Blackadder (TV Series) The Queen of Spain's Beard (1983) User Reviews

Brilliant use for an interpreter in another strong episode

[snoozejonc · 8/10 · 20 January 2021]

For the sake of a strategic alliance with Spain, the King arranges for Edmund to marry the Spanish Infanta.

This is another strong episode where the historical context to the comedy is the medieval ruler looking to consolidate power via marriage arrangement. Through this theme Edmund is put into another humorous predicament that he must somehow try to weasel his way out of whilst attempting to stay in his father's good books.

It contains a number of funny scenes involving sexual humour, language barrier issues and jokes that would likely be considered insensitive or politically incorrect by today's standards. From the start of the wedding sequence onwards it is fantastic, particularly the ingenious use of the interpreter in the dark.

All performances are superb as always with Rowan Atkinson, Miriam Margolyes, Jim Broadbent and Brian Blessed on top form.

"The Queen of Spain's Beard" - the best yet!

[general-melchett · 9/10 · 31 August 2006]

"In 24 hours I'll be married to a walrus!"

"The Queen of Spain's Beard" is perhaps the funniest Blackadder Series 1 episode yet, but is bettered by Witchsmeller Pursuivant and The Black Seal. The humour is more funny this time - the Spanish translator's role was probably one of the funniest in the whole episode. Baldrick's intelligence was once again a main point in the episode (Balders actually kills someone after 20 minutes of the episode - when a certain cunning plan is put into action), and the hideous Edmund is back at his best. His best line in this episode is when he says sarcastically to Baldrick: "Little boy with big job to do!"

"The Queen of Spain's Beard" misses out on a 10 due to the slightly poor ending, but you can't have everything, and it is only a comedy. It is funny, well done, well acted, and with better deliveries of humorous lines from all the characters. I therefore give it a 9, and recommend it strongly.

Edmund gets married

[Tweekums · 9/10 · 8 December 2014]

There is trouble brewing in Europe and the king wishes to seal an alliance with Spain by marrying his son Harry to the Infanta. Unfortunately Harry is already engaged to half the single royal women in Europe so is unavailable but somebody points out that the king has a second son who is single. So Edmund finds himself engaged to a woman he has never seen. Edmund looks forward to meeting his bride but when he meets her his reaction is one of terror; she is no beauty and she intends to have her way with him as soon and as often as possible! With Baldrick and Percy's help he comes up with various schemes to get him out of marrying the woman but nothing works and the wedding starts… can anything save our protagonist?!

This, the second episode on the DVD release, gets off to a good start with an hilarious opening scene where a woman mistakes Edmund for his brother then pushes him off the castle ramparts when she realises her mistake. Edmund's attempt's to avoid marriage proved almost as funny; his attempts to appear gay were particularly funny… strange facial expressions rather than cliché campness. The regular cast to a good job and Miriam Margolyes is delightful as the less than sexy Infanta. There is less violence in this episode; just Baldrick getting a couple of black eyes and some viewers may find Edmund's eventual bride's age a little disturbing although it is strongly suggested that nothing improper was going to happen, thankfully. Overall another fun episode with plenty of laughs.

One of the best episodes.

[planktonrules · 10/10 · 31 May 2010]

While I will admit that this episode relies more on low humor and isn't as intellectually stimulating as the first episode, it sure is darn funny. Low humor, perhaps...but very funny.

The King is looking at forming an alliance with the Spanish by marrying off Edmund to the Infanta. However, this plan develops a bit of a hiccup--the Infanta is unpleasant looking (to say the least) and sexually insatiable! So, it's up to Edmund to try to find a way out of this awful marriage. The methods he uses are hilarious--including pretending to be gay or sending poor Baldrick into her bed instead of him. There are so many wonderfully funny moments you just have to see it for yourself. My favorite involves the phrase "again, please"--tune in and see what I mean.

Devilishly clever and funny from start to finish--this one made me laugh out loud the first time I saw it and still gave me a chuckle when I saw it again today--particularly the very clever ending.

Black Adder is getting married!

[tenshi_ippikiookami · 9/10 · 17 December 2016]

"The Queen of Spain's Beard" is a terribly funny episode, where our 'hero' Edmund gets the chance to get married.

King Richard is not very happy with France, and decides to marry Edmund to the Spanish Infanta to get some connections with Spain (whatever that means, as Spain did not really exist back then; but we don't watch "The Black Adder" for its historical accuracy). As they say at the beginning of the episode, marriage was used to create alliances, and Edmund is thrilled with the prospect of his marriage. Till he discovers the infanta doesn't look as he imagined she would, and decides to do anything, but anything, not to marry her.

Cue a very funny episode, where jokes (all very, but very silly, and some maybe not very politically correct) keep flying, non-stop. The dialogues are very funny, the acting great, and the plot development hilarious. Edmund makes a fool of himself constantly, and the historical inaccuracies only add to the fun (the 'traditional' Spanish attire comment is hilarious). Totally worth watching.

Nada del otro mundo.

[BA_Harrison · 24 December 2009]

In order to form an alliance in Europe, Edmund Blackadder (Rowan Atkinson) is to be married off to the Spanish infanta; but when she turns out to be a less than attractive proposition (ie., fat with a moustache), Edmund and his cronies, Baldrick (Tony Robinson) and Lord Percy (Tim McInnerny), cook up some cunning plans to avoid the forthcoming nuptials.

Set in the year 1492, The Queen of Spain's Beard is the fourth episode of the first series chronologically, but was originally shown as episode 2, and proves to be something of a disappointment when viewed immediately after the excellent opening episode: the script is still rather salacious, but relies more on pure silliness than on clever writing, and there is none of the grisly violence that made part one so much fun. Instead, we get racial stereotypes, gay jokes, and fat jokes, all of which are fine by me (political correctness be damned), but which just aren't all that funny considering the talent involved.

Woof woof

[bevo-13678 · 10/10 · 2 April 2020]

I like the bit where the dogs bit him on the neck but he said it was a woman

Jokes about gays and implied child abuse! Not sure what to say about that...

[zacpetch · 5/10 · 2 December 2014]

The fourth episode is something of a disappointment due to the excellent episodes it's sandwiched in between. Both of those two ("The Archbishop" and "Witchsmeller Pursuivant") have a good storyline and clever humour. Here the story is weak at best and substitutes the clever humour we expect from Blackadder for puerile innuendos. This would be done again in "Beer" but that worked because of having a decent enough premise to the episode. This just falls flat.

The plot sees Edmund arranged-marriage to the Spanish Infanta who turns out to be a monstrosity and how he tries to get out of the wedding by pretending to "prefer the company of men" or having Baldrick sleep with her (getting a black eye in the process) that she may no longer be a virgin. Naturally both plans backfire.

There are the occasional good joke (The Earl Of Doncaster is a highlight, even though we don't see him) but overall it's lacking that charm we saw in the previous episode and will see again next episode. Still a passable episode, but only just.

I'd also like to point out the ending when Edmund marries the Princess of Hungary that she is NINE years old. The BBC probably wouldn't dare repeat this one now for that reason since she's still a kid at the end of the series and we know Edmund has descendants... EWW!!! On the other hand, it's historically accurate with that which is a rarity for the series.