Archers thread #164: AmbridgEnders! An Everyday Story of Soapy Folk. 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, and of course we are always delighted to welcome back former or occasional listeners/posters. 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 like to have your fortune told by Bartleby, 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.)

Thread thrown together in great haste in advance of tonight's episode. Who's in the Am? Is it George's fault? Is this the end for Alice? Over to you!

Agreed. The spoilers thread is pretty active at the moment, for obvious reasons!

Going back to the voice notes - if you delete a WhatsApp message it gets replaced by a little box saying something like 'This message deleted by the user'. Does that happen with a voice note? George would be able to explain that away really easily, though. This is going to bring a lot of stuff back up for Will, given Nic's deathbed confession to running over Matt Crawford.

But Will helped her cover it up so he knew before the confession

god I hated that sl and denouement

That's right. I didn't care for it either. Did she confess (implausibly) to Joe Grundy just before she died? And then he found out that Will knew all about it? Ludicrous.

Just wondered why, if A and D were going to have a night of unbridled passion, why did they have 3 course meal before hand. To be fair they are not a young couple and nerves surely would play a big part in it. Like Denise worrying about Alistair seeing her in the nip as only her DH John would have been the only one for years. I can understand a drink but a big meal I would think you would more likely what to sleep rather than bonky bonk. Perhaps thats just me!.
Also I would have done the same as George, Alice could have been driving whilst drunk she has before, so nobody is going to believe her when she says it wasnt her.

I meant if I was George.
Not in real life of course.

Nah. Rob would have used finding Alice drunk in a car as a way to blackmail her in order to benefit him in some way.

I do hope that the police investigators find Brookfield mud on the road, that contributed to the accident.

Where was Alice when she pulled over for a drink? I don't understand why you would sit in a car to drink (expecting to get drunk so you've put the keys away). It would take hours to sober up. Back at Home Farm, Alice would just encounter a couple of holiday makers and the Gills.

George's socials will be his undoing.

Please, please can we find out about Rochelle this week. Mick will want to contact Joy's next of kin..... will there be any?

I assume at least one of A&D had not been drinking, because I don't think either of them would drink-drive. And I think it's more likely than not that the other one would also not drink, in solidarity. They were in Alistair's car so I presume he was driving. I didn't think their first aid skills were awful (unlike their lovey-dovey whispers), it was more the shock of the situation.

I've done some basic medical training and now keep up to date with first aid training, and I don't think I'd be any better than a complete layperson at knowing what to do with a semi-submerged car. I'd be better at knowing how to treat people once rescued, but the decisions around who should go to whom, how to deal with people who may also have injuries but won't stay out of the way and wait quietly, how much danger to put oneself in to rescue others etc. - my training didn't cover any of that and I'd just have to deal with it as best I could, as any non- specialist would.

On another note, I think A&D's cover need not be blown, if they keep their wits about them and agree on a plausible excuse for being together (Denise was stood up by her friend, Alistair was in the bar of the restaurant after a failed date, Denise invited her work friend to join her for dinner rather than waste the evening, Alistair was driving her to her hotel before going home himself). However, Denise really needs to tone down the doe-eyed admiration for that to work. I'm not a fan of their relationship (I take a particularly hard-line view of adultery in general), but if they're going to do it then they do need to learn to lie convincingly! Or maybe this event will be the shock that makes one of them (my money would be on Alistair) realise it's all wrong and try to back out, while the other one is still keen.

@PatChaunceysFruitCake George has the hots for Fallon hasn't he ?
Thats why he was so distraught, and went in to rescue her.

There's many a jest spoken in true words.

The tyre-squeal in the A & D scene was Alistair braking abruptly because he’d spotted the underwater headlights - Denise made a kind of 'reacting to a sudden stop' sound.
No idea how much time had elapsed between the car going into the water and them happening to pass, but George was only just on the phone to emergency services, so presumably not that long?

Yes George has a thing for Fallon. He jumped at the chance to help her out in tea room recently and it definitely wasn't just for the money. I have wondered for a while if it has the potential to turn into more of an obsession.

Thanks for the Telegraph link, TottersBlanklyOnTheEdge. <a href="<a class="break-all" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20240506182803/www.telegraph.co.uk/radio/what-to-listen-to/the-archers-hollie-chapman-interview/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://web.archive.org/web/20240506182803/www.telegraph.co.uk/radio/what-to-listen-to/the-archers-hollie-chapman-interview/">Here</a> is an archive link for people who don't want to subscribe.

Edited to try to sort link. Edited again. - that is a mess but hopefully people can pick out the link if they want to.

Could George’s phone have dropped into the Am during the rescue, meaning he won’t be able to delete any messages? My young adults always have their phones easily accessible, so not secure, unlike mine which is usually at the bottom of my handbag. He phoned the emergency services before jumping in, so I imagine it was just shoved into a pocket.

Hats off to @TottersBlanklyOnTheEdge for predicting Fallon might be in the car. George is a psychopath - he would have been happy to leave whoever was in the car to take their chances, he only sprang into action once he realised Fallon was in there. If Alistair and Denise hadn't turned up when they did he would have spent the time waiting for the emergency services shifting Alice into the driver's seat (and then more than likely legged it). As it is, their arrival has made it more difficult to cover up his involvement. There will be a lot of clues that Alice was not driving - where was her car for a start? If she was unconscious, surely it would have been immediately visible on the bridge where she lost control not neatly parked to one side where George could heave her body into the driver's seat unseen. Then as PPs have pointed out, there would be vomit in the passenger footwell, lots of river water on Alice and in the car not to mention the fingerprints in the glovebox should the BBC Wales team of detectives be on the case. The voice message to Will will not be without significance - otherwise why make it? It also makes sense of the conversation between Will and George about phones and all the convoluted Bartleby social media stuff emphasising the capabilities of George's phone. It's like an episode of Silent Witness. I also like @OutOfTheHouse's suggestion that Alice may also have taken an overdose - so tests will show she would have been completely incapable of driving. Maybe we're all focussing on the victims in the river, but Alice is the one who is really in danger.

I would have thought with that quantity of alcohol she is going to have to have her stomach pumped? I guess she vomited

Oh, apologies @reallyalurker - I assumed my link made the article free to view for anyone clicking. (Hmph! Even more reason to end my sub swiftly.)

I am loving all the thinking around George! So Bartleby was just a red herring - it was all about his social media and his new phone, which together will hang him?

(I recall an extremely unpleasant real life crime a couple of years or so ago, where the perpetrator claimed he had been tied up at home by burglars - but his phone tracker showed he had actually been moving around his house, attacking or murdering someone.)

So Eddie made enough money that half paid for dinner at grey gables and a fancy new phone?

I think the big question we're all missing here is what will be the future of the Ultimate Arboriculturists if they have to abandon their course to sort out George's mess? Will no one think of poor benighted Emma?! 😂(I do think she was mentioned by someone upthread or on the last thread, just thought I'd go a bit melodramatic on it).

I'd say a police cell would be the safest place for Alice once her ex-SIL finds out how and why George got involved in this.

Just please, SWs, spare us months of half truths. Let it come out relatively quickly that George was in the driving seat and the rest can unravel from there.

I don’t believe Fallon can have been in any real danger. If it was deep enough to submerge the car (just how mighty is the wretched Am these days? It seems to have grown rather), she’d have been drowning between Joy being hauled out and George getting the other door open.
Agree with @LillianGish that anyone but Fallon would have been on their own. Does he imagine there’s the chance of a gratitude shag?

If you google Holly Chapman interview Daily Telegraph the article comes up and you can read it without subscribing.

The overdose thing sounds nasty.

If paracetamol she might wake up from her hangover with liver failure in a couple of days. I think I saw that lead to death once on Causality about thirty years ago - but have come across a similar event in real life.

I hadn’t forgotten the tree surgery, @Fink! But can’t recall if I mentioned the potentially lost investment here or on the other thread.

I wonder if Ed and Emma took out insurance on the course, in case of illness or disaster?

Is Will likely to change his mind about helping them if he has to concentrate, morally and financially, on his bad son?

That interview with Holly Chapman is good, doesn't spoil anything but does show her off as an actor with an intelligent interest in her character and the character's situation, and explains why and how she has been so good at getting the awfulness of Alice across to us.

on a different subject

Why are people talking about putting the keys in the glovebox as some kind of proof Alice couldn't then get them out again and drive off? I'd have thought keys in the glovebox were no more safe that the same keys in her pocket or her bag - and that it was only chosen as a location for them so that George could access them without either groping A or rummaging through her credit cards.