100 Archers threads! We are truly overinfested. Whether you need some help from a therapist in a tabard, or want to move your wife in with your FWB, there’s something in Ambridge for you!

[PseudoBadger]

Well hasn’t it been a fun few years! Thank you all for supporting the threads and sharing in love and critique of The Archers.

I don’t actually think the Bridge Farm lot are preachy or holier than thou. I think they are just perceived that way because they are organic. Which is sad.

Actually, he is sanctimonious about Kenton, but that might be justified!

I think they are just perceived that way because they are organic. Which is sad.

I agree. As a family they have had far more than their share of disasters and bad experiences. Its almost as if they have to be punished for visibly trying to live their beliefs rather than just talk the talk. It feels like the same mindset which can't allow women to be successful and happy without experiencing or developing something bad - like Alice's drinking.

Anyone who doesn't conform must have a punishing storyline.

David's sense of entitlement and always being right has always been his dominant trait. Pip is exactly the same.

I don’t actually think the Bridge Farm lot are preachy or holier than thou.
Have you forgotten Olwen?

Can I pop in a bit late to the party and twirl around with my new name, please?

Have you forgotten Olwen?

No but nor have I forgotten about the many other instances of on one character determined that they know what is best for someone else. Typically though, its only the Bridge Farm group who are accused of being preachy in this situation.

I remember Christine saying she had worked out that she would have enough with her pension to pay for the flat at The Laurels. The rent must be pretty low.

“Its almost as if they have to be punished for visibly trying to live their beliefs rather than just talk the talk.”
Yes, I think this is it. And with Oleen- how often are people who feel strongly about homelessness or refugees or whatever berated with “well, I bet you would’t take one into your house!” Bridge Farm actually did- and got berated for that too......

It’s like that funny knee jerk reaction some people have to discovering that a person who says they are left wing doesn’t actually live in a paper bag and eat recycled weevils.....

Natasha is way way too good for Tom.
I thought Helen was excellent last night, she is understandably so damaged. I think Lee will now talk to Susan and what Helen said about another man will all fall in to place. Helen will be saved from having to say the words out loud.

To change the subject, Louiza Patikas has to be congratulated for that amazing acting yesterday she put the fear of god up me!

Ref. organics , funny how Adam with his herbal lays and worrying about the environment has never been criticised for not stopping all the spraying that still goes on on Home Farm.

To change the subject, Louiza Patikas has to be congratulated for that amazing acting yesterday

I thought it more suited to Eastenders.

I imagined Natasha to be blonde, for some reason.

Well...I'm not sure that the Bridge Farm troubles are ever portrayed as a consequence of their organic farming principles. Whereas Brian's loss of standing/slice of fortune/family home is presented as a consequence of his envelope-pushing, profit-seeking business practices. Maybe it's lazy writing though - there is something about how the Bridge Farm troubles keep arriving because they are somehow unworldly and unaware. They just don't seem to understand how their actions and words might appear, or what others' motives might be - Tom and Helen's latest blunders are good examples. (I am also getting heartily tired of Helen's self-punishing behaviour - I know masochism is a loaded word in this context, but it does seem to be what the writers wish for her.)

I thought the Olwen storyline was very good, and showed how hard it is to really take someone into your home and accept them as exactly equal to yourself and your own way of doing things. I think the confrontation between Pat and Olwen was very well handled - "I don't want 'better'". I think where Pat continues to come off as rather sanctimonious and unaware, though, is that instead of hearing her say to her family, "God, I really got that wrong, I thought I was doing such a good thing, but I can see how my life and values have changed and just placed me in a different world from Olwen now, and I was wrong to think I could bridge the divide.' Instead she was just embarrassed and wouldn't admit to how it had all ended. Maybe I missed something though, or the writers still have something in mind for the Pat/Olwen storyline.

And, no, I wouldn't take a homeless person or refugee family into my house, because I know I don't have the personal resources to make a success of it. (I have some minimal self-awareness that Pat does not, though!) Doesn't mean I don't have a right to be concerned about policy failures and nag my MP about it or contribute to charities working in the field.

It’s weird that nobody seems yet to know anything about the new owners of Home Farm.

Yes it is weird, you would have thought one of them would have popped into the shop or the pub.

To change the subject, Louiza Patikas has to be congratulated for that amazing acting yesterday

I thought it more suited to Eastenders
Agreed.

Of all people Helen might have been assumed to understand gas lighting and control yet that is what she is doing here to Lee. Her behaviour in front of Clarrie and Susan was appalling.

I'm so relieved Natasha is turning into a likeable character, I don't want her to be blamed when Tom behaves like a privileged idiot.
Loving the prospect of everyone moving round the village into the right size house, it's like musical homes!
Helen absolutely must go the The Freedom Programme , and get some therapy, she probably has PTSD which is completely understandable.
Also can I change my name to FishPooSalad?

Of all people Helen might have been assumed to understand gas lighting and control

Yes, but that's the problem, isn't it? She still doesn't properly comprehend it.

Re the mysterious Gills, I think it's quite realistic that we are only learning a little about them, indirectly, at this stage.

Wrt musical homes, do Clarrie & co know that Will is going to make his home available for them yet?

And will Jenny D and Brian be able to afford
[[https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00w47v9/p00vxtx4
Grange farm]]?

It's presumably not as large and fine a house as the Home Farm house. But would Oliver want to sell Grange Farm?

I'm not sure he would Eccles. Just wondering. It must be pretty big to accommodate Clarrie and co + b&b guests. Or are the latter in converted out- buildings?

Clarrie & Eddy has to move out of their roomwhen they were doing B&B so the guests could have the master bedroom & ensuite.