The Crown

[shovel leaner 7,650]

There is a series on Netflix called “The Crown” .The new episodes out now are about Lady Diana . The wife wanted to start watching it because she likes all that royal stuff . I said there are four series of it , so she said let’s watch it from the beginning. Well it could be worse , it could be Eastenders . So I started watching it , of course being Royalty it was long before they went shooting, series 1 episode 1 , a duck shoot from punts . Not very realistic and it of course had me picking holes in it . “Why don’t these productions, employ someone who knows what they are doing to make it more realistic.”? I said . You’ve all seen it , a pheasant shoot in mid summer , with pathetic taxidermy pheasants.

          Then they went shooting at Sandringham . Good grief I protested, this is going to be diabolical. But it wasn’t as bad as I thought, then I looked and rubbed my eyes, the kings loader was none other than Tim Weston , the NGO development officer for the south west and someone I know quite well . I remember him telling me about it ages ago and never bothered to watch it . But they did consult the NGO and try their best to be realistic . Tim turned up as an advisor and was roped in to appear in it . 
        Unfortunately they should have spent a bit more time on the king and Mountbattens gun mounts , which were pathetic. But apart from that , not bad . 

[BenBhoy 4,706]

1 hour ago, shovel leaner said:

Not very realistic and it of course had me picking holes in it . “Why don’t these productions, employ someone who knows what they are doing to make it more realistic.”? I said . You’ve all seen it , a pheasant shoot in mid summer , with pathetic taxidermy pheasants.

Haha I'm glad it's not just me; we watched something other week called one of us https://g.co/kgs/KW8ct5

First episode, up in Scotland lady walking through woodland with sXs, nice i thought. You hear the whirr of a pheasant, she pulls first trigger........and picks up a red grouse!! Ffs Anyways it got me chuntering something similar to you  John, "how difficult would it be...." etc 

 

Edited December 3, 2020 by BenBhoy

[Born Hunter 17,910]

The shooting scenes did lack accuracy, even down to zero recoil. The stalking scenes are better.

But the important thing is it's just about the only thing in the mainstream that is showing fieldsports in an even remotely positive light.

[ianm 2,594]

2 hours ago, shovel leaner said:

There is a series on Netflix called “The Crown” .The new episodes out now are about Lady Diana . The wife wanted to start watching it because she likes all that royal stuff . I said there are four series of it , so she said let’s watch it from the beginning. Well it could be worse , it could be Eastenders . So I started watching it , of course being Royalty it was long before they went shooting, series 1 episode 1 , a duck shoot from punts . Not very realistic and it of course had me picking holes in it . “Why don’t these productions, employ someone who knows what they are doing to make it more realistic.”? I said . You’ve all seen it , a pheasant shoot in mid summer , with pathetic taxidermy pheasants.

          Then they went shooting at Sandringham . Good grief I protested, this is going to be diabolical. But it wasn’t as bad as I thought, then I looked and rubbed my eyes, the kings loader was none other than Tim Weston , the NGO development officer for the south west and someone I know quite well . I remember him telling me about it ages ago and never bothered to watch it . But they did consult the NGO and try their best to be realistic . Tim turned up as an advisor and was roped in to appear in it . 
        Unfortunately they should have spent a bit more time on the king and Mountbattens gun mounts , which were pathetic. But apart from that , not bad . 

A friend of mine was headkeeper at Windsor. He has some tales to tell.

[BenBhoy 4,706]

1 hour ago, Born Hunter said:

The shooting scenes did lack accuracy, even down to zero recoil. The stalking scenes are better.

But the important thing is it's just about the only thing in the mainstream that is showing fieldsports in an even remotely positive light.

The only down side is that for a lot of clueless people it will reaffirm their stereotypes of the kind of people who go shooting. Whereas one look on here would prove that some right reprobates are also into it!! 

[shovel leaner 7,650]

1 hour ago, ianm said:

A friend of mine was headkeeper at Windsor. He has some tales to tell.

A mate of mine is a Gatcombe , princess Anne’s estate. I’ve loaded there a couple of times . She and her son seem normal . I wouldn’t say anything bad as he’s still there . But there really is nothing to tell .

 

[Squirrel_Basher 17,102]

My great grandfather was head keeper to lord Bath at Longleat .About as close to royalty as I could muster .
Got his journals  here somewhere .The vermin counts were amazing back then as well as the big bag days .I’ll look it out if I can find it .

[shovel leaner 7,650]

Finished all four series and enjoyed it . Not sure what that says about me ? Bored and stuck at home and trying to not monopolies the TV might be the answer . 
       The stalking scenes were not very accurate in my opinion, they always seem to shoot them when they are skylined with no safe background. It’s probably for cinematic reasons . But it’s a fairly good social history lesson. I think I actually learned a few things , in particular the Suez crisis was interesting . We really are a slippery bunch .