EastEnders icon Jake Wood breaks silence on Max and Zoe affair and reveals "chaos" for Walford return ...Middle East

Actor Jake Wood has spoken out about the surprising return of Max Branning to EastEnders.

The BBC One aired the surprise return scenes on Wednesday night before Thursday's episode revealed in flashback scenes to earlier this year that Max had been in a romantic relationship with another recent returnee, Zoe Slater (Michelle Ryan).

In addition to the history that Max has with the Slater clan, he also becomes privy to Zoe's secrets surrounding her twins, whom she gave birth to in 2006 and also that she may have killed a man during her quest to find her surviving son.

In the present day, a recent shot Zoe called Max to warn him not to return to Walford, but he didn't sound so keen...

Speaking to the press on the set of Walford, actor Jake Wood revealed what it was like to finally be back as Max Branning, having left the soap in 2021.

On the twist of Max and Zoe's connection, Wood revealed he was "excited", adding: "Like I knew that Michelle was coming back – really pleased that she was coming back and she wasn't being recast iconic character. And I think it's really interesting to have Max in the mix; it makes everything so much more complicated. I do return for a little bit. It's quite soon before my sort of permanent return, and there's lots of drama and chaos to issue."

He added: [The flashback storyline] works really well. You get a lot of exposition, a lot of the explanation of the relationship, so by the time Max turns up proper, there's already an established relationship between the two of them. It's just been a joy."

Given that neither Max nor Zoe has had particularly smooth-sailing love lives, is this a true romance? Wood is a firm believer that their connection was true and real feelings are involved.

"I mean, from my point of view, I think the relationship between them is genuine," confirmed Wood. "I think there are genuine feelings between them.

"But I think by the time Max comes back onto the Square, it's just become very complicated in terms of in terms of where Max is at and what he's about at that moment, to be able to commit to her, but I do feel like they do have a connection, and I think a lot of that was down to Zoe's looking for her son that she gave up for adoption, and that Max helps her financially to to pay for the PI, to help look for it.

"Obviously the you know, that's got very deep meaning for Max, the not having a relationship with his kids. So I think there was a lot of common ground."

When asked about whether the episodes this week were just a tease for Max's full-time return, Wood responded in the affirmative and revealed that new executive producer Ben Wadey was the reason he came back.

"I think mainly it's all down to Ben's vision, really," noted Wood. "I had lunch with Ben in January, and that kind of cemented it for me. Ben is a big fan of the show and understands all the characters' intrinsically exciting stories coming up, so just all the mix of those things was, after that lunch, a bit of a no-brainer for me to think about coming back after five years.

"It's such a good atmosphere with all the cast. It's probably the highest I've ever known it in 15 years being here; everyone's on a real high. And the show seems to be going from strength to strength, and it's just such a great time to be coming back."

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