Ambridge on the Couch - this week on The Archers
Adam presses the big red dementia button.
07 Jun 2026
Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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Welcome to Ambridge on the Couch, an in-depth look at the archers with me, Geoff Thomas, Lucy Freeman, James Everett and Matt Rodriguez-Payne.
Chapter 2: What happened this week in Ambridge?
Now, before we make a start on your emails, let's have a recap of what happened this week in Ambridge.
We began the week with Adam, unfortunately. Adam is doing a George Costanza from Seinfeld and completely ignoring the fact he's been fired by turning up for work regardless. Brian was trundling on, getting himself tangled up in his drench pack straps.
Chapter 3: Why is Adam ignoring his firing from Home Farm?
Try saying that after four pints of Shires. He was crowing about how much he was enjoying running the farm himself, and then Stella appeared and he begged her to return to run the farm. Martin Gibson's lady friend has been disappointed with the Gay Grable's brunch. I suspect she was disappointed with her lunch companion, to be honest.
He was, in his turn, disappointed by Ian, who had not drilled deeply into Brad.
LAUGHTER
He's an accommodating lad, Brad, but I'm not sure he's ready to be forensically analysed by his boss and demanding to know the age of his girlfriend sounds faintly accusatory. Rex really needs to be slightly more measured in his responses to Alice.
After she said lightheartedly that she was ready to leap headfirst into a glass of wine, he panicked and practically tried to fireman's lift her into his taxi to carry her to rehab. Losing alcohol as a prop doesn't mean entirely losing a sense of humour, Rex.
And when someone has expressed how stressed they are, then got cross when you completely lost your shit at a lighthearted remark is probably not the time to shout, well, that's it, I've had enough and stalk off. We predicted that Rex and Alice together was going to be like two teenagers in golden retriever form and the reconciliation scene entirely backed this up. Are you dumping me?
No, I thought you was dumping me. Hooray! Let's go and have a cup of tea and do kissing. Tom wants a climate controlled greenhouse. Well, I want a Jaguar XJS, but life's a bitch, Tom.
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Chapter 4: What are the implications of Helen buying 10 cows?
He wants to do long table events where hapless mugs who forked over 40 quid a shot sit at wobbly trestles like the children's table at a crap wedding. and eat carrots while Tom parades about behind them shouting about climate change. Sounds ghastly.
Somehow he thinks this will allow him to be able to afford to send serotonin and norovirus to prep school or pre-prep or pre-prepperoni or whatever it's called. It won't, Tom. Natasha said she had other money-raising ideas. which I predicted at the time would be eyebrow-raising and involve only fans. Fruit-based, maybe. Only jams?
There was a toe-curling scene where Ed was trying to pick his Texels on camera, with his entire family laughing away at him heartily in the background. As ever with the Grundy males, the collection of accents was startling, including Ed saying he was going to put his favourite sheep on an altar, which I thought a little excessive until I realised.
Natasha was throwing things into boxes for Helen in an effort to get her out. I'm still disappointed that that whole house share went as well as it did. There must have been a bit of, by the way, I've moved all your side plates. It makes much more sense to have them there, don't you think? And simply do not believe it was hunky dory.
Natasha urged Helen and Tom into a Land Rover to go to Shropshire to look at cows that made something swell in her chest, she said. Probably needs to go and see Dr Malick. I don't know where to start with this, to be honest. When she said she could use everything they already grow on the farm to make beauty serum, is that not basically vegetables?
I mean, I know people will pay ludicrous amounts of money for what Victoria Wood brilliantly described as overpriced bits of grease, but who's going to buy a kale under eye cream and go around smelling like the compost caddy when it's not your turn to empty it? Or are they going to melt down some of the Montbelliards when they get bored of them too?
Anyway, having talked all the way there and all the way back about the inadvisability of buying 10 cows, Helen immediately bought 10 cows and then tried to make Tom feel guilty about it when he challenged her. This was an excellent piece of Darvo, if anyone fancies looking that up. And it's something she's learned subconsciously from Rob.
However, they also talked on the journey about how awful the situation was with the Aldridges. And thank God they'd never have a bust up like that. Then Akra accidentally picked up a big stirry stick and set them both off again about vegetables.
Bearing in mind both these things happened less than 24 hours later, I think it's safe to say that the air will be thick with flying custard just after Pat and Tony hand over the farm. Adam couldn't sleep and clearly wanted a chat, so he was doing that very loud huffy thing and thrashing about in the duvet until the other person wakes up and the first person says, oh, sorry, did I wake you?
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Chapter 5: How does Rex handle Alice's behavior?
You've got 13 minutes. Come on. I want to get this sorted out by the theme tune. Crack on.
If Borsig is anything like Gwyneth, there's about four police for the entire county.
And they're mostly in the kebab shop in Barmouth. So, yeah.
Yeah, particularly when it's raining, you know.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
I lived in the Netherlands right on the border with Germany when I was a teenager. And this was before Schengen. So there was still, technically speaking, a border. There was a border post. And we used to do our shopping in Germany because it was cheaper.
And so when we went across the border to go shopping, we used to try and do it when it was raining because the border guards would all be sat inside with their feet up and a newspaper and a fag on just waving you through. But if you went there on, if you tried to go across the border on a lovely sunny day, you know, one of those nice May days.
They'd all be bristling with official.
22 degrees and they've all got the sleeves, the shirt sleeves rolled up and were checking everything very carefully. So I suspect that, yes, Borsetshire Police are probably a bit like that. So how the hell Brian's managed to get them out in double quick time?
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Chapter 6: What are the challenges facing Tom at Bridge Farm?
So I came out in the morning and thought, that's funny, I don't remember parking the car there. And then I said, oh, God, I've left the door open as well. Oh, I don't remember breaking the steering lock off before I went into my house last night.
I must have been in a bad mood, blimey.
But my favourite mixtape, and a chocolate biscuit. The bastards. And then it was about 150 quid to get a new steering lock as well. Oh. Honestly, what a night's work. Anyway, so Brian... Brian has now got himself in trouble.
He has. Well, silly ass. When she said, I mean, it was a nicely written episode, I think, apart from the management speak bits. Are we supposed to? They're supposed to be funny.
Is that what it is?
Because it's business, you see.
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Chapter 7: How does Natasha plan to fund her new cosmetic venture?
And all of us listeners, like presumably the writers, business is just so not what we do. It's like a dark art, Geoff.
Are they saying that Marty's out of touch?
No, they're just saying that marketing speak is, let the business speak is hilarious.
Except they're five years out of date.
I know. Well, because they don't know anything about business because they live in BBC world. So it's not.
It's really, really poor. It is. It is.
But that's exactly what it is, honestly.
Well, I thought. Because Brad and Zainab were laughing about it, I thought, oh, well, maybe they're trying to... But Ian would know. Ian's not... Of course he would. Of course he would. He's a relatively urbane, intelligent professional. Of course.
Yeah.
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Chapter 8: What are the dynamics between Brian and the Aldridges?
Bye.
Was she doing her happy dance?
No, she was in tears. She was in tears. Oh. Yeah, so then there was one.
My God.
But let me tell you, the teaching standard, you know, those two things do not go hand in hand. OK, if you go to one of the elite, but that's true of grammar schools as well. You go to one of the sort of academically elite private schools or grammar schools. And yeah, OK, you can be really reasonably confident that the standard of teaching is going to be high.
But the fact that it's a private school does not mean, per se, that the standard of teaching is going to be any higher than anywhere else, and certainly not at reception level. Do me a favour.
And the idea of moving, again, this is something I have experience of, the idea of moving your kids from school to school unnecessarily, for me, it would be far better to put them in a school that wasn't possibly quite as good. And again, you don't know, but possibly put them in a school that's possibly not quite as good and leave them there. than it would be to move them around.
Nothing disrupts a child's development like having to start again somewhere else.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, and I love the way Natasha said, I'm not somebody I could ever see doing this. And I thought, you liar. You absolutely would want to send your child there.
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