The following article contains spoilers from the episode of Emmerdale dated May 21. It hasn’t aired on ITV1 yet, but can be viewed on ITVX and YouTube.
Dawn Taylor (Olivia Bromley) is currently at a crossroads in Emmerdale. I mean metaphorically speaking. Literally, she’s sat in her car debating whether to leave Joe Tate (Ned Porteous) and start her life again, or stay and potentially destroy it.
This week, it became clear that Joe had known for ages about Dawn’s plan to ruin his life and leave him. Graham Foster (Andrew Scarborough) and literally everyone watching the show thought that Joe would plot violent revenge against Dawn – but he took a different, and very surprising, approach instead.
Joe really loves Dawn, and didn’t want to do anything that encouraged her to walk out of the door.
He decided to spend the past few weeks trying to prove that he can change and only focus on his family, hoping that Dawn would recognise his efforts and stay.
Graham feared that Joe had taken a dark approach to dealing with Dawn’s betrayal when he found her at the bottom of the stairs. Fortunately, Dawn fainted due to low iron.
When she was back at Home Farm, Dawn was taken aback to hear Joe talk about how scared he was when he found her collapsed. Even though Dawn knows Joe has done some awful things, she keeps getting lured back in whenever he exposes his vulnerable side.
In today’s episode, Dawn was in the pub talking to Billy Fletcher (Jay Kontzle). She alluded to the fact that things were going to change soon, and Billy filled the awkward silence by joking and asking if Dawn was dying.
Which, for the record, is a terrible thing to say if you live in Emmerdale.
She also updated Moira Dingle (Natalie J Robb) and told her that she intends to leave the village sooner rather than later, because things will get even worse if she stays under Joe’s spell. Dawn also asked Moira to create a distraction up at Home Farm so Joe didn’t find out the plan.
He didn’t – but super sleuth Graham did. After spotting Dawn’s car at the stables, Graham called Joe.
He then tried to stop Dawn from getting in her car and leaving. Trying to buy some time, Graham wondered what life Dawn would have on her own with four children to look after.
It looked like Dawn didn’t want to go, but she told Graham that if she stays, the love she has for Joe will eventually turn into resentment, and they’ll both be left wanting to kill each other.
The time they spent chatting allowed Joe to make his way over to the stables to try and prevent Dawn from going. The episode ended with her in the car, wondering what to do next.
Will Dawn leave and ultimately save her life?
Or will she stay, knowing she could live to regret it?
