We revealed last week that Aaron Dingle (Danny Miller) wouldn't be leaving our screens, despite his upcoming 12-month sentence for attacking Kasim Sabet. And now we can tell you a little bit more about what the future holds for one of soap's best-loved characters. It's no secret that Aaron is off to prison, but what lots of people don't know is that Emmerdale bosses have built a whole new prison set - just for Aaron's prison story.
At an exclusive press event last week, Emmerdale boss, Iain MaCleod, told us that Aaron would be going on a dark journey during his time behind bars. Noooooooo! It's been dark enough for the poor lamb already!
Iain said: "The story for a while will feature Aaron in jail quite heavily. What we didn’t want to do, and what sometimes happens in a soap, is put a popular character behind bars and then you never see them. And occasionally people come back and say ‘I’ve just been to see Aaron’ he looks aright.
"We just thought we shouldn’t shy away from what it’s like, obviously Aaron’s experiences with jail are numerous and complicated and we’ll be touching upon the fact that Gordon took his own life in jail and that has its own, hopefully quite surprising effect, on how Aaron is able to cope in there."
He added: "The story becomes, can he escape his past and can he get over his past? What impact does the struggle he has inside have on his family on the outside? And what degree does he feel able to be honest with them about what he’s going through because Robert, Liv everyone is worried sick about him. However bad it gets in there, is it the right thing to share it with them?
"It’s only going to make it worse for them in terms of their level of anxiety. It’s big and complicated and interesting and feels very much of our time. It feels quite topical. With every news report that comes out I feel more and more pleased that we’ve been able to do something in this area."
So it sounds like we'll be seeing lots more of Aaron after all.
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