The Year Was… 2000

INTRODUCTION

The world celebrated the new millennium. The PlayStation 2 was released and Big Brother launched in the UK. Erin Brockovich made us think, Gladiator made us sweat and X-Men changed movies forever by making superhero films cool for the first time.

There would be no need for any of that in Walford. This year we took a look back on the past and took stock of what we had: Ricky departed, as did Kathy and Sam. Ethel’s return and death this year rocked us all as we held on for poor Dot. And just at a time when quiet reflection was the needed thing and the Square grieved the loss of an all time great, along came a moving van.

“One of your lot is he, Mo?” “He would have better manners if he was.”

The Slaters, one of the most important, not to mention loudest, families of the 21st century, had arrived.

EVENTS

Matthew’s Deadly Revenge
A year after the murder of Saskia and Steve had gotten away with it all. But when Matthew was released, gone was the shy DJ that had dated plain Sarah Hills. No, the new Matthew was creepy, walking in the shadows of Albert Square, watching Steve like a hawk. He painted ‘Dead Man Walking’ on Steve’s front door, wrecked his flat when he was out, threw glass in his path, blocked his toilet and messed with his phone, making Steve think that he was finally losing the plot.

One night, in the club where the crime had occurred, Matthew cornered Steve in the dark and tied him to a chair. Steve, ever the tough man, fronted it out, even when Matthew implied he had met some ‘tasty’ friends in prison. He presented Steve with ‘evidence’ that he had tracked down and murdered Saskia’s sister, and, seeing as he was waving a gun about, Steve was inclined to believe him. Soaking Steve in fluid and lighting a match, Matthew planned to take Steve out in a blaze of glory (had he been reading ahead?). Steve buckled, confessed all and was left a mess on the floor: it had only been water and Matthew had won. He slinked off, back into the shadows and was never seen on the Square again.

Thinking he’s a goner, **Steve** pours his heart out as **Matthew** pours ‘petrol’…

Steve became a quivering mess after this, drinking heavily, overdosing on medication and eventually became a full-blown addict, catering to Billy Mitchell’s dodgy drug deals. In the June he finally saw some sense and took himself away from the Square for a while to recharge his pretty-boy image…

Phil and Lisa
When she first arrived, Lisa Shaw was a biker chick. But as soon as she saw Phil Mitchell, for some reason unbeknown to rationality or nature, she went weak at the knees. It also didn’t help that Mark Fowler was also attracted to the bike (not a euphemism) and followed her around like a love-sick puppy. Indeed, Lisa couldn’t decide and spent quite some time dithering: romantic, dependable, but medically unsound Mark Fowler or savage, violent and sometimes alcoholic Phil Mitchell? Well, this was Lisa, who was never that clever, so you can guess, right?

Before long she found herself pregnant by caveman Phil, who reacted like he’d been told he was dying and literally ordered her into having an abortion. Doe-eyed Lisa took this as a sign that he must really want her all to himself and she must, by any means necessary, bear him a child.

**Phil** and Lisa: when they were up, they were up…

By April they were making plans for happy families, just in time for Lisa to miscarry. Phil blamed her in spectacular fashion, berating her and calling her names, until eventually he had a slight moment of sincerity and took her away to recuperate.

Star-Crossed Lovers
While Phil Mitchell couldn’t decide whether to love Lisa or throttle her, Peggy was doing much better it seemed, at least in the romance department. She was in remission, her mastectomy had gone well and she finally felt confident to move on with her life, talking about wedding vow renewals. Frank wasn’t sure about that last part, so they settled on a holiday to Spain instead. And not just them, oh no, this was a couple’s adventure, meaning the currently at odds Terry and Irene and the relatively stable, but boring Pat and Roy would also be heading for the sunshine.

Summer holidays… **Irene**, **Terry**, **Peggy**, **Frank**, **Pat** & **Roy** – on the trip that would change all of their lives…

And what a trip: Terry decided to criticise everything he thought he knew about women (not much it seemed) and almost got murdered by a Pat and Peggy team-up. Irene spent her time seeing the sights and becoming inspired. Roy and Peggy eventually retired to soak up the sun and relax, while Pat and Frank carried on, reminiscing. Which led to the bedroom and the biggest mistake of Pat’s life. They went home carrying on their little fling, while Terry returned home alone, Irene deciding to start afresh. She was last seen driving down a Spanish highway, wind in her hair with not a care in the world.

**Terry**‘s views on women offend the ladies and confuses the lads – look at **Frank**‘s face!

Back in Walford, Pat tried to resist Frank’s charms by keeping away from him. But when he turned up at her door step in nothing but a revolving bow tie, then even she had to admit that what they had was fate. By Bonfire Night, they planned to run away together. Frank wrote Peggy a heartfelt and brutally honest letter about his feelings for Pat, left it upstairs in the Vic and scuppered to meet his Patricia.

**Frank** and **Pat** succumb to their passions…

Unfortunately for him, Pat decided she couldn’t do it and Frank came back to the Square, frantically trying to find the missing letter. When Peggy came into the bar to present Bonfire night prizes, she delivered an explosion of her own, reading Frank’s letter of betrayal to a packed Vic and slapping them both with an almighty wallop before fleeing upstairs in embarrassment.

**Peggy** lines up her targets and her audience…

Frank was escorted out by Phil as Pat faced the music with Roy. He called her all the names under the sun and then even worse, told her that her earrings had never worked for him! That was too much for even Pat and she couldn’t resist when he flung her and her possessions into the rain-swept streets. She yelled for Frank, but it was too late. Frank was gone, and this time he would only return to the Square to be laid to rest.

Teenage Romance
While the older residents of Walford were having a barney, things seemed to be going okay for the younger generation. Sonia and Jamie began the year as good mates, both having made some questionable decisions regarding losing their virginity: Jamie had let Janine use and abuse him and then spit him out for good measure, while Sonia, feeling insecure about her weight and Martin, drunk as a skunk, had a late night fumble and he ghosted her.

A drunken fumble between **Sonia** and **Martin**…

It didn’t matter. Jamie and Sonia both saw sense and fell in love. Hard. The pair seemed like destiny, even Ethel said so. They arranged a cosy night in to finally consummate their affections, but Sonia kept on leaving, seemingly nervous. As the night drew on, Sonia realised something was wrong, but didn’t know what. Her screams alerted the Slaters next door, who rushed to her aid. Mo bent down to help Sonia, huddled in pain on the floor. Then the bombshell: “You’re not dying sweetheart, you’re having a baby!”

“If your school had a sex education teacher they should sack him!” **Mo Harris** helps **Sonia** give birth!

Sonia had no idea this was even possible. For the first few days of motherhood she couldn’t look at the little girl who had arrived so spectacularly unannounced. She named the baby Chloe and tried her hardest, but to no avail. While she and Jamie remained at odds, Sonia decided to give the baby up for adoption. Of course, the truth about her and Martin chose then to come out and Pauline, after slapping Sonia across the face like a normal doting grandmother, set out to bring baby Chloe home to the Fowlers…

The Last Birthday of Ethel May Skinner
Now in her mid-eighties, Ethel Skinner turned up in the summer at Pauline’s door, insisting she was staying for a while. While nobody seemed to question this, there was clearly something different about the long-time Square resident, and not just her age. A visit from Doctor Legg confirmed what canny Ethel already knew: she had cancer and it had spread to her brain. She had come home to die.

**Dot** and **Ethel** on her ’85th’ birthday

Ethel was determined to go out her way. She stockpiled a load of her medication and expressed her desire to end it all before she ended up ‘tied to a chair’ for the rest of her existence. Dot was having none of it though, her Christian faith her rock in matters of life and death. On the night of her 85th birthday (actually her 86th as she’d always lied about her age), Ethel gave her wedding ring to Jamie and Sonia and went to bed. She asked Dot for her favour and Dot emotionally acquiesced and handed Ethel the pills. Dot cradled her best friend as she took the medication and blew out her candles on her cake. By morning she was gone.

The loss of Ethel crippled Dot. She was determined to be punished for, as she saw it, killing her best friend. She gave herself up to the police, but there was no evidence of foul play. She tried shoplifting and even smashed up the aisle in the pharmacy in an effort to be punished. Eventually, it netted her a fine, but Dot’s heated insistence in court led to her being held in contempt and she spent two weeks in prison.

The end of an era: best friends until the end

The di Marco’s Quiet Exit
Sandra di Marco turned up with her lover Jack Robbins, Beppe’s former best friend. Her mission: to gain custody of little Joe. Beppe fought her tooth and nail however, no matter what trick she tried, and eventually he won the battle.

Gianni got together with Jackie Owen, Steve’s sister, who was obviously the calmer of the two siblings. But it was clear as the relationship developed that once a month she was overcome with PMT and turned into a psycho as bad as her brother, physically battering Gianni until he became a shell of the tough guy he used to be. Eventually, when the scratches, bruises and cuts had healed, Jackie was gone and Gianni just got on with life, seducing the next woman who came along, falling for his pseudo-Italian charm.

Rosa wasn’t having much luck either. Despite friendship with Jeff Healy, Rosa was not into being married again and rejected him rather badly. He moved onto Pauline, and clearly didn’t know a losing battle when he saw one. Nicky, on the other side of things, fell for her Maths tutor and made a bid for a storyline by claiming he’d sexually assaulted her. Of course, teacher Rod then faced the fury of the chest-beating brothers. The charges were dropped as nothing had happened, but there did seem something off about Rod. In the end, to escape the drama Rosa decided the whole family would move overnight and, aside from Beppe and Joe remaining behind, it was if they had never been…

The Slater’s Loud First Day!
The day of Ethel’s funeral wouldn’t be a quiet affair. As the Square mourned, a loud din pierced the morning air as a removal van pulled into the Square. Charlie Slater, all round nice guy and cab driver, had been seen buying No. 23 on the Square in the weeks before, and today was the day he arrived with his all-female clan.

Here they come: (L-R) **Garry**, **Lynne**, **Charlie**, **Zoe**, **Little Mo** & **Kat**

There was his mother-in-law Mo. She was the head of the family and full of dodgy deals and ways to make extra cash to increase her benefits. She had been married to a guy named Jimmy Harris – who was in actuality Pat’s dead brother! There was a deep friendship between the two women in their youth, but something had made them the archest of enemies in the years between. There would be more on that mystery to come…

“One of your lot is he, Mo?” We would learn of the past history between Mo and **Pat** in time

Charlie’s five daughters would hit the Square like a hurricane: the men of Albert Square had never spent so much time preening themselves when the four girls were unleashed on the world. There was no-nonsense Lynne, hopelessly in love with serial player Garry Hobbs, whose sexual appetites were just as big as the mouth on his face and the hole in his wallet. There was Little Mo, shy and quite timid, the little mouse, who was married and lived off the Square with her husband Trevor Morgan. There was also another sister Belinda, married and off living somewhere with her husband Neville. And then there were Kat and Zoe.

Kat was fierce, strong and independent. She took no rubbish from anybody, man or woman, and was fiercely loyal to her family. She liked to party and she liked men, and had no qualms who knew it. From the minute she stepped out onto the Square in that leopard-print, the boys, especially the handsome, straight-laced Dr. Trueman, didn’t know what hit them.

**Kat** bags herself a medic when she dates **Anthony Trueman**

Zoe was the baby, insecure and full of hero-worship for her big sisters, especially Kat and the pair were are thick as thieves, so much so that Charlie had trouble reigning them in. But, when Zoe turned away there was something in that look Kat threw at her behind her back. And it was clearly paved in sadness…

The Other Stuff
Ian gets over Mel by sleeping with nanny Laura. Mark stops taking his medication. An unexploded bomb from the war is discovered and the residents are forced into the Vic during the emergency. Ricky leaves for France in a stranger’s lorry. On Christmas Day, in a moment of passion, confusion and stupidity (or a combo of the three) Mel sleeps with Phil – best friend’s Lisa fella!

**Ian** uses **Laura** for more than just her babysitting skills…

And there was one more former resident on his way…

THE RETURN OF NICK COTTON

The first of a series of ‘bubble’ episodes, set off the Square, but featuring familiar characters began here in September 2000, with this distinct special titled The Return of Nick Cotton. Upon release from prison, Nick has a vision of his dead father Charlie who tells him that he must do something with his life. Nick, not exactly rolling in it, agrees with his hallucination and seeks out ex-wife Zoe and now-teenage son Ashley to rekindle their relationship – and help himself to any hospitality he can find.

It turns out Ashley is a chip of the old block though and when Nick’s past catches up with him in the form of some thugs he owes, Ashley aids him in his escape by stealing a posh car and father and son zoom off into the distance. When Ashley asks where they’re going, Nick doesn’t have a clue. But he knows at some point, he’s going to check in with his ma…

ARRIVALS