young woman answers the phone and Alex asks if she can have the number she has dialled as it appears she has a wrong number. The lady happily obliges, now what does she do?
Steve�s affair makes him horrendously late for Sonia�s 16th birthday party as well as forgetting a present for his own stepdaughter, then he tries it on with Wendy, but she retaliates and slaps him.
Meanwhile, Alex�s investigation as to who this lady could be asks Nimmy for help, but without realising it Nimmy explains that the number Alex was given by Steve�s mistress is in fact her brothers number, Alex must have spoken with her brother�s girlfriend. Nimmy states that her brother Sean suspects that his girlfriend is seeing someone behind his back
When Carol confront Steve with this it all blows up. Carol accuses Steve of two-timing, Steve goes one better by stating that Carol is an unfit mother who managed to kill his only blood child (Carol had a still birth in the first series) and Faye was knocked down and died later in hospital. When he finds out that it was Alex who told Carol what was going on he started on her. If it wasn�t for mechanic Tyler to pull Steve away nobody knows how far he would have gone.
Steve returned later that day to work to pack his stuff only to be confronted by an unknown person. The last thing of the second series we see is Steve looking up and uttering ironically the same line Carol finished off the last series, �What are you doing here?�. This is followed by a gun shot and a black screen which leaves the viewer asking who was it that was there in the room with him, was it Sean, Alex or Carol and was the gun shot fatal?
We�ll have to wait for the special to find out�
Steve Thornton was originally going to be the same Steve that Brain Kennedy talked to in reference to the drug dealing he�d got himself mixed up with, but this was eventually dropped and the storyline toned down to something more believable. He was however, always going to be married to Carol what ever happened.
Darren won best actor for his role as Steve, a character that was written specially for him. Darren had appeared very briefly in �Every Step of the Way�, but this was a very minor part. Darren did a wonderful job with Steve and did the part the justice it deserved. He was a very believable rouge.
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since 28/08/00.
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