Story: Blake’s 7 has always been shrouded in mystery, and as with Star Trek, we no longer have access to the creator’s mind to find out what he was thinking – so the authors tracked down all of the actors, many of the directors, and many of the other creative personnel responsible for the show’s memorable stories and occasionally less than memorable special effects. Co-author Sheelagh Wells was Blake’s 7’s makeup designer for the second, third and fourth years of its four-year run, and also spent much of her off-screen time before and after the series with star Gareth (Blake) Thomas, so she has many personal insights to the show’s history.
Review: This long-overdue look behind the scenes of my favorite science fiction series was a must-buy item for me, and though the import price was a bit steep, it was a very worthwhile purchase.
There are numerous photos throughout the book, though many of them have been seen before, with the exception of some behind-the-scenes material and humorous shots of the cast goofing off. More interesting are pre-production sketches and a suspiciously Okudagram-esque diagram of the crew’s fourth-season ship, Scorpio – many years, of course, before Okudagrams came into existence. The designs of the sets and ships are discussed, including an intriguing early Liberator concept which seemed to resemble, more than anything else, the cathedralesque U.S.S. Cygnus from the 1979 movie The Black Hole. One coincidence of both this book and “Creating Babylon 5” is that both books mention modelmaker Ron Thornton – the creator of Scorpio and of the Babylon 5 space station – and his work on “that other series.” Indeed, Babylon 5 fans who have never been able to catch this series – often referred to as one of J. Michael Straczynski’s points of reference in creating his own saga – may wish to seek out this book, the series itself, various Internet sites, and (heaven forbid!) tapes of the series itself for comparison.
If the book lacks one thing, it is a focus on particular episodes. The very different fourth season – featuring only three members of the original cast aboard a smaller and less powerful ship than in the first three years – received its own chapter, and naturally the controversial and mysterious final episode got an entire chapter to itself. But with those two exceptions, this book repeats “Creating Babylon 5″‘s omission of more specific information. Also conspicuous by their absence are the show’s writers. Understandably, the late Terry Nation could not be contacted, but Chris Boucher – the show’s script editor for all four years and writer of several episodes, including the finale – is only heard from a few times. None of the other writers appear in the book either – which is a shame, since arguably the writing is a huge part of the reason why, twenty years later, this show is still remembered so fondly. I think a follow-up is in order!
I can’t recommend this book enough for fellow Blake’s 7 fanatics – and as any other Blake fans will attest, there’s not much competition in the “making of Blake’s 7” category of literature, so you might as well track this one down.
Year: 1997
Authors: Joe Nazzaro & Sheelagh Wells
Publisher: Virgin
Pages: 128 pages