Charlie Stubbs

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Villain Overview Gallery

Charlie Stubbs
Full Name	Charles Stubbs
Alias	Charlie Mr. Stubbs
Origin	Coronation Street
Occupation	Dodgy builder Local bully Local control freak
Powers / Skills	Charisma Deception Intelligence Extreme combatant
Goals	Seduce Shelley Unwin and control her life to the point of turning her against her mother Bev Unwin along with her closest friends (succeeded at first). Marry Shelley and continue with their relationship. Force Shelley to abort their unborn child. Prevent his girlfriend Tracy Barlow from discovering his affair with local hairdresser Maria Sutherland. Stop Tracy from taking revenge against him for cheating on her (all failed).
Crimes	Assault Breaking and entering Abuse Psychological torture Adultery Blackmail Kidnapping Parental negligence Extortion Unlawful eviction Attempted murder
Type of Villain	Charismatic dodgy builder

“	Who put the ram.... in the rama lama ding dong?	„
	~ Charlie tormenting local wayward David Platt before attempting to drown him.

Charlie Stubbs is a major antagonist in the ITV British soap opera drama show Coronation Street. He debuted in November 2003 and soon became one of the show's main antagonists throughout 2004-2007 before the character was killed-off in January 2007, after which he served as an overarching antagonist from the rest of 2007 onwards.

In his characterisation, Charlie was a nefarious builder who frequently seduces women before cheating on them. His story arc began with the character being romantically involved with local barmaid Shelley Unwin; the storyline in their romance saw Charlie mistreating and psychologically abusing his partner to the point of turning Shelley against her mother Bev and her closest friends up until Shelley eventually jilted him on their wedding day. Charlie's other plotlines included a friendship with his colleague Jason Grimshaw; having an affair with fellow neighbour Maria Sutherland; beating up Shelley's ex-husband Peter Barlow; and having a relationship with Peter's troublesome sister Tracy Barlow that ended when she killed Charlie in revenge for cheating on her earlier on.

He was portrayed by Bill Ward, who later played fellow soap character James Barton in Emmerdale.

Biography

Charlie Stubbs first came to Weatherfield as a builder in November 2003. Upon arrival, he had a dispute with local businessman Mike Baldwin when the latter blocked him with his car and refused to move the vehicle away. In retaliation, Charlie humiliated Mike in public by using a bulldozer to move Mike's car away and nearly smashing up the vehicle in the process.

Thereafter Charlie began to settle in the street and began working alongside fellow builder Jason Grimshaw in the local builder's yard. By 2004, Charlie became the new landlord of Weatherfield and was also Jason's best friend as the pair have developed a close companionship with each other. At one point, though, Charlie forced Jason to acquire a sealant gun and was unaware that Mike's friend Betty Williams had overheard the conversation. Betty, believing that that Charlie wanted a firearm, phoned the police about it; Charlie was taken in for questioning until he was released after Betty realized that she had misinterpreted the argument between the two builders. Not long afterwards, Charlie witnessed Jason's mother Eileen having a fight with her arch-rival Gail Platt; the situation was that Jason's brother Todd had a relationship with Gail's daughter Sarah until her family discovered that he had been two-timing Sarah with her brother Nick Tilsley and was secretly homosexual without her knowledge.

Soon enough, Charlie begins a relationship with local barmaid Shelley Unwin after the pair begun dating each other at her workplace - The Rovers Return Inn public house. But it quickly transpired that Charlie was unfaithful as he would frequently sleep on women before cheating on them. This was first exemplified when Charlie started flirting with the pub's co-owner Liz McDonald, who at this point was seeking to move forward from her turbulent marriage to local hardman Jim a few years ago. One night, however, Charlie attempted to kiss Liz and she responded by slapping him before threatening his life if he came near her again; Charlie merely brushed off Liz's threats.

At some point, Charlie found out that his employee Vinnie was bullying café owner Roy Cropper and his wife Hayley for a while. He eventually confronted and punched Vinnie before firing him for his behaviour. A few months later, Charlie helped rescue Shelley's best-friend Sunita Alahan and her husband Dev when the pair were kidnapped by Sunita's nemesis Maya Sharma to the point where the latter set fire to their shop in an attempt to murder the couple.

By 2005, Charlie's relationship with Shelley continued when he moved in to live with her at the pub. It was then Charlie became more controlling when he started to interfere in Shelley's personal aspects and at one point ended up ripping out her earrings in a fit of rage. Later on, Charlie accidentally opened a door that ended up hitting Shelley in the face. In response to this, Charlie locked Shelley in her bedroom to stop people from seeing her face as he assumed that everyone would think of him as a wife-beater. It soon became clear that Charlie was indeed mistreating Shelley in their relationship, but he ended up abusing her mentally rather than physically. Soon enough, Charlie's actions caused Shelley to develop agoraphobia. He also began to turn Shelley against her closest friends, including Sunita, in his further bid to control her.

However, Shelley's mother Bev realized what Charlie was doing and sought to break up their relationship - with Bev having grown to despise Charlie ever since he slept with her behind Shelley's back at one stage. Charlie later forced Shelley to choose him over her mother by barring Bev from the pub and disowning her later on. Bev later sought help from Shelley's love interest Ciaran McCarthy to stop their relationship, and he agreed after realizing what Charlie was doing to Shelley. However, this failed after Charlie turned Shelley against Ciaran and later provoked the latter into attacking him in front of Shelley; she instantly defended Charlie and this caused Ciaran to leave the street in disgrace.

During this time, Charlie cheated on Shelley by sleeping with Jason's girlfriend Violet behind her back. Shelley found out about this and confronted Charlie, who threatened to break up with her unless he would be forgiven. This caused Shelley to propose to Charlie and he agreed to marry her. On the night before their wedding, however, Charlie slept with another women and Shelley was urged by her mother and friends to not go through with the wedding. At first Shelley persisted on marrying Charlie, but not before receiving treatment over her ordeal; her doctor later asked Shelley about her relationship with Charlie and she admitted to being unsure on whether to go through with marrying him.

On the day of the wedding, Charlie was prepared to marry Shelley after delivering his wedding vows. But when it is Shelley's turn, she surprised Charlie and everyone by saying "No". She thereupon jilts Charlie and runs out of the church as Bev cheers for her daughter. Charlie furiously goes to confront Shelley when her mother tries to stop him, but he shoves her away before the latter is helped up by Mike's son Danny Baldwin. It is then Charlie forces Shelley into their wedding car and kidnaps her, driving to an isolated location where he confronts her for jilting him on their wedding day. Shelley in turn confronts Charlie for controlling her life and professes that she never set out to humiliate him. Charlie claims that Shelley will regret her decision, but she says otherwise before breaking up with him for good.

In 2006, Charlie turns his attention to local wayward Tracy Barlow and the pair begin a relationship. He soon convinced her to move in with him and later forced Tracy to have her infant daughter Amy live next-door with Tracy's father Ken Barlow and his wife Deirdre. It was then Charlie attempted to control Tracy as he did to Shelley, but this proved difficult when Tracy found out what Charlie was doing. She soon began to manipulate Charlie by pretending to be pregnant; when he demanded that she have an abortion, Tracy persuaded Charlie to give her money for it and instead brought expensive shoes behind his back. Charlie soon learned the truth about Tracy's fake pregnancy and confronted her about it, but she in turn forced Charlie to allow Amy to move back in at his house.

Later on when Bev was due to marry Shelley's friend Fred Elliott on their planned wedding, Charlie encountered Shelley and they had a one-night stand. Shelley later got pregnant with Charlie's baby and he confronted her about it after discovering the matter himself; he demanded that Shelley have an abortion, but she refused and departed the street after making it clear to Charlie that she'll make the baby grow up never knowing about his father.

When Tracy found out about Charlie's one-night stand with Shelley, they briefly split up before Charlie managed to seduce Tracy into giving him one last chance. But then Charlie cheated on Tracy again by having an affair with one of her enemies, Maria Sutherland. Their secret was threatened when Gail's wayward son David found out the truth and attempted to blackmail the pair. In retribution, Charlie began tormenting David and later abducted him before trying to drown him in his bathtub. Maria soon walked in on the incident and rescued David before finding out about Charlie's true nature. She instantly told Tracy about her affair with Charlie, which led to Tracy attacking Maria and then breaking up with Charlie in public. Tracy wanted Charlie to move out, but he refused and instead kicked Tracy out of the flat before changing all the locks to stop her from going in the house; Tracy was angry and, after seeing Charlie taunting her by inviting a woman to his flat, vowed to kill him in retribution.

To begin her revenge against Charlie for his betrayal, Tracy managed to convince Charlie to reconcile with her by pretending to make amends with him. This worked successfully and Tracy continued with her plan by making it appear that Charlie was being violent towards her, going as far as to burn herself with an iron to convince everyone that Charlie was responsible for her injuries. She even locked herself in the house to make it appear that Charlie was mistreating her in the same way as he did to Shelley in the past.

By January 2007, Tracy's scheme resulted in her parents Ken and Deidre growing concerned for their daughter. Soon Charlie begun a conflict Tracy's half-brother Peter, who also believed that Charlie was mistreating Tracy and also resented him for his behaviour towards Shelley due to the fact that Peter had been previously engaged to Shelley a few years ago. Tracy later lured Peter into her house by allowing him to take a shower, before summoning Charlie to the house moments later. When Charlie arrived, Tracy made it appear that she had just slept with her boyfriend. Charlie reacted by confronting Tracy's "boyfriend", not knowing it was Peter, and ended up attacking him; Charlie forced Peter out of his house and continued to beat him up until he was stopped by Tracy and her family. This gave the impression that Tracy was right about Charlie beating her, and he was later arrested for his assault on Peter.

The following day, Charlie got community service and got drunk one night after returning home from it. He then confronted Tracy for tricking him and she ended up revealing her scheme to Charlie, but he deemed it to be pathetic before attempting to kick Tracy and Amy out of his house. Tracy managed to convince Charlie to give him a lapdance later on that night in a false last-ditch attempt to reconcile with him. Charlie relented and he watched as Tracy performed her lap dance for him. However, she then grabbed a horse ornament and smacked him on the head with it. Tracy then forced Charlie to her knees and, after ranting about how she hates him for betraying their relationship over his womanizing ways, ended up hitting him again with the ornament.

Moments after attacking Charlie with the ornament, Tracy staged the attack as an incident in which he tried to kill her - going as far as to cut herself on a hand and placing it onto Charlie's hand to implicate him as the attacker. The authorities were later summoned and Charlie was taken to hospital, where he died of his injuries. Shortly after Charlie's death, Tracy was arrested and charged for his murder. She was released on bail due to David giving her a false alibi and was supported by her supposed friend Claire Peacock, who had been manipulated by Tracy into befriending her and believing that Charlie had mistreated her.

In the build-up to Tracy's trial for Charlie's murder, she convinced everyone that Charlie tried to murder her and that she only killed him in self-defense; however, on the night before her trial begins, Tracy confessed to her mother that Charlie's murder was actually deliberate as she sought revenge for his cheating ways. Deirdre then told Ken and Peter, along with her own mother Blanche Reid, about the fact that Tracy killed Charlie deliberately rather than in self-defense. Nevertheless, Deirdre agreed to help her daughter get away for Charlie's murder scot-free after Tracy pleaded not guilty for the crime. However, Tracy's plan fell apart when she was found guilty of Charlie's murder; she was then sentenced to life imprisonment for 15 years and later on her ex-lover Steve McDonald, also Amy's father and Liz's son, was given custody of the child.

Over three years later in 2010, however, Tracy was released from prison when a forensics officer working on the case was exposed for faking his certificates; this led to the case of Charlie's murder being reopened, therefore Tracy was given a retrial and in the end she was found not guilty of Charlie's murder before being released from prison. Towards the end of the year, Tracy was attacked by Claire when she had earlier discovered the truth about Tracy's plan; how Tracy had merely been using Claire as part of her revenge scheme against Charlie; and that Tracy was uncaring when Claire's husband Ashley Peacock died in a tram crash weeks before her release from prison.

Trivia

• The character made a total of 421 appearances throughout his time on the show.
• Bill Ward (the actor who played Charlie Stubbs) was nominated for several awards for his contribution to the character's performance and story arc altogether.
  • In fact, Bill won the "Best Exit" award in the 2007 British Soap Awards ceremony.
• Charlie Stubbs was born on 17th November 1971.
• The episode which featured Charlie's murder was listed as the second-most watched for any programme on TV in 2007, having been watched by 13.1 million viewers at the time.
  • As such, Charlie was arguably opted to have "the most graphic soap death" of all-time.