The Year Was… 1997

INTRODUCTION

Entertainment wise we were sorted in 1997! Will Smith returned to sci-fi and took on aliens in comedy Men in Black but the only thing we remember is the soundtrack and the dance. Celine Dion gifted us with ‘My Heart Will Go On’ as Titanic set sail (no sarcasm, I’m a genuine Ms. Dion aficionado!) and Ellen DeGeneres broke the rules by coming out as gay on her sitcom. But the comedy was only part of it: in September the world stopped in grief as Princess Diana of Wales died in a car accident in Paris.

In the Square, life continued to deal with the consequences of the year before: Phil and Kathy had a marriage to sort out, as did Grant and Tiffany. Ricky and Bianca would also marry for the first time this year. We’d also visit Ireland…

EVENTS

Phil and Kathy in Paris
Phil was in full-blown alcoholic mode when we started the year and the problem only became worse. Unable to cope with having to share his wife with his newborn son, Phil just continued to sink. The Arches shut down, he fell in with the wrong lot, got mugged and spent most of the time clutching his head with a hangover. He’d disappear for days, and when he did see Ben, he put him severely at risk.

**Phil** squares up to **Grant** while drunk…

In order to sort Phil out, he and Kathy joined Tiffany and Grant on their break to Paris. It was there the full, ugly mess came spiraling out. He told her about his fling with fellow alky Lorna and Kathy finally broke the loop and threw her wedding ring in the Seine. She sought brief comfort in Grant’s arms (no, not yet…) but never went back to Phil. She caught the eye of Alex, local vicar supreme by Christmas, while Phil spent it alone.

Grant and Tiffany in Paris
Grant and Tiffany, meanwhile, adapted to wedded bliss. This was not to be and the birth of baby Courtney did nothing to help the situation. Although it turned out Grant was the father, he didn’t treat his wife any better. Mere days before the birth, he was yelling at Tiff and telling her that he had used her! But there he was, holding his little girl in his hand, and Grant Mitchell, thug at arms, started shedding tears.

The honeymoon period was officially over!

Of course, there was more going on: Grant was carrying on with barmaid Lorraine and within weeks of the birth, Grant was at it again. Lorraine couldn’t break it off and he started treating her just as badly as he was treating his wife. Lorraine’s unwell son Joe was convinced Grant was Satan, and to be fair, you couldn’t really argue it at the time.

While on holiday on Paris, while everyone else was arguing, Grant and Tiffany actually started getting along. But by Christmas they were at each other again, this time with Grant breaking down doors and Tiffany cutting her head. Tiffany fled to Bianca, but every time Grant gave her those eyes, she went back for more.

**Grant** and **Lorraine**: behind **Tiffany**‘s back…

Baby Dreams Dashed
Ricky and Bianca were always volatile, but they at least made it to the church on time in April, with a fleeting glimpse of Frank in the back row. Bianca panicked when she discovered she was pregnant, but Ricky was just as happy as her: baby would make three.

Unfortunately, the pair was devastated to learn that the baby, whom they named Natasha, would be born with spina-bifida and rather than allow their child to live in pain, they made the sad decision to end the pregnancy.

**Bianca** and **Ricky** struggle with their loss…

Sarah and Robbie, Ted says goodbye
There were troubles afoot elsewhere as well. Kathy’s brother Ted lost his temper when his precious princess Sarah told him that she and Robbie Jackson had done the deed. Except she led him to believe it wasn’t her idea. Ted, convinced of Robbie’s impropriety, beat the young man to within an inch of his life and fled to South Africa, where his old mate Gavin had work for him. Vicar Alex cleared Robbie’s name and Sarah carried on with her life, tormenting boyfriend Joe Wicks with her dithering and bringing her mother Irene onto Albert Square. We were grateful, but the residents of Walford were not!

A vulnerable **Sarah** reaches out to friend **Robbie**…

Terry and Irene: Match Made in Hell!
Say what you like about the pair, but Irene Hills and Terry Raymond really were made for each other. She was bitchy and flighty, and took Ted’s place in the family home like oil off a duck’s back. She came between Simon and Tony, muttering homophobic slants around them like it was a game, and caused them to split up after announcing that Tony had had a ‘who do I prefer’ moment with female reporter Polly.

When she met Terry on the other hand, she met her match. He was a gambler, a smoker and a drinker with loose morals and an even bigger aversion to telling the truth. After one particular boozy afternoon, they started to couple up. They tried to keep it a secret, but that is impossible in Walford!

From the minute he bought her a drink from his gee-gee winnings…

If I say EastEnders in Ireland…
One of the most derided storylines in EastEnders history saw Pauline discover a mystery left behind by long-dead Lou Beale. It turned out she had another child out there, a sister to Pauline and Pete, but never revealed it to the rest of the world. Cue a trip to the Emerald Isle to track down Maggie, who was nothing more scandalous than a pre-wedding birth for Lou and Albert that was ‘socially unacceptable’ at the time and given up for adoption. The problem was the characters. They were stereotypical of the worst kind and viewers reacted so badly to the story that when the Drama Channel went to repeat this year in their Classic EastEnders slot, they deemed these episodes too offensive and removed them!

Regulars Mark and **Pauline** with the Flaherty clan

Still it did have one effect: Conor and his daughter Mary followed the clan over to London, where they settled into life quite easily. Mary got involved between Sarah and Joe and the tug-of-war between them eventually drove Joe to leave Walford with his mother for good. Conor, never one to be shy, began keeping an overly close eye on Mark and Ruth Fowler’s fostering concerns…

The Other Stuff
Tony has an affair with two women behind Simon’s back and still gets beaten by homophobes. The Walford Gazette begins an investigation into George Palmer’s dodgy dealings. Billie Jackson is a witness in a robbery and Carol has no choice but to move her family away from the Square in the dead of night. Dot is held hostage by a former cellmate of Nick’s. Con-woman Vanessa fleeces poor Barry. Frank returns and saves Peggy from some thugs in a Vic raid. Ian uses a private detective and tracks down Cindy in Italy; with Phil and Grant’s help, he snatches back Steven and Peter and returns home, leaving Cindy screaming and seething…