Follow the progress of Rowan Atkinson's irredeemably wicked Edmund Blackadder throughout history.
The series fall into two camps: the first series in one and all the rest in the other. The first series was undoubtedly the best with each episode masterfully crafted by its writers flowing easily with unforced comedic grace. Thereafter, Ben Elton had joined the writing team and his influence was very obvious. Elton's funny and punchy style made for a different offering of the sitcom. Series two was also a triumph but with the third series, Elton's influence became a little too obtrusive. By the time the fourth series arrived, the show was nothing more than a vehicle for Elton's (albeit funny) one-liners and the flowing style of any good comedy was sadly pushed into the background.

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Rik Mayall and Adrian Edmondson play Richie Rich and Eddie Hitler, a pair of misfits barely surviving unemployment in a Hammersmith hovel. They spend their life in frustration, minus female company or money, in facile schemes to entertain or better themselves, their best intentions always proving the catalyst for hilariously OTT cartoon-style violence. The humour benefits from being rude, crude and surreal, and though happily bereft of subtlety or sense the situations and set-pieces are always superbly constructed, delivered and directed. But that's only to be expected from a show that essentially presents two of The Young Ones a decade down the line.

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The regulars of the Boston bar Cheers share their experiences and lives with each other while drinking or working at the bar where everybody knows your name.
Cheers centered around Sam "Mayday" Malone (Ted Danson), former relief pitcher for the Boston Red Sox turned owner/bartender at the cozy Boston pub. In the first episode, he hires Diane Chambers (Shelley Long) as his new waitress to work aside Carla Tortelli (Rhea Perlman). Plots also centered around bar regulars Norm Peterson (George Wendt), postal carrier Cliff Clavin (John Ratzenberger), and the other bartender Coach (Nicholas Colasanto). Season three marked the arrival Frasier Crane (Kelsey Grammer), a psychiatrist who wins the heart of Diane. Season four began with Coach dying and being replaced by Woody Boyd (Woody Harrelson). Shelley Long left after five seasons and was replaced by Kirstie Alley who played the neurotic bar manager Rebecca Howe.
Cheers ran for 11 glorious years until 1993 when the the spin-off series, Frasier, began.

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Father Ted is one of those rare sitcoms that defies categorisation--it owes as much to Flann O'Brien and Samuel Beckett as it does to Monty Python--and its blend of satire, character comedy and anarchic surrealism has made it a cult favourite around the world. Exiled to remote Craggy Island, Father Ted shares a house with the breathtakingly stupid Father Dougal Maguire and the constantly inebriated Father Jack, who has a small vocabulary and a taste for furniture polish. Their housekeeper, Mrs Doyle, takes care of them with a never-ending supply of tea and sandwiches: "Go on now, Father, won't you try one? They're diagonal." Together they fight boredom by dressing up as Elvis, startling ducks at the fair and provoking nuns.

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Often hailed as the greatest ever British sitcom, Fawlty Towers is closer to the more elaborate tradition of farce. Comprising two series made in 1975 and 1979, the total of just 12 episodes were painstakingly constructed by writers John Cleese and Connie Booth. Unlike most British farce, however, Fawlty Towers deals with the big themes--death, psychology, xenophobia and even sex-o-phobia (Basil's marriage to Sybil is the most sterile ever depicted in a sitcom). Basil's contempt for his guests is, of course, legendary. It takes little from patrons to unleash his sledgehammer sarcasm: "Rosewood, mahogany, teak? Sorry, I was wondering what you'd like your breakfast tray made out of," he sneers at a guest who dares request breakfast in bed. Like every Englishman, he wants to be king of his own castle and resents having to take in lodgers to maintain the place, especially the open-necked younger generation, whom he regards as sub-human.

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"Fawlty Towers": A Worshipper's Companion

This is the story of a TV celebrity, his agent and minder. Work is slow, the minder needs to flex his muscles every now and again and the celebrity has no talent.
This 6-part series that ran on the BBC in 1987 and was unfortunately perceived as a complete flop after the runaway success and popularity of The Young Ones. A satire of celebrity, in particular the attempts of talentless minor-celeb Richie Rich (Rik Mayall), to get work on TV. Richie, along with his minder Eddie Catflap (Adrian Edmondson) and manager Filthy Ralph (Nigel Planer) stumble and stutter their way through each episode drinking, farting, puking and fighting while at the same time managing to throw in the odd relevant social comment.

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A great offering from our cousins across the big pond. From its inception, Friends quickly became close to many people's hearts and could almost be classed as a comedy soap. The ten series involved a massive team of writers that kept the show fresh and intensely funny and throughout we followed the trials and tribulations of the six main characters. The final episodes of the final series aired in 2004 and was a massive TV event.

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"Friends"... 'til the End: The One with all ten years

The complete official guide.

Masters of comedy. Timeless and enduring are Laurel and Hardy who have been delighting audiences, young and old, for over 70 years - reducing audiences to helpless laughter.
Their great works are brought together in one DVD box set that includes 20 classic Laurel & Hardy films and various shorts, plus a bonus disc containing the original version of Brats (1930), extracts from the German version of Pardon Us (1931), Thundering Fleas (1926), Fluttering Hearts (1927), Prudence (1927) and the documentary Laurel & Hardy--A Tribute to the Boys (1991).

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The Laurel & Hardy Digest

The Complete Films of Laurel and Hardy

Stan and Ollie: The Roots of Comedy

The Marx Brothers were stars of the 1930s and have not been forgotten since. Each brother brought his own splendidly unique personality and humour to the combo - a mix of such diversity as to ensure madcap hilarity. The 3 most famous being Groucho with his splendid one-liners and superb put-downs, Chico with his scams and crazy affected Italian accent and the silent Harpo with his childlike horseplay and marvellous musical skills.
The Marx Brothers Collection features the following films: Animal Crackers; Monkey Business; Horse Feathers; Duck Soup.
The Marx Brothers Box Set features the following films: A Night At The Opera; A Day At The Races; Big Store; Night In Casablanca; At The Circus; Go West.

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Marx Brothers Encyclopedia

Monkey Business: The Lives and Legends of the Marx Brothers

Hailed as one of the best comedies ever made, the classic Korean war series M.A.S.H. focuses on army surgeons who develop a lunatic lifestyle in order to handle everyday horrors encountered in a Mobile Army Surgical Hospital. Though highly-skilled and deeply dedicated, this irreverent madcap mob of MDs are equally adept at making a shambles of army bureaucracy.

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Monty Python, or The Pythons, were the creators and stars of Monty Python's Flying Circus, a British television comedy series which first aired on October 5, 1969. As a television series it consisted of 45 episodes over 4 series. However, the Python phenomenon was much greater, spawning a stage tour, four films, numerous audio recordings, several computer games and books, as well as launching the members to individual stardom. The television series, broadcast by the BBC from 1969 to 1974, was conceived, written and performed by Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones and Michael Palin. Loosely structured as a sketch show, but with an innovative stream-of-consciousness approach (aided by Terry Gilliam's animations), it pushed the boundaries of what was then considered acceptable, both in terms of style and content.

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Monty Python's Previous Record

Matching Tie & Handkerchief

Live at Drury Lane

Another Monty Python Record

The Contractual Obligation Album

The Final Rip Off

Monty Python Sings

Rik Mayall stars as the ruthless Alan B'Stard, the egocentric MP who will stop at nothing to further his political career. With no morals, no depth to which he wouldn't sink and no plot too cunning, following the antics of such an immoral MP makes for unbelievable nonstop comedy.

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Notoriously, and entirely appropriately, the original outline for Doug Naylor and Rob Grant's comedy sci-fi series Red Dwarf was sketched on the back of a beer mat. When it finally appeared on our television screens in 1988 the show had clearly stayed true to its roots, mixing jokes about excessive curry consumption with affectionate parodies of classic SF. Indeed, one of the show's most endearing and enduring features is its obvious respect for the conventions of SF, even as it gleefully subverts them. The scenario owes something to Douglas Adams's satirical Hitch-Hiker's Guide, something to The Odd Couple and a lot more to the slacker SF of John Carpenter's Dark Star. Behind the crew's constant bickering there lurks an impending sense that life, the universe and everything are all someone's idea of a terrible joke.
Later series broadened the show's horizons until at last its premise was so diluted as to be unrecognisable, but in the earlier episodes contained in this box set the comedy is witty and intimate, focusing on characters and not special effects. Slob Dave Lister (Craig Charles) is the last human alive after a radiation leak wipes out the crew of the vast mining vessel Red Dwarf (episode 1, "The End"). He bums around the spaceship with the perpetually uptight and annoyed hologram of his dead bunkmate, Arnold Rimmer (Chris Barrie, the show's greatest comedy asset) and a creature evolved from a cat (dapper Danny John Jules).

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"A horrible, vile, disgusting sitcom about four students who live in the most revolting house in Britain", The Young Ones became an instant BBC comedy landmark in 1982 by launching an all-out assault on the moribund sitcom, mixing Monty Python-esque madness with post-punk anarchy. There are no real stories, only a succession of often hysterically funny scenes as ingenious gags collide with deliberately corny lines, cartoon-like ultra-violence, pop music breaks, surreal interludes with characters ranging from the Three Bears to the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, and gross-out moments based on various bodily functions and substances.
Rik Mayall, Adrian Edmondson, Nigel Planer and Christopher Ryan are the four housemates: Rick (Cliff Richard-worshipping radical sociology student), Vyvan (violence-loving punk medical student), Neil (put-upon suicidal hippie) and Mike (self-styled cool guy). Alexei Sayle appears regularly playing various mad Russians.

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