Goodbyeee

Goodbyeee... is the title of the final episode of the BBC One situation comedy Blackadder Goes Forth and the final series episode of Blackadder to be produced and transmitted. It has become immensely popular and well-regarded with both critical and mass audiences owing to its sensitive and moving depiction of the final hours of the main characters before a final charge on the Western Front of World War I.

Summary

Millions have died but the troops have advanced no further than "an asthmatic ant with some heavy shopping". Now, at last, the final big push looms.

Plot

Template:Spoiler The atmosphere in Captain Blackadder's trench is heavy for reasons other than the torrential rain - there's something hanging in the air (and for once, it's nothing to do with Baldrick). The tension is broken with a phone call from General H.Q; an assault has been ordered for the next day, at dawn. George - having been waiting impatiently for a scrap - is naturally eager to get to grips with the enemy, despite the fact that he's the last surviving member of the Trinity College tiddlywinks team who signed up on the first day of hostilities ( the rest have all died at various engaements in the war: George mentions Ypres, the Somme and Gallipoli having seen the deaths of most of them). Blackadder - also naturally - decides that now's the time to get out of madness of the trenches. He's currently in the biggest crisis he's ever faced, and it's time for the best plan he's ever had - which involves two pencils and a pair of underpants...

Wearing the underpants and sticking the pencils up his nose, Blackadder has decided to pretend he's mad in order to be invalided back to Blighty; this, for some reason, appears to require use of the word 'wibble' a lot, and is certainly convincing enough for George to call General H.Q to demand a straitjacket and immediate passage back to England. Whilst they're waiting, Blackadder orders Baldrick to try and make his coffee taste less like mud... which will be difficult, as it actually is mud. Plus various assorted unpleasant additions.

As Blackadder has refused to play charades (preferring 'bugger all', as it promises more fun), the three men have plenty of time to hand as they wait for Blackadder's escort. This leads to conversation about the origins of the war; George believes it to be a result of villainous German imperialism (despite the relative imbalance between the massive size of the British Empire and its German equivalent), Baldrick is adamant it resulted from Archie Duke's hunger-motivated shooting of an Ostrich, but Blackadder determines that it was simply too much effort not to have a war (citing the fact that the intricate system of alliances designed to prevent war was 'bollocks').

As Melchett and Darling arrive to view the patient, George goes to greet them; and Melchett casually remarks that he once had to shoot an entire platoon for trying to get out of the Sudan by wearing underpants on their heads and sticking pencils up their noses. Time for a recalculation on Blackadder's part; pretending to demonstrate this very principle to Baldrick, Blackadder claims that reports of his insanity were merely a miscommunication; after all, how could the hero of Mboto Gorge (a battle in which the British Army decimated a pacifist tribe armed only with fruit) have gone mad? Darling is naturally suspicious, but is soon lured with an offer of some of Baldrick's 'coffee'. As Darling experiences the unique sensation, Melchett casually offers George a place back in the car to General Headquarters, to witness the 'results' coming back in... an offer George refuses.

As Blackadder berates George turning down a golden opportunity to get out of there, Baldrick decides to lighten the atmosphere with his poetry (threat of Blackadder's bayonet in his throat regardless). Unfortunately, the first one starts off bad and gets worse, and his magnum opus, 'The German Guns', consists entirely of the word 'boom'. This only serves to fill Blackadder with panic, which prompts an idea from Baldrick, which Blackadder opts to consider for old time's sake - why doesn't he call Field Marshal Douglas Haig to get him out of it?

This is the worst idea Blackadder's ever heard - or at least, it would be if Blackadder hadn't saved Haig's life at Mboto Gorge. And the Field Marshal still owes him. As Blackadder happily gets packing, George and Baldrick find themselves reminiscing about the Christmas truce of 1914 (where Blackadder comments 'bothsides advanced further druing one Christmas piss-up than the next two years of war', and rants he was never offside during the football match)... and talk turns to the unhappy slog the war, which seemed so promising in 1914, turned in to. Baldrick reminisces that all his friends are dead - Katie the worm, Sammy the Spider... and, as Blackadder solemnly informs him, even Neville the Fat Hamster. Although he is bunging up the sink as a makeshift dishmop. Upset, Baldrick demands to know why they can't just stop the war and go home... a demand that, despite George's attempt to quell the 'mutiny', neither officer can answer.

Back at General H.Q, both Melchett and Darling are awake, pondering the coming battle. Melchett, having always considered Darling a son (albeit a rather disliked, illegitimate one) has a surprise for Darling... and it's not a postal order for ten shillings. Rather, it's a front-line commission - Melchett has decided that Darling is wasted at General H.Q and, to prevent him from missing 'the fun and games', has decided to transfer him. As Darling tearfully begs Melchett not to send him to the Front, Melchett - completely misinterpreting Darling's pleas - has nevertheless prepared his driver...

As dawn nears, Blackadder makes his call to Haig, reminding him of Mboto Gorge... and demanding his favour in return. Haig is not happy, but for the memory of the woman with the sharpened mango agrees to Blackadder's terms. And thus advises him to stick a pair of underpants on his head and shove two pencils up his nose, thus returning the favour. Blackadder's intended response rhymes with 'clucking bell'.

At that moment, Darling arrives in the trench. For once, the enmity between the two men is gone; both are in the same, fatal position now. George celebrates the comradeship of the men around him... and then finally admits he's scared. As is Baldrick. And Darling, who has hoped to see the war out in order to marry his sweetheart. But it is too late; the order to prepare for advance go out over the trenches. The four men line up for their certain doom... as the guns stop firing. For a brief, shining moment, it seems like peace has finally been declared - but the guns are ceasing to prepare for the attack, as not even British generals are stupid enough to shell their own men.

The end seems inevitable... but Baldrick has a cunning plan. A plan as cunning as a fox that has just been nominated Professor of Cunning at Oxford University. Unfortunately, it's too late (We never hear the plan. However just before the order comes in, Baldrick mentions a how a man could injure himself on the splinter sticking out of the stepladder up to No Man's Land. We assume it has something to do with them deliberately injuring themsleves to escape once more). The order to attack comes through, and Blackadder, Baldrick, Darling and George go over the top - into the mud and the hail of lethal machine-gun fire. They don't make it far... and the series ends as the mud of No Man's Land fades into a beautiful, tranquil field of poppies, with only sweet birdsong disturbing the peace.

Significance

In a 1999 poll held by The Observer newspaper and Channel Four to determine what the public thought were the hundred most memorable television moments of all time, the final scene of this episode came ninth. Along with Only Fools and Horses, it was the only comedy programme represented in the top ten.

Themes

As the last episode of Blackadder Goes Forth, "Goodbyeee..." encapsulates the mood and outlook of the series into a poignant and memorable finale. One of the main themes of the episode is the naivete, hypocracy and complacency of the British commanders during the Great War; men who had spent their careers (as Blackadder notes) fighting poorly-armed foreign tribes during the days of British imperial expansion. Having won wars relatively easy in the past, the British army was effectively unready to face the mechanisation and mass killings of the First World War. Also noted is the essential pointlessness of the war, and how the leaders of Europe had failed to prevent it.

Another noteworthy point is Blackadder's change in character before going over the top. Having tried to worm his way out of the war throughout the entire series, Captain Blackadder has now finally realised that he can no longer avoid his fate, and must face the horror of dying out in no-man's land.

Trivia

One of the songs George mentions ('Whoops, Mrs Miggins, you're sitting on my artichokes'), has Mrs Miggins in the title, who was mentioned in Blackadder II and seen in Blackadder the Third.

See also

• List of Blackadder episodes