As regular readers will know, I’m slowly watching Grange Hill from the beginning. There’s something about it that makes it easy and enjoyable to watch, when I thought it might be slow-paced and dated.
But I’ve realised that there’s a whole year missing in the narrative.
As you would expect, we start the series with the arrival of Tucker and his peers at Grange Hill.
As the second series begins, we learn there’s a new headmaster, and he’s making lots of changes.
This suggests that series two is the second year, as you might also expect – but it’s not.
One of the headmaster’s changes is that the forms have been renamed, and we learn that Tucker is now in 1G.
Okay, so series two seems to the the kid’s second term.
I guess that makes sense. Somewhat.
And then comes series three, and we find they have jumped to the third year.
From a production stand point this definitely makes sense, the kids have aged, of course. So why not make series two the second year?
I wondered if the broadcast schedule meant that series one and two fell within a single school year, but each series aired at the beginning of their calendar year.
It was an interesting choice which now means there is a whole one year gap in the Grange Hill canon …
… get fanficking.
