Ever since Robert Sugden (Ryan Hawley) returned to Emmerdale village, fresh out of prison, to reclaim his true love Aaron Dingle (Danny Miller) and take on said true love’s new husband, half brother John Sugden (Oliver Farnworth), little had been revealed about his time in the clink.

That is, until, his prison husband, Kev Townsend (Chris Coghill) arrived in the village, completely annihilating the long-awaited ‘Robron’ reunion in the process.

As Robert told Victoria, his relationship with Kev was initially born out of a need for protection. Robert was victimised by the other prisoners not only for his bisexuality, but for being ‘posh’.

As the two grew closer, Robert learned of a large fortune Kev was planning to leave him after he lost his battle with his terminal illness, and the two married.

When Aaron gave Robert an ultimatum, demanding he leave Kev or lose Aaron forever. As Robert faltered, unable to admit that he didn’t love Kev at all and, unable to leave him following a heart attack, Aaron ended things with his ex husband for good.

As Kev and Aaron (alongside bestie Mackenzie Boyd (Lawrence Robb) have entered into a potentially deadly feud following Robert’s ultimate decision to remain with Kev, the love triangle has become a powder keg, ready to explode at any moment.

Robert is set to take centre stage in an episode focussed on his time behind bars and just how he ended up so entwined with Kev, with an Emmerdale spokesperson confirming: ‘We will take a reflective look behind the bars of Robert’s recent incarceration. What did happen when he got sent down for six years? And has it changed this man forever?’

With an upcoming vow-renewal with Kev, and Aaron threatening that Robert’s participation will destroy any chance they ever have of reuniting ringing in his ears, will the episode shed any light on Robert’s final decision?

Speaking on Kev’s introduction to the series, Ryan said: ‘So I didn’t know I had a husband in prison. I found out I had a husband, and then, obviously, we meet Chris and I was kind of trepidatious as to what that would be like, because, you’re going to be doing so much stuff with someone, and everyone seems to have a story, everyone knew him, and he was everyone’s mate.

‘Then I met him, and we had some really nice scenes together and they were brilliant. Chris was brilliant in the scenes and I was genuinely really excited, I am genuinely, really excited to see how people are going to respond to him, because I think it’s a brilliant character, a great addition to the cast.’

Ryan then spoke more on the flashback episode itself, teasing a ‘pivotal’ twist: ‘For us to have this flashback, it’s lovely to have that whole episode to get to tell a story, and this backstory that we got to flesh out this, there’s one particularly very nice little twist that neither of us knew about it until I read the script.

‘I remember reading it like and I was like, ‘whoa’, because no one that was something that had happened, and it is massively pivotal. As far as we know, no one finds out about it so there are some interesting things that they’re sewing in this episode for things potentially leading forward.

‘So yeah, a great opportunity for me and Chris to work quite a lot together, intensively and a huge privilege, when you have that much story offered to you. So hopefully people will enjoy it, and hopefully it will be a good episode.’

Ryan also let spoke on his excitement for the fans to learn more about Robert and Kev’s union: ‘It was worth doing because it’s very informative. It kind of explains a lot about the relationship and it’s a nice scene, there’s nice episodes, nice scenes in it.’

Speaking on the scope of the episode, Ryan revealed that Robert will sport a number of different looks: ‘There’s different time periods. The episode goes from 2021 to all the way up until, like, right before Aaron and John’s wedding.

It’s at several different points throughout that time period. So I guess [the hair and make up team] had specific ideas of what Robert should look like at those different stages, because it’s like a five year time span, right? So yeah, there are some different looks. It’s all me. There’s no hair doubles or wigs. I do all my own hair. So yeah, it’s like, there’s a couple of different hairstyles, I think.’

When asked whether he can tease what’s yet to come from the increasingly-toxic love triangle, Ryan said: ‘It’s leading to a climax.’