Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Protection built in.

Meet the Other Phone.
Protection built in.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

See all MNHQ comments on this thread

Original poster

To Think 'The Archers' Should Be Put Out of Its Misery?

80 replies

JoffreyBaratheon · 11/04/2016 21:20

Ack. I just caught a minute of it tonight. It's still as awful as I remember. Turned it off as silence is preferable.

60 (or a million, whatever it is) years ago when it started, it was probably vaguely credible. But now you'd have to be a millionaire to be a farmer. And who cares about the traumas of rich businessmen?

Last time heard it was a couple of years ago when a character who was a pensioner when I was a child (and I'm in my 50s) was shagging a cockney half her age. It was actually creepy and weird.

Why do people still listen to it? (if they do?) Surely it costs a fortune - all those actors on a permanent wage packet... I was on a train in the same carriage as one of them once, and my god, did she love herself. She was shouting loudly into her phone for the whole journey on her mobile - just in case she wasn't centre of attention, for once.

My husband used to listen to it and he is a townie. (So an element of fantasy maybe?) Ditto my dad, also a city boy. I grew up in the country and have always thought it a load of self indulgent bullocks. It's so middle class and such tosh.

So AIBU to think it's time to concrete over the farm, build a nice council estate, and move on?

OP posts:
Gruach · 12/04/2016 13:12

There is, btw, a proper Archers thread where all things Ambridge are celebrated or excoriated as appropriate. It's rather popular - just passed the 50,000th post ...

Star
Cooroo · 12/04/2016 13:19

I enjoy The Archers. It's also fun to moan about it, but this can only be done among fans so we will close ranks here. The Archers groups on social media are funny, very active and a whole additional source of entertainment.

I'm also a big Game of Thrones fan, Joffrey, so please don't punish me.

redshoeblueshoe · 12/04/2016 13:42

Grauch you're so behind the times, it passed 53,000 yesterday Grin

ApplesinmyPocket · 12/04/2016 13:46

I started listening two years ago about the time I stopped watching Corrie, which had lost a lot of its charm for me. I love the Archers now and look forward to that 13 mins every day Smile

I don't know who 'Rob' is but am assuming he started out as a perfectly boring, ordinary character who had a huge, inconsistent personality change round about the time a new producer came onboard?

No, really not, there were signs from the start. It was cleverly and slowly built upon, and rarely overplayed - IMO. Though it hasn't ended well, unfortunately.

Gruach · 12/04/2016 14:12

I was just rounding it out for a headline figure red ...

JessieMcJessie · 12/04/2016 14:14

Lynda has never owned a poodle.

iisme · 12/04/2016 14:27

Last time heard it was a couple of years ago when a character who was a pensioner when I was a child (and I'm in my 50s) was shagging a cockney half her age. It was actually creepy and weird.

Wtf? A character who was over 65 forty years ago, so is now over 105, was having an affair with a cockney? I think maybe that was a dream you had ...

Plus you don't have to be a millionaire to be a farmer, that's nonsense.

EBearhug · 12/04/2016 14:46

There are plenty of programmes which the BBC makes which I have no interest in. This is a good thing - they make plenty others I do like to watch and listen to, and I also need time for sleeping and working and so on, so it's good to have times where I'm not interested in whatever is wrong.

Besides, life would be terribly dull if we all liked the same things and only those.

Having said all that, I could understand if people feel a bit overdosed on TA in the last week - it's been hard to find any sort of news or magazine programme which hasn't mentioned it, not to mention social media and the press. I'm sure some people feel they're well past saturation point.

wasonthelist · 12/04/2016 15:50

Yanbu except it should have been stopped about 20 years ago. Was an avid listener into my 30s (20+ years ago) now I just think it's total drivel.

Original poster
JoffreyBaratheon · 12/04/2016 15:52

Coo I would like the Archers if it did a GoT mash-up...

David Archer de-throned and replaced by Ser Jorah, maybe. Who could turn all the Ambridge serfs into slaves and sell them abroad...

Linda's poodles could become Dire Poodles. Or whatever.

OP posts:
Original poster
JoffreyBaratheon · 12/04/2016 15:53

Yes, was my objection is really to the waste of money it represents.

OP posts:
AugustaFinkNottle · 12/04/2016 16:06

But how is it a waste of money, OP? As pointed out, it's really very cheap to make and gets the highest listening figures of any non-news programme. Surely that is using the funding for precisely what it's intended for.

DoSomethingKirsty · 12/04/2016 16:45

You really are quite clueless OP and seem rather over-invested in a programme you don't listen to and appear to know very little about.

Stickerrocks · 12/04/2016 17:03

If it is drawing in millions of listeners to R4, it cannot possibly be a waste of money, because that's the whole point of our licence fee. If figures were available for the costs, I'm sure that you would find that over 300 episodes a year cost considerably less than one Graham Norton, Jeremy Clarkson or Kim Kardashian in fees for which ever channel they appear on.

So Gruach, we're funding your radio listening, are we! Hmm

Stickerrocks · 12/04/2016 17:04

& I think you're confusing Constanza with a poodle OP, but as you don't care, it really doesn't matter.

Ybaby · 12/04/2016 17:04

I love the Archers - its my 15 mins of escapist drama just in the same way as other people watch reality TV/soaps etc - of course it has bad/dull episodes but s does every long running programme.
Its hugely poplar - which its why it isn't a waste of money.
You don't need to listen to it just as I don't have to watch Corrie etc
If you the it so much - which is your prerogative - why not just vote with your dial?

birdsdestiny · 12/04/2016 17:10

YABU as only people who are devoted to the archers are allowed to whinge about it, we do this constantly but are very overprotective if a non listener has a pop at it.

TheJiminyConjecture · 12/04/2016 17:11

I'd never even heard of the Archers until I joined MN!

Never met a person who listens either. We must all be savages Grin

Original poster
JoffreyBaratheon · 12/04/2016 17:53

What's a Constanza?

I only put on Radio 4 because my husband vanished into Morrisons' bog and I know from bitter experience that can take a while... Trust me, I know how to turn this crap off. But I'd rather not have to.

Somehow I suspect after hearing 1 minute in a few years I am probably less 'over-invested' than its seventeen listeners. Wink

OP posts:
AugustaFinkNottle · 12/04/2016 17:56

OK, so you're on a deliberate wind-up, given that you've had it pointed out that it has 5 million listeners per week. Well done, dear. Now go and do your homework.

HapShawl · 12/04/2016 18:01

Some archers listeners also grew up in the country ;)

OP you will never ever be able to whinge about the archers more than a regular listener does - we have far more experience than you do, plus we actually know what we're talking about when we complain about it

Gruach · 12/04/2016 18:02

OP I realise you're having a (rather well timed) larf - but it's mean to tease us when we (Archers enthusiasts) are all feeling so shaken and sensitive ...

Grin
Original poster
JoffreyBaratheon · 12/04/2016 20:14

Gruach why are you feeling so sensitive? What happen? Not the hydrangeas, then?

OP posts:
Silvertap · 12/04/2016 21:16

I'm a farmer and love it.

You're not a real farmer till you've had a tractor disco to the theme tune with your lights and the neighbouring farmers.

MNHQ
PresidentOliviaMumsnet · 12/04/2016 22:33

Late to this thread but OP, yes, YABU.