Mr Bates vs The Post Office - General Discussion

[DanaK]

PBS Masterpiece 4-part limited series that premieres Sunday, April 7 at 9pm ET

The series is an British series from ITV starring Toby Jones. It's a dramatization of a British Post Office scandal, a miscarriage of justice in which hundreds of subpostmasters were wrongly prosecuted privately and publicly for theft, false accounting or fraud due to a faulty computer system called Horizon.

ITV broadcast this in the UK weekly in January (and streamed on ITVX) to great ratings

[Shrek]

Can't wait for this, been looking for it since I read about the series being on British tv.

[DanaK]

2 hours ago, Shrek said:

Can't wait for this, been looking for it since I read about the series being on British tv.

I can’t wait for it either. It sounds really good. Would posters be interested in a topic on the real case and how it differs from the series or are people ok with just discussing it in this topic?

[Shrek]

I'm good as it is as I don't know enough about the actual case, just enough to make myself look like an idiot.

[Scout Finch]

So, not a Downton Abbey character spin-off? 😉

[AnnMarie17]

I loved loved loved this series and can't wait to hear what you all think when you get a chance to see it.  I knew very little about the case in the beginning, but was still so touched by this retelling that I found myself actually weeping at the end.

I hope you enjoy it. ❤️

[DanaK]

PBS will show a special on the real life story, called "The Real Story of Mr Bates vs the Post Office", premiering April 28 at 10pm ET, though check your local listings

[chitowngirl]

My local PBS doesn’t have that scheduled at all in April. ☹️ Season 3 of Guilt is starting on the 28th at 10:00 for us…

[DanaK]

9 hours ago, chitowngirl said:

My local PBS doesn’t have that scheduled at all in April. ☹️ Season 3 of Guilt is starting on the 28th at 10:00 for us…

Hopefully it will be available to stream on pbs.org, at least for a time

[merylinkid]

Can't wait to see this.    I've been following the real case.     There is STILL no compensation for the victims.   For some victims, its too late.   They killed themselves over this.   The postal service allowed people to be convicted felons, ruined lives, etc. rather than admit the software they spent millions of pounds on was faulty.

[DanaK]

Be aware, unless people are against it, we will be discussing the real life case and real events here that the series is based on

I was software developer before I retired 5 years ago, so I know software has bugs that don’t get found and fixed before it gets released; I and teams I was on certainly wrote programs that had bugs that went out in releases that the customers had to deal with before I or we fixed it. Fujitsu and the Post Office really screwed the pooch on this denying the software had any bugs with all the issues subpostmasters were having. Even worse, the Post Office claimed to each person they accused that they were the only one having issues. That’s pretty horrifying

 

[SoMuchTV]

13 minutes ago, DanaK said:

Be aware, unless people are against it, we will be discussing the real life case and real events here that the series is based on

Is there any reason we couldn’t start a thread for the real life case and another for what’s been shown in the show so far (or episode threads)?  I’m interested in watching but I’m not fully aware of what’s happened vs what’s in the show. 

So , I guess I fall into the category of “unless people are against it“.

[DanaK]

20 minutes ago, SoMuchTV said:

Is there any reason we couldn’t start a thread for the real life case and another for what’s been shown in the show so far (or episode threads)?  I’m interested in watching but I’m not fully aware of what’s happened vs what’s in the show. 

So , I guess I fall into the category of “unless people are against it“.

Personally I think that would be better. Since I started the sub forum, I think it’s better to go that way, so I’ll create the threads

[SoMuchTV]

FYI, all four episodes are available on the PBS/Passport app.  (So far only one has aired on PBS.)

[zoey1996]

On 3/22/2024 at 8:27 PM, chitowngirl said:

My local PBS doesn’t have that scheduled at all in April. ☹️ Season 3 of Guilt is starting on the 28th at 10:00 for us…

One of mine has it scheduled for 11 p.m. CDT on April 28. The other one doesn't show it in April that I could find.

[SoMuchTV]

The “Real Story” is available on the PBS app as well. I didn’t see it when I looked yesterday, but maybe I was just looking in the wrong place. It’s a separate show, not an episode of the series. 

[Daff]

On 3/22/2024 at 9:27 PM, chitowngirl said:

My local PBS doesn’t have that scheduled at all in April. ☹️ Season 3 of Guilt is starting on the 28th at 10:00 for us…

 

On 3/23/2024 at 6:43 AM, DanaK said:

Hopefully it will be available to stream on pbs.org, at least for a time

After the ep 1 credits the special featuring the real people was advertised.

The Real Story of..premieres Sunday, April 28 11/10c

Airs again Sunday, May 5 7/6c

Both the series and special are listed on IMDb 

[dancingdreamer]

I found the real story of Mr. Bates, on another PBS channel that I never  knew I had. I used the voice remote, and it popped  up, ready for me to record.