Max Sutherland
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| Max Sutherland | |||||||||
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| Portrayed by | Sebastian Elmaloglou | ||||||||
| First appearance | 2002 Episode 3195 |
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| Last appearance | 2004 Episode 3808 |
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| Cause/reason | Went to boarding school | ||||||||
| Profile | |||||||||
| Gender | Male | ||||||||
| Date of birth | 1989 | ||||||||
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Maximus "Max" Sutherland was a fictional character in the Australian soap opera Home and Away, portrayed by actor Sebastian Elmaloglou from 2002 to 2004.
[edit] Character
Max arrived in Summer Bay with his father, Pete, to stay with his uncle Rhys and aunt Shelley. Pete and Rhys hadn't spoken to each other for years, but eventually their made peace with each other.
After leaving with his father for several months, Max's stay with the Sutherlands turned into a more permanent one when Pete ran up some gambling debts and fled to Hong Kong. Max felt alone, but quickly found a friend in Colleen Smart who lived in the caravan park.
When it was believed that Dylan Russell was Rhys' son, Max quickly came to accept him as a cousin, probably grateful for another male presence in the female-dominated household. When Dylan left the Bay in the aftermath of his mother Angie's death and failed to keep a promise to return, Max felt rather let down.
Looking for some extra funds, Max wrote a romance novel, The Bay of Secrets, under the pen name Maxine Petersen. Realising no-one would be interested in a romance by a thirteen-year-old boy, he persuaded Colleen to pose as the author. Unfortunately, Max had plagiarised sections from several existing novels and when the copyright holders found out they threatened to sue Colleen. At the suggestion of Dylan, Max's cousin Dani wrote an article for the local paper giving Max and Colleen's side of the story and they managed to win the sympathy vote, even enjoying a brief period of TV stardom.
No longer anonymous, Max set to work on his second novel, a semi-autobiographical love story. At the time, Max was torn between two girls, Tamara Simpson and Caitlin, and both of them wanted to be the one he dedicated the book to. He ended up dedicating it to both of them and was disappointed that the second book, which was written from the heart, didn't do as well as the speed-written first. Eventually both of the girls disappeared from his life, and Max found a mysterious girl at the beach, who spoke only in Pig Latin at first and was labelled a Jane Doe at the hospital. The girl turned out to be Tasha Andrews, and Max became her first friend in Summer Bay.
Sometime later, Max met another mysterious girl, Eloise Lennox. Eloise seemed to have very strict parents, but the truth was she was hiding a terrible secret. Eloise had leukaemia and was dying, but that didn't stop Max from seeing her. Eloise died during a dream-date Max arranged for her in late 2003.
Max created a memorial place for her in a mineshaft he found while out in the bush bush. Unfortunately during the 2003 season finale the mine shaft collapsed, burying Max along with his cousins Jade and Kirsty and Rhys inside. Kane Phillips, Kirsty's boyfriend acted quickly and dug the family out with his bare hands with help from Seb Miller and some of the other locals. Everyone survived the dramatic accident, but Eloise's memorial place was ruined.
Max was upset to hear that Rhys and Shelley were getting divorced and thought it was because Rhys wanted to marry his new girlfriend, Beth Hunter. He changed his mind when he found out Shelley had requested the divorce and quickly became very close to Beth, admitting to Shelley that he loved her as much as he did her.
In 2004, Rhys married Beth and she moved her family into the Caravan Park. Beth's youngest children, twins Matilda and Henry, were constantly at loggerheads with Max. The twins were annoyed about being uprooted from their boarding school and were generally rude to the Sutherlands, Max in particular. After Max and Henry were caught brawling at school, headteacher Barry Hyde arranged a boxing match between the pair so they could settle their differences in an organised manner. Henry ended up knocking Max out, partly because he was distracted by the arrival of Rhys and Beth, but Max got the last laugh when he got the sympathy vote from Caitlin and the other girls while Henry was made to look like a bully. Eventually they managed to settle their differences and Max became good friends with the pair. He even developed romantic feelings for Matilda, although she was more amused by the idea than anything and only saw him as a friend.
By the end of the year, Rhys and Beth had separated following Rhys' reconciliation with Shelley. Rhys and Shelley immediately disappeared off to the city and Max was upset when Rhys spoke to Dani and Kirsty before leaving but effectively abandoned him, leaving Beth to explain what had happened.
Rhys and Shelley returned a few weeks later to apologise to Max and told him he could come and live with them in the city or stay in the Bay with Beth or Colleen. However, Max had had enough upheaval in his life and instead asked to go to boarding school. He left Summer Bay after a quick goodbye to his friends and wasn't heard from again.
