As doors slam shut in Rob's face and behind SOC, a new door opens for the next Archers editor. Are we expecting some New Tricks, or just Archenders?

[PseudoBadger]

Welcome one and all. No spoilers please!

Rob was - and remains - a serious danger to Henry. It's such a relief that the judge ruled against him having access. I'm not sure how realistic an outcome it was, but feel very relieved not to hear any more Rob/Henry scenes.

Rob has used every chance to destroy Henry psychologically, and would have progressed to physical violence. Hope Pat and Tony have good security!

I think we just have to accept that SOC planned to rack up the tension as much as possible for maximum effect and then had to wrap it all up suddenly. I'm just grateful that he opted to give us a good outcome after all.

Bye bye, SOC. I hope Huw will treat us better.

Maybe the judge had been listening to The Archers and worked out Rob's general modus operandi.

All the farmhouses in Ambridge are big, obviously, capable of housing random family members as the need arises. Grange farm evidently has clarrie&eddie emma&ed, joe, george and girlchild whose name escapes me. Home farm is obviously massive, currently bri&jd, lillian, phoebe, think kate had a room till she decamped to her cottage, and ruari must have been silently in his room all summer. Brookfield did get perilously close to overcapacity but they've got a cottage too and a whole other flipping house they'd forgotten about for years. So I'm sure bridge farm will be similarly spacious.

😁😁Boffinmum

I couldn't hear any evidence of bias on the part of the judge, EBearHug? All we heard was him giving his judgment, which was just setting out his findings. Admittedly in RL he would have given examples of Knob's abusive behaviour, but when you have to boil your judgment down to a two minute soundbite there's a limit to how much detail you can put in.

I bet Bruce is well pissed off that he presumably had to cough up for Knob's lawyer whose efforts got him precisely nowhere.

Ha yes good point about Bruce. I bet he sees Rob as a complete failure, can't even beat a woman etc etc. And we never did get to find about about mysterious Miles....

I couldn't hear any evidence of bias on the part of the judge, EBearHug? All we heard was him giving his judgment, which was just setting out his findings.

I agree. There was no bias and I didn't hear any obvious ground of appeal. I'm not a family lawyer, so happy to be corrected, but in the areas of law with which I'm familiar, appeal courts are extremely reluctant to interfere with findings of fact (which is what we heard from the judge). 'The judge got it wrong' is not usually a ground of appeal,

Would Bruce be paying for Rob's lawyer or has Peggy unwittingly financed that with her 10k wedding present?

Among the other legal things Helen has to sort out ... Please can she revert to being an Archer, surely she won't want to keep Tichener? What happens about Jack - is he stuck with it?

Oh ho. If Gack's Bruce's only grandson then is Gack the heir to a considerable chunk of Essex prime farmland?

I've forgotten - Is Mystery Miles the older brother and does he currently farm it?

I'm sure Peggy's £10K got swallowed up long ago.

It was obvious when Jess was giving her evidence in Helen's trial that the judge believed her and not Knob. He sounded like he was really enjoying himself.

Didn't Helen register Jack as John something Archer? I thought it odd at the time that nobody queried the surname. ( hope you don't mind me joining in- I'm a long time but recently rather intermittent listener)

He's John Anthony Archer.

Helen made a point of saying she was naming him after three good men, her grandfather, father and brother.

I assume it is Jeck Wolloi rather that Jack Archer who was a drunken bully.

Oh good, I'd forgotten that. Does Rob even know that?

Rob definitely knows he's not been registered as Gideon.

How would contact work as Jack gets older? Would it change or be 3+1 until he's 18?

Well I loved it. The happy ending I was hoping for. I'm looking forward to the pantomime fallout in the village and for Rob to go back to being eeeeeevil but impotent. Hoorah! Half-cups of tea all round. Now, about that flower and produce show...

I was just wondering, selsigfach, what exactly Rob would get out of contact with a small breastfed baby at the moment? I can't see him changing nappies, he'd probably make Pat do it and I'm not sure about Helen expressing milk so that Rob could bottle feed him. I've read about contact centres, would it mean that Pat would have to take Jack to meet Rob in a contact centre in Felpersham or Brochester?

How will this work with Henry not seeing Rob though. Doesn't he still love him? How damaging would this be to completely deprive a 5/6 yr old boy of seeing the most consistent man in their lives over the last few years? (Nasty piece of work that he is)

I think supervised contact with Rob for an hour a week better for Henry at first and then he could gradually be weened off him completely.

Rob will so hate being supervised by Pat - being supervised by any woman would be anathema, but Helen's mother would be awful, particularly as (I sincerely hope) he has no prospect of charming her round to his viewpoint. I wonder whether he'll lose his temper to the extent that he loses contact with Jack also.

It felt like that was a dream sequence episode and we'll get the real verdict on Sunday...

Liked Pat suddenly finding her voice again though!

Now all that has to happen is to divorce Rob, sack him from the shop and Justin to rescind the job offer. Was a bit at the Kirsty/Tom squelching at the end, almost put me off my dinner!

I don't see why he is allowed to see Jack if he has been considered dangerous to Henry.

FWIW I don't think Henry will miss him for very long. He's surrounded by people whom he has known all his life and who are not so unreasonably strict, on a farm that he really enjoys being part of, plus he gets to see a new baby brother. I fear Rob just can't compete.