Archers thread #143: In the Bleak Midwinter, Ambridge Folk Make Moan. Best Christmas ever? Probably not! Discuss The Archers 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, although we do mostly try to be civil about it. Most of us are posting tongue in cheek a lot of the time, so don't worry about revealing that you'd love to be in Jolene's choir , 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/4636789-the-archers-spoilers-thread-7-cant-wait-for-702pm-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.)

Well, we made it through Stir Up Sunday without bloodshed, but poor Ben is now in the grip of psychotic depression. Not going to be a happy Christmas at Brookfield, sadly. When will Jill swallow her pride and go and give him the abject apology he deserves? Would it be a good idea anyway for Ben to see his gran at the moment?

Will Jazzer say yes? I hope so. We could do with a Horrobin wedding to look forward to.

Will Emma and Ed end up in court if they go ahead with this idiotic scheme to nick the logs from Peggy's Folly?

Will the two choirs put on a joint concert at Christmas? I assume so, and also that the BBC will continue to fool nobody by using recordings of what is clearly a really good well-rehearsed established choir, not a scratch choir of half a dozen novices.

Over to you!

It's a long time since I read a Mills & Boon novel, but I seem to recall that the male and female leads always get off on the wrong foot, and after innumerable misunderstandings slowly change their view of each other, with some sort of accident often throwing them together, and eventually of course they live happily ever after. I suppose we can blame Pride and Prejudice for that, but the TA SWs aren't Jane Austen standard by a long, long way.

Singing was good, though, and how lovely to hear Brian and his daughters.

Agree with all of that @Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g.

The singing was fab but utterly wrong for TA characters. Well OK for someone whose hinterland we know nothing of, but not for one whom we've known all her life.
Did we ever hear Wuss talking about her "singing like an angel" or similar?! No!

She did go to the Cathedral school, where music was supposed to be strong. It's true we never heard of Lily singing in the school choir, far less the Cathedral choir, but if I wanted to be charitable I'd say it could have been one of the things there was never room to mention.

(By the way, has anybody else heard recorded announcements on the London overground and some other lines which sound exactly like Freddy? I looked up the actor's Twitter account and found somebody had already asked him about this. He said it wasn't him. All I can say in that case is he must have got the idea for Freddy's voice from hearing these announcements. The voices are incredibly similar. Throws me every time I hear one.)

Fairly normal behaviour. Like walking into a shop in Wales in the 80s.
Strangely enough, whenever I walk into a shop in France, they switch to French just so I won't understand.

How will Adil’s employer feel about him shagging a member of the family of a rival establishment?

There was time when that was thought desirable. What’s the age difference between Elizabeth Bennet and Mr Darcy? Jane Eyre and Rochester?

They sounded pretty amateur when we heard them singing together

EB is 20, Mr D 28

JE is 19-ish Mr R mid 30s.

Emma was much younger than Mr Knightley

Interesting as Tim Bentinck (David) is the voice behind ‘Mind the Gap’ on the underground.

I had no idea he is also the 12th Earl of Portland, Count Bentinck und Waldeck Limpurg!

I agree that Adil has a young voice, light in tone so could easily be late 20s/early30s.

As an aside, Anton Lesser, who is prolific as an audio book reader as well as an actor, also has that similar voice and he can convincingly read as child, girl, woman, boy, villainous man.

Marianne Dashwood and Colonel Brandon.

Maxim de Winter and the second Mrs de Winter.

Our late Queen and Prince Philip.

I rather like Adil. I don’t want him to have Lily inflicted on him.

Me too. With luck she will now pursue him, only to be thwarted when he tells her that neither he not his family would ever accept a woman who had shamelessly seduced her married schoolteacher.

It would be glorious if Adil rejected Lily in favour of Kirsty!

Although, a Kirsty/Rex pairing is more likely imo (the 🔮 agrees)

They are definitely laying it on thickly. It is either a devious misdirection or the usual subtlety of the writers.

I don't know how old Adil is, but Jolene called him a young man this evening so he's younger than I thought (until this evening I assumed he was quite middle aged). Maybe he really is just an agent and not the high flying businessman I thought.

Ah yes, us pesky Welsh speakers daring to speak Welsh in our shops (just like we do at home, in school, at work or the pub). It’s almost as if it’s a real living language instead of something put on to piss off the tourists.

I relistened - OK not concert standard, but pretty good, especially Lily.

I see him as 40ish

It's just something I have experienced. People who have been speaking English changing to Welsh as they are perfectly entitled to do when a non-welsh speaker appears. I said this was what Adil was doing - as he is also perfectly entitled to do.

In fact it was more unlikely that he would have been talking to the person on the other end of the phone in English to start with.

Yessss pleeeeeease

As were first-cousin marriages; there are a fair few of those in Austen.

Kirsty and Roy have always seemed like the obvious pair to me. When did we last hear from Roy?