Charlotte Higgins on The Archers: deliver us from model railways Tony Archer practised male bonding over his train set, while Alice has walked out on husband and baby, hopefully to dry out The scriptwriters ‘kill us for their sport’. Photograph: Jeff Dalton/Alamy The scriptwriters ‘kill us for their sport’. Photograph: Jeff Dalton/Alamy Fri 30 Apr 2021 07.13 EDT There have been times these past weeks when The Archers has been almost too traumatic to hear. I refer, of course, to the upsetting scenes in which Tony Archer, Ambridge’s dreariest man, practised male bonding over his model railway with Helen’s boyfriend, Lee, causing the latter to confess to a weakness for superhero figurines.