Olympics Ceremony - What Do You Think it MEANS

[Pickgo]

Was the first part an ecological comment - bucolic, green and pleasant land ruined by belching chimneys and dark satanic mills?

Was the NHS stuff a clever way to support it? - Who'd dare ruin it now when it has so clearly been identified as a national iconic institution in front of the WHOLE world?

Was it primarily a celebration of mediocrity? Pop culture exposed in all its chavvy crashness?

Or a relaxed, fun take on modern Britishness?

I am a Brit and I sat there going huh quite a lot!

YY to Lego a large part of me felt like I was inside some ad executive's head at a 'brainstorm Britishness' meeting and the first thing I heard about it on the radio this morning was the Washington Post comment about the inside joke. Yes.

Still, very spectacular and well executed I suppose.

were African....loved it and got it...after all our education is almost all still based on your literature and the Bible.Sadly history revisionists now at it.

In regards to politics, the time that Mary Poppins was set is now being repeated, in the use of language 'feckless' and the 'deserving' and 'underserving' poor and the 'crisis' over how we deal with the 'workshy' population.

The industrial revolution created the underclass, it took away the manual workers jobs.

I would like to think that it was deliberate, as anyone who has basic knowledge of social policy/sociology could read lots into the show, but i am not sure when it was put together.

"The industrial revolution created the underclass, it took away the manual workers jobs."
That's utter rubbish.

I think birds has got a point, I wasn't very comfortable with glorifying that bit of history either.

It's not glorifying to acknowledge that it happened.

I think it was a great way to show the rest of the world some of what Britain has done and is about. I don't think the ceremony was saying that we are wonderful, just that we are, and that we have a strong place in the world despite being a tiny island.

Too much can be read into these things, and I have no idea what was going on in DBs head and if he was trying to make a political statement or not. But it was just a show, that all. No more, no less. And as shows go, it was a bloody good one.

It was fabulous and very "me" except for Macca.

I'm a middle aged republican leftie Scotswoman.

He was doing it all for me and let Macca have a go so I had something to moan about today. The show that just keeps on giving, excellent.

"The industrial revolution created the underclass, it took away the manual workers jobs."
That's utter rubbish

That was the findings of Rowntree's report, when researching 19th century poverty/fecklessness, whose neice Beatrice Webb (potter) wrote the blue print for our Welfare State.

I like to think Boyle was making a point, but it may have been devised years ago.

How can the opening ceremony of the London Olympics be criticised for being too British?

it can be too British by not being very inclusive.

Beatrix Potter the author and naturalist and Beatrice Webb, campaigner and wife of Sydney, are two different people.

Birds, I'm sure you know that, was just clarifying in case anyone didn't...

I loved it

Inclusive of whom? I thought there was pretty good representation of the multiculturual nature of London.

It's ok Edam, i rearranged her family, anyway, she was Charles Booth cousin.

After watching the opening ceremony the general consensus here, was it would be nice if London footed the bill for it's Olympic games.

It was made very apparent that the rest of the country only part in the Olympics is to pay for it, it would of been nice to included the rest of the country.

I got to watch the US edited version, NBC managed to completely cut out the tribute to the terror bombing victims. I did quite enjoy it, the drummers the dancers, the giant Voldemort with sparks coming out of his wand. I even liked the June and Frankie music through the years thing.
I finally turned it off when Sir Paul started to croak out his song. For gods sake I know he's popular, but I wish they'd stop rolling him out for this stuff. Hos voice is going going gone and it's sad, I'd rather remember him the way he was. He was awful in the Jubilee too.

It wasn't an ecological statement. That was Britain before the industrial revolution.

Who cares if Americans didnt understand it. That ceremony basically represented Britain. We may watch American tv shows and drink coke but we are very different and Danny Boyle captured that. It took me back to my school days and my youth and my history lessons and the dance culture I was into for a time and all the tv shows I loved. Also I worked in nhs for 15 years so that was great too ( that was probably a political statement as this government are trying their best to dismantle it).

It didnt really make reference to other countries.I thought other opening ceremonies did,and should.

When all the teams came in. Each country brought a piece of the cauldron with them so they did have a part.

And America is never self congratulatory

tuckchop he did put Eton College in - the song was in the filmed opening sequence - just after Ratty and Mole on the Thames.

CaliforniaLeaving those weren't terror bombing victims - they were friends and family of volunteers who'd died in past eighteen months or so including Danny Boyle's father. But I was very shocked that NBC cut the Anna Friel lesbian kiss for censorship. Whereas Saudia Arabia didn't!

quote, there was plenty of stuff about the whole UK: Danny Boy, Flower of Scotland, Guide me O Though Great Redeemer, Shakespeare (Midlands boy), the countryside, the Industrial Revolution, the NHS and loads of other references.

What was that big grey baby in aid of?