Thetownend.com

Not sure if this has been posted on here before; i found this on Youtube today

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iK-haxAcBSA

Interesting to watch it with a different Baldrick and no Brian Blessed as the King, and with Blackadder more like he was in series 2,3, and 4.

Is that Fred Elliott (the one from Coronation Street not the one of this Parish)?

I think it is, thank you as i was trying to place him....

I find the first series of Blackadder almost unwatchable and I'm not a massive fan of the WWI series either, controversial I know.

I do rally enjoy the Elizabethan and Regency series though.

Agreed. It's cringeworthy but not in a The Office way...  :headhurts:

They nearly didn't make any more after the first because it flopped so badly, it was awful. They reworked the characters though and the beeb gave it a 2nd chance. Blackadders character in the 1st was terrible.

Right weiner in that.

Brian Blessed carried the first series

'Chiswick, fresh horses!'

I liked the first series.  The Queen of Spains Beard  :)

Thank the lord for Ben Elton. He started on the writing team for Blackadder 2, which happens to be my favourite (2, 4, 3, 1 for me).

Will give the pilot a go sometime, not seen it before.

I don't like any of it.

 My favourite is Witchsmeller Pursuivant.

I like the way that you can look back....it is historical after all....and see the germs of greatness, that aren't quite there. Bit of later tinkering with scripts, camera work and sets, and you get a classic.

Weirdo

Heretic!


With you on the first series.  I'm not sure what they were thinking with the Blackadder character for that one.  But the WWI series was so well written.  Each to their own.

Goes Forth was up there with Python in my book

If there was a "Things you never thought you'd hear people say" thread  :sherlock:

Shame really as his blackadder era & the young ones are classics for me.


Overrated you mean? *Hides*

Oh dear. Oh dear oh dear.

Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries

Blackadder goes forth was a true work of comedy art. Goodbye was breathtakingly good.

I'm not saying I think Python is bad - that'd be nonsense. It obviously has brilliant moments and has its place in comedy history, not to mention all the amazing things it's inspired. But I just find it difficult to find it as impeccable and hilarious as some people act like it is.

Well that's my point really. It's not over egging it. I used to sneak downstairs and watch it with my co-operating dad after my mum had gone to bed. I was 9/10/11 and you can imagine the effect that it had on me at that young age. I was absolutely enthralled. So I'm not acting, I lived it first time around.

So that explains a lot then John, what with the innuendo and the partial nudity...  :D

I never found the python series funny, first 2 films though were superb, first black adder was Interesting. I can remember not going to the pub until it had been on, which only happened with that, Brideshead, and Auf Widersehn pet in my early drinking days.

With you about the films. Loved them when I was about 10, love them now.

The first one was a compilation of the best TV sketches acted out again which was ok. Holy Grail is possibly the best comedy film ever. Life of Brian is widely lauded (and yes, I get the hype Ells) but inferior to HG in my opinion. Didn't think much of The Meaning Of Life, it tried too hard to be outrageous and that was never what Python was about, it was always bizarrely subtle somehow, if you know what I mean.

I think his early TV standup was much needed at the time in bringing "alternative comedy" into the mainstream and disrupting the somewhat long in the tooth traditional standup. Plus a little bit of politics in attacking the Thatcher regime didn't hurt.

If you watch it now its terribly dated and largely terrible, very much of its time. So you'll have to take my word for it.

Quite liked his early books too, sadly he seems to have lost it in more recent times. Actually, no idea what he's up to.

On the plus side, he annoys Stewart Lee, which is good as he's one comedian I just can't warm to, but whom everyone else in the entire universe seem to find hilarious.
-----------
I fart in your general direction.

 :eek:


Although this was used in Game of Thrones recently. Not in English though. So it (python) is still influencing people today, not bad.

Monty Python will influence comedy as long as people are able to perform and watch comedy.

Outside the Internet forums, I'm quite history minded and there are historic  bits of Goes Forth that irk me, it's a fine piece of comedy work though. I, II, III are obviously a lampooned versions of the eras that they are set in.

Being that bit older, I came to Python through a tradition of listening to the Goon Show on the cat's whisker. 

For me Spike Milligan was a comic genius, who inspired much of the subversive comedy, which society in the 50's/60's generated, with the Python's picking up the flag.

I had the pleasure of seeing Spike at the Wyvern....could hardly believe it....all time hero at our shitty little theatre. he didn't disappoint, pretty sure he had no script and just made it up as he went along, just asking the audience stuff, then running with it.

I do love Blackadder but I would agree that Four is different - and inferior to Two and Three in many ways (I'm ignoring One as I didn't enjoy it and so have never revisited).

Four is an more orthodox, traditional sitcom: Bladder is meant to be more likeable - protecting his men etc. Baldrick is just too stupid to be anything other than for bouncing gags off - but then all the characters bar Atkinson's get dimmer as ther series go on.

Four is more mannered. It is slower. Every laugh is ridden. The 'more silly than a x' jokes have become an in-joke in themselves rather than just lines. They were written deliberately and fussed over as the audience liked and expected them, not because the jokes were good.

It is no surprise that it would be the most popular with mainstream audiences as it is the most mainstream. The oppositie goes for the others.

Oh but the over-dubbed bit in the fighter plane is shit.Just shit.

To satisfy my curiosity, of you don't mind, which bits irk you. As an historian myself I have my own thoughts, but keen to hear yours.

Good to see it's not just me that hated series one.

The Blackadder character in series one is much better than the one they actually went with.

Hugh Laurie in Series three was spot on.

Series one was good when it was aired. But it suffers against the other 3 series now, as  he changes from a simpering fool to a more rounded character, so doesnt hold up well If viewed for the fist time say now.

No. It's like Red Dwarf where continuity between series' doesn't exist with characters changing actors, sets looking completely different etc.

Think you mis interpreted what i'm saying. It was funny originally as it didnt have the other 3 to compare against. It isnt funny anymore bar the odd scene. It was of it's time, where the others have fared quite well.

Blackadder was at his best for me in series 2. When he framed the Bishop of Bath and Wells it was superb. :)
https://youtu.be/rBhTIoIXoTI

And it had Queenie :)

I'm not hugely articulate in writing. However, I do think that Elton and Curtis were naïve in their writing, probably written without much historiographical consideration. To the average comedy fan, this won't matter. However, many people do not realise how many of their initial opinions on subject such as WWI stem from television shows like Blackadder. It annoys me when writers get so many important and tragic events wrong, U-571 and The Patriot being recent Hollywood examples (which, in fairness, fooled few).

As you probably know, many academics are critical of the Blackadderisation of WWI which has given a generation of people an a collection of opinions on WWI which aren't true (in places). I'm not in agreeing with Gove who essentially wanted Goes Forth banished but it does have worth as a starting block for a more comprehensive study/discussion.

And as a comedy, I fully agree with A Gent Orange.

You mean there wasn't a Speckled Jim?

No, no. There were pigeons.

The shifting of popular perception of WW1, to lions being led by donkeys, goes back to Joan Littlewood's 63 stage show....Oh What a Lovely War, which turned into a fine film directed by Dickie Attenborough in 69.

Goes Forth just runs with that.... Gove also wanted OWALW banned in schools. Tories don't like the idea of the common man realising he's continually being sold down the river by the ruling classes.

 :pint:

It's a comic satire not a history lesson. I do agree 2 and 3 were better comedies though. 4's reputation seems to have been elevated by its ending.

Indeed, the Pythons themselves quote Spike as their inspiration. He was completely bonkers though which surely helps with alternative humour.