LUDWIG : the Spoilers thread !

[the80sweregreat]

BBC one Wednesday's 9pm
It is on I player , NO spoilers allowed on the other thread.

I've finished episode three which was similar ( ish ) to episode two.
Love this and I hope it's resolved as wondering what has become of James and the one who was working with him.
David Mitchell is very good.
Thought I'd start a spoiler thread but can't do the links for it.
Put the word out ..

Loved it too but there were a few holes in it. Crushing on David now

@BlueRaincoat1 yes if they were threatening to harm him why didn't they threaten John thinking it was James? Didn't get that bit either.. and why was James watching them at the end? Come on series 2!

Dh said that he must have gone into the lock up area office to fetch a key , although it looked very late and nobody would have been there ?
Plus every seventh word of the bird books sentences spelt out an address of somewhere that's been there a long time too ? That was skimmed over a lot and very convenient ( although I do need to watch the last episode again really!)

Not threatening John was strange
Nice to see Sophie Willan as the computer geek. The scene with her flicking back and forth on the screen ( episode two) and her flouncing was funny.
She is Alma in Almas not normal based on her life. I like her. New series of that coming out soon

What I want to know is why James left his cypher book in his office desk. Given that he wasn't expecting John to go in, what was he expecting to happen to it?

Maybe James was scared off by someone and left the book there by accident?
Or maybe he just knew that John would step in ? Or he thought Lucy would blag her way in
and find it? Good question though! Lots of plot holes scattered around

i was wondering how they they were going to fit all the boxes in the car as well as the house!

They did say "the security guard said it was on the right" so there was someone around. Maybe with ID for James he was able to get a key?

So the boxes hold the key to the missing pages and what it all has to do with Sinclair and Matt ( Karl pilkinton)
Might take him months to sort through that lot !

Surely he could have let his family know that he was alive at the lock up…

‘Pssst, it’s me-I’m ok, just so that you know…just act like you didn’t hear me’

Maybe James is a baddie ? (Although I didn't get this vibe from what they all said about him )
John will suss him out and end up with Lucy!
Maybe he got up to his neck with Zeigler and Sinclair and has gone a bit mad? Who knows

They knew he was alive because of the voicemail.

I agree with PPs that the biggest plot hole is the fact that no one did anything to John while he was pretending to be James.

Karl Pilkington and his wife were terrified and on the run. But to anyone watching, James was going about his life as normal and nothing happened.

Unless the bad guys knew he was a fake and just decided to let him carry on in the hope he'd lead them to his brother 🤷🏻‍♀️

Yeah, bound to be a twist there
' we knew you were John all along ' type thing
(The dodgy policeman probably is aware too but can't say too much)

It doesn't stand up to much scrutiny does it?

To be honest, I found the James going missing part the least interesting bit. It was just a necessary way in to a character like that, with no police experience, suddenly being a police detective.

I was less invested in it than the individual cases each week.

Only the old teacher actually realized he wasn't James! The Cambridge police just went with it
( until they found out otherwise)
No wonder they were useless at finding any murderers before he came. His bro must have been even worse

For those watching with small children I thought I would copy and paste from the other thread.
Trigger and spoiler warning for things that are shown through the different episodes, hopefully done in a way that it doesn’t spoil the plot:
The aftermath of a hanging (dangling feet).
A person falling from a height (waving arms and legs) and the sound of them hitting the ground and their face afterwards (several times).
Mentions of suicide.
Several bodies with close up of face (open eyes) and blood from their heads or chest. One time see a woman dying bleeding out.
Knife with blood on it.
No sex.
Brief alluding to staff-pupil relationship but not graphic.
Criminal overuse of the word ‘guv’.

As for the above being spoilers I would say that having experienced a particular traumatic death of a relative, it is a relief to be able to watch a series pre-knowing what’s going to be a trigger so you can prepare mentally for it or realise it’s not on the list so you can relax.

All the above is done in a ‘light’ stylised tone along the lines of Death in Paradise. I would guess the most graphic for most people would be the person falling to his death and hearing the body hitting the ground (repeated a few times).

Thought I would put these on so people can make up their minds before their younger children want to watch them all.

I was very disappointed that they made a lot of the notebook being covered in wallpaper which didn't turn out to be significant, I was sure there was the key to the code written on the underside.
Do we think John left the message confessing to have fled the nest like their father to put them off looking for him? And that he is actually still in danger?

Yes, I was convinced there was going to be something under the wallpaper!

Yes, I think they said that was why he left the message. John said that James would have known anyone could listen to the message, so he left it to a) give them an excuse to pretend they're not looking for him any more, and b) to pass on that info about the bird in the book that turned out to be the key to the code.

Why I found weird was that when they cracked the code, they only decoded about three words then went to the address. Why not decode the whole thing!

The first pages of that code book could be anywhere. Might not be amongst all the other paperwork they found ! What happens then?

The wall paper on the book was how he solved the one with Felicity Kendall in wasn't it?

When he found the book in Henry's room I thought it was obvious that it was that book!

I have enjoyed Ludwig - yes, the character is a bit cutesy and predictable, but it really is comforting to watch. My main question is:

How great is Lucy's styling?! I love her outfits, she just looks cool in every episode.

The Lucy actress had an enviable figure, so she'd look good in anything I bet. I Agree she looks great in every episode.

Yes, I've known quite a few head teacher offices with their own toilet - and one with a shower.

Well, they explain it when Lucy says 'I can feel he's not dead' and Henry is initially very upset, but just trusts his mum that his dad is just in hiding and goes along with it! We do see bits where Lucy cries, etc.

But I agree on the second point. Some of the suspects just confess out of the blue, like the first lady! She was just upset that the other people were annoyed at being held by the police. And yet killing another human being was no stress for her, but facing other people's annoyance was too much LOL

Anyway, definitely nothing original, definitely not a perfect storyline, but I very much liked it anyway. It's very easy to follow and I always love to watch David Mitchell portraying David Mitchell. Also, I LOVED the soundtrack! I was more compelled by that during the first couple of episodes than by the plot 😂

Various people say that John is secretly in love with Lucy. But isn't also Lucy in love with John? We see the four-leaf clover in her bookmark and basically all the attention she showed him over the years while James was like 'meh'. Might James know that he was a second choice?