The retooled Season 2, set in Elizabethan England, made Edmund into a snarky, sly plotter, and Baldrick into his dumb-as-a-brick dogsbody. Atkinson looked surprisingly sexy as hell in his Tudor togs (see above), and the cast was mostly overhauled. And the show suddenly just worked. The humor was silly and sarcastic by turns, wiith a reliance on puns and other wordplay that counts on the audience to be smart. The show continued to rely on history, but instead of proposing an alternative, it just inserted Blackadder into a sideways version of real history, making Elizabeth I a cartoonish woman who often cheerfully squealed “Off with his head!” The show also made the smart move of making Blackadder much smarter than the people around him, giving us more of a reason to root for him.
Seasons 3 and 4 built on and amplified the success of the second season. The creators continued moving Blackadder in time; in season 3 he becomes the butler to the Prince Regent, played with exquisite vapidity by Laurie (House fans should marvel at how well Laurie plays a complete moron). This season contains some of my favorite episodes, such as the one where the gang (anachronistically) loses Dr. Johnson’s Dictionary and gets threatened (also anachronistically) by the likes of Shelley and Byron. Literary nerd paradise! Season 4, in which Blackadder commands a trench full of morons in World War I, is also outstanding. It ends realistically and movingly with the boys dying in battle after Edmund runs out of schemes to get himself out of the war, but it could also be screamingly funny. My favorite joke in the entire show comes from this season, when Baldrick, in the last episode, is confused as to why the war started:
Baldrick: I heard that it started when a bloke called Archie Duke shot an ostrich ’cause he was hungry.
Blackadder: I think you mean it started when the Archduke of Austro-Hungary got shot.
This joke perfectly encapsulates the show’s approach: using wordplay and history as a way to create powerful humor. The fact that the characters are about to die over this “ostrich” shows how the events of history adversely affected the little guys who couldn’t even understand why things were happening. This is one of the awful truths of World War I, and Blackadder manages to state in a way that is both baldly straightforward and hysterical at the same time. These few lines encapsulate the genius of the show.
If you are a fan of the Doctor, or of British history and literature, or even just a fan of comedy, you should check out Blackadder. The first season is worth wading through because it does have its moments as a failed comedic experiment; seasons 2-4 will repay that effort in spades. I recommend the complete series DVD, which contains all the episodes plus the specials done after the run of the show was over. Watch them all — Blackadder would call that a very cunning plan indeed.
Clacked by Christina Furtado 
on May 30, 2012 @ 18:54 EST5EDT
Blackadder is one of the best comedies ever (except the 1st season). It has so many amazing moments that still make me laugh after watching it repeatedly.
I believe the 3rd season was amazingly popular in UK due to many people still remembering and hearing about how wasteful the war was. There is a very good scene where Stephen Fry shows Atkinson how much of enemy line they captured by pointing to a table full of soil and Atkinson thinks it’s a miniature but it turns out to be the actual 5 feet of land they captured.
I really recommend this series to anyone (the original, the extra special episodes released weren’t as good imo) and I really with Atkinson had been given the opportunity to produce more comedies like this instead of being stuck in his Mr Bean-style. Also, he does look amazing in thighs!
*POST AUTHOR*
Even though the Regency season was my favorite, I agree about the enduring appeal of the WWI season. Such brilliant gallows humor.
Oh man, Mr. Bean just does not do it for me. Atkinson’s way of pronouncing words (like “rotten borough”) is so brilliant, as is his snark!
Definitely loved Blackadder’s acerbic take on history. My fav series of the lot would have to be the third with Hugh Laurie. The utter inanity he would spout (the scene of him going on about his socks comes to mind). Plus, I think Baldrick was at his most endearing there. I think I only ever did get to see one episode of series 1– and I just remember it was so much darker (visually and in tone) than the others, and certain moments of the episode seemed almost oppressively so.
So happy you guys are doing such a column! And since you’re a fan of fanciful word-play, I really do hope you will tackle Yes, Minister/Yes, Prime minister soon.
*POST AUTHOR*
Natasha, Blackadder is what turned me on to Hugh Laurie, and thus to Jeeves and Wooster, a bit of Fry and Laurie, and House before anyone knew what it was! That season is definitely my favorite too. the episodes with the rotten borough election, Johnson’s Dictionary, and the Shakespearean actors are all my favorite.
Something I was going to include in the post but cut for length: the reason the firs season looks so different is that it was filmed on location. This proved too expensive given its ratings, so we are lucky the BBC allowed them to rework it into a studio comedy. Filming in the studio definitely helped to make it a stronger show, and I also think they just figured out what kinds of jokes they were really suited to making.
So glad you reviewed Blackadder! I especially love seasons 2 and 3, although 4 is great but a bit darker. But the Blackadder specials are amazing as well. When I want to introduce someone to the show, I usually hook them with “Back and Forth,” the time travel adventure – there are so many howlingly funny scenes in that one. Blackadder’s encounters with Robin Hood, Shakespeare, and the Romans at Hadrian’s Wall come to mind. And of course Napoleon. “With respect, my emperor – we are whoopsies! We invented the tapestry, the soufflé, and the sweet liqueur.”
The Christmas Carol special is hysterical, being the reverse of Dickens’ tale (Blackadder starts out nice and generous, gets constantly taken advantage of, and turns into a scrooge). But “The Cavalier Years” is possibly my favorite – Stephen Fry is ridiculously funny as King Charles, awaiting execution as Blackadder tries to execute Baldrick’s cunning plan involving a pumpkin.