Jo Langham

Jo was on her way to Summer Bay to meet dad David when her car broke down. Tane stopped and offered to help but she refused and was left with a long walk to town. When she returned with her father, she found Tane had fixed the car and was annoyed that he’d acted without her permission, although had to accept he’d done a good job. She was soon reunited with estranged sister Lacey, who had always blamed Jo for their mother’s death in a car crash; Jo had driven into a tree and had no memory of what had happened. Their argument escalated into a fight that saw them both arrested by Cash and taken to the station where David was sergeant. Jo asked David if he had covered up anything about the crash but he insisted he hadn’t. She tried to use Lacey’s boyfriend Theo to put in a word for her but he refused.

She befriended Dana when she met her at the Diner and they realised they were both going for a job as a cardiothoracic nurse at the hospital. Jo was interviewed by Levi and demonstrated her knowledge of the subject but broke down in tears when he asked about her family. Despite this, she got the job. Dana was bitter towards her, suggesting she turned on the tears to get sympathy. Although she later apologised, Jo was in no mood to accept.

She cleared the air with Dana on her first day at work but one of her first patients was Theo, with Lacey objecting to her being there. She had to explain the situation to Levi when he caught them arguing. She arranged a drink with Tane but it came to an abrupt end when Harper turned up needing him to look after Archie and she learned he had a baby. Although Harper encouraged the relationship, Jo declined a second date. However, they then spent the day together talking about their families. David told her that Lacey had asked for their mother’s eternity ring, which Jo already had. Jo refused to hand it over and ended up in a fight with Lacey. She agreed to Lacey’s compromise that they give it to David but found Lacey still refused to have anything to do with her. Tane discovered her having a panic attack which she had often had whenever she had flashbacks to the crash.

She began attending Tane’s boot camps but was distracted when Lacey first revealed she’d hired a private detective to look into the crash and then accused Jo of warning them off. She had another drink with Tane but made things awkward by hiding a call from Harper, even though she quickly owned up. She then attended an open house at Irene’s and didn’t realise until she was looking at one of the bedrooms that it was Harper’s. When David bought the place, Jo tried to help Harper find somewhere else to live but managed to annoy everyone, with Tane telling her to stay away from Harper. He told her they couldn’t be together because it would upset Harper, prompting Jo to kiss him to show him what he’d given up. She made a late appearance at Irene’s farewell meal where Harper extended an olive branch. She and David then moved into the beach house.

Jo helped Bree treat an aggressive patient, Bart Ainsworth, and felt guilty when he stabbed Bree with scissors after she’d left them alone, helping stabilise her. She was upset to find David was looking at the case file of her mother’s death, feeling he didn’t believe her version of what had happened and accusing Lacey of putting him up to it. David explained he wanted to make sure nothing was missed so they could move on. She was shocked to discover it was her that made the emergency call after the crash, a fact she couldn’t remember. Concluding the only way to find out what happened was for her to remember, she began looking into memory retrieval and decided to try hypnotherapy. David supervised the session run by Amelia, and Jo remembered another car swerving in front of her and causing the crash. She confided in Lacey but Cash told them the new memories wouldn’t be admissible in court.

She saw Craig Wendell at the station and suspected he recognised her so pretended to have a panic attack to get David out of the station so Lacey could snoop around. Lacey said she hadn’t found anything but later admitted she’d found out the name of the man Jo saw and that he was a suspect. Jo realised he had signed the condolence book at their mother’s funeral and they presented the evidence to David. Lacey asked her to undergo hypnotherapy again and she remembered that someone came to the car, checked on Kristina and left, but didn’t see their face. She supported Lacey after Theo was run over and killed by Wendell, and found Tane had left her a message from Cash and Eden’s wedding reception saying he wished she was there, although he dismissed it when she quizzed him about it. After Wendell was arrested, she helped Lacey move in with her and David.

She began increasingly leaning on Tane and they shared a second kiss. When they arranged a date, he confessed he had a criminal record after kidnapping a baby he’d found abandoned and helped care for. Jo accepted he’d meant well but Tane abruptly ended the date. However, not long after they began a secret relationship, sleeping together at the motel. She had worried about Lacey finding out but Lacey immediately did and was fine with it. Tane asked her to still keep it secret, since David had warned him off her. They had trouble spending time together with Tane looking after Archie, then she was reunited with her old boyfriend Eddie Shepherd when David brought him to the house, after Remi and Sonny signed him up to their record label. She had broken up with him after Kristina died and told Tane she needed to see if there was still something there. She recorded a victim impact statement for Wendell’s sentencing.

When Eddie saw her with Tane, she claimed he was just her personal trainer. She attended Eddie’s gig at Salt but Tane propositioned her in the middle of it, leaving Eddie wondering what was going on. She told him they’d dated but downplayed it. When David told her he and Kristina had given Eddie their blessing to propose to her just before she died, she kissed Eddie. After getting the news of Wendell’s sentencing, and receiving a supportive text from Tane, she slept with Eddie but admitted to Lacey that she still had feelings for them both. She tried asking Tane out but he turned her down, while Eddie asked her to come to the Off the Rails festival with him. When David checked if she was sure about Eddie, she met with Tane and asked if there was still a chance for them but quickly decided they shouldn’t be friends. She convinced Lacey to accompany her on the trip but was stunned when Eddie proposed to her on the journey. She told him she wasn’t ready to say yes or no, shortly before the train crashed.