Hmm.
Book 19. Oh dear …
Blake’s 7 was a series I was hooked on as a kiddie. It was about a band of intergalactic freedom fighters … well ok, a bunch of criminals who were on the run from the all powerful and totally evil Federation who wanted to take them down.
There was a lot of nonsense in Blake’s 7 with the storylines, as is typical for 70s/80s scifi but you had excellent characters, a classic ship and a couple of remarkable computers. It lost a bit in series 4 (spoilers) but it was still a massive highlight when it came on. I must watch the dvds again at some point.
The theme tune was magic too.
This book is about one character in particular, Kerr Avon and is written by the actor, Paul Darrow. It’s published by Big Finish Productions and I’m now incredibly wary about reading any more of their books. The only thing consistent with the series here are the names of the characters Avon and Servalan. Servalan is consistent … but then it doesn’t take much to portray true, ruthless and vicious evil. Avon is a bit different. The series Avon could handle himself in a fight but preferred to avoid fights … This Avon is a one man unstoppable army.
The setting is different, almost nothing of the technology and universe of the series is carried through to the book. Instead, we have technology that doesn’t make sense. A galactic current that carries ships. Helijets going between planets. And other daft stuff that’s just …. rubbish.
So if Big Finish have allowed this book to come out … and it’s part of a series, what are they doing with their other books ? Are their Doctor Who books actually Doctor Who ?
At the moment, I’m not too interested in checking them out. You could say that the disastrously bad novelisation here is the fault of the author. But I’d prefer to point the finger at the quality control. This particular book shouldn’t have been released with the Blake’s 7 label on it.
The story is actually fairly reasonable … but it doesn’t belong in the Blake’s 7 universe. I seem to remember saying that about another film/series too quite recently ! Wish I could remember what :-).
On a better note ….
Book 20 is Blake’s 7 Afterlife by Tony Attwood who compiled the B7 Programme Guide. When the characters were introduced, they were instantly recognisable. I haven’t seen B7 in years but when … characternameredacted … spoke, I pictured him in my mind saying the words with the character’s mannerisms.
More about Afterlife later. Gotta read it first ! :-).