💥 Archers thread #119: Has the Bull reopened? Will Ambridge pull through? We’ve all dozed off and haven't a clue. Moan about the monologues here!

[Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g]

Thank you, @PseudoBadger, for kicking off this long, long series of Archers threads.

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 think we should have monologues all the time from now on, 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 www.mumsnet.com/Talk/radio_addicts/3853783--The-Archers-spoilers-thread-5-Cant-wait-for-7-02pm-Join-us-here, 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 to PPE on the last thread for the title suggestion, which I tweaked a bit.

As for the current state of affairs: here's how it could have been done. www.youtube.com/channel/UCvRSVdfQWAjNhNu1AtABYjw Nigel Pargetter returns, albeit in spectral form. I loved these.

I don't love the current set up. Very, very hit and miss for me - but I am too much of an addict to give it up. Looking for a silver lining, maybe the rather clunky trot through the Aldridge family tree last night was helpful to newer listeners. It is rather convoluted. In 12.5 minutes they managed to explain that Adam and Debbie are Jennifer's children by different fathers, that Debbie's father Roger Travers-Macy adopted Adam, that after he and Jenny divorced she married Brian and that he (secretly) loves Adam and not nearly so secretly adores Debbie. I don't think they explicitly stated that Kate and Alice are Brian's children with Jenny, but they did manage to squeeze in a mention of Siobhan and Ruairi, and explain that Xander is Adam's son by a surrogate and has no genetic connection to either Brian or Xander's other father Ian. Phew!

@AskingQuestionsAllTheTime

They didn't tell us whether Johnny found the ticket. I think maybe we are meant to be waiting with bated breath and tuning in every day hoping to find out.

Thanks. I didn't miss anything important then.

I didn't miss anything important then.

Far as I recall there has been almost nothing important in the past three months - which, in retrospect, seems a bit ill-advised when they've had a completely captive audience over that time.

Valuable plot points:

Alice jumping before pushed from her TASWAMA job.

Scumbag Oatey flytipping on Ed's territory, being reported by him, and taken into custody by world's sharpest policeman and his pals.

That about sums it up PPE .

Davies has uttered (I think that is the word) more than one tweet about how great it is that TA is going to not-really-join all the other BBC programmes after a four-month hiatus: twitter.com/keridavies

Davies keeps banging on about how incredibly difficult it all is. I'm not discounting the difficulties, but when we've all been sitting through lots of radio recorded post-lockdown where they don't seem to encounter these horrendous problems it's really difficult to understand why only the Archers is so badly affected.

He is a DJ and therefore knows all about tech. Or (possibly) not....

Adam!

Alice is going to end up in the office, isn’t she?

Was that... DIALOGUE between Em and Fallon?

And yes, Alice is destined for the office.

She can get her wine delivered there.

Alice?

Bum. I was hoping for D E B B I E E E E E ... 💜❤️💛💚🧡

Whose idea was that? They must know that we would compare the Brian+Adam+tractor scene to the Tony+John+tractor scene. It was nowhere close, not even in the same county.
It would have been much better as reported incident in a telephone conversation between Brian and an hysterical JD.

Why are they making out Natasha is bored and needs to “flex her business muscles again”? Doesn’t she run her own juice business and Bridge Fresh with Tom?

Well, we know about the ticket now. YAWN.

So why was Harrison's wife all lovey-dovey and enjoying life last week, and now she's into terminal gloom at the state of her business affairs. Or has she only just noticed she'd had no money coming in for the last four months? Why wasn't she doing what every tea shop around here has been doing - take away and home delivery?

I can't view Natasha as anything other than one of the hopefuls on The Apprentice.

What exactly happened to Adam? My wind up radio ran out of juice at that point, so I missed a few minutes. I heard Brian say his ankle was hurt.

I was surprised to hear actual dialogue between Fallon and Emma, but they were still also doing the monologues.

Adam forgot to put the handbrake on in the Landrover, got out to check something, it rolled back he tried to get in to stop it, twisting his knee in the process it rolled over his leg. He's got a ruptured cruciate ligament, and I think Brian mentioned something about pins, so maybe a broken bone or two? I must have tuned out for some of the details.

Also, I think dropping my phone earlier has affected some of the keys, like punctuation.

Don't worry, Fallon, Rishi's Eat Out to Help Out scheme will be your saviour!

I thought Fallon and Emma had been baking and delivering all through lockdown. I suppose Fallon is looking at the loss of the eat-in trade. The mark up on a cup of coffee is enormous, reflecting the cost of wages, rent, insurance, rates, cleaning etc etc. Also, most people are willing to pay as much for one slice of cake in a cafe as they would pay for a whole one from the supermarket. So I can well believe they've suffered, as most of Fallon's overheads will still need to be paid, whether she's open or not. I wonder if she got any help from Rishi Sunak. I suspect the latter will never be spelled out, as the scripts will have been written or at least mapped out before the SWs knew what the government were going to do to help businesses.

A tiny bit of dialogue. I need more, lots more. It's all down to cost, isn't it, that the BBC decided TA didn't need proper drama. Somebody upthread or possibly on the spoiler thread mentioned there was an item in Private Eye about it. Independent production companies knew they wouldn't get commissioned and paid if they didn't produce something more or like less normal drama, so they made the effort and although it takes longer and therefore will have cut their profit margins they still got work. The BBC itself decided not to bother and fobbed off their millions of addicts listeners with this tedious monologue nonsense. Pah.

I dread to think how Adam Macy is going to play a recuperating Adam as he sounds perpetually exhausted even when both legs are in perfect working order. Poor Ian.

Ah thanks @EBearhug!

Private Eye suggested that the decision was made by people who knew little or nothing about the tech that goes into making a programme.

"The difference, insiders say, is that Broadcasting House bosses decided at the start of lockdown it would be impossible to create normal-sounding shows. Staff were told to aim for 'simplified formats' and 'reduced content'. The Archers, an in-house production, was made under these no-sweat terms. But the more sophisticated lockdown fictions came from independent producers, who, knowing that they wouldn't get paid if they didn't deliver and might not be recommissioned if they delivered weakly, worked hard and innovated to overcome the restrictions."

The whole article is quoted above, on page 5. I think this ought to be a link: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/radio_addicts/a3960829--Archers-thread-119-Has-the-Bull-reopened-Will-Ambridge-pull-through-We-ve-all-dozed-off-and-havent-a-clue-Moan-about-the-monologues-here?msgid=98363763#98363763

How's that starter marriage, Alice??

If this storyline continues as it has started, Chris is going to be glad he and Alice don't have the child he's been being broody about, isn't he.

The 🔮 says that things will get bumpy but eventually the Ambridge Alcoholism Fairy* will wave her magic wand and Alice will be saved from the demon drink by the conception of a little baybee.

*Possibly assisted by Debbie, who will be the only one to realise that Alice has turned into a bit of a lush.