Coronation Street boss scraps dark storyline for ‘demon child’ Hope over ‘burn out’ fears

Further sinister stories for Hope Stape, the “devil kid,” have been cut from Coronation Street for fear that she could “burn out.”

The 12-year-old Isabella Flanagan who plays the child actress has already experienced some gruesome plotlines in the ITV soap opera.

She was recently spotted attempting to capitalize on her father’s “celebrity” by selling signed copies of a book about his time in school. She is the daughter of serial killer John Stape, who was married to her mother Fiz.

But when she overheard students making fun of her, things took a dark turn, and she picked out a hammer to “re-enact” one of his grisly killings.

Alina Pop, the ex-girlfriend of Hope’s stepdad Tyrone Dobbs, was also attempted to be killed by Hope by setting fire to their apartment as she slept.

Unfortunately, Alina lost her pregnancy—she was carrying Tyrone’s child at the time—but she was rescued from the fire.

Hope hid her cousin Joseph in the loft for days while they believed he was missing in a further attempt to generate chaos for the adults nearby.

She was most recently observed pretending to be bitten by a dog when her aunt Beth’s dog Peanut murdered her beloved chinchilla Cilla so he could be put down.

Nevertheless, Corrie executive Iain MacLeod says he intends to take Hope’s character in a different path following a turbulent few years.

He said: “She’s definitely not going to continue down such a terrible path,” during an appearance on ITV’s Loose Women.

During the following 12 months, we’re going to focus on typical pre-teen activities, despite the fact that we’ve done some extremely dark and twisted things with that character.

Iain teased that actress Isabella, who is the younger sister of Emmerdale’s April Windsor, 14, Amelia Flanagan, will soon embark on a relationship with Sam Blakeman.

“We’re going to be creating a bond between her and Sam that will kind of teeter on a very innocent pre-teen romance,” he said, trying to steer clear of any pitfalls.

We will see a more grounded, down-to-earth side of Hope, but it will always have a Hope twist because she may be wired a little differently than most kids her age.

Iain claimed he didn’t want to run the danger of wearing Isabella out with frequent, elaborate narratives as an explanation for why the producers chose to go that course for her character.

“I believe there is a risk with any character that is that clever — and Isabella is such a terrific actress as well — that you burn them out by having them do too much big crazy stuff in a run,” said Isabella.

Iain said, “If we’re lucky, God willing, we’ll have them for years and years,” predicting that Isabella and Jude Riordan, who plays Sam, will become Hollywood stars in their later years.