Archers thread #186: Eavesdropping on a home for the terminally confused. 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 swipe right on Dane, the new Grey Gables manager, 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/radioaddicts/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/radioaddicts/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 @WitcheryDivine for the title inspiration. Over to you!

It is odd. I like Joy but I'm also puzzled by the use of the cast over the last few months.

Ruth, Will and Denise haven't been heard for months. Alasdair and Jim have had inconsequential bit parts, and few of them. Ian, Adam and Oliver who should have appeared during sewagegate only returned to usher in the Great Dane.

The Snell and Malik fest was tedious

Whilst Ian is clearly a good judge of character when it comes to Dane - what the nuts was he thinking having Adam there

so they were laughing uproariously when we had the alice and Adam scene but not much mirth when we went to them

well Dane hasn’t grown on me

do you think Peggy’s accountant has stolen the inheritance!!!

Perhaps Crispin the Vicar has charmed Peggy into leaving him all the money?

Maybe he will show up driving a Ferrari and covered in bling

I wish the Dane actor would sort out his accent. He was all wide boy and cheeky chappie when he first arrived in Ambridge, but there was a distinct southern middle-class tone when he met Helen followed by random estuary and some flat northern vowels.

Ditto. Definite change of accent. Which, you know, for a radio programme...

The Great Dane was a lot better tonight.

Do you think Peggy has left the bulk of her estate to fund something else in her honour - we've had the stained glass, the rewilding perhaps another woodland area or has she been left with not much after funding her and Christine at The Laurels ?

I don't think Dane understands how Ambridge works yet, that everyone knows everyone and in about 90% of the cases are related to each other and/or work together.

I was astonished Joy wasn’t either invited to join Alice and Adam for dinner tonight or sitting at the bar waiting for Mucky to finish his shift, shouting you-hoo to Helen across the restaurant. A wasted opportunity to crowbar her into yet another scene…

I agree that the GD needs to sort out his accent. On Monday he was proudly hamming up being the son of a window cleaner and tonight he was almost unrecognisable. Helen has displayed terrible taste in men to date so we can only assume he is going to be sticking around for a bit.

Justin will always be James Bellamy to me.

Is Harrison going to come back or will some dreadful calamity happen that prevents him from speaking on air at his party?

I was confused there, because James Bellamy is Lilian's son.

At the beginning I thought Alice was Lily

And agree Dane’s accent made him u recognisable. Although I do wonder if he is a manipulator and that was a sign

wonder how the cheeky chappy act went down in New York

I can't wait for Helen to decide she's ready to rehire Clarrie, and Clarrie turning her down

Interesting thank you, is that comparable to anybody else? As I said, I don’t actually dislike her, it’s just she’s in so many storylines! She’s even in storylines that are not her storylines.

Just catching up on tonight's episode - after allHelen has been through I can't believe how quickly she has gone back into dating again and said meeting with Dane and as to inviting him to the 40th party- shes a quick worker !

Apart from the daft bit where Ian ordered Adam to go and check on Helen, I enjoyed tonight's episode. That's two in a row - come on SW, let's go for a hat trick!

It’s so nice hearing a few of the old voices for sure. And some of the other locations.

Dane sounds like he should be in The Brittas Empire or at the very least a high street estate agent that drives something like a Vauxhall Tigra soft top.

Quite a lot of Joy's appearances involve chatting in Ye Little Shoppe of Horrors, which is at least realistic. Maybe she'll feature less when everyone decamps to the charging-station shop, surely destined to become the Harrods Food Hall of Borsetshire.

Why is the Today programme about to feature the ‘very first, pilot episode’ of TA?

It’ll be just before 9.am. The presenter sounded cheerful about it, but the anniversary isn’t until next year, so this must be to soften us up for something. The advent of TA being renamed ‘Beechwood - An Everyday Story of Incomers’?

Is it another plug for the podcast

I was going to argue ‘not that quick, she kicked Lee out 18 months ago’ but I checked. It speaks volumes for Lee’s lack of personality that in fact he was around until this January.
But Helen being a quick worker is fair comment: remember the beeline she made for Rob? Like some sort of sex-starved Exocet.

They didn't specify how much she left to the rewilding to fund an art work. Maybe that was all that was left.

Fingers crossed for Crispin the thieving vicar.

"Joy in the village"

But she wasn't heartbroken about Lee going, so she'd got over him before he actually went.