Archers thread #202: How are you finding your visits to Ambridge? Fill in your feedback forms 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 think working as a hotel receptionist is a perfectly reasonable career choice for a graduate from a family with a stately 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-12-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!

There is nothing weird about having a fire extinguisher in the kitchen.

Thassorl.

Team Harrison. If he's made to walk the plank from The Bull, I hope he will insist on getting a room back in the house he's paying towards!

Usually lurk while sharing the general disenchantment with TA and its writers over recent months/ years but have to say that two handed scene was extremely well acted.

Excellent.

That was really well done. And so uncomfortable. I remain Team Fallon.

I don’t think so, @LaMarschallin.

In my memory, Sid revealing his affair with Jolene to his then wife Kathy was a two hander - but it’s quite possible it was interspersed with other dialogues I’ve forgotten. Noooooo - Ignore that! It was Sid incandescent with fury after Kathy had an affair with A Policeman. 😂

There have definitely been others. (That I cannot immediately think of.)

David and Ruth - after Sam? (Maybe not?)

One of the Siobhan fallout conversations at Home Farm? Again I could be making that up.

Affairs tend to produce that sort of episode …

Thanks, TottersBlankly
I've got some huge gaps in my listening history so that was really helpful 😊

Team Fallon.

But it’s all speculation! 😂 I’ve forgotten more than I’ve ever listened to across 60 odd years. (With gaps.)

It is generally assumed that Brian and Debbie when Debbie had uncovered his affair with Siobhán was a two hander, but the episode actually started with Jennifer and Alice wondering where Brian had got to that meant he had stayed out so late.

Mike and Vicky was a two-hander when they were discussing the fact that Vicky's baby had Downes.

More recently, George and Emma had one on 2nd August, 2024, the day he landed her with his guilt about having nearly caused Fallon's death.

Mike and Vicky was a two-hander when they were discussing the fact that Vicky's baby had Downes Down's Syndrome.

Excellent episode. Well written, beautifully paced. Top acting by both.

Team Harrison.

Fallon was so manipulative at the beginning of the discussion - she just wants him to carry on paying most of the mortgage and rent at The Bull.

And I do wish she'd stop doing that Nicola Walker style stammmering.

Team Harrison too. Fallon is indeed being very manipulative about the house and he was quite right to tell her that whether and who he dates is none of her business. In a way I wish he hadn't changed his mind about telling her, but I suppose there was some merit in getting it over with.

Team Harrison

It was Sid incandescent with fury after Kathy had an affair with A Policeman. 😂

Dave Barry.

he was quite right to tell her that whether and who he dates is none of her business

If my relationship ended and then a couple of weeks later my ex was already dating somebody new, then I’d feel hurt and want to know who she was too !

Team Fallon

I think so too, but it's still none of her business.

Of course the whole issue has become clouded by the should-we sit-down-and-talk-about-it-instead-of-Harrison-going-his-date malarkey.

So I think Fallon is out of order.
Harrison has given her everything, even when they were together he went along with not having kids, even though he really wanted them. She didn't tell him she didnt want any until they were married. He has been very supported with her job issues. When he wanted to go part time she begrudgingly went along with it. Their whole relationship has been Harrison comprising for her, even their living arrangements now.
I dont know why on earth he moved out instead of her.
Im glad Fallon knows now that Harrison has someone else and she isn't the be all of everything. Im Sorry Harrison asked her to start again, because if she gets in a row with Lily she will use that.
Fallon is a spoilt madam and always has been.
Grow a pair Harrison and tell her she has to leave the home because you ain't paying over the odds for her anymore.

Fallon: “I want to know who it is!”
Fallon: “Why did you tell me who it is!”
I don’t like Harrison’s weakness in all this but Fallon is being really annoying.

Team Harrison.
However, I think it was a mistake to tell Fallon it was Lily.

I dislike them both but don’t think I have a team - think it’s all very realistic.

Realistic Fallon would want to know. Realistic that it’s none of her business. I can’t be bothered to listen back but pretty sure she ended things. She also doesn’t want to try again. She thought they could both have a long period of hand wring, hold each other and live in stasis without facing any of the huge admin and life changing (domestic arrangement shattering) consequences that come with it. The reality that Harrison is able to get on and is desirable to other women, not hanging around fawning after her is quite the blow. Yes it’s fast - but she doesn’t really have a leg to stand on criticising Harrison for enjoying the single life she’s forced him into. Yes it must be frustrating that it’s breached the sanctity of her new career.

Hopefully this will expedite the division of the cottage etc.

I’ll be donning my battle helmet when Jolene finds out though. Harrison needs to go home.

Fallon was quite happy living alone, which is presumably why she called a halt to the marriage. Harrison is more keen on human contact. Maybe they'll continue to an amicable divorce, maybe they'll talk things through and find a way to get back together, but whatever happens I want Lily blamed, shamed, vilified, and shunned, not because she's done anything very wrong, just because I loathe her.

She's her mother's daughter.

Team Harrison here too. Fallon was way out of order. I thought Harrison was handling her very well, but she pushed and pushed and pushed. It was none of her business and he should have told her that much earlier.

What a great episode. I'm fairly neutral and think they're both a bit in the wrong and both justifiably hurt, much like real life But it was very well done, up to and including Harrison's scaled back accent.

Catching up with the last few days, I have great sympathy for Anna, coping with a mother who needs help but won't accept it, who then does wildly eccentric things and requests help. Don't wake your child up with a 6.30am phone call asking them to bring you a shoebox! Quite close to home for me, as with many of us on the thread, which probably means the SW are doing a good job.

I don't mind Khalil but I care not a jot about Keira; it feels as though she's been shoehorned in for a long-running storyline about some kind of Important Issue, but because I don't really know her, I don't really care.

Most importantly @LillianGish, "the penguin that slides the farthest" is amazing! Please share how you say that in French.