ITV Emmerdale's Bear Wolf actor breaks silence on 'concerning' new storyline

Emmerdale's Joshua Richards, who portrays Bear Wolf, has spoken out about his character's disturbing new storyline.

Bear was last spotted driving away in his hire car more than three months ago. Yet in recent episodes, his son Paddy Kirk, portrayed by Dominic Brunt, discovered his father wasn't safely in Ireland as assumed but had actually gone missing following a lengthy summer away.

With concerns mounting over Bear's mental wellbeing, Paddy fears for his father's safety and feels remorseful that they left things on poor terms as he desperately hunts for clues alongside his wife Mandy Dingle, portrayed by Lisa Riley.

Speaking about the forthcoming episodes, Bear actor Joshua discussed his new storyline involving modern slavery: "Well, I found it a bit disconcerting really. I found it a bit frightening and also what experience do I have to bring to the table...

"So it was a bit discombobulating at first because I thought it could be interesting because of course Bear has been experiencing this kind of depression and confusion.", reports the Daily Star.

"So maybe it's a great thing to find him so vulnerable, a big strong man being vulnerable and being exploited.

"So as an actor, you just think lovely, lovely, jubbly, jubbly and rub my hands together and then pull my sleeves up to get stuck in."

Joshua continued: "It'll be a standalone episode where we'll have some kind of explanation of what exactly happened to him after he got in his car and drove away.

"We did see a few weeks after he'd left the village that he was still with his car and not with his friend Nasha in Ireland at all. So we will find out exactly what happened to him."

Discussing how he prepared for the upcoming scenes, Joshua revealed: "I was told a few months ago, told by Laura [Shaw] our producer, that I'd be off screen for a while, that I will disappear.

"I thought, 'Oh, I'll get my P45 now and off I go.' But no, they said, you'll be coming back.

"But in the meantime, Clare Golds, makeup, said, 'Whatever you do, don't cut your hair and don't shave your beard. Go raggedy.' So I became a raggedy old man while I was off."

He continued: "You first see Bear when he's at the real bottom, looking really filthy and scraggly, very scraggly and unkempt. And then bit by bit, we took it away.

"As you can see, I'm almost back to where I was before. But it's been a very complicated way of portraying various stages in Bear's journey."

Emmerdale continues on weekdays at 7.30pm on ITV and ITV X.