Pennant Robertsitis

[00:03]

Maximum power.

Welcome back to Maximum Power, a Blake's Up and Podcast.

This week we're talking about Time Squad.

I'm Cy, and I'm joined by various other people.

I'm James I'm Peter.

And I'm Simon.

Okay, so over to James.

We're on episode 4 here of Blake 7.

The 7 are slowly coming together.

What do we make of Time Squad?

Um I don't know.

My mother always taught me to, if I couldn't say anything nice, I shouldn't say anything at all.

Now, I mean, I actually quite enjoy it.

It a bit pants though, isn't it?

There's some great elements, but it's really just a mess.

I don't know where to start.

Well, James, it's interesting that you say that because this is actually the 1st episode that I ever saw back in 1978 and I was 6 years old.

[01:10]

And I have to say, I do love it, as I love all Blake 7.

But if we're going to be truthful about it, It deserves moderate appreciation at best.

I believe it was a late placement script and sadly it does show.

So territation was really quite overstretched, delivering 13 episodes, and this, I think, is where it shows the most.

Originally, it was supposed to be episode 6 in the run.

As far as I'm aware, and it was dragged forward to episode 4 to replace a script called Locate and Destroy, which didn't come to fruition.

And I think it shows.

I think the problem with it.

And it's not, see, I don't think it's terribly terrible.

I just think it's not very good.

And the reason it's not brilliant is basically because it's quite dull because I assume at this point in the series, they're still working out really what Blake 7's going to be.

And this was a potential direction they could go into hard sci-fi, one of a better description, very dry, very, you know, long sequences where we're docking 2 spacecraft together and everyone's been very serious and there's no big sort of space battles.

[02:24]

And the problem is that just makes it all not particularly interesting because to make that interesting, you need a much bigger budget.

Yes, Simon, you're absolutely right.

It lacks incidents.

It kind of inches along at a very languid pace.

And having said that, it's actually the Blake 7 archetype, as it turns out, because, you know, the crew strike at a federation facility had shot at a nuclear power plant or gas works somewhere in the west country, and there's a disappointing explosion at the end.

So for all of the fact that it's not the direction they go, it does have those kinds of archetypal things to it.

It's got elements of cyclocate destroy injured as well.

I mean, like, I guess it's the thing.

Like you say, it's the archetype.

They're testing out these sort of ideas that they come back to you again and again for the next 3 to 4 years, but they do it much better 2 episodes later.

But I also think that they're not quite sure in this episode, whether the series is going to be about a bunch of freedom fighters striking a blow against tyranny or whether it's going to be a series where they're travelling through space and discovering interesting and strange creatures and peoples and objects and so on.

[03:36]

And so this is kind of trying both of them and is a bit half-hearted at both of them at the same time.

That's right.

And if you look at next week's episode, which is much more fantasy, the web, that's sort of another direction that the series might be able to go.

Yeah, they're definitely feeling their way through all of this, but it doesn't feel like Terry Nation's heart is in either of these 2 storylines, particularly the stuff on the Liberator, all feels like it's just incident to keep Gan and Jenna busy while the boys go down to the planet and do the exciting blowing things up and meeting new people bits.

Sorry, it's interesting that you say that because there are 2 strands to this story. and I think that it's actually the 1st and maybe last time that they treat the entire crew as an ensemble, so everyone gets a good piece of the action.

But from what you said, where the boys go down to the exciting thing.

I actually find the scenes on the Liberator hand visitedly mounted as they are on occasion. more interesting than the stuff down on the planet.

Oh, really?

What is it that you find interesting about that?

[04:37]

Because I find them quite tedious and dull.

I think it's because at the heart of it.

And this is a big call.

I find Jenna more interesting to watch than Blake.

And I'm not making any claims for the performances because I think objectively Gareth Thomas is probably a better performer than Sally Nevette, but I just find the combination of her and Gan quite interesting in this episode.

And I think if you had Jenna down on the planet and Blake up doing the stuff that she is on the ship.

I would be less interested.

She's always incredibly watchable.

That's been one of the things that we've picked up on in the 1st 3 episodes, is that she is doing really interesting stuff and she's getting good character stuff to work with.

And I'm not sure there's quite so much here.

No, that's true.

She'll be relegated to the teleport operation soon and driving the ship.

Yeah, she's happy in this episode.

But yeah, she always feels, particularly in this early stage, she's quite centre stage amongst the 7 that we've seen so far.

Well, she's sort of the 2nd character.

[05:39]

Blake's the 1st character.

She sort of introduced in the space, the 2nd episode, which name's escaped me.

Baseball.

Isn't she kind of the 1st person that Blake meets?

Yes, she's introduced to Blake actually when he's in the cell in the way back.

And so she is our 1st couple of regular.

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

So she does, so she is kind of higher in the hierarchy here and then gradually descends as the series progresses.

Yes, I think it's actually a season thing.

She's quite prominent all through the 1st series.

It's only in the 2nd series that she's kind of relegated to part of the ensemble rather than the female lead.

So, speaking of female leads, We meet our 2nd female member of the crew, Callie.

And doesn't she make a fantastic impression straight off?

I love Kelly.

I love Kelly, but that was driving me to distraction, that sequence down the planet.

I mean, it's like she's giving a totally different performance in those film sequences compared to what comes later.

[06:41]

Simon, exactly.

That is exactly what we thought.

I love Kelly. one of my favourite characters, but in those film sequences on the planet, she's playing a different character, and she's giving a different performance.

I mean, I assume it works the same as Doctor Who will work the same as Doctor Who in the film stuff was done weeks ahead of before, maybe before they rehearsed the rest of the episode in action or where it is.

Yeah, so that those scenes in the quarry are 1st seen shop the entire series. entire series.

Yes.

Like the location work for episode 4 was done before any of the studio work.

That way, that makes so much sense now that you've said that.

It does.

I think there must have been some discussions about where the character was going to go because in the studio scenes for this episode in the control room in the facility and also back on the Liberator.

Jan Chappell is giving a completely different performance and it's much more like the character that we know.

Yeah, because she's really hard in those scenes in the quarry.

And when she's out on location, even sort of her vocal mannerisms are very different to the Cali that we get to know later on.

[07:42]

Look, it does make a sort of sense because the idea is she's been, you know, all her friends have been killed and she's left alone fighting just solo and she's gonna, she's prepared to blow herself up to strike a blow against the Federation.

It just that it then changes so quickly.

Like the teleporter changes her character.

Something gets left and the same thing it happened to Dan.

There must have character there, Peter.

He was too busy, big, like, you know, being upset about someone murdering his woman.

Yes, can we talk about that?

I mean, it's so, I mean, is he supposed to be set up as like sort of the muscle?

as the bit of a thug and all that sort of stuff?

And the whole performance is this very sort of RP sort of performance.

And then he has this line about they killed my woman, which is, like, it's being grabbed from Porky and Bess or something.

And it's just, it just clashes with the rest of the way the character is being betrayed.

Yes, I think it's meant to indicate that Gan is kind of the hard man of the crew, if you want, whereas one look at him and he's really not.

[08:45]

He's not.

He's so nervous.

He would be, would it not for that limiter?

Well, he's more gentle giant, I think.

Yeah, I was going to say, I think Terry Nation was very much going for the relationship from of mice and men, really, wasn't he?

Game's not supposed to be stupid, though.

No, that's true.

Those sort of elements, I think, in the relationship between Gan and Villa, of gentle giants and someone who's who's not necessarily as stupid as he appears, who takes him and they have that friendship.

That's what I've always sort of got from them.

And I did wonder whether that was in Terry Nation's mind sort of about this, particularly in Signus Alpha.

You see, Gan, take control of the convicts sort of leading them through and doing that and he's never given that agency ever again in the show.

Yes, it's such a shame because Gan is actually not a bad character.

He gets a bit of a raw deal, I think, from viewers or fans who think that he's not as interesting or layered as a lot of the other characters.

[09:45]

But the problem is that after Time Squad, he rarely gets anything to do again.

I think in the scenes in this episode where he's given a bit of background and he's given a chance to kind of be in 2 hand, to with Sally Nevette.

He's perfectly good at Gad is perfectly watchable.

But all the performances at this point are very dry.

I mean, I sort of compare it in my own experience to watching the early seasons or season at least of TNG.

Everyone's playing everything very earnestly and all the performances are quite joyless.

I mean, Avon does have the cutting one liners, but they're not as sort of camp and big as they become.

You can see them all honing their performances and getting used to their characters, and then, although I think Avon, we said before, appears fully formed in Space Fall.

I'm not sure the others are quite all there yet, and the performers are catching up with their characters and working out how to do this.

We made a very good case to say that in some ways, cyclocate destroy is a 2nd pilot for the show where they work out what they're going to be doing for the rest of the next 4 years.

[10:55]

Each character is quite well defined.

They have their role, they do this, and this is what they what they're there for, and off you go.

This is the show now.

And sort of the 1st 5 episodes are sort of working up to that and everyone feeling their way very carefully.

Oh, I think that's absolutely right.

So I think you hit the nail on the head.

It's almost as if, I mean, it will continue through the 1st series, but the series itself is a little bit dry at this and what they work out that it needs is a touch of camp, and I think the characters get them as well.

So Avon will become iconic as soon as he gets that little touch of camp in his relationship with Blake.

And yeah, I think you're right.

Cyclocake Destroyer is the actual 2nd pilot, and of course, ratings wise, Cyclocake Destroyer was the highest rated episode of the season, leave, and the one that I think caught the popular imagination.

So are you kind of suggesting that, you know, they're making this series and then they go, oh, God, this isn't working the way we hope.

And then they write, seek, they do seek, locate, destroy as a kind of a reboot, or are you kind of suggesting that they get to seek, locate, destroy it?

[12:00]

And finally they go, yes, that's what we're trying to do.

Let's keep doing this.

Yeah, I think there's very much the feeling of, oh, yeah, hang on. we've hit something here and we've got our we've got our villains that they're going to bat up against who are going to keep coming back and suddenly you've got a dynamic in this show that has been missing for these 1st 5 episodes because I don't think you can sustain the Federation as a faceless series of bases that you just go up and and destroy.

They've got to give Blake something to fight against and that has to have a face.

And a rather beautiful dress as well.

Exactly.

New is of constantly beautiful dresses.

I mean, the betting because as soon as you put the face to it in the form of server and and so on, you do then make it automatically more count, not just because of Jacqueline Pierce, but because you've got like this single villain, there is something about like the dryer science fiction of it being this sort of implacable faceless federation and it's like the deep state kind of thing, it's just out there and we don't really know the extent of it and so on.

[13:04]

And as soon as you do have the villain and villains appear.

It can't help but change the flavour of the program.

It's very interesting because it's almost likely cloquet destroyed.

And obviously this is what we talked about when that episode arrives.

It actually comes up with a new set of villains because the way back had already set up some villains.

You had Fenn Glend, you had Warag, I think her name is.

And so you had all of those people who actually set Blake up in the 1st place and they were part of the bureaucracy.

So it's interesting that they didn't return to that.

See, I quite like those characters in episode one.

I think there's a lot of potential to them that, you know, they're just kind of squander.

If they'd spent half the season with him trying to escape Earth or, you know, like, done a sort of long, like, long drawn out kind of persecution and trial thing instead of it just been one episode.

In those in these 1st 5 episodes, I didn't even say 4 episodes because I think even from the web, it's different.

There is a different series there that could have so easily gone in this other direction with these other characters as you guys are saying, and it's like it's just, it's, I don't know whether it's actively discarded.

[14:17]

I think it just falls away, but in a parallel universe, Blake 7 is those 1st 4 episodes and then sort of going on from there in a completely different direction, without the server lance, with these, with these other characters that we're meeting the way back.

Absolutely right.

And tying that in with kind of 2nd pilots and false starts as we were talking about.

It's interesting that when Travis is eventually introduced, his backstory with Blake and what happened when they 1st faced off is essentially what happens in the way back with Blake and with the guy played by Kelman from Doctor Who's Revenge at the Cyberman.

The plotting is actually the same.

Dev Terence, how could I forget his name?

Dev Tarrant.

Third brother, Dita and Dell.

It's interesting you say that because in the in earlier in the scripting process, they were the same character.

So the character that eventually becomes Travis started as as the character that was dead of Tarrant, and they, as they reworked the scripts, they became 2 separate characters, and he became a sort of kind of quasi cyborg with a, you know, with a hand that shoots like laser beams, but initially, there was supposed to be that ongoing, ongoing plot thread with him having having been the traitor and having betrayed him again and again.

[15:46]

That sort of more evidence for the fact that Clocate destroyer feels like the real start of the series because it takes what was that character in the 1st episodes and it goes off in a new direction and just happens to give it most of that backstory.

But back to Time Squad, if I may.

Just on the odd chance that that's what we want to talk about, right?

Interesting that we spent most of the episodes that if I'm not talking about every episode around it, but not this one.

I mean, the other reason why it's unloved, let's be honest, is the man who's directing it, is never one to add much panache to his direct oriol style.

But what I will say is that for Pennant Roberts in this, I actually felt it's actually not as bad as some of the Doctor Who he does in terms of the full square kind of coverage.

I mean, this whole episode does suffer from Pennant Roberts ISIS.

Absolutely, absolutely.

The unfailing ability to shoot action sequences like it's coronation streets.

[16:46]

I refer you to face of evil, Warriors of the Deep in Doctor Who and Mission to Destiny later this season.

I don't know why he can't cover studio action, but the fact is he can't go all 3 times that Jenna faces off against the time squad in the hold are all shot far too wide.

There's no cutaways and the vision switching between the shots is so flabby.

I mean, if you want an example of how it can be done effectively in a studio setup, look at Michael Bryant's work in this season, just picking one example from the top of my head, in Project Avalon, where they rescue Avalon from the cells, that's all done under the same restrictions in studio and let it, it's shot so much more tightly.

Yeah, and I was going to just extend on that is it's not just the sort of flabby, lazy sort of wide direction of that chock choices and the fact that the vision mixer seems to be at least 3 seconds behind where they should be and all that sort of stuff.

It's because it's also the performances, like the performances feel stilted.

[17:49]

Like the performances almost feel like they're shooting, you know, one of those line rehearsals, that actors might go through just to make sure that everyone's remembering everyone's line in the right order.

Do you know what I mean?

I like urgency, though.

There's no urgency there, there's live.

Live.

Line.

And there's just no sense of forward momentum, like every line is an effort.

Not by the direction, obviously, but so it's not just the fact that he can't use the studio cameras.

It's also the fact that he can't direct the actors.

And we know that the actors can deliver.

We know that they can deliver good, really tight scenes when given the direction.

But then, you know, I review you to the end of the episode for peak pennant Roberts ISIS, where the guards break into the control room and just sort of open the door and then the crew teleport away in a lethargic multicam cut, and then a little flesh goes off and the guards lie down on the floor.

It should have been laughed out of the studio.

I want to know where the pennant rubber's itis is infectious and whether we need to have him in 2 weeks quarantine.

Make sure he doesn't stuff up the rest of the season.

What he needs is a good dose of Graham Harper.

[18:52]

He goes into Clay, yes.

Yeah, it's interesting because my 1st experience of this this particular episode was from the novelisation.

There's a novelisation.

There was.

Yes, there was a book that contained the 1st 4 episodes as one long novelisation.

And in that, the author makes the scenes on the Liberator incredibly tense, and there's a real sense of creeping menace and things going wrong.

None of that comes really across in the episode.

It's just a lot of creeping around and slow fights.

There's obviously potential somewhere in this script because it felt much better in prose than it did on screen, but Pennant Roberts is very much the safe pair of hands.

He will bring this in on time and on budget, and he's the kind of director you need to keep your budget, say.

He's not going to do anything outrageous, but he doesn't do anything particularly stylish as well.

I'll take eating them off out over Pennant Roberts as the on-time on budget director any day.

[19:54]

Yes.

And also, seriously, we have to ask ourselves if that's the point.

Why employee Pennant Roberts, because again, we have an example this season in Michael Bryant of a director who does bring things in on time, but gets so much more out of his studios than Pennant does.

And you think faced with that, how could you possibly be satisfied in its work?

I read something recently about Pennant Roberts and the BBC, that the BBC used him quite often on the 1st series of shows because he was very good at doing the setup of a show.

So he did sort of similar work on Tenko and survivors, particularly, where he was just brought in.

Are you sure that this is a revisionist history and he only worked on the 1st series of shows because they never brought him back.

Well, that's entirely.

Yes, well that, well, there we go.

I was going to, I was going to make the observation that what they're trying to say that if the series can survive Penet Roberts, it'll, it'll work okay.

That might be a better way of putting it.

[20:57]

Let's not be too hard on panic because even though I do not think he does a very good job.

There are actually a couple of nice touches in this episode.

So the lights are turned down a little in the studios, especially in those hold sequences.

And there are a couple of genuinely nice moments.

The bit where the camera pans to be smashed wall communicator in the hold, and Jenna's voice becomes this goblin kind of voice coming out of it is actually genuinely unset thing.

So I appreciate him for that.

And I also quite like Utter on the quarry down the planet.

I think it's simple and effective, although truthfully it's quite hard to look at those sequences.

They initially wanted to put Cali in a red wig, red eye makeup and red contact lenses because she was actually supposed to be from that planet, not from our own.

Well, I'm glad they didn't do that.

Poor old Jan Chapel would have suffered there. very glad as well.

Yeah.

And when they decided to rewrite it, they're like, maybe we don't want to have to stick red contacts in a red wave every week.

[21:58]

And it's early in the season as well.

So there's still a bit of money floating around and the model work is very well done. for Blake 7, I think.

All of those scenes of the alien capsule being manoeuvred aboard liberated are really quite nice.

Oh, I just have to point out at that point, sorry, with the model work, it's that thing where they say transfer to inner hold number five.

It's a great way to avoid the inconsistency between the model work and then the sets that they had done.

Absolutely Got a bit of...

But I love the way they've gone to the effort of making a tiny model for the model shots and then they build the full size projectile and shove it into the into the studio as well.

That's not bad going.

They could have done that with a CSO shot behind them and they've actually gone to the effort of making the full-size thing.

And don't they use that set again later in the season?

So they've kind of, they've made the cost strip over several episodes.

Yeah, and I'm sure it turns up in countdown as well.

Yes, it absolutely does.

You're right.

The thing that Pennant might seem to be able to do as well is to keep Dudley Simpson relatively speaking under control because he does have some I'm not a huge Dudley Simpson fan, at least I'm not a huge Dudley Simpson's later work.

[23:10]

What did you do for most of the 70s of Doctor Who?

Well, indeed.

It's in the Williams era of Doctor Who, the Dudley Simpson starts to, it all doesn't go rightly with directly with the video visuals.

It's all a bit sort of, it's too bang crash wallet, whereas here you've got the subtleties which Dudley had up to kind of when he goes astray.

You've got the sort of the shaker beating irregularly when Jenna's exploring the caption.

And it's very Dudley Simpson, but he sort of loses that subtlety on his very late Doctor Who.

I'm just talking about the end of Doctor Who, like the back end of the Williams era, basically.

Yes, Dudley's interesting on Blake 7 because I think on Doctor Who, he could often be distinctive.

If you think of the doctor who scores of the 70s, if you, especially during the Phil Kinsqui era, which was probably his, that's the early Tom Baker era, when he was at, I think, his best, each story had an individual flavour, which he gave to it.

And I'm very hard pressed think of any scores in Blake second, which really stand out, except for maybe Star one, which is the end of the 2nd series, which I think has a very grand and kind of ominous score to it.

[24:19]

But otherwise, sort of delivering what he does for the Graham Williams era of Doctor Who, which is stock music.

Yeah.

Likewise, in the within stuff, you know, City of Death is the only one that really stands out.

And I think I think it's the similar kind of thing.

All the rest of it in both Blake 7 and Doctor Who, that period, does sort of sound the same, regardless of what the episode's about.

Yeah, I mean, there's occasional nice passages where he's gets a chance to write something beautiful and slightly distinctive.

I think there's some nice bits in Mission to Destiny, and in Project Avalon, particularly has a pretty good score.

But I think they might have been better off going to the radiophonic workshop and going for a big sort of symphi electronic score, maybe, and giving it a completely different field to Doctor Who in this particular era anyway.

Like I say, in some ways, it's a shame that I think producer David Maloney, who'd worked with Dudley on Doc 2 a lot and sort of saw him as a good score for sci-fi.

And I think that's a little bit of a shame because they had gone in a different direction.

[25:19]

It might have taken away the fact that Blake 7 and Doctor Who feels so much like sister shows.

What do you think of his feed?

I mean, the theme is incredible.

There was a massive pass of my childhood, just the excitement that I got from hearing that theme, Saturday night at like midnight when they were repeating series, A through C, and being allowed to stay up late and watch it.

It was a formative part of my childhood and it's still now just hearing that music brings me joy even on Time Squad.

It is amazing.

It is an amazing theme and does prize me that he's written it given some of the incidentals he writes or churns out, shall we say?

It's so anthemic.

It's a real anthem.

It's great.

So, I mean, did you ever watch The Tomorrow people?

No, no, I didn't, no.

Is that is that as well?

It's fairly lamentable in many ways, but it has, again, a brilliant opening titles with a fantastic theme by Dudley.

[26:21]

Oh, don't there you go.

Okay, is another thing.

Yeah, it's really distinctive and really creepy and very, very odd.

Have we talked about the opening credits?

I just find them an interesting choice.

And also, it's quite a contrast to the way the show is at this point, which is clearly trying to be a serious or reasonably serious science fiction program.

And yet the credits are the only sequence, it's cartoon animation, it's drawn.

I mean, maybe that was a conscious choice so that it wasn't sort of wobbly models and so on and that they obviously weren't going to go to the electric, you know, howl around type of Doctor Who, but it's always something that never sat well with me.

The series A and B credits, that is, it just is strange and even in the episode, there's a sequence where the liberators flying along and it's the drawing.

It's an animated thing.

It just seems so at odds with the overall flavour they're trying to go with.

I don't know whether this was done lazy when they decided to descend into space opera.

[27:22]

And so they thought, well, this will work for that.

Peter?

I think the main problem is that the reach of the title succeeds its grasp.

And so the idea for it is actually very good, but the only way that they could really perform it was to animate it.

There was no other real way.

And I think that a lot of the problem as well with the model work is, I don't know how accurate this is, but anecdotally, apparently the model maker, who I think was he in Scones, spent most of his budgets on the 1st couple of episodes and was left for virtually nothing for the rest of the season, which is why they literally had to animate the shots.

Yeah, and there's a sort of case in point as well, that he went off and did sort of the hero shots of the liberator and lots of shots that they could throw into episodes generally.

And then each director comes in and says, oh, well, I want to direct this and I've got an idea for this.

And so they don't end up using a lot of the actual expensive model work that they've done and then end up with the liberator flying past 1000000s of planets and the most starry possible skates that you can imagine in those strange animated sequences.

[28:33]

Have we discussed in earlier episodes that didn't the model cause a huge issue between the set and the props department because the model was actually designed by Roger Murray Leach.

I think the design caused a lot of problems because it's impossible to fly.

It needs a great big pole underneath it, to actually move it because they made this huge model, but you can't suspend it easily because it's got these tiny little struts holding the nacelles on, and it's difficult to fly in any conventional way.

And there are several model shots looking at the web next week where you can see the pole that's holding it up.

I mean, isn't there just any example of the fact that for all the difficulties that it caused?

It was absolutely so right that they went that way because I believe that I have seen an initial drawing, which was done by the model makers, what the liberators should look like, and it looked pretty much like the London from those 1st 2 episodes.

There was nothing iconic or interesting about it asshole.

[29:34]

And so boo-hoo, if they have troubleshooting it.

Thank God that Roger Murray Leach designed it.

Because I'm surprised that it caused a strike that cancelled the rest of the season. some sort of clock that then...

It's a learned fact, it's like it actually caused a rolling strike which actually cancelled charter.

It's either that or Pennant Roberts.

Let's just name it.

Yes, of course, did direct the 1st episode, which was in studio, which was Spaceball, and he directed the 1st location, which was for this.

So I think we must be grateful for small mercies that he didn't direct the actual opening episode because that could have been fairly turgid in his hands.

Well, that's interesting.

I didn't realise, I forgot that he did Spaceball, because that's actually not as bad a direction.

That's sort of fine, isn't it?

It's fine.

In comparison, it is.

Because it's uncomplicated.

Or maybe maybe he can do it better because spaceball is more about, you know, people in rooms talking.

[30:36]

I don't mean that in the negative sense because it's, you know, the tense drama of it.

But maybe that's what he's more suited to and he can't cope with too much going on.

There's not so much action in that one.

And what fights there are, the big fight between Avon and the technician, for instance, is on film.

So it's easier to cut.

Yeah, your film editor can make something of that that maybe your vision mixture in the studio can't.

I was just going to say, we're still not talking...

We're still not talking... outside squad.

Well, I think Time Squad is inextricably linked with the start of the series.

I mean, there's a lot of choices which are made in Time Squad, which do reflect on the start of the series.

There's a reason why it's the last chunk of that, the beginning, the HS tape back in the 80s, and I don't think it's just because it's Callie's introduction.

So what percentage of the episode makes it to that VHS?

Is it just?

Most of it.

Oh, most of it.

Oh, it's sickness enough, basically sliced out?

They cut the they cut the way back to shreds.

Mainly because, you know, the plot line is not really palatable for a peachy raging.

[31:41]

There's quite a bit of space for in there.

There's still quite a bit of sickness alpha in there as well, but most of Times Squad is in there.

Right.

So you do get both of the plot.

I thought maybe they, I mean, it's so long since I saw it.

I mean, it is 30 something years ago, since I saw that.

Maybe by that point the person editing the videotape and falling asleep.

Oh, and just let the rest of it run.

Yeah, okay.

Getting back to Time Squad.

Are they wearing the 7 teams costumes from the face of people?

Or does it just look like it?

It could only have been approved if one of them was wearing Leela's?

I mean, They're very BBC savage, aren't they?

No.

I mean, it's ridiculous of everything that's wrong with this episode.

It's just, and it's sort of indicative of what of what is wrong with, I think, stock standard BBC sci-fi to 70s and that you're meant to have this group of crack warriors, but it's actually the village people with middle-aged spread.

[32:44]

And it's just, it's so lame that these warriors are a bunch of fat, poorly blocked extras with glued on facial hair and I don't know, an inability to chase a granny on a mobility scooter.

It removes any kind of menace that should actually be there in the script.

Yes, and if it was made now, at least they'd be hot. you know?

I mean, it's just so depressing.

But it's that, you know, old BBC thing as well. they have no lines.

Therefore, they're only paid whatever it is, and therefore, you get what you pay for, basically.

Well, could you speak to a screen?

If the screen counts as a line of dialogue.

GH.

Also, I think it's over-promising and under delivering because Time Squad could be a 70s dance troop, like hot chocolate, but sadly, that's not what we're given.

Yeah, or some crack time travellers have come back to change the past.

Like, it's it's just a terrible name.

Like why is it called Time Squad?

[33:47]

Cryo squad, maybe.

That would be better. crew.

What do we think of the way Callie's telepathic abilities are introduced because I actually thought it was sort of done reasonably well.

It's sort of, it's quite concise the way they do it.

You know, they very quickly establish, you know, she can't just read people's minds.

She can project her thoughts, and it sort of puts the boundaries around what she can do very, very quickly.

So we don't discover that over the course of several episodes.

And more to the point, we don't have incredibly inconsistent things that Kelly's capable of doing.

I do love the way that Blake reveals that as well.

So like he faints to one side and because she can't read his mind.

He tricks her.

And so it's actually kind of natural in the dialogue.

It's not just, it's not just, I'm a telepath, but I can't read minds.

I can only talk to you in your head.

No, it's quite subtle writing from Terry Nation for a change.

[34:47]

Well, it's probably Chris Boucher.

Well, no, it's interesting that Blake doesn't know that the R&R are capable of telepathy.

I mean, isn't that sort of thing that you hear about?

I mean, I know the Federation's a big place and everything, but you'd think that someone would have known, no?

Well, I guess, you know, like if they're a totalitarian stage and they control everybody's lives and thoughts and everything, would they allow you to know about the outside world?

And Arron's supposed to be neutral as well, isn't it?

as it's sort of stated later and isn't affiliated to anything and keep themselves to themselves.

And Callie is one of the few who has made it out off-world and fighting for a call.

It's interesting what I was saying earlier about, but I think this is non-semble episode in that a lot of the rest of the episodes of the series aren't.

They actually allow different characters to have different knowledge.

And so Jenner is the one who explains to Blake about cryogenesis and what that meant.

Whereas I think later in his run, Blake becomes a little bit all knowing, he's the one who's sort of telling people their jobs.

[35:55]

Jenna, break all this and do this, where it's like, yeah, she's the pilot, she knows this.

Whereas I think here everyone has allowed their own agency a little bit more.

Yeah, and I think you see that in that opening scene on the flight deck where they're going to dock with the ship.

Jenna is very much in control.

That's her knowledge and everyone is deferring to her.

Yes, absolutely.

And I think there's a little bit of a shame in those scenes because there was an opportunity, I think, to open up Gan's character a little bit more.

So Jenna is teaching Blake how to fly the liberator at the start of the episode and I just wonder why they gave him that when it was just giving him more of the action than he already had.

If they'd given it to Gan, for instance, it would have given him more of a character to have been sort of a backup pilot, and he could have then manoeuvred the capsule on board to demonstrate that, whereas Avon does it in the episode, and he doesn't have any piloting experience that we know of.

So it's all a little bit kind of thought through at this stage, I think.

You then get down using the tissue regeneration thing on Jenna, which is obviously something that they don't have in the Federation.

[37:01]

That something that's, you know, unique to the liberator.

And he somehow has discovered that this thing's there.

So, but that's not giving the character something to do because it should be something that he does.

It's just, well, this character's here, so he can fix genera.

Yes, he's often relegated, I think, to the caregiver role, Gan.

And that's an interesting dynamic because he's obviously the strong man.

He's obviously got a violent past for whatever reason, which means he needed the limitser, but he is the one who often expresses empathy for other people on the crew and helps them medically.

So it's an interesting dynamic.

It's not overplayed, but it's there.

The, uh, the sequence where they're actually attacking the power plant or chemical factory, whatever the hell it is. something that sort of bugged me when I watched it, because it sort of felt so obvious.

Abel's the only one who's doing whatever he's doing to make the thing blow up, to make the reactor blow up.

A couple of the others aren't really, they're just standing there. they're waiting for it to happen.

[38:04]

You'd think someone would contact the liberator and say, get us ready to teleport.

I mean, I know it's kind of the dramatic thing that, you know, when they do finally call in, there's no one, there's no one listening to teleport them up, but it just feels stupid.

Like for me, it's characters behaving stupidly, which is annoying.

And you can still have had that drama.

You could have wrapped that drama up because flapping the 2 things together.

Yeah, it's like thinking about had them constantly trying.

And then they decide, shall we press the button anyway because, you know, they're going to burst in any seconds and kill us.

We may as well blow ourselves up as well, other because we're about to be shot anyway.

That that's there you go.

We've just written the better version of time.

Let's make the special edition.

I think that goes back to the crocs, though.

I mean, let's not bash Terry Nation too much because I think Terry Nation is a good writer, and he does a really good job of delivering 13 straight episodes this season, but there are a couple of instances where the cracks show, and I think Time Squad is absolutely one of them.

[39:09]

It feels like a story that's fallen through the cracks and isn't properly developed and one where the character should be developing in a way that they do encyclocate destroy, but not yet because you've just got this episode sort of thrust into a gap here.

I wonder whether, again, because it's been pulled forward, Chris Boucher hasn't had a lot of time to do some magic work on it and bring it up to standard, because I know he does that a lot towards the end of the season.

This is, we've got to get this done because we're filming next week and this will do.

It's serviceable. it'll be fine Well, didn't I didn't be able to famously say or infamously say that there wasn't a single line that Avon said that he hadn't had some involvement in writing.

Chris Boucher did say that.

He said it to me when I interviewed him. on the floor, shall I?

I think you're absolutely right, James, but having said that, I do think this is the earliest episode where we start to get some of the banter that will become very identified with Blake 7.

[40:18]

It's not quite the treasure that will come to expect, but there are some good lions.

So you have some, you have Villa St.

Lake early on the flight deck.

He says, I don't follow you.

And they even turns around and says, oh, but you too, that's the problem, which has a very nice kind of summation of that.

And I think later on when they're talking about, you know, they might get killed or but properly they won't.

And everyone says, I'm sure Blake will manage it somehow.

And so they've already, they've already set up that character dynamic, which is good.

Yeah.

Like, I think the live is actually something like, for a clever man, you know, not very bright, deaf dumb and blind, how they're going to catch us.

And then everyone says, I'm sure Blake will manage it somehow.

There's some great lines in this episode.

And actually, that's a bit of a problem with Time Squad and why we keep referencing Clokate destroyed, because Clokate destroy is a very similar story, but done well.

Whereas with Time Squad, big stakes are talked about, let's do this death defying raid, we're blind to death at the Federation.

[41:22]

But there's no follow-up in story terms.

Nothing actually has an impact or ramifications for what comes next.

And so the episode feels disposable in a way that Siklocate, destroy, doesn't.

No, exactly, and encyclocate, destroy.

The Blake getting hold of the cypher becomes the whole crux of the plot and is used against him once they've worked out.

But here, they just blow it up and you don't hear sort of next episode, oh, the Federation's communications have been crushed by Blake.

We've lost contact with this planet or anything like that.

It just happens.

Yes, you're right.

Although I think you're very cruel to call genera cypher.

Well, there's also, there's, there's real peril in Secloquet destroyer as well.

Callie's left behind.

You know, they think she's dead for a time and then, you know, she is used by Travis to lure them into a trap.

Again, we're not talking about the episode.

[42:22]

Yeah, that leads me to sort of observe that I think one of the problems with time squad, and I know that PD you're saying it's an ensemble piece where everyone kind of has an equal part, which is great.

But I think it suffers from not having an A plot and a B plot.

It has 2 beep plots.

Absolutely.

You're not you're not waiting.

I'm not waiting to get back to the other one.

I mean, B plots are sort of there to fill out the scenes of the A plot sometimes and give the secondary character something to do. you know, you can criticise them.

But it kind of focusses where the attention should be, whereas because of the fact that both of the plots are equal.

You don't really care about either of them.

Both of plots are equal, but neither of them is developed.

They go down to a planet and they run around for a little bit.

They up on the liberator and they run around for a little bit.

Yeah, and if either of those was a little bit edited down and in another episode, you probably wouldn't mind them individually.

Absolutely.

Either of them would make a good B plot in another episode.

I say, cute knee blocks.

No, I think you're absolutely right.

[43:23]

They both just feel so inconsequential other than to get Callie into the series.

We've got to go to this planet to meet her, and that is almost the primary aim of this episode, and there's no impetus to do anything else with this episode other than introduce the last member of the seven.

I think also there's like there's problems with the actual.

There no purpose in the plot as well.

A lot of the plot just happens because it needs to happen for the plot.

The bits with Zen refusing to help them.

It's never really quite clear why he's refusing to help them.

I mean, yes, you can read that as, oh, he knows they are.

Yeah, he knows that the ship is dangerous, but why can't he just tell?

Like, like, like, if that, there was an explanation in the plot, you know, apart from, oh, he might have a limit, but what does it achieve for, for that, for the ship not to, not to be saying, no, don't go near that thing.

Like, you're being enigmatic and difficult and all you're doing is actually leading them into danger.

[44:29]

If you just don't know that thing is dangerous.

Keep away from it.

They would have left it alone.

Yes, you're being getting magic and difficult just to be hypmatic and difficult.

Like, you could all it took was half a line of dialogue to say that, you know, the ship, the little pod thing was, you know, sending out some kind of cancellation waves or something to enable it to be brought on board and had to disable the ship's computer in order to do that.

I mean, there's a much more elegant way of saying that, but at least that, it wouldn't be such, it wouldn't be as trite.

You know, I have a theory that that might have been a casualty of the developing writing because Zen in the early episodes is written to be sort of troublesome.

It doesn't give them the explanations and things that they want.

However, part of me wonders if as they came towards the end of the season and they were developing the episode Aurak, who gets all of those character traits of being difficult and not working with them because he's too powerful, whether they just let that slide from Zen.

Yeah, I think there's a very good case for that.

Yeah, and there's a line, I think in Sickness Alpha, where Zen says, oh, wisdom must be gathered, it cannot be given, which he's very much conforming to here, but that is very much, again, lost pretty much from cyclocate destroy.

[45:44]

He's just the information you've arrived at your planet, confirmed.

I've got a bit of information in my databanks about where you're going and that's it.

But let's not kid ourselves that Zen doesn't have more personality than Gan.

That's true.

Because he's got more lines than gas.

Well, very famously, David Jackson, who plays Gan, apparently approached Terry Nation or Chris Boucher at one and said four, and they looked at him and they said, what?

He said four.

That's number of lines I have in this episode.

Oh.

She's just dreadful, really.

They treat him so appallingly.

But it is a lot of characters, really.

I mean, they, the fact that the latter seasons have, well, after he dies, basically, you have one fewer, it is.

It's only been 43 years.

Don't give it away.

The chaps watching it, gave that.

[46:46]

I can just see someone sat down and listen to this podcast and say, oh, watch this interesting series with Sandies along with them.

Oh, and speaking of characters like Zen, who will change.

Villa, I think, is still being shaken down as well.

So I think the problem with Villa maybe in these early episodes was that he was a little bit too much like Avon.

He's a little bit sardonic and a little bit kind of glib, and they kind of, they take those traits away from him.

He loses some of his early cockiness.

And I think that was a more interesting direction for the character to go.

Yes, it's also in these early episodes.

He has his sort of, you know, he's esky, he's picked up at Bunnings, the 1499 that he takes down to the planets and...

Oh my God, I love the Space-esky.

I don't know how many crew members.

Blake thinks he's going to get from Saurian Mach, but they pack about a dozen telling bracelets and that thing along with their picnic lunch.

You know, what I love what I love about what you just said is that British people now know what Bunnings is.

We do have Bunnings.

[47:47]

I assume that's better on some equivalent.

They bought out home base.

The British home stores?

Yeah, home base.

Yeah, our big DIY chain.

Yes, I mean, and it's also good how the crew have apparently spent so much time with each other.

They were alongboard the London for months and yet they're still finding new important things about each other.

So Jenna's like, what do you mean you've got a limit and went, surely this would have come up in conversation at some point.

When he threatened people in earlier episodes.

But he didn't seem to, you know, be under, you know, in any pain for the violence that he was, he was perpetrating.

Well, maybe he knew he wasn't going to do it.

He was bluffing, whereas here he's having to actually follow through with it.

Yes, if only so you loved him.

I've had that kind of prison record, which said, don't believe it if Gan says he's going to hit you.

He can't.

I like when Villa says, I should hate to be eaten by something stupid.

You should stay clear of Gan at dinner.

[48:50]

I do love that they've just stuck a big Lego brick on his head to show that there's a limiter there.

It reminds me of the cops they put on people in the tripod series from the 80s.

Yeah.

If you've anyone seen that.

When it needs to be seen, of course, when it's not seen, it's not there, but.

Yeah, so when Cal Scarlione operates on the limiter later in the season and he's clearly operating on something which is the size of a screwdriver and yet is kind of doing this delicate work with this little micro circuit on his head.

So, uh, I think one slip that again could have been lobotomised.

Isn't it just a screwdriver painted silver?

Yeah, I'd be disappointed if it wasn't.

Once we think of Time Squad at the end of the day.

I mean it does have its good points, but it seems to be a missed opportunity.

Yeah, I think that's an excellent summary.

I actually don't mind it.

I kind of, every time I watch it, I go into it thinking, oh, this is going to be terrible and come away going, well, it wasn't that bad.

[49:51]

It's just that it could have been better if this, that, and the other had happened.

And what I found most interesting watching at this time, as I've already said, is kind of I found it a window into what Blake 7 might have been, but I'm very glad that they didn't go through that window.

Absolutely.

And I think it's Blake 7 and I love all Blake 7 and I genuinely love it.

I don't love it on an ironic level, even though you can appreciate it that way.

I genuinely love it and love every episode, but basically with time squads.

You needed to add better writing and subtract Panic Roberts and you might add something.

No, it's a very good point.

I mean, I don't think it's the very worst depth that this season will get to.

But it just feels so uninvolving and then, and there's nothing worse than a TV show being boring.

And I think this episode is just a bit dull.

Yeah, all the ideas were there.

[50:52]

Well, some of the ideas were there, but they're just not developed very well.

Yeah.

Which is odd.

I think you have the problem with that era of television.

Sometimes I think you do need the writer's room.

You need some people throwing some ideas around each other, throwing some ideas to each other, going, well, what if so-and-so did this?

And what if that happened?

What if they had more difficulty at the end?

And what if the time squad people were something else?

you know, there's just no, it's like it's the 1st draft. and no one's gone through it to say, what if we did it like that?

What if we added this?

Absolutely.

And I think there are hints in Time Squad that it was written quickly and recent later in the season than you would think from its position, like Jenna's comment about fake distress calls being an old pirate trick?

Because in bounty, of course, coming up to that, that's absolutely what happens.

The space pirates send out a fake distress signal.

So, I mean, I can think you can see where it's coming.

Absolutely.

And there is a thing, I think, that Chris Boucher again said, it might have been in your interview pizza, where he said, Terry Nation, where Terry Nation said to him, you can have a 2nd draft or you can have the next episode where he's just literally so close to the bone writing that he just sending the 1st draft in and saying, you'll have to work from this, particularly towards the end of the season.

[52:11]

There isn't time for him to refine his ideas.

So I think the episodes are not quite as strong as his original sort of 1st 6 or 7.

Were they underwritten as well?

Like, there's always that rumour that Terry Nation scripts ran to half the time and then they needed to.

Was that actually the case?

Well, that was absolutely the case on bounty, which we will come to because that was so anaemically written that Chris Boucher had to step in and write half the episode and it was still short and so the cast improvised several scenes.

Oh, goodness me.

And you know, it's fashionable to bash Terry Nation.

He's received a lot of stick over the years for the fact that he tends to reuse ideas and he really only has about half a dozen good ideas, but they are very good ideas.

And I think when you take the pressure off him of having to supply 13, 50 minute episodes and he does what he does for series B and C and provides only 3 episodes for each season, every one of those episodes is an absolute corker.

Absolutely.

I think that's also function of feedback.

[53:12]

I think he's a writer that does have those few ideas, those good ideas, but he needs them to be corralled by someone else or helps to be corralled by someone else.

And I think this is an example of an episode where they aren't properly corralled.

So, thank you very much for listening to another episode of Maximum Power, where we almost talked about Time Squad.

So I'd like to say thank you to James, Peter and Simon for joining me today, and hope you'll tune in next week when the Liberator discovers the web.

Thank you and goodbye.

Goodbye.

Ta-ta.

Bye for now.

Switching to Manny.

Maximum power on all drives.