Well Molly has been given more scenes in the last few weeks, and now that she has a job at the Corner Shop lets hope we will be seeing a lot more of her. It wasnt keen on Molly at first when she tried to come between Fiz and Kirk, but she has grown on me.
I agree about too many of the same characters getting storylines - Steve and Tracy have had storyline after storyline since 2003! In one way im glad that Tracy is going, I feel it is the right time for the character to go. If she stayed she would only go around in circles. Sarah Platt was another one who was overused right back to when Tina O Brien took over in late 1999. However they seem to have let Sarah have a break from the main storylines recently and its all David now!
I have to admit though, I dont mind Janice. I think she is a lot better than Cilla, and I think Janice and Leanne work well together. Notice that Leanne had hardly any scenes with Les and Cilla, I sometimes forget she is Les's daughter - she even said herself it was a last resort to stay at Les's house in Friday's episode.
Kevin is like a spare part too (quite apt that he runs a garage really ) - maybe they should kill him off - that would give Sally Whittaker the chance to do some emotional scenes. I do like Sally as one of the factory girls though I must admit.
Just realised, I forgot to include Reet's friend Doreen in my list.
When comparing the number of characters with other soaps you need to factor in that Corrie has been on 46 years
Lots of characters have had loads of storylines and that's why they mostly appear in the background thesedays
I can't see why Kevin ordering a pint and fixing a car once a month is causing a major issue that he would need to be killed off
Remember all the houses need filling, hence why we are getting a new family, it's also a long time since we've had a new family start at once rather than over a period of months (like to Connors)
Plus if Dev goes someone would need to run the Corner Shop and it would be more realistic to get someone new to do it rather than some dodgy situation like when the 3 men took over the Rovers and nobody really ran it