We’re back in Shortland Street’s hectic embrace (Photo: South Pacific Pictures)

Pop CultureFebruary 5, 2024

Everything you missed from the return of Shortland Street

Staff writer

We’re back in Shortland Street’s hectic embrace (Photo: South Pacific Pictures)

Shortland Street returned for 2024 with all the answers to our burning questions from last year’s dramatic cliffhanger. Tara Ward recaps.

A brand new year of gripping drama at the hospital of dreams (and nightmares) is officially underway. Our longest running soap has finally returned after a long summer hiatus, meaning we can finally find out what happened after the dramatic 2023 cliffhanger.

Would Marty survive his accidental drug overdose? Would Harry be so wracked with guilt about letting Rahu die that he would confess to not being a doctor? Would Madonna admit to her new husband Vili that she bonked the local priest? Most importantly, do you know who this mystery baby is?

We had more questions than Marj Neilson in 1992 when she did a quiz about whether she was a pussycat or a lioness in the bedroom. Now, we have our answers. Here’s everything you missed from the return of Shortland Street for 2024.

There was another dramatic time jump

Viewers lost their shit last year when the show took an unexpected jump forward in time, and guess what? Shortland Street has done it again, taking us forward four weeks after the cliffhanger. It seems Shortland Street is the Derren Brown of the soap world, bending our minds and manipulating time itself with something called a “montage”, a snazzy trick of the small screen that we simply don’t see enough of on Shortland Street. What if every single episode was just one long, wordless clip played to some emotional music? Makes you think.

Rahu is still dead

Rahu: still dead. Stella: still mad about it (Photo: South Pacific Pictures)

Even Derren Brown couldn’t save this guy. Weirdly, Rahu did not come back to life over the summer holidays, and as a result, is still dead.

But Marty didn’t cark it

When we last saw Marty in 2023, he was lying unconscious on a superyacht having taken too much of that nasty drug Ziclastion. Worst episode of Below Deck ever! Perhaps it was the hand of god (aka Chris Warner doing CPR) or perhaps it was the power of the montage, but last night Marty went from being wheeled into the hospital completely unconscious to sitting up and smiling in a matter of seconds. He’s been through rehab, he’s now four weeks clean. What a transformation, what a hospital.

There are lots of new doctors

Chris is acting CEO while Esther looks after Marty, and he’s gone absolutely batshit with the HR budget. First he hired that shifty racist from last year, Emmett Whitman aka Max from Neighbours, along with new surgeons Phil (“I’m a surgeon, not a babysitter”) and Ihaia (he slept with Monique in last year’s cliffhanger and then ghosted her over the summer; she’s spewing).

Harry is still not a real doctor

Harry thinking about his next victim, probably (Photo: South Pacific Pictures)

Just as I do not magically transform into an athlete by putting on a pair of bamboo leggings, chucking on some doctor’s scrubs does not make Harry Warner a surgeon. But with Rahu the only one who knew the truth about Harry’s failure to graduate medical school, it seems that Warner Jr is going to continue his blunt-scapeled reign of terror into 2024. Last night he wanted to amputate a leg that didn’t even need amputating! He’s a babysitter, not a surgeon! Cue the montage, Derren Brown wants a word.

Standards are slipping

A clear disregard for health and safety policy (Photo: Screengrab)

Everyone knows there’s nothing nicer than sipping a hot drink while you watch a surgeon operate on a leg that got chewed up by a boat propeller, but won’t someone think of the health and safety situation here? Or is Chris Warner such a power hungry hornbag that he’ll take his takeaway coffee wherever he god damn well pleases? Haven’t they seen that episode of Seinfeld?!

Nobody knows Madonna and the priest hooked up

Someone needs to go to confession, and it’s not just Chris Warner re: guzzling an oat milk flat white while inside a sterile area.

Everyone needs a hug

No, not like that (Photo: South Pacific Pictures)

The entire staff of Shortland Street are more miserable than the time Gina Rossi made everyone eat possum casserole. Vili and Madonna are barely talking, Harry’s fuming that Stella blames him for killing her boyfriend, and Monique’s pissed off that the doctor she shagged at the end of year party is now working at the hospital. Also, Dr Emmett keeps scowling at scans and saying “I wanted Chris on this”. Join the club, Doc.

Drew and Vili are still pretending they didn’t hold a paedophile hostage in the basement for a week

Welcome back to Shortland Street, everything is fine.

Shortland Street screens on TVNZ2 at 7pm every weeknight and streams on TVNZ+.

Keep going!

Image: Tina Tiller

Pop CultureFebruary 5, 2024

Call the midwife: Fresh leads in Shortland Street’s mystery baby search

Alex Casey

Senior writer

Image: Tina Tiller

There has been a new development in the curious case of Shortland Street’s missing baby. Alex Casey reports.

Last week a global search was launched to find the baby who appeared in the very first episode of Shortland Street, with the hopes that they might return to Ferndale in a cameo role. With very little go on apart from the episode air date and the evidence presented in the episode itself, we deduced that the baby was likely born in February or March of 1992, possibly on the North Shore of Auckland, and possibly has dark hair.

Although we are yet to hear from the baby itself, there have been a few developments. One source revealed that their son was Baby Lucas, son of Nick and Waverley in 2000. Not the baby of interest but a baby of interest nonetheless. Someone else said they remembered a friend posting about being the Shortland Street baby, but that they were born in April, not February or March. A very promising lead, especially given the haziness around shoot dates.

Tidbits aside, the biggest development came when the baby’s midwife shared her personal account of the historic shoot. Mary Clark was the midwife who appeared in the episode and delivered the mystery baby into the arms of Lisa Stanton. She was also working as a real midwife at the time at North Shore hospital in the delivery suite, and played a pivotal role in casting the mystery baby.

“I took a somewhat odd phone call one day when I was on duty from a woman wanting to know if this was a place where she could find a new born baby,” Clark explained. “She went on to explain that she was casting for a new TV show and the first episode was to include a birth scene.” Describing herself as “always up for a challenge and some novelty”, Clark enquired around the postnatal ward and soon found a mother and baby girl who were about to head home.

The mother was apprehensive about going into a shoot environment alone with such a young baby, and asked if Clark would go with her. The answer? “Absolutely yes!”

Due to her expertise, Clark was in hot demand on set, which she recalled looked remarkably like a real hospital ward. The director at the time, Brian Lennane, asked her to coach actor Anne Cathie how to execute a believable birth. The makeup department asked for her assistance in making the baby look as fresh as can be, and when the other actors were nervous about dropping the baby, it became clear that Clark should just appear onscreen.

She remembered only one part of the scene that wasn’t true-to-life. “When I suggested that a woman having a breech baby would not be delivered in a clinic and would definitely be transferred to a tertiary hospital, the director told me that this was TV and we didn’t need to let reality interfere with a good story.” Nevertheless, she had a “fun day” and, perhaps most importantly, “nobody dropped the baby.”

After they finished filming the scene, Temuera Morrison thanked her profusely for helping to make the scene look believable, joking that “the show might get canned next week” if it didn’t. “I don’t imagine that he would have foreseen the show’s current longevity,” said Clark. “Sadly I am still waiting for my call back to continue my acting career, but I have used this fun fact about my life in every silly group ‘ice breaker’ session I have ever done.”

And with that, she left one more clue: “I remember her and her mum as delightful and very patient on the day.” The plot thickens: are you a delightful and patient baby with an equally delightful and patient mum? Born in February, March or April in 1992 at North Shore hospital? Possibly dark hair, possibly a Pisces, possibly with a penchant for the limelight? If so, email publicity@southpacificpictures.com or send them a message here on Facebook.

Shortland Street returns tonight, Monday February 5 at 7pm on TVNZ2.