The great talent of McManus and Chadwick — with the production company Shed, founded by Eileen Gallagher and Brian Park — is to combine soap-opera plotlines — sex, crime and money — with a subject of continual public fascination: the education system.
The school drama was already an established genre in British television but, whereas Phil Redmond's Grange Hill BBC1, had focused on the pupils and Lucy Gannon's Hope and Glory BBC1, spent most of its screen-time with staff and governors, Waterloo Road has been distinctive in moving between, and sometimes intertwining, the various academic layers: pupils, teachers, parents, local authority.
Cleverly, the series also increased its longevity and topicality by frequently changing the nature of the school. Initially a Rochdale comprehensive, the building called Waterloo Road subsequently became an independent school after merging with a nearby posh private outfit and still later — after being closed for failing to meet standards — was relocated to Scotland a different educational system , where it became a comprehensive again.
The popularity of fiction set in schools is usually attributed to the fact that all of the potential audience will have spent time in some sort of educational establishment. But the real advantage of schooling for TV is that classrooms and staffrooms naturally throw up the kind of storylines upon which popular drama thrives. Affairs, unwanted pregnancies, serious illness, financial catastrophe and involvement with police can all plausibly happen to teachers, pupils, parents — or combinations of the three.
McManus and Chadwick — as they had done in Footballers' Wives and Bad Girls — also incorporated fictionalised versions of recent news stories into Waterloo Road: curriculum or exam fads of new education secretaries, sexual relationships between staff and students or, in the seventh series, a teenager who was detained for the murder of a child with clear echoes of the James Bulger case.
An important lesson was also learned from Grange Hill. According to Phil Redmond , one of the reasons the show survived for three decades was the fact that a school has natural turnover of personnel, with teachers and pupils leaving and arriving each year. Eddie persuades Jasmine to postpone the detention to facilitate the match but Jasmine herself saves the day by passing herself off as a pupil and playing in the match,scoring the necessary goals.
Matt is annoyed that Steph is taking over the musical,giving the S3, Ep4. There is an immediate backlash by angry parents,as a result of which Ben decides to quit the school. However Jack's resolute championing of Ben and efforts to persuade him to stay impress Davina and they get engaged.
Steph,who has high hopes after their spot of passion,turns to Matt for consolation,only to learn that he is gay and has a partner called Colin.
Donte and Chlo return to S3, Ep5. After discovering Chlo with Brett Donte goes on the rampage,beating Brett up and vandalizing Eddie's car when he tries to stop him. Mika refuses to take part in the musical with home-wrecking Brett and drops out,allowing Aleesha to take her place. Everybody regards Chlo as a pariah for her actions and she goes on the run. Steph tells Jack he should tell Davina about their fling if his marriage is to start well.
However,although he refuses,Davina finds out anyway and calls off the engagement. S3, Ep6. With Chlo still missing Jack's problems increase as it is discovered that,having sacked his dodgy investors,he has been financing the school by offering the single parents of brighter pupils money from the Excellence In Cities grant fund in return for their attending Waterloo Road.
Eddie is fully supportive of him but the board of governors calls for his resignation and,although the pupils hold a demonstration,he is forced to resign. Grantly has his troubles too - thanks to his gambling addiction which has brought the bailiffs calling.
S3, Ep7. Though expecting he will be appointed the new headmaster Eddie is displeased to find the governors have installed outsider Rachel Mason,who has plans to turn the school into a business enterprise college,as it has more chance of success than being academic based. The pupils warm to the idea and enjoy playing at being entrepreneurs though Mika,still upset at Chlo's disappearance,gets drunk and throws up in front of Rachel,who is surprisingly sympathetic.
Tom finally locates Chlo,who is living with a couple who encourage her to steal,and brings her home. S3, Ep8. Chlo reacts coolly when Donte requests a reconciliation and Rachel has to dissuade Brett from leaving due to guilt,since he is her star pupil. Rachel also gets involved in helping Sally Froggatt,whose single mother has gone on holiday leaving her to juggle her school attendance with minding her baby brother.
After criticizing Matt's script for the school musical 'Park Side Story',Jasmine agrees to help him rewrite it whilst Eddie,having taken a group of boys on an outward bound weekend,ends up in a neck-brace,thanks to the feud between Grantly and bad lad Bolton S3, Ep9.
Aleesha is proving a nightmare as leading lady so Matt is glad to get the chance to fire her after she has been bullying Karla.
He asks Mika to return. Mika herself thinks she might be pregnant by Brett,who is disappointed to learn that it is a false alarm.
On an archaeological dig a baby's skeleton is found and the police called. Ultimately Maxine admits the child was hers by the now reformed Lewis Seddon,who is working in the school canteen. The incident brings them back together whilst Donte has a new love interest in pupil Celine. Rachel learns that Eddie's S3, Ep Chlo and Donte decide to call it a day whilst Mika is uncomfortable about sharing romantic scenes with Brett in 'Park Side Story'.
Matt panics when Rachel puts its performance forward a day to impress a V. P audience and matters are not helped when the aggrieved Aleesha sabotages the play by switching its sound effects. Tom and Karla save matters by playing the show as a deliberate comedy,offending Matt.
Grantly's wife Fleur stands by him in his financial crisis and Eddie's ex-wife Alison comes to the school with their son Michael but Rachel sees a face from the past As Mika continues to reject Brett the school sits its mock exams with Eddie challenging the teachers to sit the papers.
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