Blake's 7 was not brilliant because it defied convention. It was brilliant because it ignored convention and just tried to be the best. Never mind that science fiction television was either self-consciously avant-garde, or special-effects mainstream, or avowedly political. Terry Nation just wrote the best stories he could come up with, and the actors followed him. If that meant that someone had to die unexpectedly, it meant that. If it meant that you had to be intelligent, so be it, the audience was assumed to be intelligent. If it meant that imagination had to be used in place of some special effects, the audience was assumed up to it. But more than that, it meant that whatever happened, whether clichéd or radical, had to happen because that was the best way. And the actors -- not the special effects -- brought this vision alive in every episode.
There is a moment in the first series that I think sums up why Blake's 7 is unlike any other science-fiction show, and deserves to be rated, at its best, with any drama television ever made. Among a collection of 20th century artifacts played by a broken man to help him think is Kathleen Ferrier's "Blow the Wind Southerly". Who could not be touched who knew Kathleen Ferrier, and all this meant? But even those who didn't could hardly fail to be moved, if even a little.
Blake's 7 really sums up what the BBC was -- peerless, fearless, and the best -- but it also, in an odd way, says a lot about England. The series is only occasionally optimistic, it positively rejects heroism, but -- it rings of truth, or reality. And that's something that's quite rare in television, let alone most science-fiction television.
There is a moment in the first series that I think sums up why Blake's 7 is unlike any other science-fiction show, and deserves to be rated, at its best, with any drama television ever made. Among a collection of 20th century artifacts played by a broken man to help him think is Kathleen Ferrier's "Blow the Wind Southerly". Who could not be touched who knew Kathleen Ferrier, and all this meant? But even those who didn't could hardly fail to be moved, if even a little.
Blake's 7 really sums up what the BBC was -- peerless, fearless, and the best -- but it also, in an odd way, says a lot about England. The series is only occasionally optimistic, it positively rejects heroism, but -- it rings of truth, or reality. And that's something that's quite rare in television, let alone most science-fiction television.