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.