The Halcyon

[dingit]

Anyone watching? Loving it so far.

No clawdy, I was a bit too confident in my prediction of the girl's death wasn't I? 😂

I was of course delighted to see her emerge from the rubble.

And totally agree about Freddy and Emma. I can tell that the writers want us to feel stirred by their Very Great Love, but I'm more interested in the concoctions the pastry chefs come up with. 🍰🎂

Just an afterthought but which chef worth his salt would still be decorating the wedding cake during the wedding reception?

I didn't get the change your name thing? I mean it dosnt say they both went awol after he was shot and they would gone back to fighting and if his body was food presume just killed. Think forgect ww1 and then ww2 was very close for some people even having fight twice.

They said that they would have to get back (to England) and start new lives. They would have been presumed dead. Whilst Garland has done well the other guy hasn't, and is looking for help.
That's how I saw it anyway.

Did anyone else cry at tonight's episode? Started when she was grief-stricken in the yard and the orange in the laundry store completely finished me off.

Nearly! Poor woman nearly lost daughter then son killed. It's grown on me a lot though singer woman is annoying. Who sings in middle
Of bombing stupid cow!

I was sobbing!

Shouting at the tv when they were. Icing that cake. How much notice did the have for that wedding that they outdoor not do the basics.

Interesting development involving Mr D'Abberville. I couldn't help laughing however, because he went off to Germany when he was Edith's chap in Downton and disappeared only to re-emerge approximately 17 years later (timewise) in the Halcyon - I won't speculate what he might have been doing but the whole thing rather stupidly fits despite the fact they are unrelated dramas!

Otherwise, I can't think of much to say about that episode although I did feel the mother's pain of her loss even though we really didn't know very much about her son. I don't know much about the WVS but I was a bit surprised that Emma would be out in the middle of air raids with Fire engines. I thought it was their job to dole out tea and sandwiches to bombed out victims when the all clear rang not stand around while the bombs dropped. Hopefully, that is a true fact and not a story invention?

Anyone still watching this? I'm looking forward to tonight's episode!

Yes I'll be there to the bitter end but I have to say I've found it disappointing. I think there have been too many characters with too many vague story lines that don't really lead anywhere and it's difficult to get engrossed in any of it. I think it had potential but probably needed to know it was going to have at least three series so that they could really have worked with the characters and developed some decent running story lines. I wanted to care about these people but I just didn't.

Anyway, if we all remember rightly in the first episode there was a flash forward to the 50th anniversary party so we can guess what's coming. Anyone think this is going to go the way of 'Home Fires'?

I'm still in, quite enjoying it although I agree about the vague storylines that go nowhere sometimes. I love the monochrome Liberty print wallpaper in ugly Toby's room

That was a very gripping last episode. Good old Mr. Garland! And that final scene really got to me....that so-beautiful old song : "And as you turned and smiled at me...." I am getting weepy again! Loved it.

Poor Betsy..
A hint of love in Heaven though....

last two weeks have been the best ones I think

I agree that it was probably the best episode of the eight as there was actually some pace and tension to it but it just makes the rest of the series seem even more odd. For example, the only point of Mr Garland's mystery background seemed to be giving Mr D'Abberville a reason to call his bluff when he threatened him and making us believe he would cover up a murder. Finding the refugee chef's family was pretty easy after all the apparent difficulty at the start of the series. As for Freddy, O'Hara and Emma who knows what happened or was the outcome of their love triangle and who cares - for some reason I've also found Emma's lipstick very off putting for about five episodes like a big 'don't touch me' sign .

I don't consider myself a hardhearted person but it still left me a bit cold at the end - oh and when they evacuated the hotel during an air-raid there was strangely no sound of any aeroplanes in the sky.

Of all of them I have to admit however that Betsey was the one with a bit of warmth about her and I did quite like Peggy too.

All in all however, I feel as if someone should have taken the whole series and re-written/edited it and probably axed a few characters and they might have come up with something better. Sorry, I'm just very hard to please it seems

I thought tonight's was good, especially the last scene, but was the explosion because of the gassing or a bomb in the air raid that suddenly disappeared?

To start with I thought the explosion was going to be caused by Toby's boyfriends attempt to gas himself but after the explosion Toby went back and rescued him, so I suppose it was a bomb but the fact that it dropped literally a minute after the air raid warning went means the air raid warning system that night was pretty rubbish! I'm over-thinking this aren't I?

When did rationing start?
My mother told me that wedding cakes were usually one tier due to rationing, they family would contribute food coupons for the ingredients.
The other two tiers were an iced cardboard shell. Made to look like a wedding

So who do we think died?

Betsey, obviously, but I wondered if the Sonny & the tall porter she was talking to had also died?

It was annoying though, wasn't it?

I was hoping that Toby would just have pointed the finger at D'aberville when he first threatened him.

Also, was Garland hoping to just burn the room & the body with it?

Why not call the police & say that it was self defence?

Or why not let the secret service in to find him with incriminating evidence & the assumption that who ever he was working for had killed him?

Thinkingblonde rationing of some basic foods like butter and sugar started early in 1940 but it progressively covered other items especially imported goods which became more scarce. I think somewhere like The Halcyon in 1940 would still have been able to get hold of luxury items but it would have become more difficult as time went on and people did have the sort of cakes your mum mentioned - cardboard tiers for show with one small cake probably made with pooled ration coupons.

diddl yes so many unanswered and baffling questions left over not that I think we necessarily need another series to answer them In fact the way it all ended with lots of drama and pace made me wonder if I had misunderstood the point of the series altogether. It started out something akin to a new 'Downton' or 'Upstairs Downstairs' (the most recent version) and by the end I wondered if it was supposed to be a thriller and I'd missed the point.

The Unity Mitford character at the beginning - Charity - was quite interesting and I assumed she'd reappear in conjunction with similarly pro-German Lucien. I'd have liked more politics I think, and far less Emma with her tedious love life/home front stuff.

The Freddie actor wasn't particularly dashing, and had very little gravitas for someone who grew up knowing he was destined to be a Lord.

Peggy was brilliant. In fact, all of the downstairs characters were good. That scene with the orange :-(

If they film another series, I'd like a bit more grit, and far less Emma and Freddie. Betsey's interracial relationship deserves more attention. An affair between Garland and Peggy would be interesting. Lots of potential.

O'Hara far better then dull, serious Freddie.