Soap opera only lasted one year. Nevertheless, soap operas gained increasing prominence on UK television schedules. In 1995, Channel 4 premiered "Hollyoaks", a soap with a youth focus. When Channel 5 launched in March 1997, it debuted the soap opera "Family Affairs", which was formatted as a week-daily soap, airing Monday through Fridays. "Brookside"s premise evolved during the 1990s, phasing out the politicised stories of the 1980s and shifting the emphasis to controversial and sensationalist stories such as child rape, sibling incest, religious cults and drug addiction, including the infamous 'body under the patio' storyline that ran from 1993 to 1995, and
The 37's opposed to ones featuring "domestic or familial relationship[s]." In "The 37's", Lawrence was drawn to the relationship Earhart has with Janeway: two women, two professional pilots who have risen to great heights in their chosen fields. Not only did the historical character appeal to her, Lawrence also reveled in the "what-if" twist, the alternate historical story about what happened. Lawrence grew up watching Mulgrew as Mary Ryan on the soap opera "Ryan's Hope". As Lawrence came from a family where women more often than not became homemakers, Mary Ryan was an "exotic" character—with her career and life in New York