I haven't seen this series since it first aired, as it's never been repeated since, but from memory, I feel Broganpeter is wrong in his Eastenders analogy as, apart from it's central character being a London pub, there is little else to link it to Eastenders, the pub in this and it's customers was a metaphor for Thatcher's Britain, and the stories were more realistic, better written
and acted than anyhing Eastenders churned out!