Blackadder meeting between Richard Curtis and comedian Ben Elton led to the decision to collaborate on a new series of Blackadder. Recognising the main faults of the first series, Curtis and Elton agreed that "Blackadder II" would be a studio-only production (along with the inclusion of a live audience during recording, instead of showing the episodes to an audience after taping). Besides adding a greater comedy focus, Elton suggested a major change in character emphasis: Baldrick would become the stupid sidekick, while Edmund Blackadder evolved into a cunning sycophant. This led to the familiar set-up that was maintained in the following
General Hospital (Blackadder) become so bad that the Germans were able to send him a reminder that he was due to change his shirts. Mary says that she suspects Darling because of his "pooh-poohing" of Blackadder—a court-martial offense somewhat similar to insubordination. Mary also voices her suspicion of Smith, but Blackadder dismisses him as too obvious, reasoning that the Germans would never send a man with such an obvious accent. Edmund says that Mary herself is the spy, a fact he verified over their time together (through, among other factors, her proficiency in German and her inquisitions into British tank movements). Baldrick leads