Calvin Valentine poll on the forums at the moment, Calvin may look nice with his shirt off, but his misogynistic, patronising, whiney attitude is doing him no favours at all. It’s even making people sympathise a bit with Carmel, and we all know she’s a no good dirty boob-thief." Deller later criticised him again, writing: "Calvin Valentine, Hollyoaks, Last month’s winner (or loser, I suppose) continues to annoy, behave implausibly and maintain his self-righteous prickness, and was only usurped for a very good reason…" In her book "Soap Stars", Debbie Foy features Whittle in one of her profile features and describes Calvin
Soap opera early 1970s and in 1972, debuted "Emmerdale Farm" (now "Emmerdale"), based on the successful format of the Irish soap opera. In the late 1970s, "The Riordans" was controversially dropped. The creator of that series would then go on to produce the second of his "Agri-soap" trilogy "Bracken", starring Gabriel Byrne, whose character had appeared in the last few seasons of "The Riordans". Bracken was soon replaced by the third "Agri-soap" "Glenroe", which ran until 2001. As RTÉ wanted a drama series for its Sunday night lineup rather than a soap opera, "On Home Ground" (2001–2002), "The Clinic" (2002–2009) and "RAW"