I agree that you need to get there as early as possible, even for bag drop! We got to Gatwick North 3 hours before our flight to Spain last year (I'm OCD about travelling!) and the queue at bag drop was really long, yes EJ do go along the line calling out for people who's flights are imminient but it still seems to take as long as checking in at the airport did, they still look at your passport, they still ask the same questions!
Coming back from Malaga we got there early again, luckily as the queue for over 30 mins before we got to the front - luckily they were again calling out for imminent flights.