Samara Weaving rocks up in Summer Bay

Samara Weaving's (Kirsten Mulroney) arrival in Home and Away is finally here... for viewers in Australia, at least.

Her character Indigo is now on screens down under, but viewers in the UK will have to wait a little longer than usual as Five has now started a break from the show to avoid their transmissions getting any closer to those in Australia.

For now, British fans will have to make do with a picture from the What's On TV website. They reveal that Indigo is an unhappy teen who feels cut off from her friends back home - mainly because her mobile phone was confiscated by her parents following an unfortunate 500 dollar bill.

Meanwhile, Samara has given an interview to the Herald Sun, in which she discusses her acting ambitions, family life and famous uncle Hugo Weaving.

We first revealed Samara's new role in March. Her stint will run for five weeks.

Award nominations for Aidan Gillett & Bernard Curry

Aidan Gillett (Daniel McManus) and Bernard Curry (Nate Perrett) have both been nominated for Inside Soap Awards in the UK for their respective roles in Home and Away.

You may remember that Aidan had a guest part in Home and Away earlier this year, playing the evil Robert Cruze in a sinister rape plotline involving Joey Collins (Kate Bell).

Meanwhile, after completing filming as Peta's brother on Out of the Blue, Bernard landed the regular role of Hugo Austin on the show and he's still around in Summer Bay.

Now Aidan has been nominated for the Best Bad Boy award at this year's ISAs. The full nominees for this category are as follows:

Gray O'Brien (Tony Gordon, Coronation Street)
Jack P Shepherd (David Platt, Coronation Street)
John Altman (Nick Cotton, EastEnders)
Larry Lamb (Archie Mitchell, EastEnders)
Jeff Hordley (Cain Dingle, Emmerdale)
Danny Miller (Aaron Livesy, Emmerdale)
Jamie Lomas (Warren Fox, Hollyoaks)
Barry Sloane (Niall Rafferty, Hollyoaks)
Aidan Gillett (Robert Cruze, Home and Away)
Luke Jacobz (Angelo Rosetta, Home and Away)
Stefan Dennis (Paul Robinson, Neighbours)
Fletcher Humphrys (Guy Sykes, Neighbours)

Meanwhile, Bernard has been nominated for the Best Newcomer award. The full nominees for this category are as follows:

Katy Cavanagh (Julie Carp, Coronation Street)
Craig Gazey (Graeme Proctor, Coronation Street)
Lauren Crace (Danielle Jones, EastEnders)
Marc Elliott (Syed Masood, EastEnders)
Danny Miller (Aaron Livesy, Emmerdale)
Lyndon Ogbourne (Nathan Wylde, Emmerdale)
Darren John Langford (Spencer, Hollyoaks)
Jorgie Porter (Theresa McQueen, Hollyoaks)
Rebecca Breeds (Ruby Buckton, Home and Away)
Bernard Curry (Hugo Austin, Home and Away)
Morgan Baker (Callum Jones, Neighbours)
Margot Robbie (Donna Freedman, Neighbours)

Well done to both!

Click here to vote for Aidan and Bernard in the Inside Soap Awards 2009!

More on the AWGIE nomination

Earlier this week we reported the news that Out of the Blue had received a nomination in the 42nd AWGIE Awards, organised by the Australian Writers' Guild.

Now it's time to take a closer look at the competition the show faces in the Television Serial category...

As we told you before, Episode 4 of the show is the one which has received the nomination. Written by Sam Meikle, it sees the Manly community rocked by the news of Philby's shock death. As well as expressing grief for their lost friend, a number of the group of reunited schoolfriends also have reason to be concerned about their whereabouts on the night of the tragedy. The episode ends with a shock - as Detective Wilson arrives at the cafe and announces that the death wasn't an accident - it was murder - setting the scene for the compelling mystery that follows.

Episodes of fellow Aussie soaps Neighbours and Home and Away have also been nominated in the same category. But which ones?

Neighbours gets two nominations. The first is for Episode 5474. Written by John Davies, the episode premiered on Australian television in June 2008. It featured a shock meltdown for bipolar character Sam (Simone Buchanan), causing concern for Ramsay Street's residents.

The second nomination for Neighbours is for Episode 5486. Written by Anthony Morris, it also premiered on Australian television in June 2008. The dramatic episode saw many of the characters battling to survive in a bushfire.

Home and Away's nomination is for Episode 4649. Written by Sean Nash, it premiered on Australian television in June 2008. It saw Kane (Sam Atwell) return to Summer Bay with a big favour to ask.

Sam has already won AWGIE awards on two previous occasions for his work on Home and Away. Can he win a third time?

We'll be providing some clips from Out of the Blue Episode 4 soon to refresh your memory further!

Shane Withington in Summer Bay

Shane Withington - best known to us as Detective Wilson - gets a mention in Australia's Daily Telegraph newspaper today.

The paper reports that he's landed a guest role in Home and Away, which will keep him busy over the next few months. He plays John Palmer, a member of the surf lifesaving club.

Sadly the newspaper doesn't mention that Shane is also in our favourite show.

Just in case you're losing track, Aidan Gillett (Daniel McManus), Bernard Curry (Nate Perrett), John Atkinson (Stephen Mulroney) and Samara Weaving (Kirsten Mulroney) have all either been in, or been linked to, Home and Away in recent months. Kain O'Keefe, who played crazy Blade, is also about to pop up on UK screens.

Pretty soon it'll be hard for the casual viewer to tell the difference between the two shows!

Samara Weaving on Home & Away

According to a source on the Back to the Bay Forum, Samara Weaving - who played Kirsten Mulroney on Out of the Blue - has recently signed up for a 5-week guest stint on Home and Away.

She's expected to follow in the footsteps of John Atkinson (Stephen Mulroney), Aidan Gillett (Daniel McManus) and Bernard Curry (Nate Perrett) - who've all popped up in Home and Away recently - when filming for her role begins in the next couple of weeks.

If it's true, congratulations Samara!

Aidan Gillett and Diane Craig news

Attention all fans of Aidan Gillett!

The man known best to us as Daniel McManus will be seen in Home and Away on Five from Friday, 27th February. His storyline involves the characters of Aden and Joey, played by Todd Lasance and Kate Bell respectively.

Thanks to Sarah on the Facebook group for the info.

Speaking of the McManuses, it seems that Diane Craig (Deborah McManus) is currently appearing in Underbelly: A Tale Of Two Cities on Nine in Australia. She's playing the character of Barbara Mackay (who almost sounds like Deborah living under a half-hearted pseudonym). The show is a massive hit over there, debuting with a massive 2,584,000 viewers last night (Monday) and easily becoming the most watched programme of the day.

Charlie Rose MacLennan, who played Zoe O'Donnell on Out of the Blue, also has a role in Underbelly, but as we can't watch the new series here in the UK yet we're not sure when she'll pop up - if she hasn't already!

We'll keep you posted with any other news we find on Out of the Blue's talented cast members.

Premiere reaction, Aidan and Aussie ratings

- We've been scouring the web trying to find some reactions to the Fiver premiere of Out of the Blue from new viewers. In the interests of fairness we'll include a selection of good and bad from what we've found:

littlelau, Handbag Forum: "Seems a bit boring so far [...] At the moment it doesn't seem like a soap, more like a drama that will turn into a murder mystery."

Slade, Back to the Bay: "Ok, well I watched the first episode and it seemed a bit anticlimatic but it is early days so I'll give it a chance. During the voiceover it was mentioned that one of them was going to be murdered so I look forward to seeing that."

ukdiva23, Digital Spy: "I recorded it because it clashes with Corrie, I don't think Fiver thought it through putting it on head to head with the major soaps like EastEnders and Corrie [...] I quite enjoyed the first episode though, so will definitely continue watching."

Tyleer, Digital Spy: "I really enjoyed it, so will definitely continue to watch it and hope I can really get into it [...] I also agree that they should put it on at an early time to get more viewers but as I can't stand Corrie it doesn't affect me."

It probably is fair to say that the first episode is the least action-packed of the lot, so it will be interesting to see how reactions change as the series progresses.

- Writing on the Facebook group about his stint on Home and Away, Aidan Gillett (Daniel McManus) has confirmed that he will be on-screen in Australia by February 13. Remember that the UK airings are currently two weeks behind those in Aus.

- It looks like Out of the Blue is starting to struggle a bit in the ratings in Australia. The show performed really well during its two-month stint in a 10.30pm slot on Ten - with an estimated average audience of 335,000, and with figures looking set to soon reach 400,000 before being taken out of the slot. These were respectable figures given the episodes were on so late.

Unfortunately, since moving to 6pm on Sundays, those figures have dropped. Two weeks ago the show debuted in its new slot with 170,000 viewers. At the weekend, it had 266,000 viewers - an increase, but still disappointing. Part of the reason for this is that the 6pm Sunday slot was probably the most competitive one the show could have been put in. In Australia, news programmes are always the highest-rated shows of the day, and Out of the Blue was unlucky enough to be put up against two of them - Seven News and Nine News.

To put things in perspective, on Sunday Seven News had 2,000,000 viewers and Nine News had 1,272,000. That's a massive chunk of the available audience watching news shows! Out of the Blue's move to a 5.30pm-6.30pm slot this weekend could possibly address this problem - it'll have a 30-minute advantage over the news shows and will hopefully keep hold of viewers over the hour.

Another issue is that the show could at least build up some momentum in its 4-nights-a-week 10.30pm slot. Such a low number of episodes each week prevents that a little bit.

Whatever happens, the official ratings season has now started in Australia and so Ten will obviously be watching closely to see how the show performs. Maybe the show just needs time to settle into its new slot - after all, it dropped to just over 200,000 at 10.30pm at the start of January before shooting back up to the high 300,000s the week after. We'll keep passing on any info we can find!

Bernard Curry in Home and Away

Bernard Curry, who played Nate Lee in the final few weeks of Out of the Blue, is now playing the character of Hugo Austin in episodes of Home and Away currently airing in Australia. He made his debut in Episode 4777, which is six episodes into the 2009 season.

The 2009 season of Home and Away starts airing on Monday February 2 in the UK, so if our calculations are correct, he'll be on screen in the UK by Tuesday February 10.

In an Australian TV interview, Bernard has confirmed that his character will be on the show for at least a year, so - in the event that a second series of Out of the Blue is commissioned - he would presumably not be returning.

Don't forget that Aidan Gillett, better known as bad boy Daniel McManus, is also appearing on Home and Away soon, but we don't have any firm details yet. It'll be interesting to see if Bernard and Aidan's characters interact much after Nate and Daniel didn't have much to do with each other on Out of the Blue.