Blackadder Goes Forth

I was over at TV-Links yesterday (that is a place you should have visited thru my Del.icio.us links) and I decided to check out the Blackadder series. I remember they used to be on Comedy Central many years ago, but the series I remember the most was the one on the trenches of the First World War. And I'm glad I found Blackadder Goes Forth too.

One episode I remember vividly was the one where Capt. Blackadder shot a messenger pigeon and ate it just to avoid recieving his orders to fight in the war. Another episode had him put on a show for the sake of the morale of that men. Unfortunately he couldn't please his commander who thought that the drag act, which was really played by a woman who often disguised herself as a man (you'd have to watch the episode to know what I'm talking about) was horrible and back to the front Blackadder went. There was one episode that I thought powerful even for a comedy.

The very last episode of Blackadder Goes Forther, entitled appropriately Goodbyeee, had Capt. Blackadder and his men usually Private Baldrick and Lt. George prepare to finally get into battle during the war. Blackadder attempts to avoid this fate to the end and we see him and Baldrick and George as well as a rival Capt. Darling (a funny name) move over the top to take part in a major assault. We see them move forward in slow motion before they even get closer to the camera, we don't see them again. The battlefield suddenly becomes a field of grass and flowers and trees.

So this got me to thinking. This show reminds me of MASH, there is definitely an anti-war message here. These characters admitted that they were scared and they realized there was no glory in it. They even had trouble figuring out what they were fighting for.

You know I took an international relations class being a political science major. One topic of discussion was the war in Iraq and that there was a systems failure in preventing that. Just like there was a systems failure in preventing the First World War. It seems the in the First World War the nations involved were intent on fighting. At the same time we can look at Iraq and say that it wasn't that everyone was intent on fighting, it was that the organization (the UN) was for whatever reason unable to prevent the war in Iraq. To really discuss this would take nothing less than a lot of research.

Still Blackadder takes an interesting look at the troops who fought in the First World War and other historical events in the history of Britain. I just now started watching the third series which takes place in the Britain of King George III. It's worth a look for if not only the history but the entertainment value.