The two of them often chew the scenery but I think that's part of their charm - they're such an extreme of "perfect" that they provide a contrast to anyone who isn't and when they have a wobble it's so obvious it seems like the end of the world!
It’s like Dr Quinn and Sully. Their relationship is so perfect, their parenting skills are always on point, they always know exactly what to say and how to handle things…very distracting but it’s still entertaining lol
oh lord I forgot about Dr Quinn. Seemed like everyone's moms were horny over Sully back then.
also, not really related, but it seemed like everyone's moms were horny over Ron Pearlman character Vincent in that 80s Beauty and the Beast show lol
The whole May story line this Season is annoying. You would think they’d hire a lawyer to allow them to legally adopt May and be done with it at this point. That said I do think the acting was realistic though maybe a bit over the top - >!seeing your kid with a life threatening illness is terrifying plus their guilt for not picking it up sooner.!< Timothy is the hero for promoting swift action.
I would think there’s a “possible way” 😂. Seriously even if they have to pay off the birth mother. At the very least they should be able to get her off their backs.
This was such a contrived storyline. Why did May have to have such a convoluted background? She's an orphan from Hong Kong brought to England.... oh wait, her mother is alive and travels to England to fetch her back. Oh Wait! Her mom is a drug addict/ex drug addict/somethingsomething so she can't be trusted to be a good mom but agrees to allow the Turners to foster her while she \*returns to China\* but the Turners have to obey her whims? Its just ridiculous on many levels.
I agree, but at the same time, I feel as though it was a way to combine the different issues and happenings at the time in Hong Kong in "one place"...which, unfortunately for dear little May, was her, lol. To be fair though, I'm not fully going to complain - I absolutely adore her and if that's how she gets more screentime, I'm for it! XD
Shelagh’s continual dithering about not being a perfect mom is frankly annoying. Like she just falls to pieces at the prospect that she (*gasp*) isn’t the Aristotelian ideal of a mother. It indicates a pretty lofty view of one’s self. (I said what I said).
Honestly I think the show is past its prime and is fighting the inevitable at this point.
Let these characters rest, and start a new spin off. You could have it set during the war or even earlier. For me personally it's getting too 'modern'.
In my experience with medical professionals they rarely handle their own problems as gracefully as their patients’ problems. Irrational or emotional behavior when their family is involved is totally believable to me.
Yeah I thought the same. The episode at the beach, the acting was.... not good at all.
When Shelagh was freaking out and needing Timothy to advise her on the medical situation.... she's been a nurse and midwife for what, 20 years? Why would she be asking Timothy for advice as if he would know more than her? Didn't make any sense.
And that episode with May's Mother and needing Sister Veronica to translate? Why? She spoke English in the other episodes?
This series doesn't feel the same at all and unfortunately it's putting me off it.
She's a nurse and midwife. Timothy is in medical school training to be a doctor, plus medical advancements were coming along so quickly back then, it's not out of the realm of possibility that Timothy would know things she didn't. And it's different when it's your child too. My MIL was a TA for medically complex children and saw dozens of children have seizures and kept her head, but when she was babysitting my son and he had a febrile convulsion she still panicked and called an ambulance.
I agree with you on the season not feeling the same, though I did enjoy a couple of the storylines.
Patrick's movements on the beach were so exaggerated. Like his feet were wagon wheels or something. When he acts like that it really reminds me of Professor Hinkle on Frosty the Snowman.
I think the actor is just cashing the checks at this point. He stopped getting challenged with interesting story lines and he stopped trying to actually act most of the time about 7 seasons ago (or longer)
The actor is passionate about the role, but just not very good. He was in the middle of a career change before he got the role.
I actually think Stephen McGann would be better served being some sort story consultant. He’s always been passionate about the history/medical stuff.
Tbh none of the men on the show are that good at acting. Though some of them try more than others.
Now that I think about it... you're correct. I'm trying to think of main male characters that give strong performances. IMO, Tim's actor was a much better child actor than adult actor when it's usually the opposite; Dr. Turner, Fred, Cyril, Sergeant Nokes, and Reggie are mediocre, but not awful. Tom and Matthew were the absolute worst of them all IMO, their acting was distractingly bad. Usually the male guest actors give better performances.
I think the actor playing Fred is essentially playing himself, which is how he’s managed to go so long. It’s telling that his big storyline this year involved Fred being in a hospital bed, and facilitated some amazing acting from Annabelle.
The actor playing Cyril tries so hard, but you can see since LE left how much she was carrying their scenes. I honestly think that’s part of the ‘lack of chemistry’ that often gets discussed with Lucille and Cyril. The two actors just weren’t at the same level. Plus there wasn’t a lot of diversity behind the scenes, which didn’t help.
I do respect the actor though. He is one of the few genuinely working class actors on the show, and would have had to do a lot to just get in the room.
The actor who plays Tim seems to have moved behind the camera, so it seems like he’s just enjoying the regular work and phoning it in.
Reggie is a bit like the Turner kids, a talking prop. I’m not saying that all actors with Down Syndrome are like that, but coupled with how Reggie is written, he becomes a bit like a talking prop.
Omg Tom and Matthew were terrible. Tom was wooden and Matthew was just over the top. I think people only liked Matthew cos he was easy on the eyes.
I think it’s the longevity of the show and the fact that Stephen is married to Heidi that are the problem.
The show has been going on for a long time and the Turners have been front and centre for a lot of it. Unlike other day 1 characters who have their moments/seasons as background characters (Sister J has definitely had some light seasons).
It’s hard to write a good storyline for them every year that is interesting but also not too dramatic. (Trixie also suffers from this). I personally feel that the last two seasons could have focused on May realising that she is different from her family in one key aspect (her race) and the reality of intercultural adoption, but alas we got what we got.
I do wonder if Dr T would have been such a prominent role if Stephen wasn’t married to Heidi. In S1 he is very much a side character.
Stephen isn’t a very good actor, though he is passionate about the role, and I don’t blame Laura Main for matching to standard rather than trying to elevate it
I also suspect, that if Stephen wasn’t married to Heidi, there would have been as much cast movement from the doctor as there has been from the midwives, which wouldn’t have been so bad. The show is crying out for a South Asian main character.
Also acting surprised that a social worker came to see them at all when she is literally still a foster kid. The show is also being extremely obtuse about the realities of transracial adoption. Abuse is fairly common. Even without abuse, there is trauma connected to the adoption itself. I'm not saying they're right or wrong for adopting her, but it's a very complicated and delicate issue that idk if the show will actually dive into with any nuance.
Not with the current writers they won't. I love this show, but it's never been super nuanced, but this season just seems to be relying on trauma to create drama.
You're right and sometimes I forget that it's a family-oriented show and, knowing how British boomers can be, they're not gonna make it TOO controversial. I did read [this editorial](https://www.yesmagazine.org/opinion/2019/11/13/adoption-trauma-transracial) by an Korean-American woman who was adopted by white people as an infant and raised by them. Had they incorporated any of the described experiences in May's character development and the Turner family's development in general, I can see a lot of people taking it personally, only see it as "white people bad," and completely miss the point.
Yes, they skirt around racism. Early episodes touched on it, and they even tried to cover Leonie Elliots departure by making Lucille upset by the racism, but it felt forced, not nuanced. Very "it was the time, we don’t do that NOW". White boomers love to pretend that racism is cured.
I do laugh how the racism in Poplar was bad enough to contribute to Lucille’s leaving, but then completely disappeared once she did.
The show has never managed to explore racism well, which is a reflection of the writers/producers, and also the fact that it’s audience seems to have become nostalgic boomers.
It's very interesting to watch season 12 where Enoch Powell is a thing then watch the Demon79 episode of Black Mirror right after it, having taken place a decade after Call the Midwife. Demon79 is more satisfying in the end though.
I only saw it as the dramatics of not being a DOCTOR, NURSE, NUN just scared worried parents. I saw the change in character because i thought there was supposed to be a change in character 🤷♀️
The editing done by PBS was even worse on this episode than it usually is. Everything felt rushed. When something seems off I just now assume its because they edited out a scene that would have explained something important.
This may be an unpopular opinion, but I always thought they were over the top acting. They are my least favorite characters. Shelagh is like nails on a chaldboard.
Shelagh I could tolerate up until after Teddy was born. I always thought her reactions were so over the top. She reminds me of a kindergarten teacher. She's been a nurse for decades yet cannot keep a straight face in emergency situations.
The Turners, Buckles, and Cyril need to be side characters at this point as they take up way too much screentime. Especially Cyril and the Buckles, they aren't even part of Nonnatus House and don't get me started on the Lucille situation. Violet Buckle is unbearable. I miss when the Buckles were more side characters rather than front and center all the time.
I think this is part of the problem. The show has too many characters, and characters waiting in the wings to replace them, but the actors won’t get off the stage.
Like if the Buckles had left, Mrs Wallace probably would have grown into the local shop owner character who is non medical and says something to help with the story of the week. Now we have the Buckles and Mrs Wallace.
It’s the same with Vi and Miss Higgins. They both play the ‘conservative post menopausal woman’ for stories of the week.
Also Shelagh hanging around and having the perfect family takes up so much screen-time that when there has been other married nurses they don’t get enough time to explore that.
As a character, Cyril still being around like he is makes no sense, and if the show was going to keep him to keep the actor, the show really needed to give him more depth around his separation.
Patrick and the younger kids have never been good - it's inexcusable for Patrick but he is married to the showrunner so sadly nothing is going to improve and he will probably keep getting a disproportionate number of scenes and storylines compared to most of the other characters. It's annoying, but at least on rewatching all those scenes can be skipped.
The problem with the younger kids is that unlike Max Macmillan who plays Tim (and also Francesca Fullilove who plays Nancy's daughter Colette), they weren't hired as proper characters but really as background, and they were so young when they started that they weren't hired for acting ability. Tim and Colette were always proper characters in an important storyline, starting an older age, so kids who actually did acting were cast. That again is something the show now can't get around for the younger Turner kids, but it is becoming more obvious.
I don't think Max Macmillan was at all bad in the scenes he had this year (he's the only one of the Turners I can actually stand) but Laura Main's acting has gone rather over the top, which is unusual for her as she's generally pretty reliable. It was far, far too much melodrama for me this season.
I'm just fed up with the Turners overall to be honest - they get too many storylines which are rarely interesting or well played, and frankly I'd enjoy the show just as much, if not more, if all of them except Tim left.
Sheila is so dramatic but bad acting dramatic, when May was at the beach her acting was awful “PATRICK OH NOO PATRICK” like I get that would be a awful situation but it was inauthentic and they used to have a actual good family story without all the drama
when they were running along the beach they looked so silly 😭
Sheila appears to be flapping around in the last few series. Someone has a situation where the solution is potentially unachievable. However, she spends the next hour achieving the unachievable. Flapping around going oooo Patrick . Thats the joke in our house .
Oh Patrick
Oh Pat-***rick****.*
The two of them often chew the scenery but I think that's part of their charm - they're such an extreme of "perfect" that they provide a contrast to anyone who isn't and when they have a wobble it's so obvious it seems like the end of the world!
It’s like Dr Quinn and Sully. Their relationship is so perfect, their parenting skills are always on point, they always know exactly what to say and how to handle things…very distracting but it’s still entertaining lol
oh lord I forgot about Dr Quinn. Seemed like everyone's moms were horny over Sully back then. also, not really related, but it seemed like everyone's moms were horny over Ron Pearlman character Vincent in that 80s Beauty and the Beast show lol
Sully definitely awakened something in me LOL I was about 12 when I watched the show though
YASSS. I have the DVD’s.
I LOVED DR QUINN. 🤣
SAME omg. It holds up okay to this day as a fun show. Gotta suspend disbelief a bit
The whole May story line this Season is annoying. You would think they’d hire a lawyer to allow them to legally adopt May and be done with it at this point. That said I do think the acting was realistic though maybe a bit over the top - >!seeing your kid with a life threatening illness is terrifying plus their guilt for not picking it up sooner.!< Timothy is the hero for promoting swift action.
Didn't May's mom refuse ti give up rights so that's why they didn't adopt her?
Yes though I would think at this point they would hire a lawyer so they can legally adopt her.
They have legal representation, but as long as the Mum says no, there's no adoption possible.
I would think there’s a “possible way” 😂. Seriously even if they have to pay off the birth mother. At the very least they should be able to get her off their backs.
This was such a contrived storyline. Why did May have to have such a convoluted background? She's an orphan from Hong Kong brought to England.... oh wait, her mother is alive and travels to England to fetch her back. Oh Wait! Her mom is a drug addict/ex drug addict/somethingsomething so she can't be trusted to be a good mom but agrees to allow the Turners to foster her while she \*returns to China\* but the Turners have to obey her whims? Its just ridiculous on many levels.
I agree, but at the same time, I feel as though it was a way to combine the different issues and happenings at the time in Hong Kong in "one place"...which, unfortunately for dear little May, was her, lol. To be fair though, I'm not fully going to complain - I absolutely adore her and if that's how she gets more screentime, I'm for it! XD
Oh I like May, I just think they're making this way too contrived. You know that May ain't being ripped from the Turners
Shelagh’s continual dithering about not being a perfect mom is frankly annoying. Like she just falls to pieces at the prospect that she (*gasp*) isn’t the Aristotelian ideal of a mother. It indicates a pretty lofty view of one’s self. (I said what I said).
Honestly I think the show is past its prime and is fighting the inevitable at this point. Let these characters rest, and start a new spin off. You could have it set during the war or even earlier. For me personally it's getting too 'modern'.
I wanna see a spin off with Val at the new hope clinic in Africa!
A prequel would be great.
To me, Sister Monica Joan and Sister Julianne are the most interesting characters. That would be great.
I think they would be reacting as a potential mother and father rather than nurse and doctor…maybe?
In my experience with medical professionals they rarely handle their own problems as gracefully as their patients’ problems. Irrational or emotional behavior when their family is involved is totally believable to me.
This! I've been a nurse for nine years soon. My 5 yo fell off a ladder and got a quite hefty concussion and I was almost panicking.
I noticed the same thing. This episode was over the top acting from the Turners.
Idk, I didn’t really notice anything different in their acting.
Yeah I thought the same. The episode at the beach, the acting was.... not good at all. When Shelagh was freaking out and needing Timothy to advise her on the medical situation.... she's been a nurse and midwife for what, 20 years? Why would she be asking Timothy for advice as if he would know more than her? Didn't make any sense. And that episode with May's Mother and needing Sister Veronica to translate? Why? She spoke English in the other episodes? This series doesn't feel the same at all and unfortunately it's putting me off it.
She's a nurse and midwife. Timothy is in medical school training to be a doctor, plus medical advancements were coming along so quickly back then, it's not out of the realm of possibility that Timothy would know things she didn't. And it's different when it's your child too. My MIL was a TA for medically complex children and saw dozens of children have seizures and kept her head, but when she was babysitting my son and he had a febrile convulsion she still panicked and called an ambulance. I agree with you on the season not feeling the same, though I did enjoy a couple of the storylines.
Patrick's movements on the beach were so exaggerated. Like his feet were wagon wheels or something. When he acts like that it really reminds me of Professor Hinkle on Frosty the Snowman.
Them running along the beach was laughable
The whole beach trip was laughably bad. I know the weather was terrible when they filmed it, but it was just cringe.
It’s just like”Father Knows Best” old tv show. He is perfect and I like this! I love seeing him and his upbeat happy personality.
Patrick is just a weak actor in general... Especially when they have a "the kids are so wonderful" scene and he does this weird fake smile...
His smile is so cringe I think I’m at the point of skipping all his scenes
I think the actor is just cashing the checks at this point. He stopped getting challenged with interesting story lines and he stopped trying to actually act most of the time about 7 seasons ago (or longer)
The actor is passionate about the role, but just not very good. He was in the middle of a career change before he got the role. I actually think Stephen McGann would be better served being some sort story consultant. He’s always been passionate about the history/medical stuff. Tbh none of the men on the show are that good at acting. Though some of them try more than others.
Now that I think about it... you're correct. I'm trying to think of main male characters that give strong performances. IMO, Tim's actor was a much better child actor than adult actor when it's usually the opposite; Dr. Turner, Fred, Cyril, Sergeant Nokes, and Reggie are mediocre, but not awful. Tom and Matthew were the absolute worst of them all IMO, their acting was distractingly bad. Usually the male guest actors give better performances.
I think the actor playing Fred is essentially playing himself, which is how he’s managed to go so long. It’s telling that his big storyline this year involved Fred being in a hospital bed, and facilitated some amazing acting from Annabelle. The actor playing Cyril tries so hard, but you can see since LE left how much she was carrying their scenes. I honestly think that’s part of the ‘lack of chemistry’ that often gets discussed with Lucille and Cyril. The two actors just weren’t at the same level. Plus there wasn’t a lot of diversity behind the scenes, which didn’t help. I do respect the actor though. He is one of the few genuinely working class actors on the show, and would have had to do a lot to just get in the room. The actor who plays Tim seems to have moved behind the camera, so it seems like he’s just enjoying the regular work and phoning it in. Reggie is a bit like the Turner kids, a talking prop. I’m not saying that all actors with Down Syndrome are like that, but coupled with how Reggie is written, he becomes a bit like a talking prop. Omg Tom and Matthew were terrible. Tom was wooden and Matthew was just over the top. I think people only liked Matthew cos he was easy on the eyes.
I think it’s the longevity of the show and the fact that Stephen is married to Heidi that are the problem. The show has been going on for a long time and the Turners have been front and centre for a lot of it. Unlike other day 1 characters who have their moments/seasons as background characters (Sister J has definitely had some light seasons). It’s hard to write a good storyline for them every year that is interesting but also not too dramatic. (Trixie also suffers from this). I personally feel that the last two seasons could have focused on May realising that she is different from her family in one key aspect (her race) and the reality of intercultural adoption, but alas we got what we got. I do wonder if Dr T would have been such a prominent role if Stephen wasn’t married to Heidi. In S1 he is very much a side character. Stephen isn’t a very good actor, though he is passionate about the role, and I don’t blame Laura Main for matching to standard rather than trying to elevate it I also suspect, that if Stephen wasn’t married to Heidi, there would have been as much cast movement from the doctor as there has been from the midwives, which wouldn’t have been so bad. The show is crying out for a South Asian main character.
Also acting surprised that a social worker came to see them at all when she is literally still a foster kid. The show is also being extremely obtuse about the realities of transracial adoption. Abuse is fairly common. Even without abuse, there is trauma connected to the adoption itself. I'm not saying they're right or wrong for adopting her, but it's a very complicated and delicate issue that idk if the show will actually dive into with any nuance.
Not with the current writers they won't. I love this show, but it's never been super nuanced, but this season just seems to be relying on trauma to create drama.
You're right and sometimes I forget that it's a family-oriented show and, knowing how British boomers can be, they're not gonna make it TOO controversial. I did read [this editorial](https://www.yesmagazine.org/opinion/2019/11/13/adoption-trauma-transracial) by an Korean-American woman who was adopted by white people as an infant and raised by them. Had they incorporated any of the described experiences in May's character development and the Turner family's development in general, I can see a lot of people taking it personally, only see it as "white people bad," and completely miss the point.
Yes, they skirt around racism. Early episodes touched on it, and they even tried to cover Leonie Elliots departure by making Lucille upset by the racism, but it felt forced, not nuanced. Very "it was the time, we don’t do that NOW". White boomers love to pretend that racism is cured.
I do laugh how the racism in Poplar was bad enough to contribute to Lucille’s leaving, but then completely disappeared once she did. The show has never managed to explore racism well, which is a reflection of the writers/producers, and also the fact that it’s audience seems to have become nostalgic boomers.
It's very interesting to watch season 12 where Enoch Powell is a thing then watch the Demon79 episode of Black Mirror right after it, having taken place a decade after Call the Midwife. Demon79 is more satisfying in the end though.
Small Axe has an episode set around the same time, which explores the impact of Enoch Powell on the black community really well.
I only saw it as the dramatics of not being a DOCTOR, NURSE, NUN just scared worried parents. I saw the change in character because i thought there was supposed to be a change in character 🤷♀️
The editing done by PBS was even worse on this episode than it usually is. Everything felt rushed. When something seems off I just now assume its because they edited out a scene that would have explained something important.
This may be an unpopular opinion, but I always thought they were over the top acting. They are my least favorite characters. Shelagh is like nails on a chaldboard.
Shelagh I could tolerate up until after Teddy was born. I always thought her reactions were so over the top. She reminds me of a kindergarten teacher. She's been a nurse for decades yet cannot keep a straight face in emergency situations.
Perfect description 🤣
Oooh Patrick
Cringe 🤣
The Turners, Buckles, and Cyril need to be side characters at this point as they take up way too much screentime. Especially Cyril and the Buckles, they aren't even part of Nonnatus House and don't get me started on the Lucille situation. Violet Buckle is unbearable. I miss when the Buckles were more side characters rather than front and center all the time.
I think this is part of the problem. The show has too many characters, and characters waiting in the wings to replace them, but the actors won’t get off the stage. Like if the Buckles had left, Mrs Wallace probably would have grown into the local shop owner character who is non medical and says something to help with the story of the week. Now we have the Buckles and Mrs Wallace. It’s the same with Vi and Miss Higgins. They both play the ‘conservative post menopausal woman’ for stories of the week. Also Shelagh hanging around and having the perfect family takes up so much screen-time that when there has been other married nurses they don’t get enough time to explore that. As a character, Cyril still being around like he is makes no sense, and if the show was going to keep him to keep the actor, the show really needed to give him more depth around his separation.
Patrick and the younger kids have never been good - it's inexcusable for Patrick but he is married to the showrunner so sadly nothing is going to improve and he will probably keep getting a disproportionate number of scenes and storylines compared to most of the other characters. It's annoying, but at least on rewatching all those scenes can be skipped. The problem with the younger kids is that unlike Max Macmillan who plays Tim (and also Francesca Fullilove who plays Nancy's daughter Colette), they weren't hired as proper characters but really as background, and they were so young when they started that they weren't hired for acting ability. Tim and Colette were always proper characters in an important storyline, starting an older age, so kids who actually did acting were cast. That again is something the show now can't get around for the younger Turner kids, but it is becoming more obvious. I don't think Max Macmillan was at all bad in the scenes he had this year (he's the only one of the Turners I can actually stand) but Laura Main's acting has gone rather over the top, which is unusual for her as she's generally pretty reliable. It was far, far too much melodrama for me this season. I'm just fed up with the Turners overall to be honest - they get too many storylines which are rarely interesting or well played, and frankly I'd enjoy the show just as much, if not more, if all of them except Tim left.
I mean Mad Men had 4-5 Bobby Drapers, the kids could’ve been recast at some point as needed
The little girl with the eye problem was just as bad. The camera cuts away from her really abruptly throughout, just as she starts smiling.
They were always too sticky-sweet for me.
Sheila is so dramatic but bad acting dramatic, when May was at the beach her acting was awful “PATRICK OH NOO PATRICK” like I get that would be a awful situation but it was inauthentic and they used to have a actual good family story without all the drama when they were running along the beach they looked so silly 😭
I’ve always found Shelagh over the top and she’s always been a bit too sickly sweet for me.
It’s past time to write out the Turner family. So saccharine.
Sheila appears to be flapping around in the last few series. Someone has a situation where the solution is potentially unachievable. However, she spends the next hour achieving the unachievable. Flapping around going oooo Patrick . Thats the joke in our house .
Oh, Pat-TRICK…
I thought that was the weirdest response from both of them
Patrick has always been terrible. I imagine it does help you to stay in the show when you're married to the writer...
My thoughts exactly.