Zoe Slater

Zoe Slater is a fictional character from the BBC soap opera EastEnders, played by Michelle Ryan. She made her first appearance on 18 September 2000. Zoe arrives in Walford along with her father, Charlie Slater (Derek Martin), sisters Kat Slater (Jessie Wallace), Lynne Hobbs (Elaine Lordan), Little Mo Mitchell (Kacey Ainsworth), and grandmother Mo Harris (Laila Morse). In January 2005, it was announced that Ryan would be leaving the soap, with Zoe's departure airing on 24 June 2005. Despite turning down several offers to return over the previous 20 years, in May 2025, it was reported that Ryan would reprise the role of Zoe later in the year. The character made an unannounced return in the episode broadcast on 16 June 2025.

Following their arrival, it later emerges that Zoe is in fact Kat's daughter, and a product of incest after Kat was raped by her uncle Harry Slater (Michael Elphick) in 1983, and Zoe was legally adopted by Kat's parents, Charlie and Viv. This was nominated for Best Storyline at the British Soap Awards, as well as winning Best Single Episode in 2002.

Another highly acclaimed storyline was Zoe's friendship with Kelly Taylor (Brooke Kinsella). In 2003, Zoe and Kelly made headlines in the UK, in a New Year's Eve episode that was filmed on-location in Scotland. In the storyline, Zoe, Kelly and others travel from London to Scotland, but their minibus crashes, leaving them stranded and injured on the freezing cold Scottish moors. While stranded, Kelly cares for an injured Zoe, and they become overemotional and kiss. The episode featuring their kiss attracted 9.5 million viewers, and the precise moment that they kissed was watched by 44% of the available viewing audience.

One of Zoe's subsequent major storylines was when she became romantically involved with local hardman Dennis Rickman (Nigel Harman), which soon ended after Zoe ended up being entrapped in an affair with Dennis's father Den Watts (Leslie Grantham) – though not before he pressured her into claiming that she is pregnant with Dennis's baby, as part of his last-ditch attempt to stop his devoted adoptive daughter Sharon Watts (Letitia Dean) from leaving Albert Square; Dennis and Sharon had embarked on a forbidden romance during the former's relationship with Zoe. When Zoe starts to worry that Dennis will discover her secret, Den persuades Zoe to sleep with him so she can get pregnant, up to the point where he blackmails her with the threat of exposing her secret to Dennis. Although Zoe is forced to relent to Den's blackmail, Dennis ends up seeing them in bed together and ends their relationship. Her final storyline revolved around Den's murder on the show's 20th anniversary episode, after Zoe conspired with his estranged wife Chrissie Watts (Tracy-Ann Oberman) and their friend Sam Mitchell (Kim Medcalf) to get revenge on Den for how he victimised them. Their plan resulted in Zoe seemingly killing Den in The Queen Victoria public house after he attacked Chrissie; however, when Zoe left his corpse behind, Den regained consciousness until Chrissie ultimately killed him for good, shortly before Zoe reappeared in the room where he was murdered. Soon afterwards, Zoe leaves Walford for Ibiza after making amends with Kat and Dennis. Zoe returned for a short stint in June 2025. She is expected to return permanently later in the year.