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
Blackadder: Back & Forth finds it has actually worked. They are now in the Cretaceous Period, where they are attacked by a "Tyrannosaurus". They throw away their wager items but are eventually able to knock it out using the underpants. Blackadder comments that one of lifes mystery has been solved and that the dinosaurs were actually wiped out by Baldrick's underpants. Baldrick admits that, as he never got round to writing the dates on the dials, they cannot return to the present. Blackadder and Baldrick return to Blackadder Hall but during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I (Miranda Richardson) who, mistaking him for his