Blake's 7: Gambit

“An eyepatch? Oh, how quaint!”

The fantastic Robert Homes is back. This time he gets an arc episode, and it’s typical Robert Holmes, with everyone double-crossing each other and loads of wonderful dialogue.

The setting is Freedom City, an underworld den of pleasure said to be far superior to Space City from earlier in the series, and lying just outside the Federation. We certainly get a much richer idea of what the place is like than in the earlier story, and this is thanks to both the excellent script and the wonderful realisation. It’s said that Blade Runner invented the sci-fi trope of fashions being cyclical, allowing us to present a retro future. But it’s done earlier and so very effectively here. Krantor, the wonderfully quotable old queen and big boss of the establishment, played by the wonderfully mellifluous Aubrey Woods, and John Leeson’s Toise, dress both themselves and their quarters (shared, I presume!) in Regency finery, while the establishment abounds in historical costumes of all kinds, including, at one point, a nun in the casino.

All this is fascinating; it tells us that knowledge of history has survived all these centuries into the future, as have chess, the casino and the French language. But there’s a story arc to advance, too; this space surgeon can only be the Docholli we heard of last episode, especially as he is accompanied by none other than Travis.

Blake and co have traced Docholli here and, in an almost unheard of departure from recent convention, he actually takes Jenna and Cally down to the surface with him, leaving Avon and Vila to operate the teleport, something he seems usually to consider as women’s work. But Blake and co are nowhere as interesting as what’s going on elsewhere, such as the speed chess tournament against Deep Roy’s wonderful Klute. To win or draw against him means a prize of two million credits but, as we see when Klute is later challenged by a Restoration fop(!), failure means electrocution and vaporisation. It is, as Avon says, the ultimate risk and the ultimate thrill to the true gambler. We end, not with a laughing cavalier, but with a laughing Klute. It’s the same distinct laugh that became so familiar as that of Mr Sin in Doctor Who and the Talons of Weng Chiang.

Servalan is also here, of course, and for the same reason. This being a Robert Holmes story, she has an ever-present underling called Jarriere to form the other half of this Holmesian double act and marvel at her cleverness. In a wonderful scene between Servalan and Krantor, we establish their relationship as they politely carry out their scenes against each other. Servalan makes a deal with Krantor for the delivery of both Doccholli and Travis, in the full knowledge that he will seek Docholli’s secrets first. Krantor will have no use for this knowledge, but Servalan will then have a casus belli to annex this world to Federation, and to “have that vulpine degenerate eviscerated with a small and very blunt knife”. (Interesting choice of words- shades of Nazi Germany versus Weimar Berlin?) Naturally, they’ve both bugged each other. Oh, and I simply love that mirror.

The subplot between Avon and Vila is great too, of course. I love the way they both prey on Orac’s arrogance to manipulate him into playing along, and Vila’s hopeless inability to hide his obviously improbable run of luck.

I’m a bit confused about Travis- last episode he seemed to be on the brink of being captured by the Federation, yet here no allusion is made to this, and he seems to have been following Docholli for a long time. Still, Servalan captures him this time, and rather cleverly turns him into a walking bomb, so as to kill both birds (and possibly Blake) with the one stone. I love the way Holmes seems to gently mock the character’s pomposity here.

Docoholli is being pursued by Cevedic, a character played by an actor instantly recognisable as one Bill Filer to us Doctor Who fans. But the inevitable barmaid-with-a-heart-of-gold hatches an escape plan for him. It’s a good plan, and almost works, but on this story everything is overheard. Bill Filer catches up with him, only to be killed by Travis. Also turning up are Blake, Jenna and Cally, who have remarkably little to do this episode. The bomb doesn’t go off for some reason, and Docholli admits to Blake that, although he can’t tell Blake where Star One is, he knows a man who can. That’ll be the same as the end of last episode then.

Oh, and Blake once again fails to kill Travis, which the script is by now openly mocking him for; “If you’re man enough, kill me now”, goads Travis. Blake isn’t man enough, although Jenna is, it seems. Travis lives to fight another day.

Meanwhile, Vila is rumbled, and drugged into playing speed chess against Klute. With Orac’s help, though, he wins, and he and Avon are rich. They arrive just in time to convince the others they’ve never been away. This script is so good it can even get away with such a clichéd sitcom ending.

Blake's 7: Voice from the Past

“It doesn’t make for the most reliable of leaders, does it?”

I’d never heard of writer Roger Parkes before, until glancing at IMDb just now, but there’s something a little off about this story. It’s not that it’s bad, it’s just that the tone of this political intrigue is a little off, and that the revelation that there are idealists in high positions rather undermines the Federation’s credentials as a Big Faceless Invincible Totalitarian Thing.

The crew of the Liberator begin, rather sensibly in the light of both how knackered they were last episode and what happened last time they over-tired themselves, by heading for a bit of a rest. But it’s not long before Blake, behaving even more oddly than usual, orders Zen to head towards an obscure asteroid instead, and haughtily refuses to explain this to anyone. I don’t think this attitude can be entirely blamed on external influences and, as we’ll see, the episode ends by pointedly not absolving him.

The crew (with a lot of guidance from Avon, clearly the alpha male in Blake’s absence) soon discover that Blake is being controlled in some way related to the brainwashing he received after his trial some years ago. Things go a bit mad for a while, but eventually Blake is restrained and the Liberator resumes course for the Planet of the Health Farms.

Except that Vila is a bit of a gullible muppet- which is, I’d say, just a little out of character. Nevertheless, Blake manages to convince him to lock everyone else up and resume their course towards the obscure asteroid.

Blake teleports down to the surface, in a short scene which is quite the most cringe-inducing yet; Blake is clearly stood just a foot or so in front of some god-awful matte painting. It’s the sort of sci-fi exterior set you’d expect to see at an infant school assembly, not from the BBC. Arse-clenchingly embarrassing stuff.

Mercifully, though, Blake eventually finds some indoor sets, rather safer ground for the production. There are also a load of people, apparently rebels, led by a chap called Ven Glynd, a former senior Federation politico who seems to have defected. Unfortunately there’s also an utterly absurd bandaged figure with silly false eyes, who is apparently the legendary Shivan, a revolutionary hero who has been presumed dead.

Blake is quickly persuaded- rather too quickly persuaded according to Avon, who is invariably right about these things- that the group have a foolproof plan to legally expose various pieces of Federation skulduggery, including Servalan’s dodgy dealing with Orac at the end of last season and the killing of Blake’s defence barrister. Blake seems to swallow this, simply because of the mention of an apparently “sane” Federation ambassador called Le Grand. And yet, if the Federation can indeed be successfully challenged through its own legal system, and with the help of apparently decent and reasonable Federation apparatchiks, does this not undermine the sense we’ve always been given that the Federation is an extremely nasty, arbitrary, 1984-via-Brezhnev, totalitarian police state? The revelations we later discover in no way make up for the fact that our image of the Federation as an uber-scary and powerful entity has been badly damaged by the fact that this sort of thing is even considered plausible by the characters we know.

Still, Avon’s having none of this and Orac backs him up; Blake is still being mind-controlled. We begin to receive hints that he’s intended as a figurehead in a “triumvirate between himself, Le Grand and Ven Glynd, with Ven Glynd clearly seeing himself as the Octavian.

Le Grand’s ship lands on the planet Atlay, where the conference is due to be held, in a magnificent piece of model work from the one and only Mat Irvine. But it’s a trap; the arena is empty apart from a load of Federation troops and Servalan on a screen; Le Grand’s treachery has been known all along, and she lets out a few tears at the end of her dream. Then the shooting starts. Meanwhile, on the Liberator, it’s revealed that the bandaged figure was Travis all the time. He seems to be losing more and more dignity with each appearance.

The melee ends with everyone (except the redshirts from the asteroid, who all die) back aboard the Liberator, and Travis about to be arrested by Federation troops. Blake has forgotten all of these events, and immediately abandons all thought of his crew’s much-deserved rest in favour of renewed action against the Federation; they need to find this Docholli. Once again he’s pushing his crew hard, and the consequences will no doubt be tragic; if they are, then

Blake's 7: Pressure Point

“Sooner or later, I will have my chance.”

Blimey! It’s Terry Nation again. And it’s a cracker of an episode. Yet again it seems he’s a much better writer when his batteries have been recharged. Then again, of course, it’s fitting that such a pivotal episode in the series arc should be written by the series creator.

We begin with a couple of rebels, dressed rather like terrorists used to dress in the 1970s, skulking about by the Federation’s main computer system, Control. Initially I winced at the thatched cottage, but it seems Control is on Earth. In the South-East of England, it seems. Where else?

Watching them are Travis, Servalan in a rather fetching hat, and a couple of Mutoids. (Are all Mutoids women? I don’t think we’ve seen a male one yet.) Sadly, with Terry doing the scripting, their relationship is rather more one-note than it was last time. They’ve been expecting this scouting party, which seems to belong to Kasabi, a rebel leader played by Jane Sherwin off of Doctor Who and the War Games.

Blake, meanwhile, plans to strike at Control, the most heavily protected site in the Federation, and deliver a crippling blow to the Federation. It seems to be an utterly insane risk, and to mark a new stage in Blake’s recklessness. He’s even misled the crew about why they’ve been heading towards the Solar System. As we shall see, these tendencies are going to escalate, with awful consequences. This may be the episode where Blake crosses the line and starts to be genuinely in heed of psychiatric help.

Interestingly, only Cally is with Blake at the start, with everyone else needing a fair amount of persuading. Blake has apparently been secretly planning this for a year, and has already made contact with Kasabi. (Interestingly, we get some more information about the series backstory here; the Federation started its “expansion and conquest” about two hundred years previously.)

Avon’s reaction is absolutely fascinating. He makes no secret of his disdain for the scheme, deliberately keeps Blake in suspense, but nevertheless agrees to take part in what he derides as almost a suicide mission. But there’s a lot of meaning in his “I am surprised you ever doubted it.” Yet again it’s clear that his cynical exterior hides a loyalty to his friends and a sympathy with Blake’s aims, if not his reckless methods. He’d make the better freedom fighter of the two. Yes, he may claim that his motive is to get Blake leading a rebellion on Earth, leaving him in command of the Liberator. But I don’t believe him.

Servalan, unfortunately, takes Kasabi prisoner, and a trap is set for Blake. He and Gan teleport down and head for the rendezvous spot. Interestingly, this is the crypt of a church which has been left in ruins since “the Federation had them all destroyed at the beginning of the New Calendar.

In the crypt they find an injured young woman, Veron. The rather lovely Veron is Kasabi’s daughter, the only survivor of a Federation ambush during which she claims her mother was killed. She is, of course, doing the Federation’s bidding. At this point has to do a lot of convincing to get Gan to continue- he very reasonably assumes that this means things haven’t gone to plan and it will be too risky to continue. He’s right, and this will of course resonate later.

Just as damningly, Blake refuses to admit what has happened when he communicates with the Liberator, is spite of two direct questions from Avon. He has now essentially put both Avon and Vila in great danger on false pretences. He’s fully responsible for anything bad that befalls his comrades from now on.
The trap springs shut. Veron disappears, as do their teleport bracelets. Fortunately, Gan is ultimately able to force the door. From this point on we essentially have an obstacle course, and scenes rather uncannily similar to Terry Nation’s own Doctor Who story of a few years earlier, Death to the Daleks. We get a bit of foreshadowing on the monkey swing sequence, as Gan very nearly doesn’t make it…

At last they reach the centre of Control- and there’s nothing there. There hasn’t been for thirty years. This is all a massive red herring, and Blake is absolutely stunned. All that risk has been for nothing. It seems that Servalan and Travis have them, until Jenna arrives. It seems she’s handled the situation rather more rationally than Blake. Then again, at the moment that wouldn’t be difficult.

The episode climaxes with Gan dying during their escape. It makes sense to kill him at this point; as his pervert tendencies seem to have been dropped this season (where could they have taken that, though?), the character is suddenly too bland to keep around, which is no reflection on David Jackson. But this marks a turning point; Blake is entirely responsible for his friend’s death. He’s become a dangerous liability.

Blake's 7: Weapon

“And the other mistake I made was not getting an advance on my fee…”

So, after fourteen straight scripts by Terry Nation we get at least two in a row from Chris Boucher. Can he possibly beat the record of his illustrious predecessor? We shall have to wait and see.

After some stock rocket footage, we see two fugitives scrabbling about in a quarry. One of them, Coser, is dressed rather oddly and played by John Bennett, and the other, Rashel is a slave, freed by him after his escape. She starts out very much in this role, but it’s nice how she becomes gradually more assertive as the story continues.

We then get a rather dreamlike sequence in which Travis apparently kills Blake. Except… it’s not Travis. Yes, I know that the character is subtly different, rather emasculated, and scripted far more for comic effect than we’ve seen before, but Brian Croucher is rubbish, isn’t he? It’ll be interesting to see whether my opinion shifts over time, but right now he seems rather one-dimensional, shouty and camp, far from the genuine menace exuded by Stephen Grief.

That was just a clone, of course; the real Blake is aboard the Liberator where he’s arguing, as he often does these days, over a particularly suicidal plan of his, or rather Cally’s (she has fanatical tendencies too, of course), to attack the Federation’s Weapons Developmental Base, an absurdly high profile target.

The relationship between Servalan and Travis is evolving in interesting ways, beyond being much shoutier; it’s clear that Travis has lost all of his menace and is basically her gimp. I suspect she keeps him around at least partly because she enjoys her power over him. This script certainly brings out the best in Jacqueline Pearce, who is fantastic here. We get some exposition, too; the “clonemasters” apparently have a monopoly on cloning, and the whole subject of cloning is generally treated as something exotic, which is not quite so much the case in these post-Dolly the Sheep days.

Orac informs Blake that his plan just isn’t a goer, as security around the Weapons Development Base is currently sky high; a bloke called Coser has escaped, with a brilliant new weapon he’s invented, called “IMIPAK”. It’s all exposition at the moment, aboard the Liberator as well as on the Clonemasters’ planet. We even learn that Blake is 34, just like me.

It’s not long before the plot gets going, though, as we see Coser and Rashel take refuge in a building. Interestingly, for the second Chris Boucher script in a row we have a heavy emphasis on social class, with Rashel being a slave and Coser being the sort of “B grade” technician who isn’t supposed to be clever enough to invent something like IMIPAK. It seems the Federation operates quite a rigid caste system.

We’re introduced to Carnell, played by the excellent Scott Fredericks, a psychostrategist or “puppeteer”, a kind of uber-smug version of Hari Seldon from Isaac Asimov’s splendid Foundation novels. He’s also, of course, one of the main characters in Magic Bullet’s excellent Kaldor City audios. And yes, I know I keep going on about them! He’s great here; flirting outrageously with Servalan and showing what a massive genius he is by casually thrashing the best chess computers of his time. He really must be a genius, considering Garry Kasparov’s –performances against a computer which would presumably be far less advanced. But he lets slip that he may have made a mistake- he assumes Coser is alone. And when he later charms an underling to let him see a report, he remarks that this has “saved his life”.

We switch to an industrial location, so often seen in Blake’s 7, for the denouement. The clone tricks Coser into handing over IMIPAK to Servalan, and it seems that it consists of a gun, with which you can shoot someone to “mark” them, and then press a button to blow them up. Coser makes it sound all good and everything, what with the power one would hold over someone who’s been marked, but why not cut the crap and just shoot them? We get a rather ridiculous scene in which Blake, Avon and Gan, having teleported down, all stand still long enough to be “marked” by Travis. Why doesn’t he just shoot them?

Servalan gives them all a chance to run, for plausible and rather clever reasons; after she blows them up it will be assumed that they have IMIPAK, whereas in fact Servalan does. I love the way she has her own agenda, rather than just acting on behalf of the Federation. She’s a deliciously ambitious woman.

Fittingly, it’s Rashel who saves the day, in a pleasingly assertive manner, and ends up alone on a planet of her own with a clone of Blake as her own sexual plaything. Fittingly, this episode sees her evolve from the lowest origins possible to being the most important person in this episode. And Carnell gets away before Servalan can kill him, but not before recording a message to Servalan telling her that she’s “undoubtedly the sexiest officer I have ever known”. She can’t resist a smile.

Not quite up to last week’s standards, but this is another good ‘un.

Doctor Who: The Ribos Operation

Part One

“What will happen to me if I refuse?”

“Nothing will happen to you. Nothing at all. Ever.”

The Doctor’s got a new K9! Hooray! And then the story starts with a bang as the TARDIS doors open in flight in a scene which is made brilliant by inspired use of lighting. The Doctor’s been summoned by… well, God, and he’s been charged with a quest to find the Holy Gra- er, Key to Time. I love the way that, instead of depicting something cosmic and expensive, they’ve just depicted the White Guardian as some colonial type bloke in a hat sitting in a deckchair, which works much better.

Instantly it’s clear that, after last season’s unevenness, much thought has been given to things behind the scenes. It’s not just the (fan cliché alert) “umbrella theme”; the new era has now firmly acquired a confident tone and style of its own- no more scares and bangs, but a cheaper, less violent (well, you can’t have everything…), wittier and more postmodern take on things. And the script which heralds the new era in its fully-fledged form for the first time is… Robert Holmes, a man heavily associated with the previous regime. It’s a funny old world.

Anyway, the Doctor has a new assistant, an imperious Time Lady called Romadvoratrelundar, and she’s fab, as is Mary Tamm. Her guilelessly arrogant ways are perfect for winding the Doctor up, and we can tell straightaway that she’s going to be fun. Oh, and rather sexy too.

Apart from introducing Romana, this scene cements something new about the series’ style- wonderfully witty dialogue which is allowed freer rein than before, being let loose more often on that fourth wall, and something different about Tom’s performance. We haven’t really seen his sombre side at all since Horror of Fang Rock, and his more whimsical nature has been staging a gradual takeover for some time, but following the events of The Invasion of Time there seems to be a final shift. The Doctor is now more consistently witty, less prone to introspection, but still with a strong moral centre. But mostly he’s much more fun. I like this new Tom. And the great thing is, what with the events of the last story you could almost at a push call it character development.

Amusingly, we’re told that the Doctor only scraped 51% at the academy on his second attempt. And Gallifrey has a new president, who must be someone we saw in The Invasion of Time as we hear the Doctor say “I should have thrown him to the Sontarans when I had the chance!” Who is it then? It’s not Borusa, for constitutional; reasons. Bet it’s Kelner!

Anyway, Ribos. It’s a well-realised, wintry planet with a mediaeval level of technology which also has the fortunate side effect of suggesting a cultural hinterland in the way that futuristic metal corridors just don’t. There’s a lot of casually excellent design work here. The necessary exposition is handled admirably by means of the highly entertaining, ahem, “Holmesian double act” of Garron (the superb Iain Cuthbertson) and Unstoffe and their intended scam on nasty old offworld nobleman the Graff Vynda K. This planet has two seasons, Suntime and the present season Icetime, both of which last 32 years. Brilliantly, it’s actually part of the interstellar Greater Cyrrhenian Empire, but given that it’s only a “level two” civilisation, the offworlders who actually rule the planet have to claim they’re from “the north” and not display any advanced technology for fear of breaking conservation laws!

I’m loving this already. Garron is a great Holmesian character, a futuristic Horatio Bottomley with great lines, and the set-up is fab. I shall not speak of the Shrivenzale.

Part Two

“You hang a bit of that around your neck and you won’t never suffer from the scringes, no matter how cold it be.”

I love the way our conmen speak in cod-Mummerset accents when they’re pretending to be locals, and the Doctor actually pointed this out at the end of last episode! I love Unstoffe’s speech, but Garron’s the real star of the two of them. It’s fantastic how Holmes, incredibly, gets him to persuade the captain of the guard to deposit a load of money with the crown jewels, and makes it seem plausible. And indeed the fact that, as the title suggests, this is the first time we get a Doctor Who story that is essentially a heist movie. After years of Hinchcliffe era horror movies, Doctor Who is now plundering different sources!

The relationship between the Doctor and Romana continues to be brilliant, too: “An academy graduate doesn’t need things explaining, surely?”

Part Three

“When you’ve faced death as often as I have, this is much more fun.”

I think the scene where the Graff slaps the Doctor, and the Doctor slaps him back, is definitely in the running for my favourite Tom moment ever. The Doctor and Romana are captured and imprisoned, but it’s an interesting example of what a great writer Holmes is that while in the hands of a little writer this perennial Who cliché could be tiresome, here it’s just a pretext for a fun little chat between the Doctor and Garron, a bit of character stuff for Romana and some exposition. And once all this is achieved K9 just comes and rescues everyone, leaving the situation no time at all to become tiresome. Masterful.

The scene with Binro the heretic is of course wonderful, and almost distracts from the fact that Unstoffe seems to have acquired an RP accent what with all the stress of being hunted by the Graff. Interestingly, the Seeker seems to have genuine powers, so precognition works, which is a bit dodgy.

Part Four

“Well, I admit I had a great struggle with me conscience. Fortunately I won.”

There are so many great things about this story. I love the way the Seeker’s frenzied and tuneless shriek is supposed to be hugely annoying!

We get a well-crafted and entertaining conclusion. Binro dies tragically, the Graff disintegrates realistically in a surprisingly well done piece of characterisation, and our heroes have the first segment of the Key to Time. Only five to go.

Flawless. 5/5 and a good one too, only just missing out on a top ten spot. Great script, great new tone, great new companion, Iain Cuthbertson and, most relievingly, no obvious problems with the production. Well, Shrivenzale aside.. It feels as though the problems of last season are behind us already. Can things stay at this level?

Doctor Who: Image of the Fendahl

Part One

“You must have been sent by Providence.”

“No, I were sent by the council to cut the verges.”

After the car crash that was The Invisible Enemy it’s a huge relief to see Chris Boucher’s name popping up, and once again he doesn’t disappoint. We start with a mysterious skull, but in spite of the obvious parallels with Quatermass and the Pit there’s a lot more going ion here than just a rehash. And fittingly for a Chris Boucher story Scott Fredericks appears, again reminding me of the excellent Kaldor City audios. K9 only gets fleeting appearances at the start and end of the story, but he’s have jarred with the story’s tone in any case.

It’s immediately noticeable how much better written the Doctor and Leela are compared to the previous story, which should come as no surprise from Leela’s creator. And the story, atmosphere and guest characters are all brilliant from the start. It’s a clever touch that Thea and Adam, the sympathetic characters amongst Fendelman’s group, are implicated by being persuaded not to tell the police about the corpse found by Adam. And I just love the Doctor’s “Good morning, ladies!” to a herd of cows. We also get a self-referential moment that’s much wittier than usual: “You’ve both escaped from somewhere, haven’t you?” “Frequently.”

Part Two

“Alas, poor skull.”

We get to see a glimpse of the Fendahleen here, and we’re given the beginnings of a backstory- it seems the fifth planet of the solar system broke up about twelve million years ago, the same age as the skull. And Thea is mysteriously claiming to have planned the whole thing. This is all excellent stuff, with a mystery developing nicely and a threat which may be a little nebulous but somehow feels defined in the way it didn’t in Horror of Fang Rock.

It’s noticeable the Doctor isn’t around much in this episode, mind.

Part Three

“Dr Fendelman, I think you have an industrial relations problem.”

Leela saves the Doctor’s life, and we get a moment that could be sexual tension between them if not for the fact that there hasn’t been any other sign of any such thing. We get another excellent episode, with even the use of sci-fi concepts to explain second sight being just about passable. Stael’s agenda becomes clear, and Scott Fredericks really is excellent here. Arguably the Quatermass and the Pit connection starts to get a bit much here, what with Mrs Tyler’s “race memory” and all, but it’s all so good I don’t really mind.

We get drip fed some more backstory; apparently the fifth planet was erased from existence, War Lord-like, by the Time Lords. And the situation is nicely summed up by Fendelman just before Stael shoots him: “I have been used! You are being used! MANKIND HAS BEEN USED!”

Part Four

“…Or, on the other hand, it could all be just a coincidence.”

A simply staggering conclusion to a simply magnificent story, with elements from folklore turning out to be essential to the plot- the use of salt here is clever, and in many ways shows how this story in some ways parallels The Dæmons, only done much better.

Oh, and the Doctor fires a gun. Again. He’s always doing that!

I love the Doctor’s explanation to Adam, which at the same time explains what’s going on but remains just ambiguous enough for the Fendahl to retain its mystery. Apparently it destroyed Mars on the way, but it’s not as though Doctor Who has ever featured any Martians!

Utterly superb. An easy 5/5, and a new entry to my top five. After a wobbly start the Graham Williams era suddenly pulls an all time great story out of the bag.