Archers thread #169: Denise rocks the boat in more than one way! Will Chris find a message in a cider bottle? 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 have liked to have Harrison's behbe, 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 https://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.)

Thanks to @LikeTalkingToLassie and @BrightYellowDaffodil for title inspiration. Is this the end for Denise and John? It does seem odd to introduce John now if he's going to disappear. He has a lovely voice.

Over to you!

@MeAgainAndAgain , you are welcome. I couldn't be bothered to flip over to the spoilers thread to find the actors' names.
The Erik actor has been in many TV programmes.
Both have pleasant voices.

I don't want any more Denistare SLs, so I'd be glad to see the back of the Mack-Metcalfs.

@Sidebeforeself , I like the Hannah actor's scenes too. They tend to feature pigs.

Fewer actors per week I don't mind so much, but the huge gaps between appearances really is noticeable. We seem to be stuck in a rut of a small number of characters carrying a story forwards for weeks, and then when it ends they're not heard for months. Like Helen, for example.

I'd like fewer dramatic big issue storylines and a lot more checking in on everyone.

Ah yes, Helen. Silent since late April.

Very much agree with this. The current format is just not working for me. I no longer have the same sense of Ambridge as a village of multiple interlocking characters.

It doesn’t take much for Emma to revert to being a mini-Radio Carter, does it? 🙄 She’s her mother’s daughter, all right.

As for Natasha's crazed baby-shower plans, I have flashbacks to her previous credit-card binges, only with someone else's money. But what’s with all these utterly wet doormats (looking at you, Pip) who won't tell the ridiculous Natasha to put a sock in it?

And for that matter, why won’t people tell Lynda that no, they can’t discuss the fete/show/committee right now, they're BUSY.

Is it just my imagination or are the characters' appearances much more spread out than they used to be? It's ages since we've heard from Brian, for example. And what has happened to Meg the Horse Whisperer? Much easier to lose interest when a character only pops up occasionally. I agree. In the “good old days” I remember having 6 separate conversations, and stories moved a lot slower as a result. Now they have a pattern of one serious story, one other story, often “funny”, we still have 6 conversations, but it’s now 3 of each story. And stories are over and done with just as you’re settling and enjoying their flavour.

Maybe the changing audiences. Read an article not so long ago complaining at how slow moving the original Alec Guinness Tinker Taylor was.

I'd like fewer dramatic big issue storylines and a lot more checking in on everyone. Yes!

I re-watched the original Tinker Tailor TV series recently and loved it as much as ever. I also thought the Gary Oldman film was brilliant but it left a lot of the story out and the person I saw it with was completely bemused as they hadn't read the book.

I used to love the TV adaptations of books when I was young - eg Forsyte Saga, Brideshead Revisited, and War and Peace. They were very slow and detailed by today's standards but as a result they were similar in effect to reading the book and the characters really came to life. They inspired me to read the books.

The more recent adaptations have been very much shorter and only have time to skim the surface without developing the characters sufficiently. I can't imagine any one thinking afterwards, " I absolutely must read that book".

Is it really the case that this is what people want because we all have the concentration of a goldfish now? Is there any research to show people would no longer watch or enjoy slower paced adaptations like the original Forsyte Saga or is it just assumed that is the case?

One of my best experiences in a cinema was the 6 hour long 1987 film of Little Dorrit though, so I may be unusual.

There were some excellent adaptations of Dickens for TV at one point, of which I remember Great Expectations particularly (because of Magwitch in the graveyard, which was brilliantly done). Dickens works really well on film.

It was the theory of Philip Pullman, back at the beginning of the century, that Dickens (whose first love was the stage) would have written for films if they had existed in time, or perhaps was writing for films even though they didn't, and he gave one of the introductory preambles, the description of London fog in Bleak House, as an example: "can't you just see the credits rolling over that?" he said. (I shamelessly nicked the content of the conversation for use in an essay on David Copperfield that I had to write for university, but then came all over moral and asked his permission and gave him a footnote credit.)

So, it's not all bad then!

True for you!

I think I read that they had a second home in France on the BBC Archers website a few years ago (before COVID and Brexit). Maybe because of Brexit residency issues etc. they don’t live there any more.

That would make sense. But they were always said to live in Muswell Hill before Hampshire.

Muswell Hill before Hampshire.
And death before dishonour!

Terribly sorry, don’t know what came over me. As you were.

The 🔮 hasn't had much to say recently, but it's far from certain that DenistARE will end up being a Thing.

It says Denise is far too flaky and will not Go Through With It.
Leaving Al bereft, alone and palely loitering (I said I thought that was the Lady of Shallot but the 🔮 just glared at me, muttered something about Denise being La Belle Dame Sans Merci, and switched itself off).

I don't get why Pip doesn't call herself - she's paying.

Also suspect the revving up of Emma on the throughly unpleasant and gleeful gossip front is the SWs preparing us for her eventual shame when George is brought to book.

On the voice from I want to hear Jim. I like him.

Just caught up on 3 episodes and precisely 100 posts here.

I do find myself feeling sorry for George, despite myself. Not wanting to commit to the show because he might be in clink. That was my read anyhow.

The hen do storyline is so boring. Is the whole purpose of it just to move Fallon out to the charging station?

I wonder if the Freddie bullying will stop now 😏. Loved Elizabeth’s reaction!

For me, potato salad should be dressed with a mixture of mayonnaise and salad cream, with a bit of Dijon mustard. Also chives and masses of black pepper.

Jim is pretty much the only character I do like.

If Denise meets a man with his own swimming pool (or even departs for Caribbean warm seas with John) and Paul stays in whatever other practice Lovell James assigns him to, will penitent George, recently revealed not as the budding psychopath we thought we knew but as a pony-whispering kitten-lover, get offered a job as animal wrangler by Al?

In Germany, the potato salad divide is a sort of North-South matter, though not exactly. The North tends more towards the mayonnaise style, and the South, towards the vinaigrette style. But a few things need to be pointed out about the vinaigrette, which have been left out of consideration on this thread:

1. it should be prepared the day before, since the pre-boiled potato pieces should be soaking in the vinaigrette overnight.
2. an essential component, and the bulk of the vinaigrette, is broth or stock. I usually use chicken or beef, but obviously vegetable is fine, too.
3. an excellent addition (to a bit of vinegar, but really only a small amount, as you don't want it too sour, and mustard, and herbs, and onion) is a chopped-up apple and chopped-up dill pickles.
4. obviously, one eats it with sausages or pork roast, or similar. Salmon isn't impossible, but maybe a bit weird.

I used to love the TV adaptations of books when I was young - eg Forsyte Saga, Brideshead Revisited, and War and Peace. They were very slow and detailed by today's standards but as a result they were similar in effect to reading the book and the characters really came to life. They inspired me to read the books. Don’t forget the Pallisers. And the Barchester (not Borchester) chronicles with Professor Snape playing Obadiah Slope. Trollope is easier reading if you’ve already met the characters on TV.

Also I Claudius. The way the way the first Caesar seemed so evil, but positively benign by the time you’d met later ones.

(I shamelessly nicked the content of the conversation for use in an essay on David Copperfield that I had to write for university, but then came all over moral and asked his permission and gave him a footnote credit.) You probably got more credit for your reading around than you would have done for “your” thought.

an essential component, and the bulk of the vinaigrette, is broth or stock. I usually use chicken or beef, but obviously vegetable is fine, too. So could you use miso paste as a less faffy alternative?

@Trivium4all I don't suppose you have a rough recipe for your potato salad you could share?

For me, the best recent adaptation of books for TV has to be Slow Horses.

I would assume any carb salad - pasta, potato, or rice, will have the dressing mixed in when warm, at least some hours before it is to be eaten.

I also tend to do vinaigrette with new potatoes, mayo with old potatoes - but that isn't an unbreakable rule.

In recent years I am a complete convert to using lovage as one of the fresh herbs.