This article comes from a comment submitted to our Facebook site by Will Howley

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Eccentric, eclectic, quirky, breathtakingly very British…yes. Successful, well, that depends on your point of view. Worth £27 million, that’s open to interpretation and criticism. But was it successful as a spectacle that showcased us ‘Brits’ to a World audience… probably.

From a personal point of view I had hoped the opening ceremony would be successful, for all our sakes. And for certain moments in the first 20 minutes I made space to get ready to hide behind my sofa to cringe and whinge. But Danny Boyle did very Okay, in fact the Tory MP [who was sacked as an advisor last year because his mate dressed as a Gestapo officer at a stag night] called it “Lefty multicultural Crap”…Lefty, yes I can see that, multicultural, yep I am happy we are guilty of that, crap it was not. Was it more left wing than the Beijing opening, maybe, it was certainly not as regimented.

With a large homage to our NHS has to be a warning to the world and Andrew Lansley of what he is messing with and captured our collective hope and expressed our collective disapproval of this ‘Austerity government’.

Green and pleasant land was reflected by the setting, Blake’s Jerusalem through our greatest cultural contribution to the World over the last 50 years, our music which expresses our individuality and resilience. I could not stop laughing when the pogoing Punks were reduced to a prop. But I have to admit I detested the whole punk era, music and jumping up and down at gigs where a lot of spitting and faux anarchy was spouted. I saw that who period as a false hope to youth that was politically insincere to be turned to commercial advantage, which it has been. Okay so I admit it I’m a Jazz and Soul man

The worst keep secret of the opening ceremony was would Sir Steve Redgrave light the flame…but I was gratified that seven young athletes lit the fantastic copper caldron [see link below if you missed it] that expressed many hopes. I was stunned by the final lighting which showed the best of what we are capable of? Did it do us and London proud, almost certainly, when I for one prepared for the worst of a bad Boris & Coe joke over the last four years? Danny the Boy did us proud.