The Archers - Freddie is getting OUT: will Russ hop it? Helen is falling DOWN: is Lee still in the frame? Tom is heading UP: will Natasha be the boost his sausage needs? (Thread no. 101

[DadDadDad]

We're still here and still discussing TA (The Archers). We welcome newcomers and old hands, so if you have a question or a point of view, please dive in. No spoilers - if you've seen info on future storylines, there's a separate Radio Addicts thread for that.

I loved all the name changes on the last thread. Don't forget to change back! (If you want to).

Who's going to get Russ out of LL? Freddie? Lily? Elizabeth? Or is it Freddie who will head off?

Was such a huge fuss made when Fallon and Harrison got married in church - or EdnEmmur come to that? None of them churchgoers (though I do sometimes mix up Harrison and the vicar on account of their northern accents)?

IMO and E religion seems to have been used (and sadly still is) as just something else to create differences between humans. We're good at it that's for sure.

It’s not so much the Christening itself I object to. If people want to tell public lies for the sake of a party that’s up to them. Ditto weddings.
It was the emotional blackmail/bullying by Robin, Toby and Alan that pissed me off.

Did F and H def get married in church? I don’t remember much about the ceremony, just the reception being “no plastic”. Kirsty and Tom were of course going to get married there, don’t think either of them does much worship.
And strangely, Nic and Will got married at Grey Gables I think, yet Nic became a church stalwart. Or was it just their reception at GG?

It was the emotional blackmail/bullying by Robin, Toby and Alan that pissed me off - true. But Pip’s real objection was that she didn’t want Jill to find out Rosie’s middle name - nothing to do with religious hypocrisy, that was just a convenient excuse. The idea that Toby’s dad (when he and Pip are not even officially an item) would independently contact her local vicar to organise a christening is one of the least convincing plot twists for some time.

To change the subject, I don't remember that Lizzie had favourites between the twins, I thought that , if anything Lily was the blue eyed child. She is getting quite unpleasantly jealous of the attention that Freddie is getting.

“She is getting quite unpleasantly jealous of the attention that Freddie is getting.”

Quite understandably jealous, I reckon!!!

Just catching up on last night’s episode. Wtf is wrong with Jakob?

It seemed to me that the only point of Jakob was to allow Alistair to talk himself into some sort of employment tribunal. All that insistent inspection of Jakob's birth, nationality and parental background was really uncomfortable to listen to.

In the past one had to put up with that sort of thing. If I'd been Jakob right now I'd have been on the phone to my employers by lunchtime.

She is getting quite unpleasantly jealous of the attention that Freddie is getting. Yes they are really ramping that up - especially Freddie up Lakey Hill, lord of all he surveys while Lily beavers away at the call centre. To be fair, Lily has done a good job of driving a wedge between herself and her twin by taking up with CMR - an undisputed arse. When does Freddie actually come into his inheritance and take over from Elizabeth? If the Elizabeth and CMR plot comes to fruition Lily might not be the only one feeling left out in the cold.

All that insistent inspection of Jakob's birth, nationality and parental background was really uncomfortable to listen to. I agree. Alistair still hasn’t got his head round the fact that he is essentially the new boy at Lovell James - he still thinks he is in charge, despite Jakob’s comment that this is third year with the company.

I remember Freddie getting a pony when Lily got to go on the school trip.

Freddie is also getting LL so there has been an imbalance from the get-go.

First time poster, long time lurker here. just wondering if Jakob is to be the first autistic character in Ambridge? I was listening with my daughter (on the spectrum herself) and she thought he was superb - just the sort of things she would like to say in the same situation but has been trained not to! If we are right, I hope they develop him with some subtlety rather than a stereotypical caricature.

It could be that Jakob has been sent by Lovell James to sabotage Alistair's running of the place eg by upsetting all the clients. Alistair was very weird grilling him about the Swedish stuff though.

Is this our first meeting with Jakob? is his nose out of joint because Alistair is his senior? I don't understand why he is so uncommunicative, bordering on hostile. Have I missed something? I felt sorry for Alistair, trying and failing to communicate with someone who did not wish to speak. (Painful memories of trying to build bridges with a member of my first, departed husband's family - it really is difficult to have a conversation with someone who will not speak.)

uncommunicative, bordering on hostile.

Interesting how we can all have different takes on things. To me, it sounded as if Alastair was clumsily trying to 'Put Jakob at his ease' and was not able to switch modes when Jakob pointed out that far from being a new boy, he had been around for three years.

Alastair then got it wrong again, harping on Jakob's differences expressing surprise at how well he could speak English. And then going for buns to recreate a Swedish fika when, Alastair wasn't doing very well in English was he.

Why switch to Swedish customs of which he knows nothing, just emphasising that he Alastair thinks of Jakob as 'different'.

It fair enough as s tourist to talk about how things are 'in your country' in the workplace I think it's just rude to express surprise st how well someone can speak the language.

Why not try and build bridges by asking for some background on the clients rather than offering to 'introduce Jakob' to a client, when they had already established that it was Alastair who was the new boy.

It's an interesting point of how to survive and thrive in a new environment , especially when you have even a slightly different role. The things that worked for you before might not be so appropriate in the new place

Good to think a bit about how you are responding rather than do what you have always done.

Just done a catch up of the thread. A few musings.

We now know that Natasha's personal finances are a mess. But what about her business? Is that all smoke and mirrors too? It all feels a bit like MLMs 'fake it until you make it' kind of thing, to me.

Re the app. What Bridge Farm needs to do is their own business analysis as to whether they think using the app will ultimately bring in business, and be helpful to them, or whether it is just going to shift customers away from the shop into a more labour costing method whereby they have to fulfil and deliver random orders. It shouldn't be 'Helen's OK with it'. It should be 'We think it give us X extra income within 6 months and Y after a year etc'.

I loved the 'fatted calf sandwiches'. Spot on. And going off bowling, and a meal out, and shopping - all without inviting Lily.

I think (hope) Leonard will turn out to be a better artist than Rob and the juxtaposition of the two will bring the latter's pretentiousness sharply into focus. Maybe both will be asked to provide something for a St Stephen's art show.

Musical houses: Who gets Grange Farm when the Grundy's move out?
Jenny & Brian leaving it free for Tom & Natasha to move next door to where he is now? Where will Jonny and Hanna(h) go?

Finally please can things go right for Ed? Every time he does something I find I am on tenterhooks that it's going wrong (eg when he mixed the spray). He is now a solid worker. He deserves a break.

Jakob was bloody rude from the start Alastair then overdid it- but perfectly understandably.

Alistair thinks he's senior to Jakob.
Jakob thinks (and is probably correct) that he is senior to Alistair.
Alistair won't last.

I wonder how it will work with the surgery being at the stables if Alistair leaves. Who owns the freehold to the premises?

Excellent analysis Finallyhere. I wondered if Jakob had been reluctantly deployed to Ambridge and how Lovell James had briefed him. Probably something along the lines of “He’s an old-timer, insisting on staying out there in the sticks, tried to get him to move to HQ and wind down, but he’s digging his heels in...” Not at all how Alistair sees himself.

Ooh. That's a good point Stormy.

I did think it was good that Alistair at least tried to see how David would react to a pay up front model. Upselling really isn't going to be his thing though, is it?

George Yes but that smarmy Lovell whatever Chief Exec did mention Jacob's nationality, I thought it a bit odd at the time. Then Al finds out he's lived in Eng since he was 5 ! 'He doesn't eat cake' maybe he's a coeliac or on a diet or something.

Jakob (so far) seems like a cardboard representation of "modern" rigorous business culture, to be compared and contrasted with Alistair's "old fashioned" animals first, cake and community style.

Loved "fatted calf sandwiches". I can see how Freddie would be wildly over-excited about being home; but Elizabeth is just being horribly inconsiderate to Lily. Is this sort of insensitivity a symptom of depression?

At last, whatever one thinks of the religious reasoning on either side, somebody has said "no" to Pip

Alistair going on about Jakob's Swedishness was silly. Badly done SW.
Compare&contrast to Anisha: I don't remember Al trying to force tablet or fish curry onto her. Or, perhaps, he was going to but Shula stopped him!