Review: Blackadder: The Cavalier Years

"Baldrick, your brain is like the four-headed man-eating haddock-fish beast of Aberdeen. It doesn't exist."

I post so rarely nowadays, Blackadder is a nice treat. The Cavalier Years was a Comic Relief Special, set in the period after the English Civil War. It had its own Edmund, its own Baldrick and a low budget, reusing sets from Blackadder III. Steven Fry also stars as Charles I.
     Atkinson doesn't really get much oppurtunity to develop this Blackadder, but through his efforts, he can be seen as a cross between Blackadders II and III - constantly pandering to their monarch, but at the same time outwitting them in a near-murderous fashion. It marks a progression between the two, and I like watching this between those two series. Fry's Charles I is also a good character design, although it's a clear pastiche of the current Prince of Wales - and a good one, at that.
     The plot basically surrounds Blackadder trying to avoid the Roundheads and save Charles' life. Baldrick accidentally becomes his excecutioner in the process. The episode was for an audience already accustommed to the with of Series II and III, and so it's packed with brilliant one-liners (see quote).
     Overall, it's funny, and that's what matters. It acts as a decent enough homage to that particular era, and its Blackadder III ideas makes it a great piece to watch beforehand. On Saturday, I go forward a few hundred years to a Butler, E. Blackadder Esquire, in Blackadder III.

Thanks.