Really, they should've just ditched the whole Sleer idea when Pearce returned, or gone ahead and created a separate Sleer character and made him/her a rival for Servalan, say.
Blake's 7 on Blu-ray!
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The book doesn't go into any detail as to why Vere Lorrimer and Chris Boucher were so set on the idea of Sevalan/Sleer even when they knew Pearce was coming back, when, as you say, they could have ditched the idea and tweaked the scripts a bit.
I don't know how I feel about spinning Sleer off into a separate character though - it invites comparisons to Travis.
While the gap meant there was a lot of time to think ahead, nobody could be contracted till Financial Year 81/82 began. Hence the first half of the season is written by old hands who could be relied on to deliver fast, if not good. They were probably working with the Sleer concept already: note that Servalan only appears in two of the early episodes, and in an early outline for Traitor (or A Land Fit for Helots) Nighthawk was working out of Eagle Base.
At a rough guess Leitz is the remains of the original idea for Sleer.
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That's just what I was thinking. Giving Servalan a second recurring villain to play off of was a more versatile dynamic than just having her opposing Avon's band and the odd guest star of the week. And it would've been quite different from Travis if Sleer was a rival who'd deposed Servalan from power. I can even imagine a scenario where Servalan and Avon's band enter into an uneasy alliance against their common enemy in the back half of the season. That would've been a nice change of pace, since I find I'm getting tired of Servalan constantly popping up as the villain of the week.
But that's just the thing -- unless the original Sleer was also trying to conceal their true identity and kill anyone who recognized them, then that whole subplot must have been created in rewrites when they decided to turn Sleer into an alternate identity for Servalan. So if they had the time to write those scenes into the script, it would've probably taken less time to just cross out "Sleer" and write in "Servalan," and cut out whatever exposition was written to introduce Sleer to the audience. It just seems they made more work for themselves by creating the undercover-Servalan idea.
What are Nighthawk and Eagle Base? If those have been mentioned earlier in the thread, I've forgotten.
Early names for Scorpio and Xenon Base.
FWIW, when Traitor was first going out, I assumed that Leitz was going to be a recurring role, as an ally/rival to Servalan. Episode ending obviously proved me wrong.
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Life would be dull if we all saw the same things
I actuall like Crocher's Travis, Trial and maybe Star One aside he wasn't always given the best material.Indeed. Plus Liberator taking Sarkoff back to Lindor likely hindered the Federation a lot also.
There's resistance on the ice planet where Avalon was captured, and Pressure Point indicates there's resistance on Earth.
Still much of this happens after Seek-Locate-Destroy, so you just have to assume Blake and co were causing trouble off camera. Even the redeployment of Pursuit Ships to track Liberator probably had a positive knock on effect for other malcontents.
It isn't a terrible retcon, Hal says very little and while he says he wants Dayna to meet other people there's enough wiggle room that there were occasional visitors to Sarran. What you can't really retcon is the icky age difference between Dayna and Justin
I think half of the Sleer idea can be explained away, perhaps Servalan had the Sleer identity ready to be activated if needed, perhaps with someone else pretending to be Sleer, that covers the lack of time, but as you say doesn't explain why only 26 people knew what she looked like!
In Time Squad Blake says something like "Until now we have just been an irritant, now we're going to be a problem." before attacking the communications centre on Saurian Major.Life would be dull if we all saw the same things
Indeed. Plus Liberator taking Sarkoff back to Lindor likely hindered the Federation a lot also.
There's resistance on the ice planet where Avalon was captured, and Pressure Point indicates there's resistance on Earth.
Still much of this happens after Seek-Locate-Destroy, so you just have to assume Blake and co were causing trouble off camera. Even the redeployment of Pursuit Ships to track Liberator probably had a positive knock on effect for other malcontents.
It isn't a terrible retcon, Hal says very little and while he says he wants Dayna to meet other people there's enough wiggle room that there were occasional visitors to Sarran. What you can't really retcon is the icky age difference between Dayna and Justin
I think half of the Sleer idea can be explained away, perhaps Servalan had the Sleer identity ready to be activated if needed, perhaps with someone else pretending to be Sleer, that covers the lack of time, but as you say doesn't explain why only 26 people knew what she looked like!
The Sleer idea could have been better worked out. If Servalan was really trying she would have changed her dress sense.
I mean, if she looks like Servalan, dresses like Servalan, and has Servalan's hairdo, then... forget about all the broadcasts!
Well, Series C showed that Servalan's hold on power, even with a greatly contracted Federation, was tenuous at best.
"Rumours of Death" has Servalan overthrown by a coup, even if it was by rebels.
There must have those in both her inner and outer circle that were conspiring to have her removed from power and they instituted a coup shortly before, or during the events of "Terminal". She might have found herself facing off against Federation pursuit ships even if she did succeed in returning with the Liberator.
@Starkers is right in that she might have had the 'Sleer' identity ready in case of a coup and had to hastily activate it. Although I do think we have to take her explanations in "Sand" with a grain of salt as she was playing with Tarrant's emotions at the time.
"Rumours of Death" has Servalan overthrown by a coup, even if it was by rebels.
There must have those in both her inner and outer circle that were conspiring to have her removed from power and they instituted a coup shortly before, or during the events of "Terminal". She might have found herself facing off against Federation pursuit ships even if she did succeed in returning with the Liberator.
@Starkers is right in that she might have had the 'Sleer' identity ready in case of a coup and had to hastily activate it. Although I do think we have to take her explanations in "Sand" with a grain of salt as she was playing with Tarrant's emotions at the time.
I've got to get my hands on the sets somehow. There's very few characters as complex as Avon, and very few actors can deliver such disdain and dry humor like Paul Darrow.
I kind of wish they'd stuck with Eagle Base, or something other than Xenon, since they pronounced it "Zen-un," which was confusing after three seasons with a computer called Zen.
I'm not sure whether I think Nighthawk is a cool name or a corny one.
Yeah, but that's kind of the opposite of starting a revolt, since they took Sarkoff back to put an end to the civil strife that the Federation was fomenting to give themselves an excuse to send in the "peacekeeping" troops and take over.
Those are resistance groups, which are not the same as mass rebellions.
To an extent, yes, but as diankra said, destroying the control complex on Saurian Major was the first time they seriously hurt the Federation.
Sure, but it's still tweaking her backstory in a way they wouldn't have had to do with Cally.
That wasn't seen as inappropriate back then. And really, as long as both participants are consenting adults when any intimate relationship actually begins, there's nothing actually wrong with it. In this case, though Justin clearly had feelings for Dayna, he didn't pressure her for any more than she was willing to give. And it didn't seem to me that he'd had any feelings for her while she was his teenage student, although it's implied that she had a schoolgirl crush on him. But she was 21 years old in "Animals," so she had every right to enter into a consensual relationship with anyone she wanted.
Temporarily. Major Greenlee managed to call Federation Security before he died, and they arrived at the end of the episode to put down the uprising. I think that would qualify as an insurrection rather than an overthrow. Servalan was clearly still in power in "Moloch" and "Death-Watch."
I don't think she had any reason to lie about how she was deposed. And none of this explains the idiotic conceit that her face was unknown outside her inner circle. That might've made sense in a historical setting before the invention of the camera, but not in a far-future civilization.
I've been noticing that Avon seems more animated in Series D, smiling and laughing more often. Before, Avon was usually the cynical gadfly arguing against Blake’s, Tarrant’s, or the others’ plans, but now he’s the one setting the agenda, a more dominant role, which seems to have had a liberating effect on him (ironic, given that they no longer have the Liberator).
Ze-non is how the element is pronounced. Though why anyone would name a habitable planet after an inert element is anyone's guess.
A possible is that it's the Xenon system. With one habitable planet amid a lot of Xenon gas giants.
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My rough guess is that she might have lost power between Deathwatch and Terminal (though some lines suggest otherwise). So it was a last chance for her...
Part of the reason Paul Darrow chose to play Avon more theatrically in Series D, was that he hated some of the scripts that were being presented to him, which he felt were against his portrayal of Avon in earlier series. So, he chose to act as though Avon was slowly beginning to crack under the pressure of fighting against the Federation.
that was a running plot line in BF’s B7 audios with the final full cast taking place just before Terminal.
I'm not sure whether you mean that to be a long or a short e. "Zee-non" is the usual pronunciation of the element name, at least in America, but "zen-on" is an accepted variant, and in Blake's 7, as I said, they pronounce it "zen-un."
Xenon is far too scarce to be a major constituent of a gas giant. Its rarity is why its discoverer Sir William Ramsay named it for Greek xenos, meaning strange or alien. Perhaps that's why the writers chose it as the name of an alien planet.
Interesting.
I agree he was written differently in Series D, though. In Series C, there was no real leader to the group, and Avon often found himself outvoted when he argued against what the others wanted to do. In D, he's unambiguously the leader setting the agenda that the others follow. Also, when and why did he take up Blake's mission to fight the Federation? It seemed to begin in late Series C, like in "Moloch" where he spent weeks following Servalan to see what she was up to and in "Death-Watch" when he took action to stymie her plans, but it was ambiguous whether he was opposing the Federation or just trying to keep Servalan from getting her way. In Series D, he's explicitly fighting the Federation. And it was never really explained why that change happened.
Maybe the loss of the Liberator was the motivating factor. With the Liberator being the most powerful ship, Avon could afford to be cautious, knowing that he had the advantage in terms of speed and firepower against Federation pursuit ships.
Without the Liberator, Avon would possibly be more desperate - even with its star drive and teleport, Scorpio would be on the back foot in any engagement with Federation pursuit ships.
It was mentioned early in Series C, that the crew of the Liberator was looking for a base from which to launch a more coordinated resistance against the Federation. Xenon base gave them that.
However, the Federation was rapidly expanding again in Series D. It was mentioned at one point, that given their current rate of expansion, the Federation would soon be knocking on Xenon base's door.
Fighting back and organizing a resistance was probably the only option left for Avon if he wanted to remain free.
I wonder if the loss of Cally was also a motivating factor? By Series D, Avon and Vila are the only two remaining of the original seven. I also think Servalan saying that Blake was dead at the end of 'Terminal', could have been a reason? Avon never wanted to lead the rebellion, he only wanted the Liberator. Without Blake or the Liberator, Avon knows he has to take up the cause.
Without the Liberator, Avon would possibly be more desperate - even with its star drive and teleport, Scorpio would be on the back foot in any engagement with Federation pursuit ships.
It was mentioned early in Series C, that the crew of the Liberator was looking for a base from which to launch a more coordinated resistance against the Federation. Xenon base gave them that.
However, the Federation was rapidly expanding again in Series D. It was mentioned at one point, that given their current rate of expansion, the Federation would soon be knocking on Xenon base's door.
Fighting back and organizing a resistance was probably the only option left for Avon if he wanted to remain free.
I wonder if the loss of Cally was also a motivating factor? By Series D, Avon and Vila are the only two remaining of the original seven. I also think Servalan saying that Blake was dead at the end of 'Terminal', could have been a reason? Avon never wanted to lead the rebellion, he only wanted the Liberator. Without Blake or the Liberator, Avon knows he has to take up the cause.
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Gold is interesting: after apparent deaths Vila is definitely in charge, even though others are more forceful.
Yes in Terminal Servalan says Blake is dead and she saw his rotting body months before [/SPOILER].
Paul Darrow's acting really sells that scene.
Justin makes several references to Dayna being as lovely as ever, and then there’s Dayna’s reply to Tarrant when he asks if Justin will remember her and she says “I should hope so”. This could of course just be a girl’s romantic misunderstanding of a previous encounter, except Justin is inviting her to stay within minutes of her arrival. Yes he’s lonely but he seems awfully keen right away. He always explicitly says “You came here expecting more, a young love resurrected.” So at the very least he knew she’d formed a romantic attachment to him back in the day.
And talking of back in the day, going by the fact that Servalan is told that the base on Bucol 2 was set up 6 years before the galactic war, then even if Justin popped to teach Dayna days before he took the Federation job, then Dayna would have been around 13 or 14. Taking Peter Byrne’s actual age as a comparator Justin was likely in his mid-forties. If there were any kind of reciprocal romance going on, even if quite chaste, then even in 1981 that’d be icky. (although given the conversations Lucas, Spielberg and Kasdan were having around that time maybe not)
But yes there’s nothing inherently problematic in anything that happens in Animals itself but, and I remember having a similar conversation regarding Reed Richards and Sue Storm, there are way more factors involved in a healthy relationship than merely the age of the parties. There's the power disparity, a younger inexperienced party dazzled by an older more experienced man (or woman) and I know several people who were in such relationships which, at the time, they felt were consensual and equal but with hindsight realise they were anything but.
The episode was clearly written for Cally, and would have worked better, Jan is a decade older than Josette and I can definitely see Cally’s righteous indignation over Justin’s work. You could easily see how Cally and Justin’s paths could have crossed, before she went to Saurian Major, he’s a geneticist, Cally’s people use cloning and her ‘sister’ is a genetic scientist, heck maybe even they met socially with Zelda introducing them.
Even if it had starred Jan I don’t think it would have worked much better, and likely still would have ended up my least favourite episode. There are only two redeeming features, one intentional one not. Vila’s adventures in the bilge tanks are funny, and Darrow almost going arse over tit as they storm into the lab but just managing to stay upright is a sight to behold
