Viewers of last night's season premier of Call the Midwife have taken to Twitter to share their reactions to disturbing scenes of domestic violence in the first episode.  The BBC period drama series, which follows a group of nurse midwives working in the East End of London in the late 1950s and early 1960s, returned to TV screens last night, with many viewers complaining that a particularly harrowing scene showing Lester (James Farrar) attacking his heavily pregnant wife Trudy (Pearl Appleby) was shown before the watershed. In the controversial scene, Lester grabs his wife by the neck and stabs her in the chest with a lit cigarette before throwing her to the ground and locking her in an upstairs bedroom as their little boy wait outside on the stairs. Within minutes of the scene airing, Twitter was flooded with angry updates. One horrified viewer wrote: "Honestly even for a show that goes for the brutal as much as possible this episode is impossible to watch. #callthemidwife" Another posted: "Bloody hell #callthemidwife is a bit full for on pre-watershed...I'm ushering 11yo off to bed." While most of the upset centered around the decision to show the scenes before the watershed, some viewers shared their emotional reactions to the show and praised the writers for shining a spotlight on domestic violence.

Domestic violence does not have a watershed and #callthemidwife handled it with sensitivity and yet still realistic.

— andrew bogg (@andrew_bogg) January 23, 2017

#CallTheMidwife brought the pain and the tears and the joy with this season opener. A gift on a rainy Sunday night, especially this week. pic.twitter.com/UJy4HhXAzW

— Jace Lacob (@televisionary) January 23, 2017

#BryonyHannah was incredible on #callthemidwife tonight. Forget the stereotype, it's 1 of the most important shows on TV. Tour de force.

— Adam Veenstra (@adsveen) January 23, 2017

#callthemidwife highlighting how far we've come and also how relevant #Womensmarch #womensrightsarehumanrights still is

— Olivia Welsh (@oliviawelshy) January 22, 2017

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