Blake's 7 - episode "Breakdown"
When I got out my tape of "Project Avalon"/"Breakdown" to do some Phantom-related research (what happens when Zen goes offline?) I discovered that the video had been left still wound halfway through from when I watched "Project Avalon" for the Blake's 7 Synchro-watch in the newsgroup alt.fan.blakes-7. Apparently that was over twelve years ago...
At any rate, I thought I might as well write up my impressions of the episode for the newsgroup for old times' sake, since I never actually did "Breakdown" at the time; but since there hasn't been much traffic in that group for years and Google have broken the newsgroup archive interface, I thought I'd post the article here as well, for posterity.
We get some interesting glimpses into life outside the Federation in
this episode -- again, it's a Terry Nation-penned episode, so this is
presumably part of the original series concept. The planet Epinal is
apparently home to a highly civilised non-humanoid species (although in
retrospect, I do wonder how useful an alien brain surgeon would be in
operating on a human), something that the special effects budget
prohibited ever being shown on screen. Meanwhile, space station XK-72 is
a 'neutral' territory, the independence of which is evidently tolerated
by the Federation: it's within a few hours' flight of at least one
Federation base, so clearly they could easily take it over if they
wanted to. Perhaps the research coming out of 'independent' centres is
more technologically adventurous than that carried out under the aegis
of the Federation, and thus it's worth allowing them to operate at
arm's-length... or perhaps the Federation-dominated galaxy isn't
actually as monolithic as I tend to envisage it.
One can certainly see why David Jackson was apparently disappointed by
what was billed 'as Gan's special episode' -- he barely gets a line of
dialogue throughout, and in fact spends most of the running time unable
to emote save by opening and closing one hand! Gan is really little more
than a plot device here: the emergency of the week, serving as a
rationale for the Liberator to risk a shortcut through uncharted danger
and to make direct contact with a potentially hostile high-tech base.
We do get a powerful demonstration of just how strong Gan is, though --
when Blake tries to tackle him on the flight deck, he is clearly no
match for him whatsoever, being thrown around like a discarded toy.
(Although weirdly Blake doesn't appear to realise this: he keeps
attacking Gan, despite his obvious total inability to make the slightly
impact on him, and despite his later conclusion that Gan very nearly
killed him -- although I think the latter refers to the eventual
strangulation attempt once the others arrive, rather than to the
knock-down fight that precedes it.) Perhaps Blake is afraid that if
he gives Gan a moment to reflect, the madman may finish what he has
started and kill Jenna instead? In fact, as we see at various points in
this episode, Gan's mania seems to lose interest in motionless bodies,
so the unconscious Jenna is probably safe enough.
Even when the rest of the crew arrive, Gan is still more than capable of
taking them all on at once, just as he fought three men together in
Vargas' temple on Cygnus Alpha. Blake eventually brings him down only by
hitting him over the head from behind -- attacks to the groin and
stomach having proved entirely ineffectual! Under the circumstances, I
felt that Cally really should have obeyed Blake's urgent instruction to
bring the tranquillisers to immobilise Gan, rather than pausing to ask
Jenna how she is feeling...
Is this the first episode where Avon admits that there is an area of
technical expertise that is beyond his abilities? From the tone of
Blake's suggestion that he might be up for a little neurosurgery, the
series' tendency to endow him with universal competence has clearly been
observed and not entirely appreciated by the others...
Blake demonstrates unexpected 'equal opportunities' traits at two points
in this episode: first of all when he asks the two women to help carry
Gan instead of co-opting Avon, and secondly when he volunteers to take
over the donkey-work holding the vor-ray(?) scanner, simply standing and
moving it in response to instructions, so that Jenna and Cally can watch
the results and do the analysis -- although in practice, it is Avon who
does all the analysing! On the other hand, Blake's suggestion that the
callow Dr Renor might be amenable to a little 'vamp' attention from
Jenna doesn't work out too well: while Jenna agrees cheerfully enough,
when it comes to it she apparently can't bring herself to play up to
the young man, and embarks on a sustained effort to squash his
pretensions.
It's interesting that while Renor is introduced here as a somewhat
obnoxious character, he turns out to be the better 'doctor' of the two:
he genuinely cares about his work and the welfare of the patient, while
Kayn reveals himself as a narcissistic psychopath -- a "genius" surgeon
with no concern for others.
Avon's eagerness to embark upon the trip into the Prohibited Zone
struck me as unusually gung-ho for a character usually risk-averse: I
wonder if this is in part a reaction against Zen's warnings, an attempt
to demonstrate that Zen is only a computer, after all, an element that
Avon stresses throughout the series. However, he rapidly reverts to type
once Zen's warning proves all too justified. (No explanation is ever
suggested as to why the presence of the gravitational vortex in the
Prohibited Zone is not documented -- obviously, space traffic needs to
be warned off the area, but there is no top-secret installation or
anything else involved that would require the very *nature* of the
danger to be kept under cover. Just a handy plot device, I'm afraid.)
Effective use is made of distortion on the screen to suggest first of
all (by localised manipulation of the Liberator's image) the stresses
being placed on the ship and subsequently, by total blurring of the
characters' faces, the disorientation experienced on the flight deck.
This episode probably features the fastest and slowest speeds ever
attained in the series: we are told that the Liberator cannot survive
speeds above standard by twenty, we see her accelerating above standard
by twelve under the influence of the gravitational vortex, and Jenna
pulls away from station XK-72 at 'standard 0.01', one-hundredth of
'standard' speed. It is perhaps surprising that the Liberator doesn't
have a separate drive/speed scale for in-system work, given the
differences in demand between interstellar travel at faster-than-light
speed and manoeuvring around solid bodies under the influence of
gravitational fields from nearby stars and other bodies...
It's also worth noting that this episode gives some idea of 'real'
flight times between star systems, with distances to nearby planets
quoted as several hundred hours of travel (although travel to the planet
Destiny, in "Mission to Destiny", is only eighty-odd hours!) The
fifty-hour flight time to XK-72 implies either that the crew are
seriously short of sleep by the time they arrive (they've all been up
for two days non-stop?) or that a certain amount of down-time must take
place off-screen between crises :-p
I couldn't help wondering exactly what Blake was proposing to do versus
an escaped Gan when he recruits the shaken Cally into the flight-deck
team and charges off to track down Gan single-handed: after all, he has
already tried this once and signally failed to make any impact on the
man whatsoever. However, we see later that he has at least learnt the
'hit him over the head with a heavy object from behind' lesson.
And while I'm usually on the Blake side of any Blake vs Avon argument, I
can't help feeling that Blake comes across as distinctly unappreciative
of Avon's efforts in getting the vital auxiliary systems back online in
time to save the ship from being pulled apart by the gravitational
vortex -- all the acknowledgement he gets is an offhand "yes, all right,
now help me carry Gan, will you?"
Apparently Gan's wholesale assault on the computer linkages doesn't
actually destroy the systems as Avon had predicted...
It's unclear why Blake, when talking to Cally, rules out any attempt to
persuade Avon to stay with the crew after his announcement that "staying
with you requires a degree of stupidity of which I no longer feel
capable" (a statement which, at the time, Blake appears to shrug off
with a cheerful retort). The obvious interpretation would be that he
considers an unwillingly convinced Avon to be a liability: but given
that any Avon-derived reasons for staying on the Liberator are likely to
be deeply self-interested ones, this merely reinforces the likelihood
that Avon will bail out at some future point when self interest suggests
an alternative direction (which, to be honest, is most of the time!)
The impression actually given in this scene is that, despite his
statements to the contrary, Blake *is* angered by Avon's comments and
isn't prepared to raise a hand to stop him leaving the crew. (And aren't
Vila's comments about "the trouble with a genius is that you're never
quite certain what he's up to" a sidelong poke at Avon in his absence?)
On the other hand, it is not at all clear why Avon, on learning that the
Liberator is in danger, decides to return on board rather than avail
himself of the freely-offered sanctuary of XK-72, not to mention the
compliment to his abilities thereby implied. In fact, he even lies to
Farron to suggest that he is not returning: as it turns out, he is lucky
to get back at all, having blithely assumed that Vila would hang around
indefinitely waiting to teleport him up. As events turn out, of course,
he saves his life by leaving the station before it is accidentally
destroyed in the firefight that ensues -- but there is no earthly way
anyone could have predicted that the outcome would have been that way
round.
So one can only assume that he is prompted by stirrings of conscience at
the realisation of the others' plight... and perhaps by the
demonstration that anyone on the supposedly 'neutral' XK-72 could betray
him to the Federation at any time, without any means of escape. (We also
learn in this episode that the entire crew are under a 'death sentence'
in absentia.) We have already seen, after all, that Avon was prepared to
make the others' escape a condition of his own acceptance on board XK-72
-- somewhat to my own surprise, I confess: I'd assumed that the sale of
the Liberator was have been the bargaining chip he planned to use to buy
his place! He is clearly not quite as self-interested as he likes others
to believe.
Blake's arrival on board the space station is used to create a humorous
interlude, as Farron commands the technicians at the station's arrival
bay to ensure that he is not armed on disembarking from his supposed
'shuttle': Blake's first words are "Don't worry, I'm not armed". This
does, however, raise the question of how he was able to overhear what
Farron was saying immediately before his teleport arrival. Or is just
just coincidence?
After unexpectedly volunteering to be the one to fetch Kayn's tools and
assistant from the station (I strongly suspect Blake intended Vila to be
the one to go, and by his hopeful volunteering of Jenna Vila evidently
assumes the same!), Avon only appears to take one teleport bracelet from
the rack. I originally assumed this was a continuity error; then, when
Avon announces that he is not coming back, a neat bit of prefiguring.
But he clearly *does* take a spare bracelet with him for Dr Renor to
use, since he is able to teleport back on board when he changes his
mind; and after all, he couldn't possibly have guaranteed that he would
be able to get a good deal out of the station administration, or indeed
any acceptable 'deal' at all, so it would have been most unwise to give
his bracelet to Renor.
We get an interesting glimpse into the perception of Blake and his crew
among ordinary people: Renor exclaims over "*the* Blake" and calls Jenna
a "celebrity". Perhaps this sort of thing contributes towards the
promised death sentence -- the Federation can't be very pleased at the
lionising of its opponents!
It always seemed very dodgy to me for the crew to attempt to force Kayn
to carry out a risky operation at gun-point, as he could easily simply
have killed Gan -- or the additional stress could equally have caused
him to make a mistake. I note that despite Vila's concern that "Blake's
got a conscience" and might not be prepared to be ruthless enough, it is
in fact Blake who comes up with the clinching threat: he will not kill
Kayn (a threat the surgeon obviously believes to be an idle one, since
they need his skill), he will instead cripple him if they are forced to
flee before he completes the operation.
This ties in neatly with the final shot of Kayn, after he snaps
altogether and murders the base commander. (One can't help feeling
sympathy towards Farron, who behaves decently throughout and has to cope
with what is obviously routine scorn and abuse from scientific prima
donnas like Kayn on a regular basis.) We see Kayn, now apparently
completely round the bend, staring mesmerised at the hands -- his
precious hands -- which have just killed a man. Is it possible he is
actually suffering remorse, or is he just worried that he may have
damaged himself with the unaccustomed interpersonal violence? ;-p
Either way, it's a moot point: his action has not only doomed Kayn
himself, but all the other 'neutral' personnel on the station, when a
stray plasma bolt heads directly towards XK-72 immediately after the
murder of its commanding officer. Although, to be fair, it's uncertain
quite what Farron could have done in any case to protect his command
under the circumstances, even without the headless-chicken scenario that
ensues -- still, given that the station supposedly specialises in
weaponry as well as space medicine, there might well have been some kind
of counter-measures that could have been launched in time.
At any rate, I thought I might as well write up my impressions of the episode for the newsgroup for old times' sake, since I never actually did "Breakdown" at the time; but since there hasn't been much traffic in that group for years and Google have broken the newsgroup archive interface, I thought I'd post the article here as well, for posterity.
We get some interesting glimpses into life outside the Federation in
this episode -- again, it's a Terry Nation-penned episode, so this is
presumably part of the original series concept. The planet Epinal is
apparently home to a highly civilised non-humanoid species (although in
retrospect, I do wonder how useful an alien brain surgeon would be in
operating on a human), something that the special effects budget
prohibited ever being shown on screen. Meanwhile, space station XK-72 is
a 'neutral' territory, the independence of which is evidently tolerated
by the Federation: it's within a few hours' flight of at least one
Federation base, so clearly they could easily take it over if they
wanted to. Perhaps the research coming out of 'independent' centres is
more technologically adventurous than that carried out under the aegis
of the Federation, and thus it's worth allowing them to operate at
arm's-length... or perhaps the Federation-dominated galaxy isn't
actually as monolithic as I tend to envisage it.
One can certainly see why David Jackson was apparently disappointed by
what was billed 'as Gan's special episode' -- he barely gets a line of
dialogue throughout, and in fact spends most of the running time unable
to emote save by opening and closing one hand! Gan is really little more
than a plot device here: the emergency of the week, serving as a
rationale for the Liberator to risk a shortcut through uncharted danger
and to make direct contact with a potentially hostile high-tech base.
We do get a powerful demonstration of just how strong Gan is, though --
when Blake tries to tackle him on the flight deck, he is clearly no
match for him whatsoever, being thrown around like a discarded toy.
(Although weirdly Blake doesn't appear to realise this: he keeps
attacking Gan, despite his obvious total inability to make the slightly
impact on him, and despite his later conclusion that Gan very nearly
killed him -- although I think the latter refers to the eventual
strangulation attempt once the others arrive, rather than to the
knock-down fight that precedes it.) Perhaps Blake is afraid that if
he gives Gan a moment to reflect, the madman may finish what he has
started and kill Jenna instead? In fact, as we see at various points in
this episode, Gan's mania seems to lose interest in motionless bodies,
so the unconscious Jenna is probably safe enough.
Even when the rest of the crew arrive, Gan is still more than capable of
taking them all on at once, just as he fought three men together in
Vargas' temple on Cygnus Alpha. Blake eventually brings him down only by
hitting him over the head from behind -- attacks to the groin and
stomach having proved entirely ineffectual! Under the circumstances, I
felt that Cally really should have obeyed Blake's urgent instruction to
bring the tranquillisers to immobilise Gan, rather than pausing to ask
Jenna how she is feeling...
Is this the first episode where Avon admits that there is an area of
technical expertise that is beyond his abilities? From the tone of
Blake's suggestion that he might be up for a little neurosurgery, the
series' tendency to endow him with universal competence has clearly been
observed and not entirely appreciated by the others...
Blake demonstrates unexpected 'equal opportunities' traits at two points
in this episode: first of all when he asks the two women to help carry
Gan instead of co-opting Avon, and secondly when he volunteers to take
over the donkey-work holding the vor-ray(?) scanner, simply standing and
moving it in response to instructions, so that Jenna and Cally can watch
the results and do the analysis -- although in practice, it is Avon who
does all the analysing! On the other hand, Blake's suggestion that the
callow Dr Renor might be amenable to a little 'vamp' attention from
Jenna doesn't work out too well: while Jenna agrees cheerfully enough,
when it comes to it she apparently can't bring herself to play up to
the young man, and embarks on a sustained effort to squash his
pretensions.
It's interesting that while Renor is introduced here as a somewhat
obnoxious character, he turns out to be the better 'doctor' of the two:
he genuinely cares about his work and the welfare of the patient, while
Kayn reveals himself as a narcissistic psychopath -- a "genius" surgeon
with no concern for others.
Avon's eagerness to embark upon the trip into the Prohibited Zone
struck me as unusually gung-ho for a character usually risk-averse: I
wonder if this is in part a reaction against Zen's warnings, an attempt
to demonstrate that Zen is only a computer, after all, an element that
Avon stresses throughout the series. However, he rapidly reverts to type
once Zen's warning proves all too justified. (No explanation is ever
suggested as to why the presence of the gravitational vortex in the
Prohibited Zone is not documented -- obviously, space traffic needs to
be warned off the area, but there is no top-secret installation or
anything else involved that would require the very *nature* of the
danger to be kept under cover. Just a handy plot device, I'm afraid.)
Effective use is made of distortion on the screen to suggest first of
all (by localised manipulation of the Liberator's image) the stresses
being placed on the ship and subsequently, by total blurring of the
characters' faces, the disorientation experienced on the flight deck.
This episode probably features the fastest and slowest speeds ever
attained in the series: we are told that the Liberator cannot survive
speeds above standard by twenty, we see her accelerating above standard
by twelve under the influence of the gravitational vortex, and Jenna
pulls away from station XK-72 at 'standard 0.01', one-hundredth of
'standard' speed. It is perhaps surprising that the Liberator doesn't
have a separate drive/speed scale for in-system work, given the
differences in demand between interstellar travel at faster-than-light
speed and manoeuvring around solid bodies under the influence of
gravitational fields from nearby stars and other bodies...
It's also worth noting that this episode gives some idea of 'real'
flight times between star systems, with distances to nearby planets
quoted as several hundred hours of travel (although travel to the planet
Destiny, in "Mission to Destiny", is only eighty-odd hours!) The
fifty-hour flight time to XK-72 implies either that the crew are
seriously short of sleep by the time they arrive (they've all been up
for two days non-stop?) or that a certain amount of down-time must take
place off-screen between crises :-p
I couldn't help wondering exactly what Blake was proposing to do versus
an escaped Gan when he recruits the shaken Cally into the flight-deck
team and charges off to track down Gan single-handed: after all, he has
already tried this once and signally failed to make any impact on the
man whatsoever. However, we see later that he has at least learnt the
'hit him over the head with a heavy object from behind' lesson.
And while I'm usually on the Blake side of any Blake vs Avon argument, I
can't help feeling that Blake comes across as distinctly unappreciative
of Avon's efforts in getting the vital auxiliary systems back online in
time to save the ship from being pulled apart by the gravitational
vortex -- all the acknowledgement he gets is an offhand "yes, all right,
now help me carry Gan, will you?"
Apparently Gan's wholesale assault on the computer linkages doesn't
actually destroy the systems as Avon had predicted...
It's unclear why Blake, when talking to Cally, rules out any attempt to
persuade Avon to stay with the crew after his announcement that "staying
with you requires a degree of stupidity of which I no longer feel
capable" (a statement which, at the time, Blake appears to shrug off
with a cheerful retort). The obvious interpretation would be that he
considers an unwillingly convinced Avon to be a liability: but given
that any Avon-derived reasons for staying on the Liberator are likely to
be deeply self-interested ones, this merely reinforces the likelihood
that Avon will bail out at some future point when self interest suggests
an alternative direction (which, to be honest, is most of the time!)
The impression actually given in this scene is that, despite his
statements to the contrary, Blake *is* angered by Avon's comments and
isn't prepared to raise a hand to stop him leaving the crew. (And aren't
Vila's comments about "the trouble with a genius is that you're never
quite certain what he's up to" a sidelong poke at Avon in his absence?)
On the other hand, it is not at all clear why Avon, on learning that the
Liberator is in danger, decides to return on board rather than avail
himself of the freely-offered sanctuary of XK-72, not to mention the
compliment to his abilities thereby implied. In fact, he even lies to
Farron to suggest that he is not returning: as it turns out, he is lucky
to get back at all, having blithely assumed that Vila would hang around
indefinitely waiting to teleport him up. As events turn out, of course,
he saves his life by leaving the station before it is accidentally
destroyed in the firefight that ensues -- but there is no earthly way
anyone could have predicted that the outcome would have been that way
round.
So one can only assume that he is prompted by stirrings of conscience at
the realisation of the others' plight... and perhaps by the
demonstration that anyone on the supposedly 'neutral' XK-72 could betray
him to the Federation at any time, without any means of escape. (We also
learn in this episode that the entire crew are under a 'death sentence'
in absentia.) We have already seen, after all, that Avon was prepared to
make the others' escape a condition of his own acceptance on board XK-72
-- somewhat to my own surprise, I confess: I'd assumed that the sale of
the Liberator was have been the bargaining chip he planned to use to buy
his place! He is clearly not quite as self-interested as he likes others
to believe.
Blake's arrival on board the space station is used to create a humorous
interlude, as Farron commands the technicians at the station's arrival
bay to ensure that he is not armed on disembarking from his supposed
'shuttle': Blake's first words are "Don't worry, I'm not armed". This
does, however, raise the question of how he was able to overhear what
Farron was saying immediately before his teleport arrival. Or is just
just coincidence?
After unexpectedly volunteering to be the one to fetch Kayn's tools and
assistant from the station (I strongly suspect Blake intended Vila to be
the one to go, and by his hopeful volunteering of Jenna Vila evidently
assumes the same!), Avon only appears to take one teleport bracelet from
the rack. I originally assumed this was a continuity error; then, when
Avon announces that he is not coming back, a neat bit of prefiguring.
But he clearly *does* take a spare bracelet with him for Dr Renor to
use, since he is able to teleport back on board when he changes his
mind; and after all, he couldn't possibly have guaranteed that he would
be able to get a good deal out of the station administration, or indeed
any acceptable 'deal' at all, so it would have been most unwise to give
his bracelet to Renor.
We get an interesting glimpse into the perception of Blake and his crew
among ordinary people: Renor exclaims over "*the* Blake" and calls Jenna
a "celebrity". Perhaps this sort of thing contributes towards the
promised death sentence -- the Federation can't be very pleased at the
lionising of its opponents!
It always seemed very dodgy to me for the crew to attempt to force Kayn
to carry out a risky operation at gun-point, as he could easily simply
have killed Gan -- or the additional stress could equally have caused
him to make a mistake. I note that despite Vila's concern that "Blake's
got a conscience" and might not be prepared to be ruthless enough, it is
in fact Blake who comes up with the clinching threat: he will not kill
Kayn (a threat the surgeon obviously believes to be an idle one, since
they need his skill), he will instead cripple him if they are forced to
flee before he completes the operation.
This ties in neatly with the final shot of Kayn, after he snaps
altogether and murders the base commander. (One can't help feeling
sympathy towards Farron, who behaves decently throughout and has to cope
with what is obviously routine scorn and abuse from scientific prima
donnas like Kayn on a regular basis.) We see Kayn, now apparently
completely round the bend, staring mesmerised at the hands -- his
precious hands -- which have just killed a man. Is it possible he is
actually suffering remorse, or is he just worried that he may have
damaged himself with the unaccustomed interpersonal violence? ;-p
Either way, it's a moot point: his action has not only doomed Kayn
himself, but all the other 'neutral' personnel on the station, when a
stray plasma bolt heads directly towards XK-72 immediately after the
murder of its commanding officer. Although, to be fair, it's uncertain
quite what Farron could have done in any case to protect his command
under the circumstances, even without the headless-chicken scenario that
ensues -- still, given that the station supposedly specialises in
weaponry as well as space medicine, there might well have been some kind
of counter-measures that could have been launched in time.