Brian is over a barrel, Alice has drained the barrel and Shula has given it to Alistair with both barrels - The Archers is not exactly a barrel of laughs at the moment.

[PseudoBadger]

Thanks to @LillianGish for the thread title.

I think Will knows perfectly well that Jake and George are kicking off but is using it to fuel his bitterness - just as he puts a nasty spin on anything anyone says to him to try to comfort him.

I imagine it distracts from the guilt he feels at leaving Nic all alone, in the full knowledge that she was ill, while he went out to the Gamekeeper's shindig. And for bullying Nic into covering up the Matt-squishing incident when she wanted to report it.

Plus guilt at being a fairly rubbish dad - for all the 'we can afford it,' bollocks, he is highly dependent his mum and Emma at the moment and his kids are at each other all the time.

Jake probably wants to stop going to see his mother's grave every five minutes. Will doesn't seem to be giving them any choice in the matter. I thought his dad was very kind to Will. Needless to say Will will blame everything on Emma from now on. I know Clarrie is trying to help but allowing Emma and herself to take all the parenting slack is not going to help Will in the long term.

Why aren’t Ed and Eddie helping out with the extra housework? I usually find Emmur irritating but I’m seething on her behalf.

Eddie took Jake to teach him how to cheat at football.

I suppose that at least got him away from George.

Will is being a complete a**e. He's not the first man to find himself having to be mother and father to a young family after losing his partner. He's lucky to have the support of his family and probably half the village if he wasn't so nasty to everyone.

Horrible character.

Am I the only one furious at tonight's episode? Jazzer's interview? No-one would be that inept, surely? Just using Jazzer as comic relief because the Grundies aren't available. Not very impressed at the conduct of the interview either. No hint of a common scoring framework, just some floppy comparison of one candidate with another.By the end of the day, they won't have a clue who said what (especially as they seem to be interviewing about 12 candidates for one post).

It sounds like they employed a candidate who is used to a higher position and will probably turn out to have a dodgy past.

Jazzer may have felt that as there were people on the panel who had years worth of knowledge of his ability with pigs, he was either going to get the job or not.

To be fair, listening to an interview panel working through standard questions and painstakingly discussing a scoring grid wouldn't be riveting radio. And I don't think there's anything that specifically indicated that they didn't use that process.

I was a bit annoyed at the assumption that Jazzer wouldn't be a good team player.

He does his job well and cares about his 'girls'. He gets on well with Neil and Tom, even though Tom is a rubbish boss. He is fun to be around and good for team morale. I reckon he would repay the investment.

I quite agree with you R4 that Shula is not behaving in well and she should talk to Alistair properly - but it is between them and I don't think it follows that there should be no boundaries for Dan.

My hope for the Jazzer/pig story is that (a) he doesn't want the indoor job anyway but went for it to get some leverage with Tom and remind him how valuable J is to his business, and (b) he and the fabby new pig woman will bond over porcine matters, fall madly in love and live porkily ever after in Jim's spare room.

Something I don't understand; Jazzer talks about his "girls" but since Tom went unorganic, his pigs are "weaners", youngsters being fattened up for slaughter. Generally they'd only be there for a few months,

The "girls" belong to Neil, who keeps the breeding sows and sells the weaners on to Tom.

GnotherGnu I suppose it was taking time out between interviews to compare candidates with each other - when I've been interviewing, the schedule has been tight enough that we confine ourselves to agreeing the scores of the candidate we've just finished with, and reminding ourselves of any areas we particular want to probe on the application form of the candidate about to come.

But yes, Gnu, I should stop thinking of TA as a documentary and remember it is just a set of fictionalised devices to move the plot along, and any resemblance to real life is purely coincidental.

What I can't believe is Justin interviewing for a pigman. Neil and Adam could have done this on their own.

It is rather ridiculous ADaSK - when we remember the high powered international wheeler dealer that they first introduced us to. But isn’t that always the way with soaps? I haven’t watched EE for yonks but still clearly (vaguely) remember numerous people arriving in the Square in expensive suits and flashy cars, weighed down with dosh - and invariably after a year they’d be sofa surfing and working on the market.

Poor Justin doesn’t seem to have noticed his own enforced downward mobility!

What I can't believe is Justin interviewing for a pigman

Ahem, pigperson.
It didn't ring true to me either but I justified it as not Justin checking out lower-rung staff but Justin checking out Neil's management abilities (but that then raises the question of why did Justin hire a manager who he does not trust).

I was disappointed that they didn’t go with a “Jazzer confounds expectations and aces the interview” storyline. I think that they underestimate how much the listeners love Jazzer and want the best for him.

Ah-ha! go Jazzer! looks like he was playing a crafty hand with master-businessman Tom! Love it!

Helen is not loveable, is she?

That was brilliant. Well done Jazzer!

I enjoyed that episode. Jazzer played that well. I love the idea that Lynda's main criterion for a new dog is how good it looks from behind.

I expect I am alone in this, but I'm relishing the Bridge Farm Archers having this awful houseguest who hogs the bathroom and sits around all day criticising everything. It's like AIBU meets TA! I'm thinking of the endless threads at Christmas when families are thrown together for several endless days of forced jollity and realise all over again that they don't see each other the rest of the year because they hate each other.

However, I'm not looking forward to hearing Sheila Dillon tomorrow. I cringe when they do cameos like this.

Olwyn’s toenails in the bath...! 😳

I felt quite sorry for Pat being simultaneously harangued by Olwyn and Lynda. I mean, I'm not saying she doesn't deserve some of it, particularly if it brings her to realise how far she has sold out, but it's a bit much to go for a little stroll in the countryside and have one's life choices hauled over by two separate people!

Didn't Bridge Farm already live through the misfit house guest with Jazzer?

... and Helen!