The Annotated Blake’s 7 - 1979

Before we kick off, apologies for the brain spasm yesterday when I said I couldn’t think of any mass appeal TV show that deliberately made its hero unlikeable. I obviously forgot, or overlooked, the two incidents involving Dr Who, one of which I was actually personally involved in. Oopsy.

To be fair to myself, I don’t think either of those were quite the same as Blake’s turn. They were both conceived more along the lines of a tactic to ginger the audience up, rather unwisely in my opinion. Certainly, it was never intended that the audience should dislike the Capaldi Dr Who. Which is probably why this didn’t occur to me. Also, I think Colin - after his first story - is meant to be brash in a loveable way, like Hartnell, Pertwee and Tom Baker could be. The difference is that he is personally unpleasant to his assistant - that’s the dreadful error.

Another question has occurred to me overnight. Why does the show go on after Blake? It seems always to have been the intention to carry on for one more year, either with - or much more likely without - Gareth Thomas. BBC drama of this era had a tendency to last a minimum of three series, unless it was a horrendous misfire or flop. It seems likely this is the reason - why stop ‘early’ when you have a hit, and an obvious choice for an actor who can move on up to be leading man?

Right, onward!

Inter-Spiral Space

There were no repeats from Series B at all. This may possibly be because the arc plot is difficult to chop up. Almost every episode either picks up on a previous one, or leads to a future one. Only ‘Shadow’, ‘Weapon’ ‘Horizon’ and ‘Killer’ feel like they stand alone, and the latter pair are not the series at its best.

There was a little more merch in 1979 - some jigsaws, the Corgi die-cast Liberator, and the BBC’s own attempt to cash in on the disco sci-fi craze that brought the Star Wars and Doctor Who themes into the charts in funky arrangements. Unfortunately, unlike those tunes, the theme of our show has a shifting time signature, and only one brief musical deviation. This makes it maddeningly repetitive when flattened out to 4/4, and robbed of its swoops of grandeur it merely tootles thinly. I quite like the shouty Federation man in the middle bit though. ‘Your fight is useless!’