Blake's 7: Stardrive

“There are times when even the most cynical must trust in luck.”

Another episode from Jim Follett, then. It’s a perfectly decent piece of entertainment, if a little ho-hum, and interestingly it’s a definite sign of a more ‘80s sci-fi aesthetic, with the Space Rats looking very much like something out of Warhammer 40K.

We begin with a very revealing scene showing us just how reckless- almost to the point of a death wish- Avon has become since the events of Rumours of Death. He plans to take Scorpio dangerously close to an asteroid, and “ride” it to the location of some much-needed unobtainium without being spotted by the Federation. Everyone else makes it clear just how insane they think it is.

The result is catastrophic; the Scorpio crashes and sustains serious damage which endangers all their lives. Avon loses an awful lot of face here; he’d been unchallenged as alpha male for a while to this point but this sort of humiliation can’t help him.

Interestingly, it’s Vila who comes up with the idea which saves them all, allowing Vila and Tarrant to repair the hull with a limited force wall protecting them from the vacuum. It’s fascinating that he has to pretend to be drunk and pass of the idea as someone else’s, too. This is a great example of the disconnect between Vila’s “high intelligence” (as we were told in Sarcophagus) and his sometimes literal status as court jester.

Three Federation pursuit ships suddenly appear while Scorpio is a sitting duck, but somehow they all seem to spontaneously explode. Avon has the whole crew watching slowed-down footage, in shifts, for hours, to find out why. Ultimately, Soolin (we still know nothing about her!) spots a small ship at the bottom of the screen. And Vila recognises the helmet; they’re Space Rats.

Apparently the Federation has banned all use of small ships (the equivalent of motorbikes?) for leisure travel, so the only people who use such vehicles are criminal gangs. The Space Rats are violent, joyriding thugs, according to Vila, and the nearest lot are on the planet Caspar. They seem to have access to a very new kind of advanced “photonic” space drive, however, something that a Dr. Plaxton was working on before the Federation collapsed. (Of course, the Federation is now very much on the rise again, and we see signs of this every episode. I note that Orac comments on the Federation’s ship programme being ahead of schedule).

Vila and Dayna teleport down for a spot of reconnaissance. The planet turns out to look, predictably, exactly like a quarry. But Vila and Dayna have been spotted. Avon, meanwhile, is well aware that they’re both going to be captured, and is willing to sacrifice them as a diversion. The Scorpio needs that stardrive.

The Space Rats, at first glance, look fantastic, with really, really great hair and great patterns on their face from either tattoos or make-up. This is, I’m fairly sure, the first ever appearance of any punk-derived fashions on any BBC sci-fi drama. Unfortunately, our inevitable niggling doubts about how they can possibly wear helmets with hair like that lead us to notice that their “Mohicans” are in fact crude wig / hat things. Bah!

We discover that Dr Plaxton (none other than the great Barbara Shelley!) and her underling are working for the Space Rats for some reason, developing an ever better stardrive prototype. Unfortunately, we get a rather annoying couple of lines implying that Space Rats don’t ever bathe. This is an insult commonly applied to youth culture of all kinds, and a rather nasty and unfair one. It used to drive me up the wall in my Grunge / thrash metal teens and twenties. I also notice that all of them except Atlan, their leader, are portrayed as thick and inarticulate. Not that I’m bitter at all. Of course, such over-sensitivity to this script’s patronisingly old-fashioned attitude to youth culture now marks me out as an old fart who can remember when such things existed.

Oh, and how come there’s a planet which seems to be occupied entirely by young people who belong to this youth culture? Why are there no older Space Rats? Where are there parents? How does all this work economically? I think we should be told.

Dayna reports back that they’ve found the little “choppers” and where the stardrive must be kept, but Avon is rather evasive when she asked that Vila and she be teleported back aboard. We then cut to Avon, Tarrant and Soolin; they’re on the surface too! He’s deliberately allowed them to walk into a trap as a diversion. This episode seems more and more to really be about Avon and his increasingly reckless behaviour. It’s a good job the Space Rats are a bit rubbish and not particularly scary, really.

Our heroes don’t have too much trouble, after a perfunctory chase scene, in escaping with both the stardrive and Dr. Plaxton. Unfortunately, they are immediately targeted by three Federation pursuit ships. Fortunately, Dr Plaxton offers to get the stardrive working so they can escape, and works very hard to get it ready. This is where we find out just how ruthless and dangerous Avon has become; just to give them a few more seconds, he sacrifices her life. It works, and the Scorpio breaks clear.

“What about Dr. Plaxton?”, Avon is asked. “Who?”, he replies. This episode may be notable for giving the Scorpio a super-duper hyperdrive, but it seems to be a bit of a tipping point in Avon’s continuing psychological breakdown.