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...

I'm grudgingly admitting the Dopeys were less dopey tonight. I don't think Ruth was gloating and she was actually listening to Josh for once.

Tom and Hannah are vile.

Couldn't agree more with everything @Peartree17

Incarceration in a frightening dehumanising experience from what I've heard. I gather it's only getting worse in the face of budget cuts too. (Old school friend works in prison service.) Personally I don't see the value in custodial sentences for drug offences, at least low level dealing and personal use. The war on drugs has gone about as well as the war on terror. Can we have a war on slippers and afternoon naps please?

It sounds as though the SW are planning on banging up Ellis and Freddie together no matter how unlikely the reality of that would be. What does the 🔮 say @BoreOfWhabylon ? I only hope Freddie rises in the hierarchy before they meet again. I can't bear the Ellis the storylines - I'd like to think if you grasses someone up you wouldn't be placed together but I don't have that much faith in our system.

As an ex smoker who recently took up running for the first time in my life I think Jazzer is a total hero. Why is everyone teasing him? The man just ran 3 miles. Am I the only person who finds that really impressive? I know he's training for a half marathon, but still.

That blog is amazing Teeny - thanks for linking.

I remember once seeing a documentary about a woman's pleasure which included following disciplinary proceedings brought against one of the inmates who, very obviously, had major learning difficulties and had no clue what was going on. I was absolutely appalled that anyone thought it was even approaching a fair procedure: she so obviously did not understand anything and was prepared to say yes to anything to keep other people happy. And, depressingly, I understand that that's a scene that is replicated in our prisons every day. It is, quite simply, shameful.

I thought Ruth sounded more concerned but realistic about Freddie's shortcomings - I didn't like josh's tone much though.

I imagine Josh was as pissed off as I am about all the "Oh poor poor Freddie" when he's been dealing for ages. If the Nolithando incident didn't stop him then he deserves no sympathy at all. And all that "Oh he's so sensitive-he can't deal with people like that stuff. Pah.....

I thought josh sounded somewhat amused by his parents shocked reactions rather than pissed off.

So impressed am I by the actor playing Freddie that I found him on twitter and told him so. (First, of course, I had to locate my own antediluvian twitter account.). He had the courtesy to thank me . I'm so glad we are hearing him in the YOI. Honestly, I've quite a crush going on.

MysticBore™️ at your service @TigerTeatimes

I shall consult the 🔮

Ellis and Freddy will be banged up together.
They will knock seven bells out of each other.
The scriptwriters can't decide what will happen after that.

Wha? Whaddi say?

I imagine Josh was as pissed off as I am about all the "Oh poor poor Freddie" when he's been dealing for ages

Josh was realistically pissed off and amused at his parents' gullibility. The scene with Ruth was well done by both even if you could hear the thud of pennies dropping for Ruth.

Josh was realistically pissed off and amused at his parents' gullibility. The scene with Ruth was well done by both even if you could hear the thud of pennies dropping for Ruth.

Yes I'd assume most of the younger generation knew more of the reality whilst their families were happily assuming he had been caught out on one incident. Its surprising the extent to which they must all have kept quiet.

I do hope we don't get the Ellistenders and Freddie Street locked up together story.

What does LSW stand for? I just keep thinking 'Lazy Script Writers'

Oh sorry - Lurking Script Writers from a usenet group I frequented many years ago. I forget where I am at times

Lazy Script Writers would be more appropriate for some story lines

Caffeine, I knew that, but just thought it was a common acronym! Don't tell me, you were formerly known as an umrat?

I do hope we don't get the Ellistenders and Freddie Street locked up together story.

Brookside ...

It would be a shame if they went down this route. But it did seem to be where Josh’s comments were leading us.

a woman's pleasure
I'm assuming that was meant to be prison - otherwise a very strange thread. Auto correct really does have a peculiar sense of humour.

I noticed Hannah's 'Sorry, what?" preoccupation too, after Jazzer's (completely reasonable and entirely provoked) rejoinder. I think she's a right bunny-boiler and that moment is supposed to indicate the seed of her plotting something horrible for him. Which would be awful if she pulls it off because - Jazzer! could she undermine his reputation as a pig-whisperer somehow?

I don't remember her previous appearance but was she a nice person then? She's absolutely vile now.

Hannah's 'Sorry, what?"

It's Hannah playing mind games. She comes on to Tom then, when he responds, she goes all cool and distant and tries to make out that it is him doing the chasing.
She suggested the lunchtime tryst but when Tom said "I'm here" she didn't respond with a "I want to rip your clothes off". She put him in his place with a distracted "sorry, what?"
She initiated the sexual relationship but then said she's (allegedly) also got someone else on the go.
She keeps pulling him in then pushing him away. I presume it's a variant of 'treat them mean to keep them keen'?

The law is an ass. These pills etc. are bought and used by many many 'normal' middle class people too. They are not even regarded as wrong because booze is just as bad (if not worse) and it's not illegal . Think how much taxpayers money could be saved if everything was legalised (as it is in some countries). The whole thing annoys me, it's hypocrisy central.

Sorry for the rant it's being done well on TA I loved the way that Lady Elizabeth hated being "herded' with everyone else

I agree with you, ppeatfruit. I've never taken an illegal substance in my life and am never likely to, but I can see no sense in having alcohol and tobacco/nicotine legally available and all other mind-altering substances banned. Alcohol by a good many measures does more harm than any other drug, probably because it is legal and therefore widely available, but at least we get a lot of revenue out of it to put back into the public coffers to deal with it. Ditto cigarettes. Producers and retailers of both have to comply with government legislation over manufacture, advertising and supply, they're heavily taxed, because they're legal people will freely report to HCPs what their consumption is and then the HCPs can address that, etc etc etc.

Meanwhile the producers of illegal substances pay no tax, adhere to no standards so the drugs are full of fillers that are also noxious to health, the whole thing is run by organised crime so supports other anti-social activities like prostitution and people smuggling and the cost of law and customs enforcement activities is huge.

We'd do far better to go back to the beginning and get reputable scientists to rate each drug for the harm it might do. Then get some sensible experts on health and public policy to consider whether they're safe enough to be legalised at all and if so what safeguards should be put in place to help/prevent people abusing them. Tax them all heavily. Put good support in place for addicts. Provide decent health information in the hope people will make an informed choice. Watch the prisons empty.

Oh look, a flying pig!

However, back in the real world, Freddie knowingly supplied drugs to others for personal gain despite knowing it was against the law and risky (after Noli's experience he had no excuse). I don't have much sympathy for him for having been caught and punished. I do think prisons and YOIs should be better places, though. A lot of people (not Freddie) end up in prison because they've never been treated like a decent human being. A therapeutic approach that combined education/training, good basic diet, plenty of exercise, counselling and work, with basic but decent living conditions and zero tolerance of bullying would go a long way to sorting some of them out.

There goes another one!

@Peartree17 I couldn't agree with you more.

I haven't ever been to a YOI, but I spend quite a bit of time in the male prison estate. I think they're portraying it very well so far. I really feel for Elizabeth, but goodness I wish someone would explain the rules of engagement to her. Complaining loudly in cut-glass tones about her son having been assaulted is pretty much like signing Freddie's death warrant. Wrong, but true. She has to let him work out the rules of engagement and keep his head down.

FWIW, I think that a short prison sentence often works far better for the likes of Freddie as it is a genuine shock and very likely to act as a deterrent in the future.

I suspect Ellis will turn up at the same YOI and all hell will break lose. I get that it's great from a plot POV, but wouldn't happen in real life. They'd be careful to keep grasser and grassee apart. Hey ho - preparing to suspend disbelief.....

Oh - and Hannah is utterly without redeeming features. She needs to be written out. How can we make that happen?????

Thanks Tiger Do you remember that a Professor Nutt actually did what you recommended and the government responded by sacking him. They can't face the truth of their hypocrisy also I suppose that the highly influential and. wealthy alcohol industry lobbied them heavily.

There's no way the new wave of 'designer drugs' - until recently 'legal highs' could be properly risk assessed. But maybe if some substances which have been in widespread use over a long period for which there is data could be put on the same footing as alcohol and nicotine, it might reduce demand for the more risky stuff (including the new drugs).

Errol The main problem is human behaviour though; anything 'banned' is immediately catnip to some strange people, those who LOVE risk taking. I don't know how society makes laws for those oddballs.

Yes, I do remember Professor Nutt. He committed the unpardonable crime of applying common sense to a tricky problem and speaking the plain unvarnished truth. Of course he had to go.

Horse riding more risky than E, that was one of Nutt's observations wasn't it? Ambridge is a hotbed of pony-pushing, maybe that's what led Freddie astray?