A Resurrection of Sorts

"Blackadder Goes Forth", Take Two

The NZ Herald has carried the following piece: 

Beloved British comedian Rowan Atkinson has reportedly told friends he is planning a reboot of the cult black comedy Blackadder and is "extremely excited".  The Mr Bean superstar is set to team up with his original co-stars again to bring the 80s series back to life, including Tony Robinson, Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie, The Sun reports.

It had been previously reported the cast would perhaps consider a one-off show, but now it's believed a full fifth series is being considered.  The original series ran for four seasons between 1983 and 1989, with each season taking place in a different period of history.  The new season - according to a source of the Sun's - will be set in the "modern day", in which Edmund Blackadder (Atkinson) would be a university lecturer.  [NZ Herald]

This will be an interesting project indeed--if it ever gets off the ground.  We have enjoyed every Blackadder series.  But, if the above report is correct, this one will be fundamentally different.
  All the previous series traded in japes over different periods in British history.  Now, however, the pronounced intention is to move to the present.  In other words Atkinson, Fry, Robinson, et al. will be indirectly setting themselves (and the established world-view) up for mockery.  Why so?  Because all of the actors and script writers will have to make fun of themselves and the world-and-life view which (as moderns) they all actually represent in real life.

Given that the modern denizens of our dominant world view (post-Christian atheistic materialism) take themselves very, very seriously the mockery in which Blackadder has historically traded could quickly be cast as verging on the blasphemous.

And blasphemy is never funny when it is one's own world-and-life view that is under attack.

We predict that the series will either be the best and most powerful yet, or it will fail miserably.  We will either receive cutting japes at homosexuality or trans-genderism, or we will be lectured on the evils of homophobia and the like.