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Blake (413)
This is it, the infamous final episode of Blake's 7. So in one sense only, yay, this is the last review post, and the end of the rewatch. :-)
I know a lot of people revel in the pointless tragedy and celebrate the anniversary of the broadcast, but I cling to the fact that it was written as a cliff-hanger, and take pleasure in writing my version of the next unfilmed season. So there.
A cliff-hanger? Really?
- Gareth Thomas had it written into his contract that Blake would be seen to die on screen and would not be brought back in any form.
- Boucher said that he could have any of the Scorpio crew survive whose actors wanted to come back.
- He also said that he filmed the scenes where they were shot in dream-like slow motion to give himself the option of interpreting them some other way.
Some people love this episode. I am not among them despite it being intended as a cliff-hanger because I remember being very depressed after seeing it as a teenager, so much so that I almost didn't watch the reruns this century. Not the thing to show just before Christmas in the UK during a depression either; I've read about children writing letters asking why they killed their friends. :-( Also, the message we're left with since this turned out to be the last episode is that it's just not worth fighting evil and injustice. I refuse to accept this.
That all aside, this episode has a surprising amount of humour in it with a lot of darkly witty lines including one of my favourites:
SOOLIN: Surely you're not afraid of the dark.
VILA: Only when it's unilluminated.
This might be the favourite episode of many but there are still holes.
Where does Avon get his bloody great gun?
What is this about:
BLAKE I'll bear that in mind. [puts his gun back in his belt] [A card comes out of the computer. Deva reads it and hands it to Blake.]We don't hear any more about that; maybe it was something that was going to be brought up in S5?
DEVA Last known locations and probable movements for both subjects, and official authorization to hunt them.
And what was Arlen going to tell Deva, and why was it significant enough to even mention?
The representative from the Federation High Council is probably Sleer, or is she actually on the High Council? Her absence is one of the good things about this ep; I'd hate to have had it rubbed in that evil triumphs.
How come Avon knows that's Blake's flyer?
OK, Blake tells Tarrant that Jenna is dead, but I don't really believe it. Blake was turned in by Dev Tarrant so I'd say he was ensuring Jenna was safe from someone with almost the same name.
Now that Avon knows that's Blake's base since Tarrant has just told him, why the hell does he shoot Klyn instead of saying who he is? (Yeah, the actor, his wife, wanted it but that's no excuse to confuse the plot further.) And why doesn't Blake tell his people to welcome the crew since he knows it's Avon and Orac at least? If Klyn had said something to them instead of calling security, things might have--only might have--been a bit different. I still don't think there's any excuse for Avon shooting unarmed Blake even if he believes Tarrant. After all Avon wasn't happy about Keiller shooting the doctor on the Space Princess so he hasn't been that ruthless before.
It's all a tangle of errors from start to finish and still depresses me.
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I only enjoy bleak if there's some leavening of it, or a hopeful resolution. I'm pretty close to giving up on SGU which doesn't even have anyone with a sense of humour, though I wouldn't have one in the dark either.
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Chris Boucher: A cheque landing on the mat.
'S easy, damn it; I could do it. So could umpteen other fan writers, and have.
I saw it when it first went out, and concur about the timing; it was a bastard of a thing to do just before Christmas. I'm only glad it wasn't one day earlier, which would have been my birthday...
I think there are ginormous holes, many of them centred around Bake's bounty-hunting. The only thing I can imagine Arlen having to tell Deva is Blake's identity, which would hardly lead him to have confidence in her.
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I wish one had.
Ah yes, I enjoy writing it myself. And I have to say that episode made me into a fanfic writer.
The whole thing about Arlen is odd. Just how did she check out anyway when she was really a Federation officer? They can't have known that much, or been able to find out much on such a lawless planet. Plus they all, Arlen and Blake included, took so many stupid risks.
I like your icon. :-)
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And then when the fourth series was repeated the following summer, I missed it again because we were on a camping holiday!
Of course, I could now rectify this omission any time I wanted, but I think I prefer to live with the mystery. ;-)
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And really, not having seen Season 4 is a Good Thing. I almost didn't review it. As for this episode, I'll never watch it again as a whole; maybe just the occasional scene.
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They're aliiiiive, I tell you! Even Blake if I choose.
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I actually can't think of another way it could have ended. Avon and Blake drinking a beer and discussing the good old days. Raising the glass and promising each other they will fight the Federation together leaving the viewer with the overall good feeling that this time they will succeed?
I don't remember what I felt when I saw this episode for the first time. I had probably already heard what would happen. I saw series 1 and 2 as a teenager and had to wait 25 years before I could watch series 3 and 4. I can imagine people feeling shocked and cheated, but this ending has giving much food for thought in the minds of the fans and the fanfic writers, so I'm not complaining. It has produced some very nice fic!
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I'd have settled for that. Hell, I'd have settled for Terminal which was supposed to be the final ep: it was open-ended and had some hope.
Admittedly I might not have written any fanfic and wouldn't be here now., so you're right about the effect. :-)
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I was stunned when this was shown, but almost immediately decided Vila and Avon had made it. Why Vila is obvious, but I think Avon too because although I never liked him, I enjoyed their double act. So when Tony Attwood's Blake's 7 Afterlife came out in 1984, saying they both survived, I embraced it as what MUST have happened
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Michael Keating BTW swears that Vila escaped and runs a bar with Kerril. :-)
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I'm pretty sure only read the book the once, back in 1984 when it came out, and I really remember very little of it now. I was 12/13 when I read it, and I often find that I was oblivious to some of the themes, shall we say.
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I pretty much regard it as another fanfic. It's meant to be official but I don't know anyone who thinks of it that way. He kills Tarrant off rather gratuitously and introduces Avon's sister who's never been mentioned before. Attwood was considering writing a sequel but I don't think he got the interest.
At least it was a hell of a lot better than Paul Darrow's Avon: A Terrible
NovelAspect. I haven't read it but I've seen enough excerpts stunning in their ignorance of astronomy, anatomy, and, well, Avon.no subject
Now she would be something worth him stealing!
I never fancied giving that a try. To me Avon was always like the sarcastic maths teacher who made you look stupid every single week in front of your classmates. He said funny things that could raise a smile, but that could never made up for it.
I don't know, but I sometimes think that however many times I re-watch as an adult, I can only see the black/white good/bad battle of what was a childhood programme for me. Even though I could understand that my good guys were their bad guys, and that things weren't always that cut and dried, especially as I got older as the programme progressed. I'm sad it ended when and how it did, but I know (and knew then) who made it and where they went. I cared enough that 21 years later I looked for other Vila fans when I started my LJ, and I found you, my longest LJ friend :0)
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I don't think there's any doubt that the Federation is evil and that our guys are the good ones even if they are criminals; they have ethics and they give a damn. And yes, I'd hate to know Avon, but Vila is entirely another matter. :-)
I know (and knew then) who made it and where they went.
So what do you think? Vila survived of course, but where do you think they went, and what did they do? :-)
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These days I imagine that Vila stuck with Avon for a while because he could embezzle the money and carry the gun, and that Avon allowed this because whatever he thought of him, he was a talented thief. They got a small ship, and kept low until one night they ended up on some big casino planet somewhere, beat the house and collapsed drunk in their room. When Avon woke up Vila was gone.
With the money.
And the ship.
Avon didn't care much, he had be squirrelling it away and didn't care what happened to the little man. Vila, who had actually just been pretending to be drunk and had actually been on performance enhancing water the whole night had left about 10 minutes after Avon passed out, and went straight to find Kerril.
I've always like the happy ever after
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Vila's slightly taller than Avon though when he's not trying to look smaller. He's good at it though. :-)
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Yeah, it would be one of those ones, where you think it is a race for Vila to be away before Avon comes after, but some time check later and you would realise he actually had a 10 hour head start, or something like that ;0)
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So it's the final ep. BUT there's awesome fanfic out there to read. *grin*
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The ending is sort of reminiscent for me of the ending to S:AAB (I don't know if you're familiar with it so won't go into details!), in the sense that you can sort of choose whether to see it as a cliffhanger or a resolution for the characters. For me, S:AAB's ending was perfect, really, given that they only had one season to resolve a five-season arc. By comparison, B7's ending was in retrospect a bit - well, a lot - simplistic; there wasn't really any attempt at individual character resolution, except for Blake and Avon, depending on how you interpret it. They could have written a more thorough ending, even with the hope of a further season. Either way, I wouldn't have wanted a happy ending for the show. For some of the characters, maybe, but I wouldn't have changed what happened between Blake and Avon.
I knew how B7 ended before I saw the episode, so I suppose it was never going to have the impact it was supposed to. When I imagine how first-time viewers must have felt when the episode aired, though - wow! So basically, I was impressed with their balls, but not so much with the details. Although the gunshots-after-the-credits thing was great; I loved that.
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I watch TV for entertainment, not to be shocked or depressed. I gave up on BSG in season 2, stuck with Firefly despite the reavers only to be hit with the film, and I'm this close to giving up on SGU. It's just too dark--physically and otherwise. At least Firefly and B7 have humour, but I suppose it's hard to joke in the dark. I'm intrigued with what Rush said about the Destiny at the end but I'll need some real SF and interest to keep me watching.
I read your post about that other series and was very glad I'd never watched it.
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For me personally, I guess I'm entertained by being shocked and depressed :) Somebody once remarked to me that their mother only considered a film good if it made her cry. When it comes down to it I suppose I watch TV to feel something; whether it's good or bad is irrelevant, as long as it's strong emotion, impact.
I find quite a bit of humour in both BSG and SGU - grim gallows humour for the most part, admittedly, but I like it. S:AAB had a lot more humour; it made the characters more human, and made the ending even more impactful. Something that makes you love people that never existed, that tears you in half when they suffer - that's impressive, to me. It's powerful. It's art.
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I can't handle too strong emotion which is why I avoid the news. I have too much empathy; I put myself in the place of others. The only good cry I like is one that's part happiness.
I don't really feel any connection with the characters on SGU, but I did like several on BSG. If they killed off the lot on SGU, I'd be pissed off but not put-punched. I wouldn't be losing anyone I cared about except maybe for Eli, though they haven't really developed his character much. I don't notice any humour there. I'm watching West Wing (yeah, I often come to series very late) and there are several laugh-out-loud places in each ep, and I love those characters. SGU has yet to engage me, I suppose. That, or have some intriguing SF ideas because that's another thing that will keep me interested: hard SF.
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I like hard sci-fi, but mainly as a backdrop to the human element, or (preferably) interacting with it. I love cyberpunk because it's all about human/computer interface. There seems to be a lot of opportunity to do this with SGU, so I hope they develop it in that direction!
I suppose I enjoy empathising with suffering characters as well as happy ones because for me, life is all about amassing psychological experiences, good as well as bad. I don't *want* to be miserable, but if it happens, I try to think of it as a learning experience, something that will make me more fully human. Or at least provide some kind of insight into what being human might mean!
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An intriguing idea will make up for lack of characterisation for me in a novel because I can add more myself, but for some reason I'm not doing that with SGU. However if they have sufficiently interesting story-lines, which they haven't lately, I'll stick with it, but I need something to keep me watching. Maybe they'll find a technologically advanced planet with some brighter bulbs in stock ;-) I won't hold my breath about that one though.
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I really don't believe it was. If it had been, they would never have let Blake be accused of child abuse, of all things. I honestly think Nation intended it as adult viewing - that first ep was gritty enough. Then a younger audience started to watch (though the demographic was never really kids; the average age was early 20s) and the BBC, who thought all SF was kiddy stuff anyway, got to marketing it at an audience I don't think it was ever meant for, and making it less adult in the process.
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My mind boggled for a moment when you talked about kids writing in. I knowthe BBC had a thing where science fiction=kids' show, but it was quite too harsh for anyone under 12 at least, imo.
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They were apparently deluged with letters from devastated kids, including ill ones, who loved those characters; also adults who were depressed enough about the economy and Christmas before being slugged with that. One guy I think was fairly suicidal (though he probably was anyway).
I think I read about it in one of the books on the series. Dammit, they should have given them another season, even if it was a short one.
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Blake is clearly insane by now. Not one thing he does makes any sense and he is responsible for getting his own people killed mistakenly by Avon and the others and for the slaughter at the end. Deva already warned him his silly games would end up getting people killed. But Blake's arrogance of course means that he always has to get his own way even when it makes no sense. Blake deserved what he got, it was his own stupid fault for setting up the circumstances that got himself and everyone killed.
I also don't believe Jenna was dead. Jenna wasn't with Blake after Star One. They ended up on different ships. And Jenna wasn't the kind that on her own, she would make a suicidal gesture like Blake claimed she did. That's completely against her character.
Avon never kills unless he feels that his life or the life of the people with him are in direct physical danger. To assume that Avon, who has never been ruthless before, is now being ruthless doesn't seem to make much sense. There has to be a reason why Avon did it that is consistent with his character. I don't think he was being ruthless here at all. He and the crew obviously believed they were in danger by now and I believe it is tied to how Avon all of a sudden has a big gun.
Avon and his big gun. I suspect that because of Blake's stupidity, that Klyn and the tech who attacked Tarrant weren't the only ones who showed hostility to Avon and his crew. When they entered the base, it was without violent intentions. They wanted to join up with Blake. But when they see the tech trying to kill Tarrant, Soolin immediately shoots the man in the back, instead of trying to stop him in a less lethal way. Trying to strangle someone isn't an instantaneoulsy deadly, it takes time. It's not like snapping their necks. She had time to go and pull the guy off Tarrant.
Now unless you believe that Avon and Soolin and the others are so mindlessly violent, (and Avon never was) there must have been a reason why they're suddenly so defensive and consider the people on Blake's base a threat to them. That is how I think Avon ended up with the gun. There had to be another scene where Avon go the gun, that is common sense. But I suspect that in this scene another one of Blake's people tried to attacking Avon's group and they having to defend themselves and that is how Avon got the gun. This explains why they have now gone on the offensive and consider the people on the Blake a threat. It explains why Soolin shoots the tech in the back the moment they see him trying to kill Tarrant (who looks wounded) and why Avon shoots Klyn when she calls for security rather than trying to show them she's not the enemy. Avon doesn't shoot people who are not the enemy. And Tarrant telling Avon that Blake is there only confirms that it is one of Blake's people trying to kill his crew. Why wouldn't Avon and the others now consider everyone on the base an enemy?
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One other thing GT definitely wanted Blake dead and never able to come back and yay for him! Even though it was left in the air for the other characters, TN had planned to have Avon and Vila come back though for another series.
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Klyn is already calling for security against them. Avon feels he has to stop her by shooting her because he's not close enough to stop her any other way. He has already seen Blake's people trying to kill Tarrant, a man who looks injured and in not that good a shape. And people question why Avon doesn't take a more peaceful action as if he has absolutely no provocation? Blake's people, and by extension Blake, at this point are acting like their enemies. Why wouldn't he shoot them just like Jenna shot the Federation troops in the back while they were running away?
Just once, I'd like to see people apply the judgements to Avon as they seem to for others.
on B7
...it's just not worth fighting evil and injustice. I refuse to accept this.
I was going to say something about New Zealand's position on the Sliding Scale of Idealism to Cynicism, relative to Great Britain, but I see by your profile that you've lived all over. Individual personality can override national anyway.
I was spoiled for GP by Leah Rosenthal's cartoon in =Textual Poachers=: Bang! You're Canceled! Avon looks suitably shocked, but Dead!Blake is just drumming his fingers, and thus I became a Blake fan. I always fall for the eponymous hero eventually, no matter how despised by antihero fans, but in this case I fell before seeing a single episode. (And just as well, because Gareth looks a big dork in the first several scenes.)
Re: on B7
I love Leah's cartoons and the Bizarro B7 series. One of those made me laugh out loud in a cafe. :-P
Avon fans either seem to love or hate Blake. Vila of course is my favourite but I like Blake and the others too, and Avon up till the end of season 3.