Archers thread #183: The Scorekeeper's Apprentice. 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 share a hot tub with Mucky Mick, 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.)

Credit for the title goes to @TottersBlankly who suggested it and @BeatriceBatchelor who coined this lovely phrase. (It's led me to take a look at the Wikipedia page for The Sorcerer's Apprentice. I had not known before that the animation in Fantasia that goes with the Dukas symphonic tone poem is more or less unadulterated Goethe, and the story goes back to ancient times. You learn something every day.)

At the end of the last thread, there was an apocalyptic tone as we were all bemoaning the lack of continuity and farming storylines (especially lambing, which used to be a big theme at this time of year). Are there any reasons to be cheerful? (Not just Part 3 - another reference for the older listeners here. ) Over to you!

Both DH's and my cousins are funeral directors and are getting into direct cremation. So collecting and storing the body, taking it out-of-hours to the crematorium, then making the ashes available by delivery to or collection by the family. They provide a cotton body bag unless people want something more elaborate.

Nigel's mother Julia was very snobby about Elizabeth and the Archers in general, but back in the days when the SWs and the Editor could do comedy pretty well there was the glorious revelation that Julia was a greengrocer's daughter from Lewisham and her real name was Joan. https://www.bbc.co.uk/webarchive/https%3A%2F%2Fwww.bbc.co.uk%2Fblogs%2Fthearchers%2Fentries%2F695c1185-ad62-476a-b357-8a2da43b3c31

@TottersBlankly I only hope it doesn’t have an effect on her heart.

Gosh yes, 💔 that would be awful. 😢

I’m not worried about Elizabeth’s heart. The SW’s memories aren’t long enough for that to be an issue.

I don’t want them killing off any more established characters but the consequence of Elizabeth popping off in the form of Freddie having to suddenly run the estate would be interesting

I think that Elizabeth has now had the surgery necessary to install a pacemaker which will prevent her from being able to hyperventilate herself hysterically into collapse in the future, but whether they also fixed what was wrong with her heart I don't know.

Surely Elizabeth doesn't have a heart?

Freddie seems to be growing up, which I attribute to Vince. I like Freddie ... he's very much Nigel's son, but with a bit of intelligence. Not a lot, but a bit! His sister is a nasty piece of work, and it's a shame she split up with the ghastly Russ as they deserve each other.

The self-defenestration of Russ was possibly the best moment for ten years …

There are too many live/dead cast members to be written out for the SW’s to consider deading Elizabeth.

That said, they’ll probably just ignore them for a decade and hope that we forget.

I am struggling to imagine how they’ll fix the “Freddy ought to have been running LL by now”, but it gives me something inconsequential to rant about.

I adored Russ and wish he'd come back. He and Helen would be perfect together.

I think my problem is, I don’t care if Rochelle does have mental health issues.

Maybe Joy had a bad childhood and that’s why she was a bad mother. You’ve got to do your best and take responsibility. Rochelle is arguably doing a much worse job than Joy ever did. But anyway, who cares.

Just realised that Joy didn’t take the mick, she left the mick 🤣

Well Rochelle’s kids are doing better because they have a decent dad

don’t think Joy or Rochelle can challenge even Helen for single mother of the year

i dont really care about the abattoir SL because I don’t care about Vince or Rochelle. So if Vince ends up being made an idiot of and Elizabeth dumps him I can’t see why he needs to stick around

To be honest, I don't see why any of them need to stick around - and I'm not just talking about Vince, Rochelle, Joy and Mick. I'm thinking about pretty much all of them - in particular everyone at Brookfield, the bloody Snells, Adam'n'Ian, absolutely everyone remotely connected with Bridge Farm and all the Aldridges apart from Brian and Kate .And they Grundies!

I speak (write) as The Wrong Sort of Listener.

Same here.

And it was Russ who spotted Chelsea's talent and encouraged her. Brad, being particularly dim witted, got the wrong end of the stick. If Russ were still around Chelsea might be doing something to advance her career.

Begs the question - are they all redundant?

Body storage is expensive though - it was about 80% of the cost of a direct cremation a friend's dad had recently. Came down to about £1200 I think.

i don't think so. David and Brian (and Brian made a VERY good point about how they have been shirking their succession planning) were arguing one side - and Ben who works in the NHS and is younger with more friends, i would guess, with school-age children, was arguing that the tax take is needed.

Frankly i was expecting him to say "well you're leaving it all to Pip, aren't you, as the farmer in the family, why should i care?" but he didn't. (that is my understanding of family farms - at least up to now, anyway, not sure how the changes affect genuinely family farms)

As for Brian "i have no natural successor." That confirms it: Adam was washed away on a tsunami of sewage, never to be heard of again. Yaayy.

ETA: Back to Rochelle. Sure Joy neglected her. Her father neglected both of them.

I liked the succession and inheritance Chat except for Jolene joining in which just wouldn’t happen, she’d be muttering about it to herself while changing a barrel.

It felt realistic for Ben who is working in the NHS to be seeing it as a funding issue, and kind of sweet that he doesn’t feel it relates to him. Generations arguing about actual happenings in the world was quite refreshing!

I’ve realised what I find weird about Elizabeth - I picture her in Victorian times complete with big dress and lace bits. So in accordance with that I’d like the whole Vince thing (which again feels realistic, men get over interested in younger women at work all the bloody time! and of course Lizzy won’t commit to him so he may wonder where the current relationship is going) to end up in a recurrence of her heart problems and her Taking To Her Bed and attempting to run the whole estate from there. Freddie and Lily inevitably having to do more. Lily probably finding a suave estate manager boyfriend and them both trying to elbow Freddie out before eventually being given their marching orders while Elizabeth has a smelling salt or two. Eventually turning into the ailing aunt in Vanity Fair, what’s she called again.

@AllWrong I think you have it all wrong about Elizabeth

I see her as a strong festy determined character who will stand for no nonsense. She was expelled from her boarding (?) school, pulled Lower Loxley into good financial shape whilst Nigel had his schemes and geniality. She coped when Nigel died even if Freddie and drugs pulled her under. Yes she can be selfish and pig headed, she was the spoilt youngest child after all. her attitude over the inheritance of Brookfield was poor.

I like her a lot.

@AllWrong absolutely, Jolene having a rant to Tracy later or similar would have been far more believable.

Ah, @Brefugee - I was pretending I hadn’t heard that no natural successor nonsense, whilst fervently hoping another SW / the creative team will correct it.

How dare they!!! Adam laboured at Home Farm for decades. Showed leadership, brought innovative change, was always on top of wider farming issues, rose early, went to bed late. It’s utterly, utterly outrageous that they’re trying to wipe him from the records and deny him his rightful inheritance.

"well you're leaving it all to Pip, aren't you, as the farmer in the family, why should i care?" but he didn't. (that is my understanding of family farms - at least up to now, anyway, not sure how the changes affect genuinely family farms)

What tends to happen is that one child tends to gravitate towards farming but it doesn't follow in law or practice that 1 child gets everything.

Under present rules APR and BPR gives 100% relief on farms and businesses provided the assets are used for a business. This will reduce to the first £1m and then there is a 50% relief above that. For prime value land in certain parts of Scotland £1,000,000 might be less than 60 acres. 60 acres isn't a viable farm- you'd be looking for at least 150 -200 acres and on top of that stock,
equipment and the farm house needs to be added. There is unlikely to be cash sufficient to pay an IHT bill, unless land is sold.

Gosh, it all seems very complicated and not well thought out. Thanks for the explanation

Maybe Brian by saying "natural successor" he meant" of the blood". Of course he would never have dared to say that if Jenny were alive, but Adam and Debbie aren't his biological children. Debbie is never coming back from Hungary or wherever she is and he's always had a fraught relationship with Adam.
Will be interesting to see what does happen when he pops his clogs but seeing how the SW deal with actors dying these days( Peggy and Roy), Brian will probably live till he's 150 so they don't need to deal with it at the moment.
I do wonder why they don't now make the characters die when the actors do, they had to do it with Phil archer and Sid perks, it would have been straightforward to have Peggy die, and a fatal accident could have befallen Roy abroad, there's no purpose in keeping them alive.