The Archers #93: The Flower and Produce show - who's going to get their just desserts. Freddie? Ellis? Russ? Pass judgement here.

[DadDadDad]

No, that's not a jokey exaggeration, this is really the 93rd thread in a series started by PseudoBadger five years ago! In fact, post number 90,000 in the "official" count will be made on this thread.

Lovers of The Archers welcome (along with the rest of us who have a more complicated relationship with the "TA" ).

One rule we try to stick to: No mentioning of future episode plotlines published in the Radio Times etc. However, once an episode has aired, say what you like!

What is going to happen to Freddie? And are we ever going to hear from Lily again?
I also am wondering what it will take for Kenton to apologise to Fallon...

Here's a scene for a few months' time...

YOI governor: So, Freddie, we know this hasn't been the best environment for you, so I've arranged your transfer to a great place that will really work hard to help with your rehabilitation. It's just outside Manchester, and I hear they've got this amazing new creative arts tutor, called... I had the name here... Russ... it--- Freddie? are you OK?!

Freddie will attempt suicide and it will be this that brings Lily back into the fold.

I think Freddie will just get a kicking. Suicide isn't the only storyline for YOI/prisons. Hopefully he doesn't pick up a drug habit whilst he's in there.

Elizabeth needs to get onto the What to take to prison thread.

So is Kenton really going to lay into Harrison now?

Elizabeth needs to get onto the What to take to prison thread This made me laugh, a different take on buying Egyptian cotton sheets and tagines a few weeks ago.

I wonder now what will happen to all the blaming of Harrison.

Two minds with but a single thought. :o

but YOI for a boy like Freddie

I don't agree that its automatically worse for Freddie than other boys. I do think when you have had all life's advantages you have less excuses for drug dealing - he hasn't been raised with bad examples, isn't desperate for money to pay the bills. Even now, he will come out and still be inheriting LL and have a job for life - a very different situation from many other boys going to YOI.

In effect he has 6 months for multiple offences of dealing - I really don't see how that could end in a non custodial sentence,. or be much less.

I do know he will be OK in the long run and just take over the stables, maybe with a programme to rehab young offenders?

But he is such a convincing actor, I luvs him.

Oh, LilG, l’ve just been saying to dh l couldn’t bear to be married to an Archers denier. Though he’s been snoozing all through my reading (out loud) this thread and the spoilers so that’s nearly as bad.

I love Freddie’s actor too. He has to be back though his time in YOI can’t be unrealistically okay. So something will no doubt happen.

He didn't go to boarding school, did he? That would have set him up better for life in an institution.

I hate this Mumsnet idea that posh people need special treatment. Freddie should get a tougher sentence than a kid without his advantages.

i assume it will have come out in court that Freddie admits to having been dealing over a long period. Therefore I would hope that Kenton backs off from blaming Harrison, given that his moans have all been along the lines of "my poor nephew, having his life destroyed because of ONE mistake".

What good would that do Bertrand ?
I thought we are all supposed to be equal before the law,anyway.
Freddie's sentence will be much tougher for him because he'll have zero coping skills and will be an obvious target. He'd also be a massive suicide risk. Being 'posh' hasn't helped him at all.

I'm not sure what the point of this storyline is apart from anyone can get caught up in drugs and here are the consequences.We know that Freddie's weak,easily led,vulnerable and not too bright - a gift for people like Ellis.That could be the point,I suppose.

The court needed to be tough on Freddie because he already has all the support you could ask for and a secure economic future. He chose to be a dealer. He was also complacent about the harm he was doing (Noluthandu; Jonny; relationship with Lily; his family’s livelihood).

I don't agree that its automatically worse for Freddie than other boys Freddie is a mummy’s boy, in the nicest possible way. He has been brought up in some luxury, surrounded by family - he recently cried when his horse died. He hasn’t been toughened up by boarding school, he’s always lived at home in some luxury in a village where everyone is looking out for him and knows about the tragic loss of his father. He’s also a twin - I know Lily is in Manchester now, but he will feel her absence very keenly. Freddie has not been portrayed as being in any way streetwise - I’m thinking of the Isle of Wight festival with Johnny and Nolli’s stay. Part of the reason he carried on dealing was because he was afraid of Ellis - who as a Borchester sixth-former is going to be a complete pussycat in comparison with anyone he’ll meet in a YOI. He got himself into a situation and he didn’t know how to get out of it which doesn’t bode well. There’s no excuse for drug dealing, he knew what he was doing was wrong, he’ll still come out to a Stately Home (though might find it hard to get a license when he’s eventually in charge) but Freddie is in for a very tough time.

Did confessing do Freddie any favours? It seemed to me that it just hardened the heart of the judge against him.
The only upside I can see is that all his wrongdoing is now in the open, thereby removing any future threat of blackmail by Ellis.

Well I’m guessing we haven’t heard the last of Ellis.

One hopes he will have a stately home to come back to. I wouldn’t be keen to hold my wedding or important conference at a venue where the scion of the house is in serving a sentence for drug dealing. It’s a very unpleasant thing to be publicly associated with - given that there will be plenty of other places one could choose.

Losing the licence is one thing - the unsavoury reputation and slur on Elizabeth’s character (because either she’s a ‘neglectful mother’ or has allowed her son to think he’s above the law) might do far more long term damage. What on Earth will she do if the business grinds to a halt?

Oh I don’t know Quater, there have been quite a few aristocratic druggies (I know Freddie’s not an aristo) - scandals at Blenheim and Broadlands spring immediately to mind. At least he’s not taking drugs and blowing his inheritance that way. I’m not sure a wayward son would put people off, though not being able to get a drink might.

Delurking to say yes, it didn't do Jamie Blandford (as was) any harm!

I’ll be delighted to be wrong if my wrongness brings new posters and saves Lower Loxley!

I think Freddie's experience in the yoi will be... Multifaceted. Yes, some of the other young people there will be aggressive and unpredictable, but they will also have their vulnerabilities. The shocking and sudden loss of his father might turn out to be something he has in common with a lot of the others.
Also, I think Freddie is so posh that he may register more as 'alien species' rather than 'target', certainly initially. I haven't visited yois often, but when I have, the kids there by and large find the idea of someone having a job at all very posh. They won't know what to make of Freddie. Also, again, as a generalisation, private school kids tend to be bigger than the average yoi inhabitant (better nourished). I don't know if we've ever had a physical description, but if Freddie is a burly 6 foot - or even a 5' 9, then he's not going to look like an easy target. That eyebrow piercing might help a bit too.
And, of course, the staff will be keeping an eye on him. They'll probably warm to him quickly - he's daft, but he's amiable, polite, and definitely rehabilitat-able.

Can’t imagine he’s ‘burly’! Do we ever hear of him engaging in any regular sport? (Sitting on a horse twice a year surly can’t be enough?)

I tend to think of him as willowy. Definitely not able to defend himself much in a physical fight.

I thought Freddie rode regularly? Was certainly confident enough to hunt.