Call the Midwife

The poor doctors who prescribed the drug with only the intention of helping the mothers, the mothers who took the drug in faith and trust , all innocent yet there must have been so much guilt felt

Yes, I see the doc's started smoking again...

Trying hard not to give away a spoiler. I had read about the final scene but not who it related to. Wasn't who I'd expected.
DD and I were of the same mind regarding the black guests at the wedding. Would that have been as unusual as we thought in 1964 ? I believe DD found that the law changed 12-18 mths after this.

Trying hard not to give away a spoiler

If I noticed this thread had been brought back to the top of 'actives', but hadn't yet watched the episode, I certainly wouldn't open the thread! If anyone does and sees a spoiler, they shouldn't be surprised really

I thought that the young midwife (who is carrying on with the vicar) would be the one to die from some flea-borne bug, as a great deal was made of the rats/fleas and her reaction to the bite. Maybe this plot line will pop up in the next series.

I thought the vicar was going to be married before the couple get into "mischief"!
The death was handled beautifully I thought, as was the outing of thalidomide as the culprit of the deformities (sorry, what a horrible word).
Such good acting by everyone. Is there definitely going to ba another series?

They announced the Christmas special at the end.

I was amazed and intrigued by baby Susan when she was being examined - such a clever and frighteningly realistic depiction. I know the first episode used an animatronic baby, but surely the face and head of the little one last night was real and not computer generated? Superimposed onto an animatronic body?

And if so, it got me thinking about the baby's real parents and how they would have felt seeing their little girl as a thalidomide victim. Not sure I'd have been able to watch it in their shoes.

Indinana, I hadn't known that....(that the limbs/head had been superimposed), and couldn't understand how showing a baby in such a way could've been allowed.
Wasn't she just a lovely wee baby?

Indiana good point about the real parents.

Oh Marelli wasn't she a little darling? Those big innocent eyes searching her mum's face, wondering why she was crying. Poor little sausage had no idea

Well, I did not think I would be confused with Call the Midwife, good Sunday evening telly. Then I read a post mentioning Tuppence and Jim Broadbent. Love Jim Broadbent but sure he was not in Call the Midwife and who the heck is Tuppence. Then it dawned, the thread had morphed into War and Peace. Silly me.

There is no particular evidence that atomic radiation causes birth defects in later-conceived children. This from Wikipedia:

No statistically demonstrable increase of congenital malformations was found among the later conceived children born to survivors of the Nuclear weapons at Hiroshima and Nagasaki.[11][12][13] The surviving women of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, that could conceive, who were exposed to substantial amounts of radiation, went on and had children with no higher incidence of abnormalities than the Japanese average.[14][15]

The deformities caused by Thalidomide were thinly spread across the population so it took the medical profession a while to realise that there was a pattern emerging.

Getting back to the TV it is a great series with wonderful actors (the exception being the wooden clown Fred).
Still see to have a drama which is all about women, with women at centre stage and men only being peripheral characters.

Are you watching? So moving- I am balling my eyes out here.

This is a programme that I have never watched.

I love it!

Perhaps even more moving tonight because we were in South Africa recently and recognised some of the places.

And also because I just didn't dilate with our first one- and had to have an emergency section after 11 hrs of labour- and I know we would have both died had a section not been available.

Anyhow- a wonderful series.

DH and I really enjoyed it, and were quite choked at the end!
Looking forward to the new series.

Dh was messaging his brother who lives in SA while I was watching it - it's too soppy for him.

We both enjoyed this immensely. Me C comments in the plots and sub plots plus some good characterisation. I can understand that but I just love it in a human level too.

I thought that doing a Christmas "special" set somewhere else might be rather corny and unconvincing but, as always, Call the Midwife was brilliant.

Pleasant viewing. Nice to see SA. The formula for the programme is obviously popular. Are they struggling to come up with more local scenarios? It was a bit unrealistic for so many of the staff to just decamp for 6 weeks.

Found it a very enjoyable programme for Christmas viewing though not sure DH would agree! (Think he will be watching cricket today so all's fair).

I love CTM for all same reasons as already posted. Was sad though to think apartheid wasn't that long ago. In UK in late 1940s my MiL got married and I remember she told me how sad she was to be made to give up her job as a nurse after her wedding, as her dad said her new husband needed looking after 'properly' as he was a widower with a young son. No thought for her needs or wishes!

I love the usual episodes of CTM and also the books but I disliked the Christmas special episode. I thought the plot was totally unreal. I mean, what were the poor pregnant women of Poplar supposed to do when the midwives were off in South Africa, not to mention the local doctor gallivanting off too! I love seeing and reading about that particular period in the East End of London and the magic comes partly from the brilliant acting but for me it is the fact that the books and TV series are based on reality that makes it wonderful and emotive to watch. Stick to the docklands!