Rik Mayall

Few TV shows are held responsible for blowing apart the genre they belong to, but that was the legacy of The Young Ones. The incendiary BBC Two sitcom redefined the parameters of comedy by making an embarrassment out of elements of the genteel English suburban sitcom, exemplified by The Good Life and Ever Decreasing Circles.

From now on, thanks to The Young Ones, sitcom could sit squarely at the heart of youth culture, while those tuxedoed comics who had built their routines on jokes about mothers-in-law found themselves beyond the pale.

It is hard to think of another great BBC sitcom blessed by such a strong pedigree as that of Blackadder. Running over four series, spanning 1983 to 1989 – plus the occasional special – the creators and stars of this comic masterpiece read like a roll call of late-20th-century British screen talent.