cake-emu
cake-emu
24K posts
soph/cake (she/her) | UK | 35 | i was gone from this site for years then sapphic Carla Connor dragged me back (i was powerless to resist) | I mostly just make Coronation Street gifs (feel free to send requests)...
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cake-emu · 1 day ago
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Lisa Swain therapy scene visual language analysis
We all (except Lisa apparently) knew it was coming: a Becky Swain mention in Lisa's first therapy session!
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Yet while it wasn't a suprise for us as an audience, we still felt Lisa's shock in that moment. Let's look at how that was conveyed visually in the scene.
In this 10th July 2025 episode (directed by Merlyn Rice), we were treated to six whole minutes of Lisa in therapy. A goldmine! The scene we'll be looking at is the second of three that take place during the therapy session. As the scene opens, we're shown a number of close-ups (the clock, posters on the wall, the therapist writing notes, his potted plant) as Lisa casts her gaze around the room, frustrated and impatient following her decision to sit in silence.
We're then shown a wide shot of both characters sat in the room, to once again establish the scene, and also show us on which side of the room the cameras are located:
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So we see that the scene is being filmed from the side that is to the therapist's left, and Lisa's right.
In filmmaking there's a convention called the 180-degree rule, aka the 180 rule. Like all rules, it can be broken but ideally you want to be breaking the rule intentionally, for a specific purpose* (e.g. to create a sense of unease or tension, to illustrate a character's shift in perspective or understanding, to signal a change in tone or atmosphere, to mirror shifting power dynamics, and so on). It's named for the 180° axis, which in this scenario is essentially an imaginary line, along which you have two or more characters situated, and which the cameras do not cross during the course of the given scene. Put simply, the rule governs where you can place your camera/s in the scene.
Here's a visual to help explain (courtesy of Adobe):
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Note how we have two figures in this diagram, each with a camera placed behind them, and another camera facing them from side-on. The cameras in reality can shoot from anywhere within that half-circle that has been established for the scene (the dotted line is the 180° axis which the camera must not cross). So let's imagine the figure in blue is Lisa, the figure in red is the therapist, and the camera at the bottom of the graphic is showing us our wide shot we just highlighted above.
The camera behind Lisa gives us this over-the-shoulder perspective:
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And the camera behind the therapist gives this over-the-shoulder perspective:
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Rules exist for a reason, and this one acts as a guideline for viewers, maintaining a sense of continuity and creating spatial consistency so we as an audience understand where the characters are located specifically within the space they're occupying (here it's the therapist's office) and also in relation to one another. Ultimately, it makes the scene coherent for us, allowing us to focus on the 'action', in this case dialogue, facial expressions, and body language. If the camera kept crossing the 180° axis and was shooting from various different areas of the room, we would be disorientated, and become distracted by trying to figure out where we are being placed each time we cut to a new angle.
So crossing the invisible line can disorientate, but it can also be done to intentionally convey disorientation.
In this scene, Lisa has almost been lulled into thinking she's able to stick to 'safe' topics during the session: she asks the therapist about his plant and the discussion develops from there. She steers the focus to Carla briefly, and inadvertently to Betsy. Obviously she would prefer to not be having any kind of conversation with this man, and small talk about plants is no doubt far from her idea of enjoyable, but if she has to talk to him then these topics are just about acceptable to her, even if she is constantly grasping for control of the conversation. We can tell from her body language and fluctuations in her voice that she's uncomfortable, but she's playing along for now (although being a smartarse about it).
We get almost 2 minutes worth of conversation where we cut back and forth between coverage of Lisa and the therapist in a series of over-the-shoulder shots, mostly medium shots, with the occasional medium close-up on Lisa. Not only has she been lulled into a false sense of security (relatively speaking) but so have we. This repetition of shot type and content for almost two minutes doesn't have a soporific effect because we're engaged by the dialogue but it is disarming.
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And then! The therapist says that magic word: Becky.
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We can see instantly that Lisa is caught off-guard.
And then to really hammer home the unease, when we cut to the next shot, the camera has crossed the invisible line! Suddenly it's on Lisa's left for this over-the-shoulder close-up of the therapist:
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It's jarring! What the hell are we doing over here?? We were so comfy and cosy watching this back-and-forth from the other side of the room, and now we've been flung to the opposite side without warning!
So when we cut next to Lisa, we feel her shock. She too is now shown in close-up from the other side of the 180° axis and she looks like she's just had the rug pulled out from under her feet.
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And then we get a slow zoom in on Vicky Myers's extremely expressive face while the therapist talks, and we understand that Lisa has been left reeling by this mention of her late wife and the therapist's suggestion that they talk about her.
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The scene ends there and we, like Lisa, are left a little stunned!
Imagine that somebody in the same room as you was watching this scene through earphones, so you could see the visuals but couldn't hear any sound. Even if you had never watched Coronation Street before, and had no context for what this scene was about, you would understand that this blonde woman had just heard something shocking in that moment and doesn't know how to respond.
If the cameras had stayed on the same side of the room for the entirety of the scene, and we had instead seen the slow zoom on Lisa's face from this side:
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we would have sensed that she was stunned by the topic of Becky being brought up but would we have felt it as intensely? By breaking the 180 rule, the director has given us an additional visual clue to understand Lisa's emotional state in that moment. Vicky Myers is a strong performer and undoubtedly would have pulled it off regardless but this technique makes the effect extra potent. We have insight into what Lisa is feeling because to a lesser extent we feel it too!
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If you enjoyed this post, you can check out my other visual language analyses of scenes:
9th June 2025
26th May 2025
9th October 2024
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*if you want an example of the 180 rule being broken for no discernable reason, look no further than the 16th December 2024 episode in which Carla and Lisa are enjoying a spa day and making Christmas plans. We start facing both women as Carla finishes giving Lisa a shoulder massage and then they have a little heart-to-heart conversation with Carla moving to the bed and Lisa turning to face her. This results in the camera being on Lisa's right/Carla's left:
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Then, partway through the conversation, we suddenly cross the line and cut to the camera being on Lisa's left/Carla's right:
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Then we cross the line again as Carla jokingly warns Lisa that she won't be cooking Christmas dinner:
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Before we cross back once more. Not only do we keep crossing from one side of the room to the other but the colouring is also different as a result of the decor, making the change stand out even more. There's no way the rule break in this (emotionally and tonally) very soft scene was intentional as the content/atmosphere really doesn't warrant such a jarring change, nor indeed repeated 180 rule breaks. It seems more likely to me that it was somehow necesitated by circumstances on the day of filming.
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cake-emu · 2 days ago
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you’re an older sibling ?? and what for ??? your younger sibling becoming taller than you ????
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cake-emu · 2 days ago
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cake-emu · 2 days ago
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Lisa talking about Carla in therapy
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cake-emu · 2 days ago
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cake-emu · 2 days ago
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I open Tumblr. I post something that should be a diary entry. I close Tumblr. I open Tumblr after having it closed for 1.2 minutes. I reblog 176 posts in a row. I add tags of absolute gibberish to 7 of those. I close Tumblr. I open Tumblr I post yet another should-be diary entry. I close Tumblr. I open tu
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cake-emu · 2 days ago
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cake-emu · 2 days ago
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Carla Connor ☆ 03/01/2007
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cake-emu · 3 days ago
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Lisa Swain vs therapy ♡
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cake-emu · 3 days ago
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Coronation Street | Lisa Swain (10th July 2025)
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cake-emu · 3 days ago
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Is it just me or does having a silly little tv show to look forward to make the passage of time bearable
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cake-emu · 3 days ago
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TINY FROG ALERT 🐸
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cake-emu · 3 days ago
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Coronation Street | Lisa Swain + plants (vs flowers)
"reeling at the idea of Lisa buying flowers for her girlfriend every second day but never plants for the house. Because flowers aren't expected to last, they're meant to wilt and die. Something to nurture though ??? To grow attached to and let down ??? No thank you!" (words courtesy of @airesgay)
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cake-emu · 3 days ago
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cake-emu · 4 days ago
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Coronation Street | Carla Connor + Lisa Swain (20th January 2025 | 10th July 2025)
good catch, @swainconnors
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cake-emu · 4 days ago
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the worst part of being a non-american on the internet is statistically you're probably going to make a lot of friends who ARE american and then you start getting crazy thoughts like "i should take a vacation to buttfuck tennessee" or "i wish i could immigrate to new jersey"
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cake-emu · 4 days ago
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What site do you use to find hostels? I've been wanting to travel more but don't have an unlimited budget unfortunately and also would like to know that it's relatively safe and not too dodgy
hey! Besides the usual aggregators (Booking.com, Hostelworld), there's also Independent Hostels UK. In England & Wales there are also of course the YHA hostels, and the Scottish equivalent is Hostelling Scotland (my favourite group of hostels - I mostly stay in these when I visit Scotland).
Obviously youth hostels you can generally expect to be very safe but honestly I've never been in a situation where I've questioned my safety in a backpackers' hostel, certainly not in the UK. But for peace of mind, you can get a feel for a place (e.g. if it has a bit of a dodgy vibe) through the reviews :)
don't hesitate to ask if you have further questions 😊
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