The Last Scene.

 

George: But really, this is brave, splendid and noble…(Blackadder, Baldrick, Captain Darling and Ltnt George stand together inside the billet. There is a long pause as they look at Blackadder, who doesn’t react.). Sir

 

Blackadder: Yes, Lieutenant.

 

George: I’m scared, sir.

 

Baldrick: I’m scared too, sir

 

George: I’m the last of the tiddly-winking leap-froggers from the golden summer of 1914. I don’t want to die…I’m not really over keen on dying at all, sir

 

Blackadder: How are you feeling, Darling?

 

Darling: Ahm – not all that good, Blackadder. Rather hoped I’d get through the whole show, go back to work at Pratt and Sons, kepp wicket for the Croydon Gentlemen, marry Doris. Made a note in my diary on the way here. Simply says: “Bugger”.

 

Blackadder: Well, quite.(Outside is heard a muffled voice: “Stand to, stand to…Fix bayonets!”) Come on, come on, let’s move. (They all file out of the door. Blackadder turns to George as he is about to leave.) Don’t forget your stick, Lieutenant.

 

George (picking it up) Rather, sir. Wouldn’t want to face a machine-gun without this.

 

They emerge in the trench and line up against the parapet. There is a sudden silence as the noise of machine-guns/shelling stops.

 

Darling: I say, listen, our guns have stopped.

 

George: You don’t think …

Baldrick: Maybe the war's over. Maybe it's peace!

 George: Well, hurrah! The big knobs have gone round the table and yanked the iron out of the fire!

 Darling: Thank God! We lived through it! The Great War: 1914-1917. 

 George: Hip hip!

 All but Edmund: Hurray!

 Edmund: (loading his revolver) I'm afraid not. The guns have stopped because we're about to attack. Not even our generals are mad enough to shell their own men. They think it's far more sporting to let the Germans do it.

 George: So we are, in fact, going over. This is, as they say, it.

 Edmund: I'm afraid so, unless I think of something very quickly.

 Voice: Company, one pace forward! (everyone steps forward)

 Baldrick: Ooh, there's a nasty splinter on that ladder, sir! A bloke could hurt himself on that.

 Voice: Stand ready! (everyone puts a hand on their ladder)

 Baldrick: I have a plan, sir.

 Edmund: Really, Baldrick? A cunning and subtle one?

 Baldrick: Yes, sir.

 Edmund: As cunning as a fox who's just been appointed Professor of Cunning at Oxford University?

 Baldrick: Yes, sir.

 Voice: On the signal, company will advance!

 Edmund: Well, I'm afraid it'll have to wait. Whatever it was, I'm sure it was better than my plan to get out of this by pretending to be mad. I mean, who would have noticed another madman round here?

(whistle blows)

 Edmund: Good luck, everyone. (blows his whistle)

 (Everyone yells as they go over the top. German guns fire before they're even off the ladders. The scene changes to slow motion, and explosions happen all around them. [An echoed piano slowly plays the Blackadder theme.] The smoke and flying earth begins to obscure vision as the view changes to the battlefield moments later: empty and silent with barbed wire, guns and bodies strewn across it. [A bass drum beats slowly.] That view in turn changes to the same field as it is today: overgrown with grasses and poppies, peaceful, with chirping birds.)

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