Episode 2: Shadow

In the last episode, The Liberator got repossessed by the Bowies who originally made it, taking Blake and co. to the unimaginatively named Space World . Blake and the gang managed to accidentally emancipate three planets which were under the control of a computer called The System .

This week, Blake travels to a space station with the unimaginative title Space City , but things don't go quite as well for the inhabitants of the planet he visits after.

This is the first episode of Blake's 7 which is not written by Terry Nation. Chris Boucher, the scriptwriter of Shadow Bucher continues Nation's habit of giving episodes single-word titles, often including a pun or double-meaning , had acted as the script editor on the first series of Blake's 7 and had already had to flesh out some of Terry Nation's scripts toward the end of series one, when the task of completing them had collided with the shooting schedule. He was certainly someone who knew the form of Blake's 7 better than anyone else, other than Nation himself, of course.

The tribe of Sevateem from Face of Evil Chris Boucher I'm quite intrigued to see where Boucher takes the series. As I've mentioned elsewhere, I enjoyed his two fourth doctor stories a great deal, especially Face, which I think is a darker and more thoughtful story than people give it credit for. They're probably distracted by the near naked people and Lesley thingy off-of Easties. I also read Boucher's Missing Adventures novel Corpse Marker. (Yes, I read the spin-off novels. You don't know what it was like in the 90s with no Who to consume. Times were desperate.) Apparently Corpse Marker acts as a cross over with Blake's 7, featuring one of the characters from series 2. So there. Two can play the Blake's 7 facts game. (With the aid of Wikipedia.) Single-word titles The reason I quite like single word titles is a little bit nerdy No but do explain, you say? Why thank you I will. . Back in the dark days when there was no Doctor Who on and we only had a worn out of Revenge to watch until the tape stretched and Tom Baker's hair went super fuzzy, there were the Target novelisations. These did the trick of providing Who stories with the bonus of not having budgetary limitations. The effects were infinitely better. However, one thing annoyed me. The titles. Doctor Who and the Zarbi. Doctor Who and the Android Invasion. Every dullard knows Doctor Who is the name of the series NOT the character. Anyway, when lining them up (and reading them) in order, Doctor Who-Full Circle, was the first not to have the annoying and . I've just realised Full Circle is two words, making that entire anecdote irrelevant. Meh.

Space City, a space city, situated in space.

The Shadow Broker

Shadow starts on a lovely, bubbly space city, called ... uh, Space City. Largo, a creepy ponce, is fiddling with a purse full of jewels, while sitting cross-legged on a sort of plinth, which is the only piece of furniture he requires. A couple of burlap slaves, Bek and Hanna, have pinched the jewels for Largo, in exchange for Shadow , some sort of drug.

Largo calls Bek dream head , which almost sounds affectionate, but he doesn't say it in a very friendly way.

/img/characters/largo.png Largo Senior member of the Terra Nostra Creepy drug pusher man Plinth Sausages and mustard W.A.S.P.

Is it possible to say I do love a plinth without sounding filthy?

Deposit or withdrawal?

Shadow is served in tiny brown balls and according to Largo, the withdrawal from it causes great pain then death, unfortunately in that order. Largo has access to Shadow as he's part of the Terra Nostra This is presumably a reference to the Cosa Nostra - or is it a suspended rhyme for Terry Nation , who completely controlled the world of Blake's 7? . He manipulates Hanna into begging for Shadow, because he's terribly insecure but then Bek grabs Largo's gun and tells him to lie down and close his eyes. Hanna grabs some Shadow and Bek plays a recording of him threatening Largo as he leaves, as a sort of joke. It's a bit like the start of The Lumberjack Song sketch.

/img/characters/bek.png Bek Sci-fi junkie / artful dodger Dream head with a heart of gold

Karl Howman, as Jacko in Brush Strokes Bek is played by Karl Howman, who played Jacko in Brush Strokes, yet another show I would watch with my family in the 1980s (he's since gone on to EastEnders, but I don't care about that). Brush Strokes is an interesting show, which was an uneasy balance between reasonably well characterised women and Howman's Jack-the-lad cheeky-chappy persona. But I can't be bothered re-watching it, to see if it's good or not. Sorry!

I seem to recall it was dull. Sorry fans.

/img/characters/hanna.png Hanna Limp dream head Motivational device for Bek

Hanna is played by Adrienne Burgess, who was in a fourth-doctor episode of Doctor Who called The Sun Makers, playing along side Michael Keating Who plays Vila in Blake's 7 - do try and keep up . I am pressing the Charlotte fact button ... now:

Veet (left) and Goudry (right) from The Sun Makers The Sun Makers is written by Doctor Who stalwart Robert Holmes. It's not one of my faves, although it apparently was Louise Jameson's. Her performance is flawless whereas personally I feel Veet is a bit over played, which is a shame. Louise also gets to say the line: before I die I'll see this rathole ankle deep in blood! And to think some people thought her character too violent. I digress. The peculiar thing about Sunmakers is it was written as a rant by Holmes who'd been stung by a massive tax bill. So we get the Doctor pitted against a foe who is taxing humanity to death. I kid you not. The Collector plays with the Doctor's hair in The Sun Makers The best performance for me is the Collector himself, played brilliantly by Henry Woolf. His character is bald and there's a lovely moment when he looks sadly at Tom Baker's (massive) hair and sort of strokes it. It's hilarious but also adds depth to a villain who is otherwise just a tiny green Taxman in a Davros chair.

The book The Rough Guide to Space City on a budget is full of interesting titbits

Terra firma

On board The Liberator, we get the abridged version of The Rough Guide to Space City on a budget: it's run by the Terra Nostra and is a sort of Libertarian paradise, where all kinds of naughty things can be bought for a price. Blake wants to meet the Terra Nostra so he can use them to infiltrate Earth.

He has no use for smugglers who drop their shipments at the first sign of a Federation cruiser

He hopes that Jenna's previous encounter with Largo will persuade them to work together. Largo tried to hire Jenna to transport a shipment of Shadow, in her smuggling days, but she refused, for moral reasons. Jenna has a strong suspicion that Largo got her arrested, when she refused to carry Shadow for him. Because if there's one thing organised crime is famous for, it's their unswerving loyalty to those who have wronged them in the past.

Gan has moral objections to working with the Terra Nostra, which perhaps discredits my elaborate conspiracy theory that he is a psychopath.

Carried away by a moonlight Shadow

Back on Space City, Bek and Hanna's brother Petey has died of a wee bit too much Shadow. Or too little Shadow, not really sure. The point is, Shadow was involved somehow.

Bek's about to abandon Hanna because she's being especially limp today, when they're interrupted by a Terra Nostra bloke with a gun He's not given a name. The closest we get is Enforcer , which I'm pretty sure was not chosen by his mother. Perhaps it's his gamer tag on XBox live. , who takes them to Largo.

Sex and drugs and rock and roll I've already noted elsewhere that Nightmare of Eden covers the drug abuse theme (as do others) but I'm not aware of Doctor Who doing much about sexy ladies, at least not in the 70s. They normally turn out to be robots, aliens, or vampires. Or hologrammatic psi-projections of old ladies, as in Pirate. One of the robotic cleaners from Paradise Towers The 7th Doctor does offer to take Mel (Bonnie Langford) to Paradise Towers. (This isn't a euphemism.) Instead of a luxurious resort they find a hoard of killer robot cleaners, managed by a psychotic Richard Briers. No wonder the Doctor doesn't take holidays often.

The vice commander

Back on The Liberator, Vila is trying to persuade Cally that Blake is making a mistake: the Terra Nostra are far too dangerous for Blake, an Alpha to deal with In the Federation, there is a caste system which dictates what sort of live you lead and what work you can do (Vila is a Delta). It probably doesn't have anything to do with the ethological use of the terms. . But it's all a plan to trick her into suggesting he should teleport across to Space City, so he can smoke lots of women and sleep with some drugs It's not quite made clear what vices Vila indulges in . She doesn't fall for it, but it doesn't matter: Vila remembers that Orac can operate the teleporter.

The tits-and-arse based relief in Largo's lounge Hemorrhoid relief I'm indebted to Stephen Bell for pointing out the rather rude nature of the wall panels in Largo's lounge They're quite difficult to see, due to the bright lighting . Perhaps this is the set-designer's equivalent of photocopying your arse, then leaving the print outs around the office?

Inappropriate wallpaper The Doctor wears his painting outfit during Underworld The maintained its white interior with basic roundel motif (looks cool, disappointingly just cupboards,) for most of the 60s and 70s. In the fourth Doctor era we start seeing changes. The secondary console room for one. At one point the Doctor even decides to redecorate (I think this was Underworld. One of Leelas stories anyway.). It's a nice moment of domesticity. From the movie to new Who, we now seem to get a refreshed console room with every regeneration. It's a bit annoying. I say this because I like to think there might be a point (in the infinite variations of the multi-verse) where the chooses some dodgy adult themed wall dressing and the Doctor walks in and says: we discussed this and I said no .

Getting a bum deal

On Space City, Blake, Jenna and Avon negotiate with Largo, while Gan provides a bit of backup muscle by hiding in a corridor and listening to his fitbit like a lummox. Blake wants Largo to make introductions to the Terra Nostra on his behalf, but Largo denies the organisation even exists.

Avon realises negotiations are pointless but before they can leave, Largo's enforcer comes in, and holds them all at gunpoint. Someone else holds up Gan We never find out who - it's implied that this happens at the same time as the enforcer bursts into Largo's plinth room :

Tearing off a strip

Back on The Liberator, Cally realises that Vila has scarpered. She quizzes Zen about it, and it turns out that Orac is Up To Something, as usual. Cally calls Vila, and it's implied that he's either at a strip show, or with a sex worker or some kind Vila's breathing is rather laboured. Who knows - perhaps he's at the gym. .

Actually I've just remembered, the 8th Doctor sets up home in a brothel in a The Adventuress of Henrietta Street (another spin off novel). There's no funny business at all, despite him looking like Paul McGann. The story is INCOMPREHENSIBLE (not just for that reason).

Cally tries to find Orac, but he warns her against it, through the Tannoy system Because this is a British , threatening to destroy the life support systems if she keeps poking about.

Avon and Gan have been moved to inside a sort of cargo container, where Bek and Hanna are being held. Jenna and Blake are still with Largo in his plinth lounge, presumably because they're the glamorous ones. Blake calls Cally at gunpoint and asks her to bring the rest of the money. She realises it's a trick and uses THE POWER OF HER MIND when Largo asks her a question about something Blake said earlier.

Feeling feint

Cally realises that Largo's a wrong 'un and she needs to take action fast: she gets the battle computers on-line, puts up the shield and clears the neutron blasters for firing. Then she contacts central control on Space City and threatens her way to getting Blake and the others released. Space City sends an attack ship after The Liberator and Cally either blows it up, or fires a warning shot (it's not quite clear):

At the end of series one, both Sally Knyvette (Jenna) and Jan Chappell (Cally) felt that their characters hadn't had enough time for development. It's great to see Cally getting a chance to operate The Liberator by herself and fire the neutron blasters for the first time since The Web.

Escort agent

Largo's thug arrives at the cargo container to take Vila and Gan somewhere to get rubbed out, but they pull the old our junkie has suddenly got ill trick and Avon and Gan clean his clock. They bust into Largo's boudoir and make short work of him, before freeing Blake and Jenna.

Bek demands that Blake take him and Hanna away with him, but Blake just apologies and teleports away. Bek's just about to kill Largo, when Blake comes back and is like jk! The three of them return to The Liberator.

Back on The Liberator, Vila's passed out from too much booze or women. Blake's plan is to force the Terra Nostra to help them by going after the source of Shadow.

Think tank

Cally has a weird feeling about Orac and goes hunting for him again. She wanders down a corridor and he gets on the Tannoy again, whispering I - warned you - not - to look - for me then this happens:

This is by far my favourite of the series so far. It makes a nice comparison between Orac and a cage, it's visually interesting and has a witty ending, where it cuts from Orac saying I warned you not to look for me to Largo saying I know where to look for them, chairman . The film 2001 had a huge impact on - the Stargate sequence in particular - and you can see its influence on Space: 1999 and Star Trek: The Motion Picture. Unfortunately, it encouraging a generation of directors to throw any old nonsense at the screen, in the hopes of capturing Kubrick's lighting in a bottle. However, Jonathan Wright-Miller, who directed Shadow, avoids such traps in his montage sequence. It's not perhaps intended to be taken literally, but instead expresses something of Cally's anxiety and Orac's apparent omnipotent power.

Shadowing The Liberator

Largo is explaining to his boss that he'll capture Blake and his crew soon, as he has an agent on board. After he hangs up, Largo's enforcer accuses him of lying, and Largo admits he is, but that Hanna will still tell him where Blake is going.

The Chairman is played by Verdon Dobtcheff who has had an unbroken career since the early nineteen sixties. You might remember him from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, where he got to play against Harrison Ford's horrible Scottish accent. But we don't care about that. More importantly, he appeared in The War Games, a second-doctor episode of Doctor Who which was the final story of the sixth series. Charlotte! Any thoughts?

The unnamed scientist from The War Games (top), played by Verdon Dobtcheff The War Games, as you quite correctly point out, is the second Doctor's final story. As such it's a little off my radar but here are my thoughts anyway because never pass up the opportunity to waffle about your specialist subject. It's a strange story about attempting to take over the galaxy using soldiers from earth, who are stolen from their respective time zones and forced to fight in simulations, so the cream of the warriors can be picked out. This sort of 'survival / selection of the fittest' is a theme Who returns to a few times. I've already mentioned Greatest Show and indeed Face of Evil covers it too. For me the striking point is we first find out the Doctor's true relationship with the Time Lords. It turns out he nicked the and ran off because he didn't like their policy of non-intervention. From this point on, the Time Lords like to use the Doctor to do their dirty work, like those curtain twitchers who notice you've parked in the wrong place or chained your bike up or put something on your balcony they don't like and don't tell you to your face, but instead put a laminated notice through your door and watch you while you're reading it. The Time Lords also choose the Doctor's next appearance (whole essay in there) and banish him to Earth, where he regenerates into Jon Pertwee and colour .

The Dark Side of the Moon

On The Liberator, Blake is using Zen's magic dome to analysing Hanna's last remaining fix of Shadow. He finds out that it's derived from a form of cactus called moon disk which can scuttle about, in order to avoid the sun. Zen tells them that this cactus was found on the planet Zombar, until it went extinct, because people were Hoovering it up for all the delicious drugs you could find inside them.

Blake thinks the bit about it being extinct is a load of old nonsense and sets a course for Zombar. Gan's uncomfortable, because dealing with the Terra Nostra would make them either drug pushers or cheats. Jenna's in favour. Bek wants revenge. Avon thinks they found Zombar too easily and the whole thing is well dodge.

Vila awakens from his vice-slumber and finds Cally unconscious in a corridor next to Orac. She wakes up, but isn't all there. Orac claims she's insane.

Vila can't remember anything of the previous night This is space, so it's all night, all of the time - even leaving The Liberator and strutting about Space City. Jenna and Vila are suspicious of Orac and his motives, but as usual, Avon thinks he's just a machine Avon is great and everything, but he's a terrible electronic engineer .

Colonel Mustard, with the poison, in the lounge

Largo's mustardy death

Largo's enforcer informs the chairman that The Liberator is approaching Zombar. He knows this because Largo has been adding something to the Shadow which emits particles which can be detected (presumably at great ranges). The enforcer has used this to track The Liberator, after he killed Largo.

Blake, Avon and Jenna teleport down to the planet. Jenna finds some moon disks, which look a bit like the bottom of beer bottles. Jenna hears them whispering.

We don't know how Largo was killed, but it involves a disgusting yellow fluid coming out of his mouth. Unless he was killed while eating.

Cruise control

On board The Liberator, Vila leaves the teleporter unattended, while he gets something for his head. Gan complains, so Vila switches on Orac, so he can watch it instead.

We get another of Cally, where Orac tells her she is alone and he is The Darkness:

Cally runs to the teleporter and Orac teleports her down to Zombar. She carries on running once she reaches the planet surface.

Blake, Jenna and Avon come across a small pond, which has more moon disks around it, plus some equipment which looks a bit like space parasols. Jenna says she can hear them singing again.

Sensorship

Blake ignores Jenna and explains his plan: he's going to get them all to wander about, sticking sensors in the ground. Then they'll teleport back to The Liberator and he'll lock on to them from orbit, and blow the ruddy base to Kingdom Come.

I have many questions about this plan: Why can't Zen target any particular spot on the planet without sensors?

Why didn't they use this plan at any other point in the first series? It turns out the number of questions I had was two. And both have exactly the same answer: because it wouldn't make very good drama, you idiot . Sorry for wasting your time .

Cally collapses and moon disks approach her like randy tortoises.

On The Liberator, Hanna is being questioned about Cally's sudden awakening, scarpering, teleporting and general mischief. Her take on it was that Cally was seized with a sort of madness. Gan mentions that on Auron, it's possible for madness to be shared, due to THE CURSE OF TELEPATHY. Bek wonders what happens when telepaths are isolated from each other. Gan suggests that Cally might be suffering from space telepathy loneliness Everyone has an opinion on Telepathy, but no-one is an expert. It's exactly like the Internet. .

A View from the Bridge

Vila goes to turn off Orac, but gets an electric shock from his key I suppose in modern terms, we might be tempted to call it a dongle . Well, I would anyway. . Orac tells him You will not disconnect. The bridge is almost complete .

Silver service

Blake, Jenna and Avon are listlessly wandering about, sticking sensors in the ground like a more-exciting-than-average version of Gardener's World when a man in a silver suit starts watching them from a nearby dune. Avon's not too happy about this. Look:

Get busy with the fizzy

Orac announces the bridge is complete and The Liberator immediately starts to lose power from all systems and fall into the gravity well of the planet. Gan implores Vila to do something, but apparently he prefers a death where he impacts on the surface of Zombar to getting another shock from Orac. Floppy Hanna steps up and high-fives Orac's power switch and gets zapped TO A FIZZY STATIC DEATH:

Orac hates high-fives.

The Liberator's speed increases, to the point where a VIDEO EFFECT is used, and everyone's pushed into the soft-furnishings.

The ghost in the machine

Cally's surrounded by Moon Disks, some of which have clambered onto of her, like eager kittens. A sort of ghost version of her steps out from her body and speaks to them with telepathy Coincidentally, Cally and the Moon Disks is also the name of my prog-rock band :

There's a lot of guff about Cally being in The Darkness's dimension, Orac's carrier waves, bridges and energy.

Adventures in time and surrealism I quite like the trippy Carrie / Orac / Moon pod stuff. It's fair to say a lot of the more trippy concepts of earlier Doctor Who, whilst brilliant (oh yes they were), lost something in rendition. Apparently Red Dwarf had more budget per episode than Who had for a series. That said, for a children's show (there, I've said it) it didn't shy away from horror or surrealism. A favourite sequence for many is the Tardis exploding in the Mind Robber. (For some the attraction may be Zoe's sparkly bottom spinning off into space.) Adric tosses a coin in Warriors Gate Moving into the Douglas Adams and John Nathan-Turner eras, Doctor Who got a lot weirder. Warriors Gate is surely bewildering for most adults, let alone kids. Lots of scenes of Adric flipping a coin in a white vacuum. Psychic lions. Daddy what's Dwarf Star alloy? How the hell should I know, son? Leela and the Doctor from The Invisible Enemy Anyway, two of my favourite meanderings inside the fourth Doctor's head: the Invisible Enemy. Here Leela and the Doctor are cloned, shrunk and injected into the Doctor's brain. At one point they stare out into the space between reason and imagination, which has a nice sea breeze and looks like a whole bunch of floating columns. the Deadly Assassin. The Doctor spends almost two whole episodes inside a world of nightmares. There's a sequence with a horse in a gas mask. Just because. Gallifreyan prison uniform I love Assassin, not just because of this awesome outfit. (Gallifreyan prison uniform apparently.)

Burning bridges

What seems to be happening is there's a Bad Thing called The Darkness which is trying to get into our universe, and is using Orac and Cally to do so. It probably would have managed it, but Cally's Moon Disk friends call clubbed together to help her, with their tiny telepathic powers.

Cally pinches Orac's off switch with space magic, then wakes up, surrounded by Moon Disks.

With Orac powered down, Gan and Vila get control of The Liberator again. Meanwhile, Blake, Avon and Jenna are scrapping with more of those silver stunt-men when reinforcements arrive. Vila brings them back up and Cally collects her lost teleport bracelet, then gets teleported back too.

The prince of darkness

Cally explains some chuff about The Darkness to everyone: Orac uses different dimensions to transmit communication waves - the same dimension which telepaths use to communicate with each other. But Orac's not telepathic any more than a bicycle which strays into the bus lane automatically becomes a bus This idea of a consciousness existing in hyperspace predicts the Minds from Iain M. Bank's Culture novels. .

Cally got Orac's switch by using telekinesis, a power she usually doesn't have Imagine the plot holes this would create , but speculates that the moon disks gave her the strength.

This weakness of Orac to invasion from being from another universe is countered by Avon in a strange way - he sets a charge on Orac, so that he will be destroyed if it happens again Rather than, for example, just switching Orac off .

This is a terrible approach to computer security - a field I know almost nothing about. So, as this is The Internet, let me speculate wildly. You could If you were feeling particularly wilful split computer code into two elements: The parts which do stuff, like find your bank details, or something The data, such as your current account balance, or lack thereof, which can be further split: Data which comes from a trustworthy source (such as your bank's own databases) Data which comes from an untrustworthy source (such as anything typed into a web browser) What Avon should be doing is ensuring that any data Orac gets back from hyperspace is treated as highly suspect and never gets executed (i.e. ran as code) by Orac. What he does instead is roughly the equivalent of strapping a suicide vest to a president, to protect them from terrorism. Now that you've read this, you have enough information to find this cartoon funny. Congratulations!

Avon has found an on one of the guards he killed which suggests that the Federation controls the Terra Nostra, meaning Blake's original plan was an almighty waste of everyone's time.

Cally has brought a Moon Disk up from the planet with her. She keeps it in a lasagna dish full of sand. It's like a pet rock Perhaps Gan is right and she was going bonkers in the nut, from lack of telepath buddies. Perhaps this moon disk of hers will keep her from wigging out again. .

I say we take off and nuke the entire site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.

Blake plans to take Bek back to Space City, then come looking for him in three years, when he expects him to be useful in some way. Seven pursuit ships arrive, but before The Liberator pulls away, Blake allows Bek to launch an orbital strike on the compound they marked on the planet surface.

Doesn't this mean that many Moon Disks will die? We've just established how they are sentient and we've seen hundreds of them dragging their smooth buttocks over the sand on Zombar. I suspect if the episode had run a little longer, we'd have seen Cally feeling a great disturbance in the Force .

Watch Shadow on YouTube