Archers thread #164: AmbridgEnders! An Everyday Story of Soapy Folk. Discuss The Archers here.

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

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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!

It does raise hope for a situation like one in a village I worked in many years ago. A new drainage system was being put in and someone removed the guard rails from one of the holes. Late one evening a car drove in, containing a couple, each one married to some else. They weren't injured. I think even the car wasn't badly damaged. But they were the cause of considerable entertainment.

Yes, that’s my point. George was going out to a party. Unless he’d told his dad he was staying over, he’d have already told him not to lock up. Heks now left the party early but is taking Alice home. No change in expected arrivel time. No need to make that phone call other than a) to remind us he’d been drinking b) make it hard to pretend later that he wasn’t involved in the accident. He didn’t need to tell Will he’d be late back and not to lock up. Will already knew that

I assumed George was planning to stay over at the house party /crash on the sofa (as I did plenty of times) so originally told will he wouldn't be home that night

Also does George have his own car and own insurance (as in not just on his parents?)... that's going to be costly, or if not his own ins would he have 3rd party cover to drive other card or is that only if insurance is in your name? (Not an insurance expert just asking) x

That wouldn’t be enough to get a new identity. She’d have to have staged a fake kidnapping.

Or why someone from NE England would settle so far away in Ambridge? Wouldn’t be unknown. See Ruth.

Apologies to you all, I’m catching up with three pages of posts so you’re hearing rather a lot of me

I think George will leave the scene - he is a practised liar that doesn’t face his actions. Remember the LL damage.

My guess is that it’s Joy and Fallon and that Fallon is hurt but undiscovered for ages. Harrison will eventually discover George’s involvement and go nuts losing his job for ever.

Here are maps from my 1990 BBC Archers Book (darker green background) and 1994 BBC Archers Book (lighter green). The maps are not in the same orientation and Ambridge appears to have shifted a bit... Nevertheless, the Am does appear to be fairly substantial.

This was what I thought the point of the phone call was. Party not as good as George thought, so would unexpectedly come home earlier, rather than the next day.

ETA - would expect you’d need fully comp insurance for that clause. And I wouldn’t expect him to have a car or that. Although has he given Henry a lift in the past before all the messaging-the-step-dad business? Paging @AskingQuestionsAllTheTime

Yes, you did. The synopsis on Sounds apparently calls it “the sound of running water”

re car locks and accidents
I looked into this a while back as a friend had an escaped convict try and get into her car while she was driving in a country lane 😮he failed
apparently carlocks are automatically disabled by sudden impacts so in an accident etc you wouldnt be locked in
also the emergency services can easily open a locked car they say

I didn’t mean she had an official new identity but has given herself one. Choosing the name Joy on purpose

161 posts in under 15 hours. Wow. This thread won't last long at this rate! This will throw @DadDadDad's stats into utter confusion. (Good to see you here!)

The only reason for George's call was to give Will a moral dilemma when he realises that George fled the scene.

This is why the 🔮 referenced Chappaquiddick.

But who was in the other car and who will find them?

Irrelevant but I’ve always found “Lakey Hill” a funny name as it’s the one thing it’s very unlikely to be, what with gravity.

I still think Alice fell out of the car and then the car went into the river with George in it. Partly because why else have signs of George being a decent human taking his parents out on Friday if they don’t want us to care about his survival? Mind you having listened again it did sound like it could also be that George crashed then the other car went into the river while George watched helplessly. Horrible either way.

I’m pretty sure it was Saturday as Alice said she’d come home “yesterday”. And would make sense for Brian to come round the next day rather than two days later. Brian was majestic as ever.

George going to a party and expecting he might be very late/ staying over makes sense on a Saturday than a Sunday. (Although Ambridge has form for having parties on odd days)

I have been running through previous Archers RTAs - of which there are many - in my mind. Is there any likelihood that the scripties will remember / reference Emma's car accident and the associated memories this one will inevitably dredge up for her?

Slightly off-topic, but I was amazed to realise that it was thirty years in February since Mark Hebden was killed. I feel so old 😱

I think Alice will be ok in the end and will be put back in rehab, but George will be blamed and the Archer/Grundy feud will be refuelled for another generation.

She always comes up smelling of roses!

im hoping george shows he’s decent deep down and calls the police and tries to rescue the people in the other car. I suspect he’ll leg it though

i liked last nights episode and I really hope they don’t screw it all up by jumping the shark

How is all this going to impact Ed and Emma and their tree surgery course? And Emma’s GCSE? All the time and money already invested in both.

Why can’t they ever have nice things ???

Having now Googled the Chappaquiddick reference (never heard of that before!) and thought about it more, including George calling Will. I think the other car went in and George will move Alice to the driver's seat and do a runner. If they were in the water this wouldn't be possible and also the other driver/passenger would be a witness. This scenario also means the occupant(s) of the other car are fairly badly hurt/dead or they'd still be witnesses. George would have to think there wouldn't be any witnesses.

Or the Will call was a red herring!

Maybe they've drowned Marky!

It's a Bank Holiday today, which makes having a party on a Sunday a bit more likely, perhaps.

Have we all heard the new Doom Promo?

I’m sure Alastair referenced the maypole dancing earlier in the day? Which would make it Sunday?

Oooh no, when was that on?

New as in not Alice pondering? A second trailer?

No, if so.