Emmerdale spoilers follow from Thursday’s episode (4 December).

After a high-stakes visit to Emmerdale on Thursday evening, the emotional closing scene between Marlon Dingle and Rhona Goskirk felt like a not-so-subtle message to the audience: “This is gonna end.”

While Celia Daniels’ twisted storyline looks set to continue for a little while longer, we may have finally reached the start of the final chapter. We just have to be patient, it seems.

This week’s episodes have featured a long-awaited turning point in Emmerdale’s dark storyline focusing on April Windsor’s exploitation at the hands of Celia and Ray Walters. April bravely confided in her dad Marlon and stepmum Rhona about her ordeal, but Celia and Ray still found a way to secure the family’s silence… for now.

“Listen to me,” Marlon told Rhona as they reflected on a devastating day. “I accept, right now, in this moment, I don’t know what to do. But if we can protect April and Ivy and Leo, we can at least keep some control.”

He added: “We’re gonna get her out of this, Rhona. Whatever it takes. Whatever we have to do. This is gonna end.”

Related: Emmerdale’s Charity to confess shocking truth to Vanessa – before major panic

It was a hopeful moment that was needed after such a bleak – yet powerful – episode in the long-running storyline. When April previously fantasised about telling Marlon everything in a special episode last month, she imagined a nightmare scenario where her father was immediately killed as a consequence of her speaking out.

The real-life version wasn’t that much better for anyone involved. April’s boyfriend Dylan Penders was run over by Ray and left fighting for his life as a punishment for her speaking out. That settles it, then – looks like the criminals haven’t been making empty threats all this time…

Meanwhile, queen of mean Celia focused her efforts on threatening Marlon, Rhona, Leo and Ivy with dire consequences if April didn’t keep working for her.

This feels like a difficult balancing act for Emmerdale. The reality of soaps, with hundreds of episodes to fill each year, is that huge and engaging stories like this often need to rumble on for a long period of time. But the downside here is that the on-screen narrative could almost be seen to confirm April’s worst fears – she sought help, and things got worse for everyone.

Soaps love to highlight the real-life charities and organisations they work with when developing issue-based stories like this. The message is nearly always to reach out and seek support, so it’s tricky if the journeys we see on screen show negative consequences when someone speaks out.

Fortunately, Marlon and Rhona’s tear-jerking heart-to-heart is a clear signpost to viewers that things will ultimately start getting better… we just need to keep watching to see it. And from Marlon and Rhona’s perspective, they’ve clearly made a mistake by choosing to tackle this alone rather than cutting through the manipulation and contacting the organisations that can help.

Emmerdale has done a fantastic job with Ray and Celia’s saga, incorporating several characters across the two main story strands – April and Dylan’s ordeal, and Bear Wolf’s forced labour on the nearby farm.

With actors Joe Absolom and Jaye Griffiths quickly establishing themselves as two of the soap’s best villains in years, it’s perhaps no surprise that Emmerdale bosses want to keep them around for at least a few weeks longer.

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Related: 7 huge Emmerdale spoilers for next week (8 to 12 December)

Despite our early fears that April’s special fantasy episode would undermine the real-life revelation when the time came, this week’s episodes saw the soap at its best – with standout performances from Amelia Flanagan (April), Zoe Henry (Rhona) and Mark Charnock (Marlon) in the big scenes.

Having Rhona present for all the key moments was a skilful way to keep the episode fresh compared to the previous dream sequence episode, where she’d been absent. Plus, pushing forward the terrifying Celia as the main figure confronting April’s family also provided a different flavour to what we’d seen last time.

Spoilers released today have revealed that Celia will still be swanning around the village in a few weeks’ time, while poor Rhona suffers in silence as she watches her oblivious friend Laurel Thomas get close to Ray.

Further ahead, though, there have been hints that Ross Barton could start playing a role in the storyline. Does the fightback start here? And surely someone will think to get resident hardman Cain involved at some point? Fingers crossed!

The NSPCC, Childline and FRANK offer support and resources for the issues raised in April and Dylan’s storyline.