My top 10 sitcoms - #1Blackadder

Tweet

If ever a show showcased smart, silly and joyous British comedy, post Monty Python, its this series. It had four seasons, each set in a century of British history. The first one was based around the end of the feudal middle-ages. It followed a dimwitted Prince Blackadder (Rowan Atkinson) trying to overthrow the king to take the crown, aided by his mischievous and astute serf Baldrick (Tony Robinson) but the worst of the four seasons. The writers and cast learnt lessons and produced a good second season, followed by a brilliant third and fourth season. The same cast reappear in all the three seasons as different characters with the Edmund Blackadder family lineage the constant. It was all written by Ben Elton & Richard 'Love Actually' Curtiss. It also starred Stephen Fry & Hugh Laurie. It's such a great script with comedy writing and silly slapstick that seem to work so well the kinda way Laurel & Hardy was structured, loveable losers making us laugh.The key for this working so well for a home audience is its exploitation of the British class system in the show to maximise the laughs and set pieces, perfected in the final season in the trenches of World War One, Blackadder Goes Forth. There was talk of a fifth season in the 1960s but not to be. Would it have worked in World War 2? Of course it would but the guys didn't want to do it so...