The Prince and the Pauper BBC TV comedy series "Blackadder the Third" has an episode, "Duel and Duality," where the Prince Regent believes that the Duke of Wellington is after him. The prince swaps clothes with Blackadder (who is his butler) and says, "This reminds of that story 'The Prince and the Porpoise'." Blackadder corrects him: "Pauper. The Prince and the Pauper." Since "Blackadder the Third" is set during the early 1800s, this is an anachronism. In 1996, PBS aired a "Wishbone" adaptation titled "The Pooch and the Pauper" with Wishbone playing both Tom Canty and Edward VI. The BBC produced a six-part dramatization of
Edmund Blackadder to a lord ("Blackadder II"), a knight (""), a royal attendant ("Blackadder III"), a shopkeeper ("Blackadder's Christmas Carol"), to an army captain ("Blackadder Goes Forth"). Throughout each series, Blackadder is a self-serving, cynical opportunist concerned solely with increasing his own influence, status and wealth. His character is symbolized by the adder, the United Kingdom's only native venomous snake, which sometimes appears in the series as a visual motif. With the exception of the first Blackadder incarnation, Prince Edmund, each Blackadder is generally cynical, charismatic and intelligent. While he is haunted by bad luck, he is usually very capable of manipulating