Blue Heelers is an Australian police drama series that was produced by Southern Star Group and ran for twelve years on the Seven Network, from 1994 to 2006.

The series was the first to examine the stressful world of young police officers who are "thrown into the deep end where they are left to sink or swim".

[2] Along with the long-running Crawford Productions series Homicide, Blue Heelers holds the Australian record for most episodes produced of a weekly prime-time drama.

[6] The series launched the careers of many Australian actors, such as Lisa McCune, Grant Bowler, Ditch Davey, Rachel Gordon, Tasma Walton, Charlie Clausen and Jane Allsop.

Many other actors of today also appeared in guest roles, including Hugh Jackman, Charles 'Bud' Tingwell, Peter O'Brien, John Howard and Robert Rabiah.

A total of 150 people were involved in some way with the show's production each week, including cast members, crew, wardrobe, publicists and writers.

When this same young officer left the force only a year later due to the shooting death of his colleague, McElroy was even more intrigued to learn about the very fickle, yet rewarding job of policing the community.

[7] McElroy continued his quest by asking ex-police officer Michael Winter to write down what it was like to be a city cop who transferred to a country town.

The pilot went on to become the official first episode of Blue Heelers, telling the story of a new cop in town, Maggie Doyle, and her beginnings in Mount Thomas.

[3] They also hoped that the show would act as a tribute to the courage of police officers, who risk their lives everyday, never knowing if they would return home at the end of the day.

After low ratings in 2003 and 2004, the producers and executives of Blue Heelers realised that there were apparent problems which could potentially lead to the series' downfall.

[32] As the show remained basically unchanged from its debut ten years earlier, the production team decided that a revamp was in order.

Later in that season, a live episode, "Reasonable Doubt", was broadcast in hope of offering a short-term ratings boost and encourage more long-term viewers.

[31] Producers also hoped that a shift in direction, a change of mood and setting, and the addition of four cast members would cement Blue Heelers' long-term future.

Jo Parrish (Jane Allsop) and recurring cast member Clancy Freeman, and injured the show's main protagonist,[35] Senior Sergeant Croydon.

The Daily Telegraph television writer Marcus Casey commented, "Mount Thomas has become a darker, grittier place, the people and cops in it transformed by an invasion of evil".

[36] Storylines of the proceeding five episodes focused on the bombing of the station and the four new main characters: Rachel Gordon as Amy Fox, Geoff Morrell as Mark Jacobs, Samantha Tolj as Kelly O'Rourke, and Danny Raco as Joss Peroni.

Producers hoped the new tone of the series, the new younger actors, and McInnes's role reprisal would lure back viewers who had stopped watching the programme.

[37] Critical response after the event was reassuring, and it appeared that critics were approving of the drastic moves by Seven and Southern Star: The recent shake-up at the old station has swept aside an unhealthy staleness that had settled on the place and there's some much-needed fresh energy provided by the new recruits, including Samantha Tolj as true-blue Aussie gal Kelly O'Rourke and Danny Raco as Italian stallion Joss Peroni.In the hope that viewing would increase, an 11-episode season in 2006 was commissioned by the Seven Network.

[5] Blue Heelers originally aired on Tuesday nights at 7:30 pm on the Seven Network, thus it was limited to a PG content level restriction.

The third and fourth season premiers aired on Monday nights during the 8:30 pm timeslot, but the show moved back to its original slot before the next episode.

[46] Australian television quiz-show The Weakest Link, hosted by Cornelia Frances, also aired a Blue Heelers special episode on 9 August 2001.

Cast members John Wood, Neil Pigot, Ditch Davey, Jeremy Kewley, Jane Allsop, Suzi Dougherty, Paul Bishop, Caroline Craig and Peta Doodson took part in this special event.

Blue Heelers aired briefly in the United States of America in the early 2000s on the short-lived cable channel Trio (carried primarily by DirecTV).

At least ten out of the fourteen regional companies that formed ITV aired the first few years of the series and most initially broadcast it in the original hour-long format during the afternoon (with necessary edits to suit the time slot, usually regarding profanity).

When the three Carlton-owned ITV regions (Carlton, Westcountry and Central) started a uniform programme schedule during 2002, Blue Heelers continued to air as two half-hour episodes, and the final batch of episodes shown in these regions were from Season 7, finishing the season on Wednesday, 20 November 2002 (Australian air date: 22 November 2000).

When the English ITV contractors reformatted as one company in late 2002, regionally-run programmes such as Blue Heelers and Shortland Street (which were at different points of the series in each region) disappeared from the schedules.

[52] Throughout the show's broadcast it continually drew a strong audience, regularly appearing among the top-rating prime time programmes on Australian television.

[5] Blue Heelers' executive producer, Gus Howard believed the show's popularity was due mainly to the quality of the cast.

Maggie's being shot and left for dead during episode 255, "One More Day", was ranked by TV Week as the third most memorable moment of a drama series on Australian television.