Fannish new year's wishes

[vilakins]

I recently rediscovered these and I might start doing them again. From the fannish5:

What are the top five things you would like to have happen in 2007, in any fandom?

OK, for Blake's 7:

1. B7E goes belly-up and sinks without trace.
   
2. Someone who likes Blake's 7 for its own sake buys the rights.
   
3. We get some excellent radio plays (maybe even the hoped-for fifth season) with Paul Darrow, Michael Keating, Steven Pacey, and Jacqueline Pearce playing Avon, Vila, Tarrant, and Servalan.
   
4. A well-written new series with a new young crew and occasional guest appearances by Paul Darrow and Michael Keating as an older Avon and Vila (Terry Nation did want those two to survive) and maybe also Jacqueline Pearce as a still beautiful Servalan. Not too much of her though; they overplayed that card in S4.
   
5. Said new series to have cool new SFX but to have its real strengths in characterisation and witty intelligent dialogue. Oh and a bit of hope would be nice.

Comments

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

I'd like to see a spinoff series with Pearce, Croucher, and Chappell. Particularly Croucher and Chappell, whom I'm convinced should become a sort of Tracy and Hepburn with explosives and black leather.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

You could submit scripts to Big Finish. They'd have to change the names but I believe they've got away with a Travis one already.

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

Really? Which one?

Mind you, I'd also like to see them on TV, being all old and glamorous and awesome, too. There aren't enough middle-aged action stars. Especially women.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Didn't they make one called 'The Final Act'? Maybe it wasn't them. I read a transcript a while back; I think Travis was a bounty hunter. Sorry I'm not much more help.

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

No, that wasn't them. That was the guys doing the Kaldor City audios. (Big Finish started out making truly awful Doctor Who audios... I gather they've improved since, thankfully.)

[spacefall.livejournal.com]

I would prefer no new official B7 material ever. When it comes to fandoms, I'm a necrophiliac :D

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Actually I'd much prefer no more new stuff too, but that's only one item and I needed five. I think now that Doctor Who's been such a success, we're not going to escape some attempt at reviving B7. Sigh.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Mind you, number 2 would do it. We could buy the rights and just not use them.

[jaxomsride.livejournal.com]

I'm a bit chary of a "radical reinterpretation" of the series!

Gauda Prime the aftermath would be interesting but only if well written; I wasn't too impressed with the last Blake's 7 radio play.

The trouble is that being a "freedom fighter" in the current political climate is not exactly a "good" thing and most TV studios would be aware of this. Mind you having said that the new "Robin Hood" series does just that with biting comment that relates directly to the current situation in the Middle East. Maybe now the Iraq war has gone sour Blake's 7 may again be more palatable to todays audience.

I think a sort of "Blake's 7" the next generation is a good idea, though I would miss the old characters. However they are all older (the ones that didn't die), maybe a sort of mentor, Obi Wan/ Brom style character, especially for Avon who SHOT the last serious threat to the Federation - guilt trip time! He wouldn't need to die either just declare that revolution is a young person's game! So writers could write him in more than one episode.
As for whom? Well the Auronar children would be all grown up! Just use the telepathy well please and not just Alien possesses them!
Servalan could have had children by Tarrant - that planet wouldn't have gone to all that trouble just so they could have FUN there would have to be consequences - them as the next generation of Bad Guy - Sleer's dynasty, calling eldest child by her old name and the youngest Travis - twins Of Evil!!!

The Doctor Who revival worked because they got a good team in to do it, though Torchwood does not seem to be developing well for me, not enough Captain Jack and I can't STAND Owen and Gwen's getting tiresome too.

Whether Blake's 7 works depends on
Which production team does it.
Who writes it.
Who they get to play the characters.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Doctor Who works because doctors regenerate and people are used to him changing. The B7 characters should stay as we know them (the distorted versions in S4 were bad enough) or not be used at all. I could accept an older Avon and Vila making guest appearances or even just one in the pilot, but apart from that, I'd rather they left them alone. As for making Avon the sole survivor, that directly contravenes Nation's wishes for a sequel.

I gave up on Torchwood. I don't like the characters, Jack isn't the Jack I got to like in Doctor Who, and I hate that RTD is pushing his nihilistic views on death all the time.

[peladonww.livejournal.com]

I hate that RTD is pushing his nihilistic views on death all the time.

You mean it's not just me imagining that! I thought I was being over picky given that I don't like it, don't rate it and it's a team writing job and so could have been co-incidence. Well maybe I'm not imagining or being over picky about other things too then, in which case it's about time the commissioning agent cut them down to size and pointed out that public entertainment is that and not funded for them to practice brain washing techniques or other forms of social engineering on.

[jaxomsride.livejournal.com]

The Old "there is nothing after death"! Yeah stating once is okay but they are flogging it to death.
I'm not quite ready to give up on it just yet,but it is getting close.

And yes it would be silly to see someone else in the same roles, besides if they are going to move on then they need to MOVE on although having someone symbolically handing the baton on is a common device. Besides I wasn't advocating losing Vila but would he really be involved with the resistance if he had a choice? A reluctant hero indeed!

I mean considering the use of Pylene 50 what would the federation be like further on down the line with the majority of the population zoned out drones with an elite few who do the actual thinking. Militarily they'll need a smaller force to start with so would they really be geared to actually cope with an organised resistance group?

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Good points!

I don't think Vila would be involved, but he could be called in as a reluctant security consultant. :-) Terry Nation wanted them both to survive because the dynamic and snark was so good between them in S1 - S3. Avon needs someone to take him down a peg. ;-)

[jaxomsride.livejournal.com]

Yeah kinda like an old married couple!

No reason you couldn't have a similar dynamic between two new characters.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

True.

[gair.livejournal.com]

being a "freedom fighter" in the current political climate is not exactly a "good" thing

Well, but "freedom fighting" wasn't exactly a non-issue in late 70s/early 80s Britain (http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/othelem/chron/ch78.htm), was it? Bobby Sands died in 1981, the same year as Season 4 originally aired.

[jaxomsride.livejournal.com]

It was not exactly the same as the "War on Terror" they are trying to talk up now either, it was viewed as Britains problem not an international threat.
The same year Bobby Sands died our heroes got axed too, coincidence??????? The fact they were comparing Thatcher and Servalan didn't help either. Blake was more of a socialist too.

[astrogirl2.livejournal.com]

Ah, that would all be nice. Well, except for the "bit of hope," maybe. You know I like it bleak. ;)

[kerravonsen]

Well, just a bit of hope. Not too much. 8-)

[executrix.livejournal.com]

I'd like to see a sort of new-old series that integrated some of the old footage with new material about what was going on on Earth, and on the dozens of planets where Avalon fomented rebellions.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

That would be interesting. DS9 did that well with their return to the TOS tribble episode; they interleaved the action and had their characters walking right past the old ones.

[executrix.livejournal.com]

I rented the first season of Jonathan Creek on DVD--it would be the ultimate violation of the Curl Rule if the Rebellion recruited Jonathan and Blair Sandburg.

[kerravonsen]

LOL!

[sallymn.livejournal.com]

For the combination of curly heads we're talking about, I'd throw the rule away completely. Oh dear, the eye candy...

[peladonww.livejournal.com]

So why did Lj decide to log me out? Grrr.
Anyway what I said was....

Nice idea, and new CGI techs should make it possible to mix it with the now digitised old material, if expensive.

Of course developing CGI raises other possibilities too......
But I'm not sure who I would trust with them.

[executrix.livejournal.com]

Sigh. I suppose anyone who really loves a series has to say "Death Before Dishonor" if re-animation becomes a possibility. It's as if every announcement comes with it's own Monkey's Paw so we can huddle, terrified, and tell it to GO AWAY.

[jaxomsride.livejournal.com]

Re-animation Dr Frankenstein " Give my creation life!"

[executrix.livejournal.com]

Yup--"how's that work out for you, Doc?"

[labingi.livejournal.com]

I agree with all your top 5, especially no. 1.

[imhilien.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't mind a new series, but only if they guaranteed to do a good job of it. With Avon, of course.

I think I'm being too hopeful, though...

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately you are. :-(

[tlingel.livejournal.com]

1 is I think, highly likely.
2 sounds nice, but 1) means it won't happen since no-one would want to put up the money. I think I agree with spacefall- let's stick with what we have. I never really liked Servalan much - At the time I was (and atill am) a Jenna fan

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

We can hope for #1. I don't really want the rest; I'd prefer nothing at all to the sub-standard stuff we probably will get.

[azdak.livejournal.com]

As far as I'm concerned, the more of the original cast they can squeeze in the better, but I'd like it if they weren't just guest appearances, but the point of the series - for example if the new generation of rebels is, say trying to find the supposedly mythical Orac and follows a trail of rumours and claimed sightings that gradually works its way through everyone who survived GP and lets us see how each of them has adapted to the aftermath and whether they're still actively rebelling or have reached an uneasy compromise or have given up totally/gone into hiding/are still tenaciously hunting Servalan. Whatever. And I'd like to see lots of flashbacks, and also have the original crew argue with each other and be utterly stroppy with the newbies. I have no special requests for who should have survived, but I think it would cool if each of the original cast got to be the main character in one episode, even if it was only in flashback.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

That's a brilliant idea! I'd prefer that to the new crew doing basically the same thing,

[peladonww.livejournal.com]

Oh yes! That sounds good too.

[megpie71.livejournal.com]

I'd be willing to see a "40 years on" storyline for the whole B7-verse. Mind you, I'd be picky about the whole situation anyway - I'd want to see some evidence of further economic deterioration of the Federation, as well as some sensible looking at The Great Problems of Empire - namely communications and corruption. Situations would change over 40 years - for a start it's enough time that the mineral exploitation cartels which took over Gauda Prime might have nearly exhausted the planet's mineral rights, which would leave a rather depleted planet for use as either a prison, a dumping ground for toxic waste, or a return to its original purpose as a food supply colony.

I'd also be interested in seeing some kind of forty year delayed effect of the suppressant drugs or similar. After all, there's plenty of documented cases of such things happening on this planet (maybe there could be a record of one planet where the drug interacted badly with the combination of human physiology and a particular light wavelength), so why not elsewhere?

I have to admit, I'd be really interested in a pickup of the series which actually looked seriously at the history, politics, economics, and similar; the structures of empires, and the way that different systems decline and fall. The aftereffects of such a collapse might well be catastrophic in the short term, but I'd be interested in seeing what would happen over the long term. It would need a younger cast (and probably a cast which was somewhat more ethnically diverse than the original Liberator crew, to fit in with current sensibilities), and it would open itself up for a bit more obvious textual homoeroticism (both masculine and feminine) than the original series did. However, I can see both Avon and Vila as survivors, and I can see them getting picked up as "advisors" by someone younger than they are, simply because they've been there, done that, and have not only the t-shirt, but the complete leather outfits to prove it.

If it was done *well*, a "40 years on" pick-up of B7 would be brilliant. However, it would *have* to be done well, because if it's done badly, most of the fandom would be up in arms and baying for blood.