Archers thread #177: Will Bridge Farm get a PassiveAggressivHaus? 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 love to have a moribund camper van parked indefinitely outside your home, 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.)

Over to you!

One deluded listener apparently said she had enjoyed the week and found it "heartwarming" but she sounded very much like a lone voice.

Very likely a scriptwriter. 😅

Or the sw mum

PatChaunceysFruitCake
In the meantime sort of enforcement notice on the camper van will do

Only if Emma and and Ed receive the bill for the back-tax they owe for living in their van since April 2020, and apply for planning permission for it to be there at all.

@AskingQuestionsAllTheTime oh yes! I actually have decent professional experience in this stuff 😳 Although it doesn't have to be Emma that reports him.

I will settle for some kind of Karma for Mick. But not at Joy's expense- who is basically kind.

Meh, Joy has a dark side. She’s one of those too nice people that I don’t trust

I have flitted about with this one and sometimes think it might be something that could make me feel very sorry for Joy, especially as she seems nice enough.

After tonight's episode though I am assuming it is something that casts her in a bad light. They've let it brew for a while now so it had better be suitably shocking.

I must admit, I was a bit surprised that Joy thought it was ok for Mick to keep his complaint going. I expected her to have wiser words.

Is that how it ended? She was talking about the need for forgiveness.

Have I missed something as it only seems to be Emma getting all the flack for covering for George when it was Will too?

I totally agree.
I find Joy a bit of a nosy parker and Mick gives me the creeps.
Also why is Robert always calling Lynda Lyndy to everyone, I thought he only used to call her that as a pet name, now he uses it to everyone he speaks to.
The podcast is crap and Ive stopped listerning to it because its only want they want you to hear, how wonderful and soooooo well written perleeeese!!!.
I was watching an art critic on You Tube, he was telling me about the hidden meaning in the old masters paintings which is really interesting. Anyway he mentioned TA, and I thought it was funny that everybody would know about TA, how famous it is and what a shame it has got so bad now.

I think it’s called misogyny

they have got that right at least!

Is that how it ended? She was talking about the need for forgiveness.

Yes alongside kicking Emma while she's down. It's petty. But parish Councils are rife with this stuff.

The 'Lindy' thing was really bugging me too

I haven't liked Mick since he spontaneously provided a cover for Alistair and Denise's presence on the night of the accident. Why would he rush in, unasked, to cover up adultery by two people he didn't know?

And everything suggests he is grubby and scruffy and completely tone deaf in social situations (for example, at Grey Gables), none of which are attractive qualities in a man as far as I am concerned. And his apparent lifelong desire to be Father Christmas is a further massive turn off.

There is also the problem that his personality seems to be different every time he speaks. I have no idea who he is because the SWs don't seem to have agreed on a consistent personality for him. If he disappeared in his camper van tomorrow I couldn't care less.

And on the subject of people disappearing, where are Alistair and Denise? I never thought I'd say I miss them, but their prolonged absence is just another example of the current lack of continuity in the writing. Instead of regular appearances by established characters like A&D we had to put up with the total drivel about Chuck, Faith, Elle and Joel.

I think it is only my obsessive desire to know the truth about Rochelle that keeps me listening. I have lost any respect for myself really.

Mick has an interesting take on integrity. He was happy to cover up for Alastair and Denise but reported Emma!

Going back to the misogyny point

he covered for Alastair because why shouldn’t a chap have a bit of nookie with a married woman

I bet Mucky Mick has his own dark side.

Probably misguided of me, but I'd always assumed Rochelle was made up to cover for some serious lack in Joy's life, like being made to give up her child as an unmarried mother. More interesting if Joy dedded her, either accidentally or (horrors!) deliberately.

He also felt he owed Alistair something for helping rescue his dripping doxy.
I too reckon Alistair is owed something for his part in Joy’s retrieval - possibly a good hard slap.

My problem with Mick is that he’s a comedy character and thus fundamentally not believable as a real person. That’s the result when you give someone storylines around ‘hilarious' situations like not having any trousers when someone knocks on the door (oo-er Vicar), or they have a clapped-out old camper-van (comedy gold), or they can’t do the voice for Father Christmas (oh, my aching sides).

He's the ageing Robin Askwith of Ambridge who's somehow accidentally strayed in from 'Confessions of a Window Cleaner', or similar. And I therefore also can’t believe in his relationship with Joy, who while annoying in her own way, does come across as being grounded in reality.

Too much crappy. lazy writing. Too many abrupt personality changes and/or people acting in utterly unrealistic ways.

Why can't Zainab do a modular degree (abroad?)?

I think modular degrees are great for those that can't decide on a single subject for Uni. I'm not sure the UK universities offer them. Wish they had done in my time in the earlies 80s. Maybe I wouldn't have dropped out of university before the 1st year was out.

My nephew took a modular degree at Utrecht university before bl**Dy Brexit. It was free as well so his parents were delighted after having paid for private education up to that point. He loved not having to specialise. He's now working for the Foreign Office.

Agreed on the Lyndy thing @Nettleteaser101 . They need to stop that immediately.

Partly. But it's also another example of disappearing characters. We have no idea what flak Will is getting because Will has vanished. Does he never get harrangued by anyone at the school gates? Is he now back working with Adam (who has also gone silent, along with the lingering questions over Alice's recovery)? How are Chris and Emma getting on? I guess we'll never know.

Godesstobe
I haven't liked Mick since he spontaneously provided a cover for Alistair and Denise's presence on the night of the accident. Why would he rush in, unasked, to cover up adultery by two people he didn't know?

Because as far as he could tell, they had just helped save the lives of the two passengers in the car he'd been driving when it was pushed off the road into a river, perhaps?

I think they had not at that point dtd (they were on their way to do so) and so he wasn't covering up adultery anyway.

It’s all very unsatisfactory. The SWs have created something that they actually cannot sustain. Too many characters, too many hanging threads. EastEnders in its glory days was an excellent example of how to write a soap. They would never have wasted a week of airtime on something as banal and pointless as Chuck and Faith- unless Eddie was going to have an affair with Faith. That’s what it needed- a reason to make their appearance relevant and current- highlighting, for instance, cracks in the Clarrie/Eddie marriage. Instead we had a dead turkey implausibly lying around in the pantry at the end of November! Such a waste…