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Liverpool Echo
Liverpool Echo
Entertainment
Ryan Paton

Worrying response to Holly Willoughby's emotional return leaves This Morning future in doubt

Right, deep breath. This was the way Holly Willoughby emotionally returned to This Morning earlier this week.

The Queen of daytime television made sure to don the whitest of angelic white dresses as she arrived back on her throne with one hell of a rescue operation on her hands. It is a moment that will go down in TV history as she made the first desperate attempts to repair the broken reputation of ITV's flagship daytime programme, which remains in tatters in the wake of Phillip Schofield's affair scandal.

Her long-time co-host's fall from grace has played out in the most public fashion imaginable and his standing as daytime television's King lies in the toilet alongside This Morning's status as the most wholesome show on the box. This Morning's charm lay in it being an easy-going, comfort blanket of a programme, which was always tied together by the chemistry of its two hosts.

READ MORE: Loose Women's Ruth Langsford makes This Morning hosts wince with savage swipe

Fans would stick along for the ride as anchors swiftly moved between the most far ranging of subjects with a gentle smile and a smooth segue. However, all of this has been undermined after the behind the scenes politics were laid bare for all to see.

Many This Morning colleagues have rushed to shoot down reports of a toxic environment and insisted it is a happy place to work. However, the way certain people associated with the show have pounced in recent weeks has been difficult to ignore, despite question marks over the true motives of their complaints.

A show like This Morning is reliant on an unerring belief in the relationship between the hosts - but will fans ever be able to buy this again to pay attention to what's actually happening in the episode? Will fans ever again be interested in Lisa Snowdon's fashion tips on summer essentials and Gino D'ACampo's risotto recipe - or is the story now always destined to be whether they spotted Holly throw some side eye towards Alison Hammond.

The battle to win back the trust of fans is now This Morning's greatest challenge, and the reason why Holly's returning monologue started with a question focusing on whether the viewers are OK. The address overplayed how much the public had actually been impacted by this ugly fallout, as the real question still remains whether This Morning is OK?

ITV bosses will surely be concerned about the immediate aftermath to Monday's emotional return as the show has continued to dominate headlines for the wrong reasons. Amanda Holden has not been shy to wade into the ongoing drama, despite being an ITV employee with Britain's Got Talent, and continued to stick the knife in yesterday as she adopted a sombre tone to mock Holly's words on Instagram.

It's a particular worry whenever a politician is in a position to do the mocking and MP John Nicolson even took aim at Holly in his opening statement as he grilled ITV bosses over their handling of the saga. Despite ITV's best attempts to move on, the drama shows no signs of slowing down just yet and it seems Eamonn Holmes won't be satisfied until he offers Phillip Schofield out for an actual fight.

Did ITV expect Holly's emotional return to go differently and win back some fan favour or will the channel be concerned it's so quickly became a subject of parody? People will point to how any publicity is good publicity and figures from TV critic, Scott Bryan, showed that 300,000 additional viewers tuned in to see Holly's first emotional address.

However, they weren't sticking around for the rest of the show as 200,000 of them switched off afterwards. If This Morning is to have any long term success then it needs to get to a point when the content on the show is once again the story and not the backstage drama.

If yesterday's episode is anything to go by, the tactic is to keep going, keep taking those deep breaths and rely on the well-tried format to dig them out of this messy affair. However, just how many of those deep breaths ITV's flagship daytime programme has left will be up to the viewers, who will ultimately decide the long term fate of This Morning.

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Holly Willoughby breaks This Morning tradition as she addresses Phillip Schofield scandal

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