Jodie Gold
Jodie Gold is a fictional character from the BBC soap opera EastEnders, played by Kylie Babbington. She first appeared on screen on 7 June 2010. On 24 October 2011, it was announced Babbington's contract would not be renewed and Jodie departed on 14 November 2011, along with Poppy Meadow (Rachel Bright).
Originally introduced as a love interest for Darren Miller (Charlie G. Hawkins), she is also the daughter of established character Vanessa Gold (Zöe Lucker). Jodie is Jewish and Darren has a circumcision operation to respect this. Her step-father, Harry (Linal Haft) was thought to be her father until Vanessa reveals this time him in an argument. Darren also proposes to Jodie but decides not to marry her after thinking he's not good enough for her.
Babbington received many letters within six months of her initial appearance, from fans saying that Jodie is their ideal woman. When Jodie's friend Poppy was introduced, her initial scenes with Jodie were described as "a bizarre and utterly irrelevant chat" by Jody Thompson from the Daily Mail. Daniella Graham from the Metro said that "viewers were left questioning why on earth anyone thought this pointless sub-plot was necessary." This was later confirmed to be "filler" as a large amount of scenes were cut out from Tommy Moon's funeral.
