This is not so much a page that details the inspiration for the series itself, but rather a personal view of the series' origins, why I liked it at the time and became a fan, and why I still like it today ! I'll try not to witter on too long ...

Blake's 7 came about as a replacement programme for the "Softly Softly" police show slot. As a science fiction show and Terry Nation project, it follows on from series like "Survivors". I don't really remember Survivors, although I'll catch up with the videos one day. It also came riding in on the back of the science fiction explosion that was Star Wars. Suddenly there was great interest in SF, and there were various series around this time, such as Space : 1999, and Buck Rogers in the 25th Century. Blake's 7 however was an entirely different kettle of fish from these two.

The series showed us SF with a gritty tone, it was futuristic, but the future wasn't one where the administration was benign and magnanimous, far from it. B7 depicted a galaxy under the oppression of the Earth Federation. No-one was really free; although you could live out your life under the Federation, you didn't have democratic freedom, or freedom of speech. Anyone voicing concern or resistance to policy was hunted down. Resistance leaders like Blake were brainwashed into model citizens, effectively shattering the resistance itself - far better for the administration to have a reformed character around, than a dead rebel leader.

The premise for the series is thus set, with a group of rebels lead by Blake, fighting the corrupt and oppressive Federation. Unlike Star Wars, we don't always have good vs. bad - often the rebels can act as badly as the Federation in pursuit of their goals. No-one is portrayed as faultless, each character's flaws and weaknesses are shown. We also regularly lose characters on both sides, sometimes replaced, sometimes not.

The series was gripping from episode one, and we watched every week without fail (you had no choice at that time as there were no VCRs). I personally loved things like the Liberator spacecraft, a wonderful design which has had homage paid to it in a recent episode of Babylon 5. You could see some of the sets wobbled at times, and that wherever possible places like oil refineries and quarries were used as locations - none of this mattered one bit (and still doesn't). The programme stands on its own merit 20 years later. You can still watch it because at times it was brilliant, occasionally dire, but the character interactions and acting have always been excellent. You can forgive the BBC its lamentably mean budgets because it managed to produce a science fiction classic which inspired a whole generation, including J. Michael Straczynski, the creator of Babylon 5.

All original graphics & code © shipofdreams 2000 - 2007 no unauthorised reproduction.
Blake's 7 characters and concepts are copyright Terry Nation, programmes are copyright of the BBC.
All copyrights and trademarks implied and acknowledged.
This is a fan site dedicated to the show and makes no profit (commission donated to charity).
This site uses CSS and should degrade legibly for non-CSS browsers.
Last update April 30th 2002.