EastEnders has aired a devastating Christmas special containing Mick Carter’s dark final scenes on the soap, as he dove into the Channel to save his beloved ex-wife Linda.
The pub landlord, played by Danny Dyer, saw his fate left on an ominous note in the hour-long post-watershed festive special, as the love triangle storyline had an explosive end on the BBC soap.
The drama saw the aftermath of Mick and Janine Butcher’s (Charlie Brooks) wedding, as her manipulative staging of the car crash earlier in the year, to frame Linda (Kellie Bright) for being behind the wheel, was finally exposed.
As Albert Square celebrated Christmas Day in classic fashion, Linda and Mick tearfully agreed to give their marriage another go, as she told him he was the love of her life.
The pair shared an emotional reunion kiss, before he headed upstairs in the pub to confront Janine on their ‘sham of a marriage’.
In their bedroom, Mick tossed Janine his wedding room and chewed her out for her string of lies after he finally learnt the truth of her actions in the car crash.
She tearfully insisted: “I was protecting you Mick. You should have seen her. She was off her head.” She desperately continued: “I will speak to Linda and I will smooth all of this over. All of this will be in our past and we can have our future together, our life.”
A furious Mick replied: “Do you honestly think I want to be with you now? To sit there looking at you, to touch you? I was going to give up everything for you and for what?”
He then savagely told Janine he did not love her and never had, adding that he would send her divorce papers to sign while she sat in prison for her crimes.
While Janine tried to appeal to Mick over her pregnancy with their child and memories of their wedding day on Christmas Eve, he gave her mere minutes to pack her bags and leave.
Janine did indeed scarper, but when Mick learned she had done so with her passport, he set off in hot pursuit of her with Linda, fuming: “She doesn't get to skip off into the sunset. She's got to pay for what she's done.”
A highly dramatic car chase then ensued, as Ricky called Janine to reason with her and return to Walford to ‘face the music’.
Yet a desperate Janine only doubled down, veering off towards Dover, with Linda and Mick in a close behind.
Complete with ominous scenes of water crashing across the cliffs, Janine was seen driving at speed down a dark country road as Mick feared causing a car crash between the pair.
Yet they soon came to a stop by the coast, prompting another confrontation between Janine and Mick – which saw her initially beg him to have pity and let her go, before she began hurling insults at him.
The pair came to blows and Janine soon fled in the car – but not before Linda managed to jump in beside her.
As chaos ensued in the car, the pair soared off a cliff into the Channel waters below in a jaw-dropping stunt that left the two women plummeting through the sea in the car.
Mick jumped in and dove down, saving pregnant Janine from the car, while Linda managed to escape to the shore herself, unbeknownst to Mick.
The last EastEnders fans saw of the favourite was his murky figure diving back down into the depths of the water to save Linda – and never emerging.
Linda and Janine were left on the shore staring out at the dark waters, as a distraught Janine screamed: “Where is he? Mick! Oh God, where is he?”
