Blake’s Seven reboot?
I recently watched the miniseries of The Andromeda Strain, and though I admire many of the actors who were involved with the project, the reason for making such a remake still eludes me. The original movie was fine as it was, and plenty creepy — and some of those scary bits were removed in the 2008 miniseries. As political commentary, it was still nowhere near as witty or scary as the BBC’s End Day.
There’s word of a reimagined Blake’s Seven on Sky TV in Britain. That’s one SF piece that would be intriguing and worthwhile to see with new special effects – as opposed to Doctor Who, where the effects added to the overall charm. It’s also the most challenging aspect for new viewers of the show to deal with.
Otherwise, there’s no reason that Blake’s Seven couldn’t have the critical acclaim of the current and challenging Battlestar Galactica or Firefly. Certainly, with its emphasis on politics and morality riddles, it’s not a show that only science fiction fans could enjoy.
Plus, that means the original series would probably be released to the US on DVD. Amazingly, despite fans that have collected the show avidly since it was first aired on WGBH-Boston in the early 1980s, Blake’s Seven is still not available in the US.
“How to Get into Rebel Space Opera Blake’s Seven” is an excellent introduction to this series, which has been described as both “Robin Hood in space”, “witty” and “nihilist”. It arguably inspired such later shows as Crusade, but one fun way of viewing Blake’s Seven is to imagine that the Federation of Star Trek has become hopelessly corrupted… in fact, doesn’t the Blake’s Seven symbol kind of look like a side-turned Federation symbol? hmm.
While it’s not quite as difficult to imagine as a non-Shatner “Captain Kirk”, it’s interesting to speculate who would play Blake and Avon, as well as other pivotal characters such as Cally, Jenna and Vila. But particularly Blake. Like the character of Gandalf in Lord of the Rings, his early appearance and character is deceptive. Anna Chancellor has already been bandied about as a worthy Servalan, the scheming villain of the piece.
