Emmerdale’s Vanessa Woodfield has been a brilliant friend to Rhona Goskirk throughout her rape ordeal at the hands of Pierce Harris.
But she threatens to blow the whole case when she tries to lie on the stand – oh, Vanessa.
Read more: Emmerdale viewers heartbroken watching Rhona in court
Tuesday’s night’s episode saw Rhona bravely relive what happened. She was subjected to a brutal line of questioning from Pierce’s barrister who tore her apart on the stand.
But Rhona stood her ground and said: “It doesn’t matter. The only thing that does is that I said ‘no’ and he raped me.”
As she came out of court, Vanessa and Marlon were waiting, unable to go in to support her until they’d given their own evidence. When Rhona admitted it hadn’t gone well, and things weren’t looking good, Vanessa decided she needed to do something.
She told Marlon the only way they could help Rhona now was to lie under oath to make sure Pierce looked as guilty as they could possibly make him look.
Appearing on Lorraine this morning to talk about tonight’s episode, actress Michelle Hardwick revealed what’s going through Vanessa’s head when she comes up with the plan.
“Vanessa has been the eyes of the audience throughout all of this,” she explained.
“You completely understand where she’s coming from, but it’s perjury. You can’t lie on the stand.
“All she’s thinking about is her friend Rhona and this journey they’ve all been on for the last 18 months, she just wants to see him sent down.”
But is that really the best way to go about it? Surely the truth will out in court eventually?
Michelle went on to say that although fans have loved Vanessa throughout the storyline, after the decision to perjure herself the tide is starting to turn against her.
“Up until last night everyone’s been like ‘come on Vanessa’, and a lot of people actually thought Pierce was going to kill Vanessa.
“But last night I had a lot of tweets saying ‘Vanessa’s going to muck it up for everybody’.”
And sure enough, fans on Twitter weren’t happy with her decision.
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Let’s hope she doesn’t completely mess things up for Rhona, and that Pierce still faces justice.