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RE: [B7L] Character Change & Development - mostly Vila
by Nicola Mody-Nikoloff 25 Oct '01

25 Oct '01

> -----Original Message----- > From: Dana Shilling [mailto:dshilling@worldnet.att.net] > Sent: Thursday, 25 October 2001 03:09 > To: nublake > Subject: Re: [B7L] Character Change & Development - mostly Avon > > > Well, Cally does go from highly-strung, intense, > 'companions-for-my-death' > > guerrilla fighter to righteous ersatz earth-mother, but > that, methinks, has > > more to do with Bad Writer Syndrome than character development > Or Multiple Possession Trauma Totally agree! The 'girls' were badly done by in the series, even Dayna at times. And I counted 5 alien possessions for Cally and a couple for Vila for that matter (and I suspect a third). > > Absolutely. The greater harshness of his voice and manners > in the later episodes is rather too striking to miss. > Just you try having a job where you get more concussions than > tea breaks. Yes! So someone else noticed! At least I assume you were talking about Vila? (I've just joined). Because Vila *is* the one who got regularly clobbered. Poor Vilakins. Multiple head injuries, loneliness, rejection, possible a victim of class snobbery (probably unconscious) and all the drudge work. No wonder the poor sod took to the bottle. Re the concussions - I'm writing a humorous B7 series called "Vila Restal's E-mails" (I'm about to finish season 3) which comprises all the e-mails he sends from and within the Liberator (later Scorpio) and gets back. Vila keeps a 'running head injury total' for his concerned mum, and it's up to 11. He says he almost kept an 'alien possession total' on Cally but thought it would be mean. If he had, it would be 5. BTW excerpts of this have been printed in an SF zine here. When it's finished, I may put it on the web with a link to the hermit library. Nico *** This e-mail is privileged and confidential. If you are not the intended recipient please delete the message and notify the sender. ***

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FW: [B7L] Derelicts (and longish minor ramble)
by Sally Manton 25 Oct '01

25 Oct '01

Mel wrote: <I recently bought Derelicts. It certainly is a challenge, but well worth the effort. Bryn Lantry's singular style is wonderfully distinctive, and I'm looking forward to reading other examples of her work in the future.> She's one of my favourite B7 writers, and does *the* best GP Blake I have come across. <I'm still catching up, after many years in the wilderness away from B7. I watched the series on its first run as a teenager and loved it, but fell by the wayside some years later, though I bought the videos when they came out.> <grin> I simply went away and sulked for - oh not long, 17-18 years? - about *that* ending ... lovely to see you. <One thing which has struck me, the difference in attitudes towards the characters between then and now. Re-reading early Horizon and other fanclub newsletters was an interesting experience. The current perceptions of Avon certainly seem very different,> Oooh, tell more. Are we worse Meegats than they were? :-) <but also that of characters like Anna Grant and Jarvik, neither of whom were so hammered back then as they seem to be now.> I rather like Jarvik, but purely for the entertainment value - *because* he's so wonderfully appallingly obnoxious; I always cheer when he gets it :-) _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp

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Fwd: Re: [B7L] Sand and the Girl Next Door
by Sally Manton 25 Oct '01

25 Oct '01

After I wrote: <Well, I'm glad someone enjoyed it ...> Tanja wrote: <They weren't the only ones.> Actually, that makes me even gladder :-) <I can certainly understand why Jacqueline Pearce names this as her favourite episode - it gave her a chance to give a more three dimensional portrait of Servalan, without making her weak.> *But* ... I *do* think it makes her weaker (yes, the scene with Reeves is good, however) *without* adding any worthwhile dimension at all - and the whole thing is so utterly conventional. I guess it comes down to our perception of the character: Servalan is fairly cliched from the start (all of this is IMO only) but there is a reasonable integrity of character in the charming, smiling, hollow, unable-to-feel monster which Children and Auron and Sand totally violate. And the Authorial Intrusion is particularly jarring - I can feel the author jumping up and down and screaming "look, look, I'm giving her feelings!!" I like Servalan best in her most inhuman moments, such as Deliverance, Trial and Terminal. Or - if one wants vulnerability - when it's her own safety that affects her usual invulnerability, such as Rumours. The Servie in Sand belongs more in Batman than B7 :-) _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp

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Cult TV
by Steve Rogerson 25 Oct '01

25 Oct '01

Who else is going to Cult TV in Liverpool this weekend? -- cheers Steve Rogerson http://homepages.poptel.org.uk/steve.rogerson Redemption 03, 21-23 February 2003, Ashford, Kent Celebrating 25 years of Blake's 7 and 10 years of Babylon 5 http://www.smof.com/redemption

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Character Change & Development - mostly Avon
by Sally Manton 24 Oct '01

24 Oct '01

WARNING, WARNING ... my previously threatened 'how Avon's changes in costume reflects his state of mind' argument is in here somewhere <veg> Ann Basart wrote: <Which of the main characters change most over time? How? Why?> Well, Cally does go from highly-strung, intense, 'companions-for-my-death' guerilla fighter to righteous ersatz earth-mother, but that, methinks, has more to do with Bad Writer Syndrome than character development (or maybe she saw Dayna's youthful bloodthirstiness as too close to what *she* had been, and didn't like it) Jenna doesn't change a lot (she gets less to do, true) but I think there is a notable change - the woman who didn't believe in dreams 'but would like to' would not IMO have sent that message to Servalan in Star One, believing even as she did so that it *was* a betrayal of Blake (she didn't know he'd come to the same conclusion). I agree with Betty's: <I think Avon in particular changes a lot. Watch a first-season epsiode and a fourth-season episode back-to-back, and it's impossible not to notice the contrast.> Absolutely. The greater harshness of his voice and manners in the later episodes is rather too striking to miss. Buts it's more than that, he changes earlier, and it's a combination of different things. Look at the very contained, stiff, ultra-reserved, consciously deliberate Avon in early S1 - his drab choice of clothes, his unconsciousness of his sex appeal (The Web), his more reserved body language. That changes quite a lot over the season (certainly the latter has by by Duel :-)) and by late S1/early S2 he's getting more comfortable about *physical* closeness (if not mental or emotional), blossom sartorially from computer geek into peacock with blaster (that silver jacket), and burnish the hard, glittering edges to his personality and style - both visual and vocal (theese edges, of course, get rather more sharp and savage as the strain of the Star One arc gets worse). And that's just *before* things all start going really wrong for the dear man *after* Star One :-) Back to Ann: <Are these real developments in character, or are we simply shown different (and perhaps surprising) aspects of a given person at different times? (As in the Servalan/Tarrant "Girl-next-door" exchange in "Sand.")> Well, the only way I can stomach 'Sand' - *especially* that nauseating flirty scene - is by assuming that the love dirt not only affected their emotions and hormones, it did seriously nasty things to their brains as well. But Vila's an interesting case in this question - the 'sudden' appearance of the adult, grimmer, slightly menacing Vila in 'Gold' can be jarring, but if one recalls, the potential *was* always there, in his very first scenes in 'The Way Back'. _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp

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Sand and the Girl Next Door
by Sally Manton 24 Oct '01

24 Oct '01

Betty quoted Jacqueline Pearce ... <He said, 'If *you* were the girl next door, I'd move!' and he did! [laughter] I told Tanith Lee about that conversation and she wrote it into the script so Steven and I had great fun playing that scene.> Well, I'm glad someone enjoyed it ... _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp

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Re: Fwd: Re: [B7L] Stuck in Damian's Dungeon Stories (was Stuck in a cave storie
by Sally Manton 24 Oct '01

24 Oct '01

Ellynne wrote: <Anyhow, I came up with a comprehensive list of worse case scenarios for Cally surviving in Rescue and what's the worst Dorian could have done to her short of leaving her in the basement and how much guilt and angst could we put Avon through on account of it (the last was kind of interesting.> Neat idea, yes. <Anyhow, Cally's nightmares wound up having all 200 years of Dorian's cruelties to draw on (drawbacks of telepathy [well, he was planning on using her as the main link to pull in the others, ergo . . .]). > Very neat idea, yes :-) I like that rather a lot. <Even Avon would notice that.> Possibly, but this is where *I* might have have problems (speaking as someone, remember, who ain't keen on Avon&Cally anyway and might be biased). It's the timing. Possibly he would notice ... but right at *this* moment, possibly he might not notice or - if he did - much care. In fact, despite the fact that I really believe he is quite fond of Cally, his reaction just at *this particular minute* might be - "just get over it." Post Terminal, Avon goes into an almost complete deep-freeze IMO and yes, while it might not be as bad if Cally wasn't killed, it'd still *be* bad (he lost the Liberator, he thinks he's lost Blake for good. Did anyone die in Cally's place?) He starts *seriously* using the others, and seems totally oblivious to Vila's souring humour and drinking problem and the more systematic denigrating that goes on (and Vila is as important to him IMO as Cally, remember). Re Dorian's bit about the bond between them - it's there, but it's bitter and cracked by the events of Terminal. And the general nastiness and tragedy of Power comes in part from the fact that both Avon *and* Pella are both at a nadir at the exact wrong moment. OTOH, if Cally could start broadcasting the nightmares and affect Avon at a time when he needs every bit of his strength just to get by ... now *that* might be interesting as well. > > <Dang, Avon's bratty little sister is a Mary Sue. Ah, well . . . .> > > There are ways round it. Make her as plain as a pikestaff, or built > like a > Soviet tractor-factory queen, or a bimbette or the bimbettiest > (though how > she *could* be with Avonic genes I don't know) or be a compulsive > chatterer > with a voice like a dyspeptic cockatoo ... or Angela Anaconda, > maybe? Ah, well, there may be hope. She was a compulsive chatterer. Her red hair is an obviously artificial shade (she's competitive about attention). Actually, she was an AU sister, literally. I was working on a story where Avon got to meet his counterpart in the rose colored glasses Trek universe. The product of a stable (if sardonic) family, his half Vulcan double had quite the extended family, including the little sister (all of them seem to act like firstborns who think any others in the family are really neighbors Mom and Dad are showing excessive [and soon to end] tolerance for). The perky little sister did decide it was her mission to save Avon from himself (kind of literally, as it worked out). Unfortunately, it ground down to a halt halfway through, at about the time all Avons present had attacked her, come to think of it. Family, the ties that bind. Ellynne ________________________________________________________________ GET INTERNET ACCESS FROM JUNO! Juno offers FREE or PREMIUM Internet access for less! Join Juno today! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/web/. _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp

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B7 movie
by Steve Rogerson 24 Oct '01

24 Oct '01

Coo, got a news bulletin today on the slow progress of the B7 movie. Anyone any ideas who thw anonymous author is? -- cheers Steve Rogerson http://homepages.poptel.org.uk/steve.rogerson Redemption 03, 21-23 February 2003, Ashford, Kent Celebrating 25 years of Blake's 7 and 10 years of Babylon 5 http://www.smof.com/redemption

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Re: Fwd: Re: [B7L] Stuck in a Cave Stories
by Ellynne G. 24 Oct '01

24 Oct '01

On Tue, 23 Oct 2001 05:59:50 +0000 "Sally Manton" <smanton(a)hotmail.com> writes: > > :-) Love the idea of Avon as counsellor ... just two queries: [a] > given what > Our Heroes are put through canonically, for quite a few of them > (Soolin, for > instance) it would have to be VERY VERY awful to be more traumatic > than > usual, and [b] given that this is Avon we are talking about, for > most of his > less-than-beloved crewmates he possibly wouldn't actually *notice* > till they > started screaming at him from a distance of 5 inches or less :-) > He's just > not interested enough to actually *see* they're in trouble ... The idea I'd toyed with was something along the lines of "What's the worse thing that _could_ have happened to such and such character in such and such episode . . . ?" Anyhow, I came up with a comprehensive list of worse case scenarios for Cally surviving in Rescue and what's the worst Dorian could have done to her short of leaving her in the basement and how much guilt and angst could we put Avon through on account of it (the last was kind of interesting. Avon carried a huge guilt load for ages over Anna. From Countdown, I'd guessed he'd spent a lot of time imagining the worst that could have happened to her, while hoping he was wrong. I also suppose that one reason he keeps his distance from others [besides natural standoffishness] is to keep from ever being close enough to someone to be the cause of that [or, at any rate, care about it] again. Then, he finds out he was wrong, nothing had ever happened to Anna. He'd never had anything to feel guilty about [except RoD, but that's not the same as being _helpless_ while someone you care about suffers]. Then, all of his worst nightmares happen again/for the first time to Cally). Anyhow, Cally's nightmares wound up having all 200 years of Dorian's cruelties to draw on (drawbacks of telepathy [well, he was planning on using her as the main link to pull in the others, ergo . . .]). She's not sleeping at all, when she can help it. There's a serious weight loss problem (which Cally, more than most, can't really afford). Plus, she's getting uncharacteristically jumpy and irritable. Even Avon would notice that. > > <Dang, Avon's bratty little sister is a Mary Sue. Ah, well . . . .> > > There are ways round it. Make her as plain as a pikestaff, or built > like a > Soviet tractor-factory queen, or a bimbette or the bimbettiest > (though how > she *could* be with Avonic genes I don't know) or be a compulsive > chatterer > with a voice like a dyspeptic cockatoo ... or Angela Anaconda, > maybe? Ah, well, there may be hope. She was a compulsive chatterer. Her red hair is an obviously artificial shade (she's competitive about attention). Actually, she was an AU sister, literally. I was working on a story where Avon got to meet his counterpart in the rose colored glasses Trek universe. The product of a stable (if sardonic) family, his half Vulcan double had quite the extended family, including the little sister (all of them seem to act like firstborns who think any others in the family are really neighbors Mom and Dad are showing excessive [and soon to end] tolerance for). The perky little sister did decide it was her mission to save Avon from himself (kind of literally, as it worked out). Unfortunately, it ground down to a halt halfway through, at about the time all Avons present had attacked her, come to think of it. Family, the ties that bind. Ellynne ________________________________________________________________ GET INTERNET ACCESS FROM JUNO! Juno offers FREE or PREMIUM Internet access for less! Join Juno today! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/web/.

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Sand and the Girl Next Door
by Walter Minne 24 Oct '01

24 Oct '01

Good day all, With the recent references to the Sand episode, and in particular to Tarrant and Servie getting all mushy, it has reminded me of something that I have been wondering about for a while. Servalan, near the end, makes a reference to herself as the girl next door, to which Tarrant responds that he should move next door. My question, to those who might know more about the history of the writing of this episode, is this - Was this a deliberate reference to the Hammer Film, The Reptile, where the slinky girl next door was played by Jacqueline Pearce herself? And if so, who inserted it? What a pity Tarrant wasn't a fan of those ancient flat projection entertainments, then he might have known better than to take up her offer ... >;-) Catch you later, Walter Minne

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