"Blake's 7" by Trevor Hoyle was published in paperback by Sphere (off the back of their "Star Wars" paperback) just before Christmas 1977… even before the show debuted, and in hardback from Arthur Baker in January 1978. This covers the first four episodes to set up the format and clearly draws heavily on the draft scripts much of the time.

"Blake's 7: Project Avalon" was also by Trevor Hoyle and appeared from Arrow in January 1979 in paperback. This one covers the five Travis episodes from Series A, but with a heavily truncated version of "Deliverance".

And there was a third one… but that's getting ahead of where you are at present.

All the best

Andrew

Avon and co were clearly too busy congratulating themselves on getting out alive to think about checking their radiation levels! It also isn’t really very clear how much of a gap there is between the events of Deliverance and Orac. Maybe it was only a few hours, or maybe they were just overconfident.

Poor Vila looks awful by the time he’s met Blake and Cally. No wonder he couldn’t wait to ask if they’d got the meds. Part of me does think that with Vila it’s a case of – if you think you’re ill, you’ll feel worse.

That screencap was chosen very carefully – I wanted to get that nanosecond with Avon’s arm fully out as he relaxes it slightly once Blake grabs him. I don’t think Vila holds his gun straight up the entire time, but he certainly doesn’t look at all prepared with it and clearly has no intention of using it.

I’m immensely looking forward to seeing Avon and Orac together. Will be great to see how it works out.

I hadn’t noticed your Servalan fact! I’d seen her referenced as Servalan beforehand – she was the only character I could have pointed out before I watched it and though I thought she was a villain, I wasn’t entirely sure.

I’m prepared to be disappointed in the reality of Orac’s potential, but it’s shoved to the back of my mind. I’m still too excited about the possibilities and think it’s a cracking idea!

Captain's log – yes, it doesn't make in-universe sense but maybe Blake kept it for the duration of each mission and then erased it every time.

Radiation – you reminded me that I still hadn't watched Chernobyl. I will, even though it's still too real for me. Your take that radiation drugs on ships were a given and that's why the crew didn't even check on that made a lot of sense.
Still, I'd imagine Avon and Co running to the med bay to check themselves for rad levels right after teleporting from Cephlon. Strange that they didn't do it.

They spent a lot of time there – Blake told Avon that after 4 hours of search they were to be swapped for him and Cally, but Ensor Jr. took them away, so Avon and Co got stuck there for more than 4 hours. They should have gone for radiation meds on return. But Terry was tired, the last script and all.

Loved Avon and Vila teaming up too! And yes, it's about their survival. Loved that the first thing Vila does when he meets Cally, he asks for meds.

Acidic ocean – I assumed it was about PH quality of regular water, i.e. it was more sour than alkaline. Ocean of sour water, not of acid.

Ensor: his chest piece looked great, yes! And he was a nice character. Who was very callously treated by Cally of all people. "Oh, I'm having a heart attack!" "Very good, carry this heavy box for me, will you?"

Servalan's first field trip and she's wearing trousers. Sensible.

And yes, it was awesome to see Avon save the day! But I looked at your screencaps here and on Twitter and realized that Vila was holding his gun up and as away from everybody as possible, the whole time. Aww bless. 🙂

Orac – I remember laughing out loud seeing that it's just the Internet. I thought it was awesome. Also loved how Orac immediately got under Avon's skin – someone even bitchier than him just came on board. The story will obviously continue past that explosion – but how? 🙂

Re: the continuity about the radiation poisoning. This reminded me of how the Trevor Hoyle novelisation ran differently. In the heavily truncated version of “Deliverance”, it was Blake – not Avon – who went down with the party to Cephlon and so it was Blake who became irradiated… hence in the book it was the dying Blake who went down to Aristo with Cally (who had not been affected).

Re: ‘something for the dads’. This, sadly, does appear to have been one of the approaches at times and was rather obvious even then.

Re: The Phibians. They do photograph them carefully by and large. Some of them later become some of the Argonds on the rather wonderful BBC SF puzzler “The Adventure Game”. And the sequence where Servalan is attacked by the creatures *does* still pack a punch because we’ve not seen her imperilled before; there’s something very unsettling with the way that both Jacqueline Pearce and Stephen Grief play that scene and its aftermath.

Great to see you enjoying this world that Terry Nation has created so much, *and* being excited by Orac’s potential. I know that a few other people who have come to the series in recent years were underwhelmed by Orac’s abilities when revealed (because of the way technology has changed) – so to see your excitement here is refreshing. Love your notions of what happens next, and looking forward to how this pans out with your continued viewing.

Many thanks again for an engaging read which brings back so many vivid memories.

All the best

Andrew