How good are "Blake's 7", "Odyssey 5", and "Space: Above and Beyond"?

[Mal]

Re: How good are "Blake's 7", "Odyssey 5", and "Space: Above and Beyon

Despite the uneven first half of the series, I highly recommend S:AAB.

ditto.

There is an unfortunate thread with Nathan West seeking his annoying girl friend. But once they kill that off, the show is stellar.

T. C. McQueen may be one of my favorite characters in all of science fiction. You can't watch these 45 seconds and not absolutely love the character! And Tucker Smallwood plays an absolutely awesome CO.

And Shane Vansen, well i'll let this speak for itself:

The Pilot is online if you want to check it out risk free

 

[Candlelight]

Re: How good are "Blake's 7", "Odyssey 5", and "Space: Above and Beyon

Sorry, "great dialogue" and "Terry Nation" do not go together.

To clarify, Terry Nation wrote the scripts but in *most* cases the scripts were heavily edited by script editor Chris Boucher. He has even gone on record and said:

"Terry Nation never wrote a single line of dialogue for Avon, I altered all of it"

Although I have been searching and can't find the web page where he said that.

 

[FredH]

Re: How good are "Blake's 7", "Odyssey 5", and "Space: Above and Beyon

There is an unfortunate thread with Nathan West seeking his annoying girl friend. But once they kill that off, the show is stellar.

Although, the way they kill it off in the finale is damn near perfect.


(Goddam it, how does spoiler code work?!)

 

[Candlelight]

Re: How good are "Blake's 7", "Odyssey 5", and "Space: Above and Beyon

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Blake%27s_7

This is such an interesting article. It highlights many of the changes the show went through before we got the final episodes and characters that we know and love.

Contains spoilers for the show, so don't read if you are planning on watching it spoiler free.

Edit: This document actually contains the quote by Chris Boucher I was looking for:

[Terry] Nation made it clear to Boucher that he would only be able to deliver the first draft of each script, telling Boucher, “you can have rewrites or you can have the next episode: which do you want?”. As a result, while Nation created the plots, Boucher provided a great deal of input into the characters and the dialogue. According to Boucher, “Terry came up with the characters, he came up with thirteen good stories, but he didn't come up with the dialogue. I remember saying, and I think it's pretty close to the truth, that for a long time, Paul Darrow [playing Avon] never spoke a line that I hadn't written or altered to make the lines sharper”.