The everyday lives of working-class residents of Albert Square, a traditional Victorian square of terrace houses surrounding a park in the East End of London's Walford borough.

In the 1930s, Alison starts a new boarding school and becomes embroiled in a sinister plot to dethrone the royal family of Bosnovia.

Four mental patients - who, due to unauthorized experiments, believe they're living in a dream and have shed all moral imperatives - escape and find their way to the nearest bus-load of stranded schoolgirls.