🧚‍♀️ Archers thread #120: Magic time. Dialogue! Good Fairy Lilian made Lynda’s wish come true. Will Phil vanish in a puff of smoke? Join the Magic Circle in Alice’s shed, where time is never called!

[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 hear more about the Naughty Milkman, 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 @Roysnewshirt for the excellent title suggestion, which I tweaked a bit.

I wonder how much dialogue we're going to get in the coming weeks. They're back to normal recording, I believe, albeit socially distanced. Also, when will we get our Friday and Sunday episodes back? I know I'm not the only regular to miss TA a lot more on Friday than on Sunday. The Sunday episode is still an incomer, of course, having only been introduced some 20 years ago, of course.

(My parents retired to a village and some features of Ambridge life are very familiar from their experience, the 'incomer' label being one.)

Just to be clear I don’t really want Alice to fall into the arms of a slave-master but the scene worked relatively well...

Occasionally, both the starter and main will be mushroom-based (or both goats' cheese)

Oh yes I had forgotten the doubling up of mushrooms. And places who construct their entrees from a thinly disguised vegetable side. I spent about a decade being offered ratatouille every time I went out, that at least seems to have died out.

Gavin is having serious misgivings. He likes Kirsty. I wonder if he’ll be the one to tell her

I thought last night we were being set up for Gavin telling Alice. He certainly seems to be primed to tell someone.

Gavin has hinted that he's thinking of leaving, and I think if he does tell Kirsty it will be when he goes.

I wonder if seeing Philip deceive Kirsty about the 'gambling' made him see the situation Kirsty is in in a completely new light. Gavin knows that if she knew the truth she'd be horrified and would leave Philip (and possibly report P & G to the police - which adds to his dilemma).

I though that Alice’s flirting with Gavin was pretty abhorrent. She is incredibly immature and doesn’t really know how to relate to men in any other way. Came across a bit like her Aunt Lilian actually.

I totally think Gavin and Alice are going to end up running off together. Alice tried to leave before, doesn't want this baby and Chris isn't listening (he's beginning to sound a bit narcissistic- not spotting her drinking, not listening any time she talks about not wanting children etc.)
Gavin is obviously fed up with his Dad and has come to see the "horses" as people.

It would be quite a nice "ending" as they can lurk out in the ether for ages with lots of possibilities to reappearing even when Philip is behind bars.

Oh and it sounds like builders prices are going to go up in Borsetshire soon.

I was surprised that Philip threw the gambling into the conversation without warning Gavin in advance. There was a break in the scene and then they were all eating dinner so he’d have had the chance to take him to one side and hatch a plan. It was risky to trust that Gav would just catch on. Though perhaps Gav might have refused to play along if given some warning?

When did Alice try to leave before? I missed that.

It would be great if she went through with the termination and the marriage broke down, she got help with her drinking and found a job far away somewhere. However I fear that she will continue the pregnancy, miraculously stop drinking and be transformed by motherhood.

I’m astonished that what Ed and Emma have said in clear terms, plus the suspicious collapse, has not created even a tiny bit of suspicion in Chris’ mind about Alice’s drinking. Talk about head in the sand.

It would be quite a nice "ending" as they can lurk out in the ether for ages with lots of possibilities to reappearing even when Philip is behind bars

I’m just not sure that Gavin can have a happy ending once the slave-ring is discovered. He is in too deep and saying ‘my dad made me do it’ won’t cut it in a police interview. He is as guilty as his father I’m afraid and will be facing jail-time. No chance of Gavlice living happily ever after...I can’t see Alice enjoying being a prison visitor for long!

Gavlice

Not Gavlice. I mean GavAl

He is in too deep and saying ‘my dad made me do it’ won’t cut it in a police interview not to mention the fact that he was in charge during the Grey Gables explosion.

Hmmm Alice as prison bride. Could that happen? She’s extremely self centred and entitled. I’m going with no.

Philip covers up Gavins involvement (how?) and Alice is blind to it. Possible

I hope she does have the termination. Chris really is a knuckle dragger, he just wasn't listening to her last night.

I have enjoyed the scenes with Gavin and Alice, Gavin does seem nicer, at one point I wondered if Alice was going to ask him to accompany her to the clinic. I think it was a mistake to tell Chris, if that's the way she's going to go, because he won't be able to deal with her getting rid of his baby that he's been so broody for. I don't think their marriage will survive that.

Trouble is, if he tells Susan Alice is pregnant, it will be all over Ambridge (no doubt broadcast over the airwaves on her show too) and then Alice will feel she has to carry on the pregnancy. If that happens, I could see a storyline where Alice descends into PND and back into alcoholism.

I though that Alice’s flirting with Gavin was pretty abhorrent

When was she flirting? I didn't pick that up last night at all.

“Ooh, I don’t know any of your secrets Gavin Moss”

"Oooh, now you know two secrets of mine, now you have to tell me two of yours" and her little-girl voice .... She was flirting. It is what she does, when she isn't being unpleasantly vitriolic. See also her assumption that the only thing Ed could possibly mean was that he fancied her. She is oriented on sex-flirt lines.

When was she flirting? I didn't pick that up last night at all

I didn’t think she was flirting either. I think she was just enjoying having a bit of light relief and a laugh with someone who wasn’t judging her.

Agreed @AskingQuestionsAllTheTime. Don’t you think Lilian is similar?

I remember when the vegetarian option was an omelette. But for a period after that, 1980s probably, I used to order the veggie option at mass catering events because that way you got something edible
Yes, then it was quiche (often salmon or tuna) or veg. lasagne, then someone decided that vegetarians liked goat's cheese.

I'm tempted to cook a mushroom and butternut squash risotto with caramelised onion and goat's cheese for lunch but I'll have to dig up some beetroot to go with it.
It will be like eating out.

Alvin?

I liked the Gavin and Alice conversation. Rather beautifully written (by TA scriptwriters' standards,) freighted with tension and poetry ...

But these bland characters! I remember complaining, when he first appeared, that Rob had no discernible character. And I've wasted plenty of energy excoriating the SWs for magicking up a cardboard cut-out man for Kirsty - when in fact Philip is all the more chilling for sounding so ordinary, reasonable, salt of the earth. And he believes, or thinks he believes, he's doing something entirely acceptable and it's other people who would be wrong to judge him.

Fascinating week. BOOPs all round.

I thought Alice was mildly flirting in the way that friends or colleagues do without it meaning anything.

Kristiffur must be blind, deaf and have no sense of smell to not notice the extent of Alice's drinking.

Eurgh @MikeUniformMike if my colleague spoke to me like that I would contact HR!

if my colleague spoke to me like that I would contact HR!

...depends on which colleague!