Fast falls the eventide for Joe Grundy, the darkness deepens for Ed - will he be fenced in or is there still time for acts of pennants? Abide with us and discuss The Archers, thread #104!

[GabrielleNelson]

Thank you, @PseudoBadger, for kicking off this long, long series of Archers threads and @DadDadDad for being our resident statistician and keeping the ball rolling when Pseudo stepped back a bit and more recently when someone forgot they had promised to start the next thread, ahem.

All views on The Archers welcome here! New blood welcomed. We don't all agree on all points and most of us are posting tongue in cheek a lot of the time, so don't worry about revealing that you'd like to be Susan's best friend or other unusual views.

Spoilers: not on this thread, please. We don't wait for the omnibus to discuss the weeknight episodes, but we do try our best to avoid cross-contamination from this thread, where spoilers are positively welcomed!

For newer listeners, lurkers or those who just have no idea what we're talking about, DadDadDad has created this useful thread: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/radio_addicts/3557323-For-Archers-fans-a-guide-to-acronyms-on-the-long-running-discussion-threads-and-any-other-meta-thread-questions-you-may-have BOOP point for him! (See thread for explanation.)

Thanks also to LillianGish for the splendid thread title. As actor Edward Kelsey died last month, we have probably heard Joe Grundy for the last time, or will do very shortly. RIP Mr Kelsey; many thanks for creating a wonderfully vivid character, gnarly toenails and all.

As pointed out on the last thread, we're getting very close now to the 100th birthday of June Spencer, who plays Peggy Woolley. What an achievement! I hope the team manage to squeeze Peggy into that day's episode, come what may.

I was thinking about it last night D3 ... I’d imagine that the leading thug inmates would be keen to prevent Freddie - who they would (unjustifably) suspect of cleverness - from becoming popular and developing some sort of constituency. (Thereby undermining their monopoly of power.) So they couldn’t allow him any friends.

(I knew that undergrad dissertation on Foucault would come in useful one day ... That and a misspent soap viewing youth.)

Wasn't there a conversation between Lily and Kenton about the licence being in jeopardy if Freddie came back to live at LL.? Of course she knows about it. You'd think she'd encourage him to live out, he could return every day to see Lizzie if it was needed.

Surely it would make more sense to eat there and tell Kenton to knock the price off his debt

I vaguely recall that had been an option in the past.

Why should David effectively ‘pay’ to eat comparatively expensive pub meals he may not want?

My understanding of what Freddie said was slightly different - that Billy was the target of the prison heavies, whom everybody (including Freddie) dreaded. And when Billy crept back towards Freddie at their meal-break, probably towards the only person who he thought might have any scrap of friendly feeling left towards him, Freddie told him to go away - presumably not wanting to be associated with the gang’s target or to make himself a target by associating with him.

Then Billy hanged himself.

So Freddie does feel responsible, even if he isn’t.

Of course he doesn't have to eat at The Bull, but the point is he didn't reject the suggestion because he didn't want to eat a fairly expensive pub meal but because he didn't want to put money in Kenton's pocket which he perceived Kenton would not use to repay him. So why not cut out the middle part of that process?

@ppeatfruit Yes, Lily knows about the licence. When it first came to light, she was all for telling Freddie so that he would voluntarily go and live elsewhere. This was partly what consoled her about Lizzie deciding at the last minute that she couldn't come on the joint visit - that she would be able to talk to Freddie openly. In the end, I think Lizzie did change her mind and come on the visit at the even-laster minute? I'm not sure about that bit.

It was only Lizzie's mental state which persuaded Lily to hold back from basically telling Freddie not to come home at all.

So all of that in relation to the licence she is well aware of. What she has pushed out of her mind (having been previously concerned by it) is how much not having the licence affects the overall business. She's never had it spelled out for her - bankrupt in X months - like Kenton did for Freddie, but she was concerned by the state of the finances a few months back, when she took over from Geraldine.

I do sometimes wonder if the people calling Lily sanctimonious and so on have young adult children

Pre-CMR, Lily was constantly offering relationship advice to others. It struck me at the time as odd.

5000 Billy TRIED to hang himself he didn't actually do it. The Prison obviously removed him from that particular place. (well that's was my assumption).

How much does K owe Dave? I certainly think it should be paid back ASAP but what good will it do David - everyone now knows he’s an embarrassing smug self - centred tw*t.

The Archers is stressing me out..... don’t go Freddie !!!!! (runs upstairs sobbing leaving supper to burn.....)

Ok - I have listened again (somewhat distracted by the Freddie actor’s lovely voice through headphones - he’s really evolving in this part). And find that 5000Flapjacks heard better than I did:

Freddie told him to go away

I’d thought I heard ‘they’ told him to go away.

However, I’m not sure I agree with your interpretation. To me it seems Freddie told him to go away to protect Billy, not himself. But I do see a perhaps stronger (but less attractive) argument for the Freddie protecting himself view ...

It's amazing how different eye ear-witnesses to the same event can remember it so differently! I think some of you have misunderstood what Freddie said about Billy, but it could be me who's wrong. I feel a transcript may be needed...

That's very true Dadx3 If we're distracted or suddenly the actors lower their voices (not that happens so much now ) then we think they say what they might not have actually said !

Oh D3, I am (for unshareable reasons) the last person to set aside the primacy of the text in almost any situation. But TA is broadcast to our ears - and my enjoyment is based on what’s delivered aurally. (Even if unclear.) I’d have a different relationship with TA if I was reading it.

((((Hugs)))) to Thing123 I didn’t think I could live if Freddie was sent away. Managed it somehow. But my blood pressure rises dangerously every time beautiful Ed curtseys helplessly to Tim ...

I feel like some deep emotions are being stirred up in this discussion. I'm not a hugger but / / to anyone feeling a bit unsettled.

George - very intriguing to think you would have reasons that you couldn't share for believing in the primacy of the text. That's not an attempt to get you to share, but to acknowledge you've clearly have experiences that are far beyond me. On the other hand, it would be interesting to hear what light your dissertation sheds on this. Apart from his Pendulum and the way it illustrates the coriolis effect, I know Fouc-ault on that subject.

Oh Lord ... Tbh I have no idea if Foucault specifically mentioned Freddie’s situation. But something about the structures of power in Freddie’s former residence brought to mind Discipline and Punish. Haven’t looked at it since the late eighties though!

But the moment when I learned that Law evolved to protect property, rather than people (except as owners of property) was the moment when I fell out of love with the subject. Which made early working life tricky.

I guess I vaguely pictured Freddie being like Tim Robbins character in Shawshank, but nobody has to tell me all the reasons why that's a bit far-fetched now I write it down.

Talking of writing things down...

I have transcribed Freddie's dialogue (two scenes) for my own benefit - attached as pictures so you can ignore if you want to keep it a purely aural experience. I've omitted Lily's lines, so you'll have to interpolate. Doing these transcriptions does really highlight the skill of the actor in bringing them to life with little pauses and emphases.

In my mind, it suggests Billy would have been a target anyway, but his association with Freddie didn't help, and Freddie tried to "save" him by pushing him away. Then when Billy attempted hanging, Freddie blamed himself (it seems clear that in fact he did nothing wrong and it's the bullies who were to blame).

Freddie doesn't think Billy died, but he never found out what happened to him.

Pre-CMR, Lily was constantly offering relationship advice to others. It struck me at the time as odd

Oh I dunno. ISTR at that age having quite a few friends who indulged in this - mostly recycled from Cathy&Claire.

GIrls are still raised (by wider society if not immediate unit) to focus on other people and relationships before themselves. Teenage girls spouting relationship advice always struck me as a part of that culture.

We all have different preferences for how we interpret information (visual, aural, kinesthetic, etc). When I did French at school, back in The Dark Ages, it was very much text-based which suited me to the ground. I could see what the unusual sounds looked like when written down and transfer that cognition to the next time; I had the logic of grammar explained and took it on board. I think that I would have been lost in the current mode for an aural, pick-it-up-as-you-go-along method.
Having said all that, I like radio! Usually more-so than TV. It's more honest because the visual distraction is missing. I knew Tony Blair was a bad 'un a long time before most people cottoned on because I didn't see his Bambi, good-looks version. I heard the duplicity in his voice.

My interpretation of what I heard Freddie say was that he’d told Billy to go away in order to protect Billy, and that Billy then felt rejected thus attempting to hang himself...

My ears (and the rest of me) are somewhat sleep deprived, though, so I may be hearing things wrong!!

My understanding was that Freddie told Billy to go away to protect Freddie's status in prison - he didn't want to be associated with the unpopular kid.

i.e. utterly selfish. Freddie rejected Billy & Billy responded by trying to hang himself.

and did anyone notice that Russ was 'comforting' Elizabeth while Lily was having her chat with Freddie?

grumio - I really don't think that interpretation is right. Freddie had no status in prison and suspected that Billy was beaten up for daring to talk to him. It's possible that Billy saw it as being rejected by Freddie, but I can't see Freddie's selfishness in this situation. (Of course, we've only got Freddie's version of events so there may be other factors we're not aware of).

I think Freddie telling Billy to go away is directly related to what he says about no-one wanting to sit next to him. Billy did, the thugs didn't approve, plus he was a vulnerable target anyway - so Freddie pushed him away to give them less cause to go after Billy.