EastEnders legend pays tribute to ‘love of her life’ after death in early BBC iPlayer release
This article contains spoilers for tonight’s episode of EastEnders, which airs tonight at 7.30pm on BBC One, or can be streamed now on BBC iPlayer.
Sonia Fowler (Natalie Cassidy) has said her final farewell to Martin Fowler (James Bye) in some of the soap’s most emotional scenes.
Their love story began in 1999, when she fell pregnant with his child as a teenager. Their daughter, then named Chloe, was put up for adoption and a vicious feud between the Jackson and Fowler families began.
The child – now named Bex – was later returned to Sonia after the death of her adoptive parents.
She moved on with Jamie Mitchell (Jack Ryder), who Martin accidentally killed in a car crash, and the pair later reconciled.
After the death of his mother Pauline (Wendy Richard), they moved away and faced marital issues.
In the last decade he’s married again twice – first to Stacey Slater (Lacey Turner), and then to Ruby Allen (Louisa Lytton).
Since February, the three women have had to deal with the grief of losing him in The Queen Vic explosion, and it hasn’t been an easy journey.
Ruby has taken full control of the funeral preparations whilst Stacey, unable to cope with her feelings, fled the area to stay with brother Sean (Robert Kazinsky).
Sonia has had a number of other issues, as the blaze was caused as a result of her former fiancé Reiss Colwell (Jonny Freeman) crashing his car into the pub.
He was on the run from the police after murdering his comatose wife, though ultimately also met his end in the horrific incident. This was just moments before Sonia gave birth to their daughter, Julia.
Earlier this week, Elaine Knight (Harriet Thorpe) urged her to allow time to grieve, saying it was ok not to be ok.
She opened up to sister Bianca Jackson (Patsy Palmer) and confessed that she was struggling with Stacey claiming to be Martin’s one true love, when she was his first love.
A returning Bex (Jasmine Armfield) then asked her mum to accompany her to the undertakers to pay her final respects.
Sonia wondered whether she could brave the situation, but was given food for thought from Linda Carter (Kellie Bright) in tonight’s episode.Reflecting on the death of her own husband Mick (Danny Dyer) – who went missing at sea – she told Sonia that she would have given anything to be allowed to say goodbye to him properly.
After making the realisation that this could be the final time to be alone with him, Sonia headed to the chapel of rest with Bex and Kathy Cotton (Gillian Taylforth).
Once alone, Sonia apologised for not making more of an effort with Martin.
She then questioned whether they were too young when their relationship began, and perhaps with time it would have worked out.
Before leaving, she admitted that Jamie wasn’t the love of her life – he was, and she’ll always have a place in her heart for him.
