Who killed Archie Mitchell?

Every year Eastenders along with the other U.K. soap operas, join the race for most miserable, shocking and depressing Christmas storyline. Bringing to the fore, as much turmoil, sadness and depression as they can to the soap families that reside in them.

This year was of no exception on Albert square, with Eastenders offering the christian, syed and Almira love triangle. As well as the murder of serial philanderer, hard geezer and all round bad apple Archie Mitchell. Actor Larry Lamb met his screen death by means of being struck by the rather hefty Queen Victoria bust being purposefully and accurately dropped on him from a considerable height, knocking him clean out.

Those clever Eastender producers however, hid the identity of Archie's murderer leaving us, the viewers wondering. Who killed Archie Mitchell?

Archie had accumulated a lot of enemies in the time he had spent on the square, most of which are members of his own family.

There are no shortage of suspects or motives, which makes it even harder to decipher just who the killer maybe.

Is it the scorned ex-wife or the dumped and embarrassed fiance. It could be the resentful and angry daughter or the girlfriend of a pride trodden nephew.

Let's see who exactly is in the frame and why? Because until the 17th of february 2010, it's anyone's guess.

Peggy married Archie despite her own reservations and subsequent warnings from her friends. His controlling nature soon came to the fore and even his own daughter Ronnie persistently advised her against the nuptials, however the wedding went on regardless. Not long after they said I do, the marriage quickly fell apart and Archie was out on his ear. In the time between the beginning of the divorce and his death, Archie had broken Peggy's heart yet again, got engaged to Janine, of whom Peggy has had a particular dislike of for many years. Archie and Janine then worked in cahoots, to underhandedly obtain the Queen Vic, which subsequently left Peggy and the rest of the Mitchell clan homeless at Christmas. He then had the audacity to tell Peggy that she could have her divorce if she slept with him for one more night. She was justifiably outraged and stormed of in Anger. But did she return to kill him?

The son of Peggy Mitchell and father of Ben, borrowed a substantial amount of money from an unsavory source which soon left him with a bitter taste in his mouth. After failing to pay back the money at the correct time, Phil was bady beaten and threatened. Desperate times lead to desperate measures and Phil reluctantly borrowed some more money from Ian, using the Queen Vic Pub to secure the loan. Archie and Janine then used Ian's problems in his personal life against him and blackmailed him into handing them the deeds to the Vic. As a consequence Phil felt in some part guilty for the situation the family had found themselves in and could have killed Archie.

Daughter of Archie is one of the least likely to have committed the crime as she is more forgiving and had the better relationship with her dad then anyone else on the square. However this does not rule her out as it's sometimes those you least expect. (Take for instance, Darren being Georges father, I didn't see that one coming!) Roxy has a fierce temper and if pushed far enough may have killed her father in a moment of madness. After seeing what her dad did to Ronnie and the consequences of his actions, paired with the underlying guilt she still feels for having Jacks baby, along side witnessing all the other misery hes caused others, she may well have flipped.

Veronica Mitchell and her dad Archie have always had a tempestuous relationship. Headstrong, independent business brain Ronnie made no secret of her ever growing disdain and resentment for her father and his actions. When Archie announced that he and Janine were taking the Queen Vic Ronnie made her opinions of him very clear, not knowing she was pregnant he pushed her onto the bar and she subsequently lost her baby. This coupled with the recent death of Daniele, her daughter that came to Albert square to find her, whom Ronnie gave up when Daniele was born and she was a teenager. More then this, before Daniele came to the square, Ronnie's father had told her, she was dead! All this makes for more then enough of motive on her behalf.

Spoilt sister of Phil and daughter of Peggy, Sam is notorious for getting in trouble and getting her own way. After getting in trouble abroad Sam returned home for support and a good hiding place from the old bill, however her thoughtlessness and recklessness got her in further trouble. Like her brother Sam found herself in some serious financial trouble but unlike her brother didn't go to a loan shark, she rather dimly thought she could trust her Uncle Archie and spoke to him about her plight instead. Her evil, scheming Uncle Archie persuaded her to steal thousands of pounds of Ronnie's money and flee. Sam being Sam and there not being any love loss between her cousins, took his blatantly bad advice and promptly left the square without a word to any but with a lot of Ronnie's cash, while Ronnie was on holiday. Soon however weather due to guilt or the inability to stand on her own to feet the clueless thief returned, blamed the whole thing on Archie and was of course immediately forgiven by mum and brother. Although forgiven the family was still in turmoil and since her return the family fortunes had taken a severe nose dive. Sam may have murdered Archie in a bid to eradicate the problems they now faced, even if rather drastically!

Phil's hard faced, on off love interest may have killed Archie in an attempt to help Phil. Although Phil had been living with her since their forced ejection from the pub, she could not bear to see him unhappy any longer and may have decided to take the matter in to her own hands. This again is an unlikely suspect but one that should not be ruled out. She offered him a  false alibi and pilfered him a new shirt, to replace another one because he had Archie's blood all over it from the night of the murder.

Ben's brother learned of Phil's financial difficulty and loaned him the money despite being life long rival's. Ian was soon tricked in to being filmed sleeping with Janine after his partner Jane left him before Christmas. When Jane returned wanting to give their marriage another try,  Archie and Janine showed him the footage and told him in no uncertain terms that if he did not hand over the pub then Jane would see what he had been up to while she had been away. Not wanting leave his brother homeless but more concerned with keeping his relationship Ian reluctantly gave in. He may have killed Archie to eradicate all evidence of his night with Janine and get back into Ben's good books.

Phil's son has had more then a few problems in his short ten or so years. When his mother died, he had to move in the Queen Vic to live with his Dad, of whom he hardly knew. Not long after joining eastenders Ben's dad starts going out with a crazy lady called stellar who turns out to be a complete nut job and starts heavily bullying him, she left Ben and Phil's life by committing suicide after being found out. Not long after that Phil turns to the bottle and the return of his detrimental alcoholism. After dealing with all that and some, he then has to contend with Archie and all the problems he caused only then to be left virtually homeless at Christmas. With that and many other issues I am surprised he hasn't cracked already. Although it is highly unlikely Ben could have lifted or pushed such a heavy object as the Queen Victoria bust, this is soap land so technically anything is possible.

During her time of mental health problems and in between Archie's stint with Peggy and Janine, Archie effectively raped Stacey by forcing himself on her. But because she was suffering a then untreated mental illness  she felt she could not report it to the police. She dealt with that alone for a while until she got back together with her and on off love interest Bradley, only then to discover she was pregnant with Archie's baby and had to tell the whole sorry story to Bradley. Including the fact that she wants to keep the baby after her regrets for aborting her and Bradley's child at the beginning of their relationship. Bradley sticks by her and they decide to bring the baby up together as their own. Although it seems like it worked out for Stacey, she still had many a reason to want to bump off the old man.

The Gold digger and Eastender super bitch, was unceremoniously slung out of the pub by Archie still in her sexy Santa underwear. After being dumped by Archie because he no longer required her. She killed off her first husband Barry for his money and Archie was her meal ticket back in the pub where she feels she belongs, after taking that away from her and denting her pride Janine threatens to kill him if he doesn't take her back, when he slams the door in her face she runs off to grab a knife. She has form and plenty of motive but does that mean she killed him?

Stacey confessed to Max, that she was indeed Archie's Killer, after seeing poor innocent Bradley fall to his death trying to escape from the police. What a shocker.