Iconic Australian drama series set in Wentworth Detention Centre
Cult Australian jailbird drama Prisoner: Cell Block H has joined the My5 streaming service from Channel 5.
The soap has previously aired on Channel 5, as one of its launch shows in 1997. The series previously aired on ITV in the late 1980s and 90s. My5 has added the first ten episodes of the soap to stream, with further editions to be added in the future, should the current batch prove popular with viewers.
Prisoner: Cell Block H, created by Reg Watson (Crossroads, Neighbours, The Young Doctors), was his take on British drama series Within These Walls (LWT) and launched on Network 10 Australia in 1979. The series followed the inmates of ‘Block H’ of Wentworth Detention Centre and make household names of its cast both down under and in the UK when ITV began screening the series in the late 1980s – after the show had ended production some years earlier. The lives of the women in detention, and the officers who worked the cell block, ran for almost 700 episodes.
IIRC, PCBH was originally aired in the UK as a late-night offering, which admirably suited those returning from the pub, who could forgive the wobbly sets, dreadful acting and contrived plots - I rarely missed an episode of the early series but lost interest as the original cast members were replaced.
The show’s themes, often radical, included feminism, LGBT matters, and social reform. Prisoner began in early 1979 with the advertising slogan, “If you think prison is hell for a man, imagine what it’s like for a woman”. The series examined how women dealt with incarceration and separation from their families and friends, and the common phenomenon of released inmates re-offending. Within the prison, major themes were interpersonal relationships, power struggles, friendships and rivalries. The prisoners became a surrogate family, with the self-styled “Queen Bea”, Bea Smith and the elderly “Mum” (Jeanette) Brooks (Mary Ward) emerging as central matriarch figures. Several lesbian characters were introduced on the show, including prisoners Franky Doyle (played by Carol Burns) and Judy Bryant (played by Betty Bobbitt), as well as corrupt and sinister officer Joan Ferguson (Maggie Kirkpatrick).
Early episodes featured a high level of violence (1): Lynn Warner’s burning in a steam press; a prisoner hanging herself in her cell; a fatal stabbing; and a flashback sequence triggered by the time Karen Travers stabbed her abusive husband to death in the shower. The series’ first major story arc was the turf war between Bea and Franky, in a bid to become the prison’s “Top Dog” (unofficial leader), culminating by episode 3 in a riot where Meg was held hostage and her husband—prison social worker Bill Jackson (Don Barker)—was stabbed to death by inmate Chrissie Latham (Amanda Muggleton).
(1) Much of the violence was cut in the UK.
I might try a viewing … or I might not … 
I used to think the lovely Peta Toppano was a rose amongst the thorns:
but now I know that, in “real life”, she looked like this:
