Watched the end of this one again (no sacrifice and all that ...) You know, despite the Andromedan Kitchen Front and green goo-ism, this has *got* to be one of the best endings to any TV episode I can recall, nearly as good - in its way - as *that* one two years later (who *doesn't* get a frisson at Avon's 'Fire!'???)
A couple of thoughts struck me -
You can see that Vila is genuinely terrified (this is not his patent jokey, panicky dither, this is real fear) in the last couple of minutes, but can see absolutely no way out; he *can't* run away from what must appear to be certain suicide, so doesn't fight it (much :-)). It's like in a nightmare that he can't wake up from. Made me wonder how I would cope in such a situation, where death was staring me (quite literally) in the face and I had to stand stock-still and watch it head straight for me. I think MK's portrayal of very real (and totally un-standard-heroic) fear does help with the suspension of dibelief here - were none of them quaking, it would be harder to swallow that they *were* facing death.
I love Jenna's line "I just hope Blake understands why we betrayed him," - the fact that she does see it as a personal betrayal but realises she has to do it anyway (not knowing that Blake's come to the same decision). The fan and scriptwriter spotlight on *Avon's* path from Cygnus Alpha to Star One has overshadowed Jenna's, methinks (even as late as Killer, she seems doubtful of Blake's action in putting up the plague warning: "There has to be a warning Jenna. There has to be." and it takes a moment before she appears to agree.)
In fact, this is a really good episode for Jenna, far better IMO than The Keeper that was *meant* to be about her :-), her scenes with Vila and Orac on the Liberator show her as strong, forceful and swift to decide and act where necessary. Pity she's *still* overshadowed by My Heroes and Travis ...
Also love the fact that in sending the message in Blake's name, Jenna shows such glowing confidence that his arch-enemy Servalan will unquestioningly believe the 'political criminal'; and the fact that Servalan *does*, without a second's hesitation (look, even though she does know there was a hunt going on for Star One, Servalan might have seen the message as some form of trap to pull her forces away from key areas. But no.)
And - just a quibble - couldn't someone have sprung for a black singlet for Croucher? Now someone's pointed it out to me, every time he dies all I can see is his white underwear through the rips in the leather ...
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