"When you live on the permanent dark side of a planet, no one cares too much what you look like."
REVIEW: Ben Steed's first of three Blake's 7 scripts is convinced the show can do things it's not historically been very good at. There are long ship combat sequences undermined by the visuals, for example, where the techobabble is hardly any more help at explaining just what's happening. A bit like a game of Battleship brought to television, but a little less interesting. By the end, we'll also get a lot of flailing hand-to-hand combat and in particular, Dayna being in no trouble at all except when she's somehow in big trouble she might easily get out of. Throw in Avon obsessed with an alien rock - even if there IS something of an explanation - and being both distracted and distracting, and you get the sense that maybe Steed didn't know the show very well, and that Boucher didn't do enough of a job of editing his screenplay (certainly, the dialog's a little plain).
I'll also raise an eyebrow at how Servalan is used, much too willing to be dominated by a man, but I think we're supposed to be creeped out. We meet Jarvik who, in another life, might have been Travis' worthy replacement (he's killed because Federation soldiers are just the most inept in the multiverse, something repeatedly proven in this episode), but is so irredeemably macho, it hurts the program. This guy used to be a Fleet captain - indeed, he knows jerkface Tarrant because the younger man served under him - but gave it all up to work in construction as a way to return to nature (well, that's as maybe, not an industry I think of as pro-nature). He hates machines and has a tactical mind that can out-think computers. And I think this particular bias, quite opposite to Servalan's, would have been enough to create conflict between them. But no, there's a strong sexist vibe throughout where he's shown to particularly disrespect women, up to an including sexually assaulting Servalan in her own control center while surrounded by guards who never get a single shot out. It's gross even before she says she wants him to do it again. Now, we know Servalan sleeps with subalterns, usually as part of her manipulations, but I didn't imagine her as a willing bottom. I guess the macho allure does something for her. I just find it inherently annoying. Jarvik, who has been trash-taking her below decks (in "nature") is tasked to capture the Liberator and manages it by sacrificing a lot of men (or Mutoids at least), though he's always on the brink of getting executed because he won't share his plan with the President. It's entertaining, if not sensible.
When the ship is captured, it's all off-screen. We understand the clever Trojan horse ploy has worked, but it's a little jarring anyway. Avon, still using his brains despite his weird obsession, manages to instruct Zen to only give Servalan control if she first orders the ship to drop the crew on a livable planet. She gleefully orders him to Kairos, the nearest such planet, which has the reputation of being deadly 51 weeks out of the year. (They harvest crystals there - the Liberator's piracy target - only for a week before SOMETHING makes it deadly.) A good chess match, though it's a little silly that the planet is only deadly because of giant bugs that kill anyone there with the crystals in their possession. I get the point about Federation greed, but it's an easy trap to escape once you know. Also on this planet, inexplicably, is a lunar module (bigger on the inside) the gang can escape in. And Avon's special rock? It reflects yourself, but a bit stronger. Zen and Orac thought it was a smarter computer. Cally's telepathic probe showed her her parents. Avon thought it was the smartest life-form he ever met (unacknowledged as part of the same phenomenon). And at the end, the Liberator's sensors see it as a powerful threat which makes Servalan abandon ship. Weird and convenient. Jarvik is right, she relies on computers to tell her what's what way too much. She probably needed his yin to her yang, but alas. Too sexist to survive, but shows that maybe she needs a least SOMEone to bounce off of. That said, I'm with Avon: Spare us the eulogy for this guy.
NOT MY FEDERATION: Those crystals aren't dilithium, are they?
BUT MIGHT BE MY EMPIRE: Hiding people in storage spaces was developed by a certain Solo, first name Han.
WHO?: Andrew Burt (Jarvik) would play Valgard in Terminus. Frank Gatliff (Servalan's chief toady Dastor) had been Ortron in The Monster of Peladon. Anthony Gardner (Shad) had played Alvis in The Macra Terror.
REWATCHABILITY: Medium-Low - Bit of a mess from a newcomer, and I'm not sure what to make of Jarvik, honestly. Are we supposed to think he's butch and cool? Or actively wish him dead?
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