4 ms·

+1. I enjoyed the first three Blackadder series as a rollicking laugh, but BA4 had an overall much darker theme - and that last episode, especially the last 5 m

+1. I enjoyed the first three Blackadder series as a rollicking laugh, but BA4 had an overall much darker theme - and that last episode, especially the last 5 minutes filled me with more sadness and tears than any other war drama movie ever did... The time lapse of the field at the end after everything falls silent...(excuse me, I have something in my eye!) Captain Darling: "rather hoped I'd get through the whole show; go back to work at Pratt & Sons; keep wicket for the Croydon gentlemen; marry Doris... Made a note in my diary on my way here. Simply says... 'Bugger...'"

dghf 10y ago
Darling gets a couple of good bits in that episode. The part where a car comes to take him from his desk job at HQ to the front, and you see the driver only from the long shadow he casts on the office floor, is chilling.
- venomsnake 10y ago
  I think that the best was - "We lived trough it - the great war of 1914 - 1917" ... and suddenly you feel like punched in the gut.
  - cyberferret 10y ago
    Yes, that brief glimpse of hope that was brutally torn away seconds later... The Cpt. Darling quote I mentioned earlier had that 'punch in the gut' feeling for me too, because it somehow brought to light how large his life was outside of the war... I began to wonder about Pratt & Sons - did Pratt have sons or other employees in the trenches too? Same with the Croydon gentlemen - how many of their 11 will die in the war and never play cricket again? Who is Doris and is she waiting anxiously at home for him? What will she do when she gets the telegram telling her he will never come home? After laughing at Darling as an idiotic, simpering, one dimensional character in the earlier episodes, it was awfully gut wrenching to see him here as a more complex personality with a full life, who was quite simply terrified at the inevitable prospect of having that very life ending in a few minutes time when they went over the top. 'Bugger' indeed...
- cyberferret 10y ago
  Yes - that was certainly a very ominous scene. The beginning of when my heart went out to that character. Stephen Fry played his part brilliantly - He certainly epitomised the pompous brashness and careless disregard for the value of human life that seemed to be prevalent amongst the Generals and leaders of the time...

dghf 10y ago

Darling gets a couple of good bits in that episode. The part where a car comes to take him from his desk job at HQ to the front, and you see the driver only from the long shadow he casts on the office floor, is chilling.

venomsnake 10y ago
I think that the best was - "We lived trough it - the great war of 1914 - 1917" ... and suddenly you feel like punched in the gut.
- cyberferret 10y ago
  Yes, that brief glimpse of hope that was brutally torn away seconds later... The Cpt. Darling quote I mentioned earlier had that 'punch in the gut' feeling for me too, because it somehow brought to light how large his life was outside of the war... I began to wonder about Pratt & Sons - did Pratt have sons or other employees in the trenches too? Same with the Croydon gentlemen - how many of their 11 will die in the war and never play cricket again? Who is Doris and is she waiting anxiously at home for him? What will she do when she gets the telegram telling her he will never come home? After laughing at Darling as an idiotic, simpering, one dimensional character in the earlier episodes, it was awfully gut wrenching to see him here as a more complex personality with a full life, who was quite simply terrified at the inevitable prospect of having that very life ending in a few minutes time when they went over the top. 'Bugger' indeed...
cyberferret 10y ago
Yes - that was certainly a very ominous scene. The beginning of when my heart went out to that character. Stephen Fry played his part brilliantly - He certainly epitomised the pompous brashness and careless disregard for the value of human life that seemed to be prevalent amongst the Generals and leaders of the time...