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blakes7-d Digest Volume 98 : Issue 112
Today's Topics:
Re: [B7L] Merlin
Re: [B7L] Liberator
RE: [B7L] On the espidoe 'Power' (long)
Re: [B7L] Liberator
Re: [B7L] Liberator
Re: [B7L] Liberator
[B7L] Logic of Empire
[B7L] A Hard-Wired Seven (long)
[B7L] Gender (was re: Deliverance pros and cons)
Re: [B7L] A Hard-Wired Seven (long)
RE: [B7L] A Hard-Wired Seven (long)
Re: [B7L] Power
[B7L] Hi, and Bye for a while
[B7L] Assassin
Re: [B7L] Liberator
Re: [B7L] Re: Power
[B7L] Horizon
[B7L] RE: blakes7-d Digest V98 #111
[B7L] Re: Liberaror
[B7L] model orac
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 14 Apr 1998 16:28:33 -0600
From: "John J. Doherty" <alijd@gemini.oscs.montana.edu>
To: Blakes7@lysator.liu.se
Subject: Re: [B7L] Merlin
Message-Id: <3.0.5.32.19980414162833.007dfaf0@gemini.oscs.montana.edu>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
I've seen the IMDB entry on this Merlin. My fear is that it is the
rumoured TNT version of the horrorific "The Mists of Avalon" but perhaps
not -- Mists is more about Morgan Le Fay than Merlin.
Blaze (I've usually seen it as Blaise) is Merlin's mentor/teacher/student,
depending on which parts of the legend you read. The Brits may remember
Don Henderson playing Blaise in the BBC's "Merlin of the Crystal Cave" a
few years ago.
-- John
At 05:41 PM 4/10/1998 -0700, Jay McGuigan wrote:
>I know a couple of people, including myself, were wondering about the
>two upcoming films called Merlin, and which one GT was in.
>
>I did a little research and IMDB states that GT is in the one with
>Jason Connery as Merlin, GT plays Blaze (?). Doesn't say if it's a
>theatrical release.
>
>The other one is a TV mini-series which will be on NBC (I think) with
>Sam Neill as Merlin and Rutger Hauer also.
>
>Hope this sheds some light on it.
>
>Jay
>100% Avon
>Retainer of Avon's Leathers
>B7 Novice Writers Group
>
>
>
>==
>
>
>****************************************************
>I have no morals, yet I'm a very moral person. --Voltaire
>Everything is for the best, in the best of all possible worlds.
--Voltaire (Candide)
>Check out my homepage at:
>http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Valley/4518
>_________________________________________________________
>DO YOU YAHOO!?
>Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com
>
>
>
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1998 09:23:53 +1000
From: Bill Billingsley <whb@bha.oz.au>
To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se
Subject: Re: [B7L] Liberator
Message-Id: <3.0.1.32.19980415092353.006a094c@rabbit>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
At 10:35 14/04/98 +0200, Jeroen wrote:
>
>
>PS: Secondly ... where IS orac.
>
>
Still in the flyer?...
--------------------------------------------------------
The Loch Mess Monster
(occaisionally mistaken as Bill Billingsley)
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1998 15:05:31 +1200
From: "Graham, Gregory" <GrahamG@agresearch.cri.nz>
To: "'Helen Krummenacker'" <avona@jps.net>, "'B7'" <blakes7@lysator.liu.se>
Subject: RE: [B7L] On the espidoe 'Power' (long)
Message-ID: <710458B7BCD3D011897D0000F8003AB791D91E@invex.agresearch.cri.nz>
Content-Type: text/plain
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Helen Krummenacker [SMTP:avona@jps.net]
> Sent: Tuesday, April 14, 1998 4:37 PM
> To: Graham, Gregory
> Subject: Re: [B7L] On the espidoe 'Power' (long)
>
> Graham, Gregory wrote:
> >
> > > Oops sorry! Avona that message was meant for the lysator list.
> > >
> > Could you forward it on for me?
> >
> > Thanks in advance
> > Greg
> I will be happy to, as soon as I get another post from the list.
> ::blush:: I haven't got the list in my address book.
>
blakes7@lysator.liu.se is the address you want. Sorry for forcing you
to send it on but I haven't got a copy and I really should do some work
for a change...
> Your points are
> excellent, though. I really like the women of B7, though the
> complentary complaint is that part of the problem is _yes_ the women
> are sometimes more experienced, always intelligent, active-- but
> except
> for Servalan, they let the guys decide what to do! Still, they vote in
> the debates, and sometimes their suggestions are the ones used. I
> agree
> it's very advanced for the time.
>
Good point, but I think it was more letting Avon decide what to do (and
the Judiths et al would happily do that). Having considered the result
of Avon's captaincy, perhaps they should all have listened to Vila :].
> Oh, Leela is the savage companion (I used to dress as her) you
> couldn't
> remmeber the name of, and the last companion, Ace, was totally
> kick-tail. She carried homemade high explosives with her, much to the
> Doctor's dismay.
>
You used to dress up as Leela <eek><blush>. We only got to see "silver
nemesis" in NZ, and the feeling I had was "Oh god, a loud-mouthed
American in an excellent Brit program". How come Christopher Reeve
is(was) the only American actor that can do Brit Flicks and not stand
out like a sore thumb.
Leela and Ace would have been the only regular characters to carry
weapons, does this mean there is a correlation between Barbarians and
Americans (on TV anyway).
Thanks for the compliment by the way, I hope my last few comments have
spoiled your opinion.
TTFN
Greg
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 14 Apr 1998 18:54:26 +0100 (BST)
From: Judith Proctor <Judith@blakes-7.demon.co.uk>
To: Lysator List <Blakes7@lysator.liu.se>
Subject: Re: [B7L] Liberator
Message-ID: <Marcel-1.42-0414175426-0e8Rr9i@blakes-7.demon.co.uk>
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII
On Tue 14 Apr, Lucas Young wrote:
> Did Liberator use one of Ensor's chips? Could ORAC access Zen's data? I
> think once the Gauda Prime ruse was over (Avon had enough time to plan it
> before coming into the base) they dug ORAC up and used the base to rebuild
> the Liberator!
Ensor developed the tariel cell.
It seems highly likely that the System developed the tariel cell independently
as Orac was able to control any computer with tariel cells and in the episode
'Orac' he is able to control Zen.
There are other occasions on which he controlled Liberator/Zen. 'Dawn of the
Gods' has Orac wanting to investigate the 'black hole'.
One thing I've never been able to decide is how much data storage Orac had. He
used other computers to do his donkey work on occasion. (I think it was
'Traitor' where he uses a Federation computer to do calculations and was caught
in the act). Did he use other computers for data storage too? He may have had
very little capacity of his own as he wouldn't have needed it.
If this is the case, then he might have relied on Zen's memory banks to record
all the details of Liberator's design and have lost them when Liberator was
destroyed.
On the other hand, he might have found it all so interesting that he kept his
own copy.
The real $64,000 is what difference taking Orac's key out actually made. It
certainly stopped him being able to talk, but the series is rather inconsistent
about whether it prevented him from doing other things.
Judith
--
http://www.hermit.org/Blakes7
Redemption 99 - The Blakes 7/Babylon 5 convention
26-28 February 1999, Ashford International Hotel, Kent
http://www.smof.com/redemption/
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1998 16:35:09 +1000
From: Bill Billingsley <whb@bha.oz.au>
To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se
Subject: Re: [B7L] Liberator
Message-Id: <3.0.1.32.19980415163509.006ae330@rabbit>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
At 18:54 14/04/98 +0100, Judith wrote:
>The real $64,000 is what difference taking Orac's key out actually made.
Turned off the flashy lights. :-P
--------------------------------------------------------
The Loch Mess Monster
(occaisionally mistaken as Bill Billingsley)
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1998 09:11:40 +0200 (MET DST)
From: "Jeroen J. Kwast" <jeroenkw@gns.getronics.nl>
To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se (mailing list)
Subject: Re: [B7L] Liberator
Message-Id: <199804150711.JAA23320@pampus.gns.getronics.nl>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
>
> The real $64,000 is what difference taking Orac's key out actually made. It
> certainly stopped him being able to talk, but the series is rather inconsistent
> about whether it prevented him from doing other things.
>
Stop the "clicking" noises ? 8o;)
AFAIK only the user interface. To prevent unauthorized access to ORAC because
he would obey anyone (volcano) without question ... eventualy.
There are some inconsistencies over the years (mostly at the introduction
of ORAC) but it looks like ORAC always functions (when not dropped on the floor).
Jeroen
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1998 17:33:11 +1100
From: Sandy Douglas <scd@magna.com.au>
To: space-city@world.std.com
Cc: blakes7@lysator.liu.se
Subject: [B7L] Logic of Empire
Message-Id: <v03007800b159ed35a5b5@[203.111.124.4]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
I haven't seen a review of Logic of Empire so here it is.
This is a fan produced audio tape made by the same people who did "Mark of
Kane". If you liked that one you will not be disappointed with the
followup.
This tape is set 7 years after Gauda Prime and features Paul Darrow as
Avon, Jackie Pearce as Servalan and cameos from Peter Tuddenham as Slave
and Orac as well as Gareth Thomas as Blake.
This is written by fans for fans and as such has tremendous attention to
detail.
Avon sounds like Avon. Both from the script and from the actor. In this
episode Avon says exactly what is necessary and nothing extra. As well
Darrow has his Avon voice firmly in and under control. As an aside his 2nd
season Avon voice is also there- in a flashback dream sequence with Blake
showing that he is capable of doing another radio play in any series from
1-4.
I wont give the plot away but deals with Avon, the sole survivor of Gauda
Prime now a moral arms dealer and a resistance group who want him to do a
small service for them. Betrayal is the name of the game but by whom and
the reasons why are what makes this storyline interesting.
What I like about this production was what I like about the series as a
whole. The Avon one-liners, the relationships between the characters and
the twist at the end. Though I will admit the ending was very much like a
story I first read on the Internet a couple of years ago.
If you didn't like the Dr Who-like adventure of Sevenfold Crown this may be
more to your liking. I did like the little warning on the tape-
"Unauthorised copying ... etc strictly prohibited or Avon will shoot you
down like a dog"
The tape is available from Horizon.
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1998 11:11:06 +0100
From: Russ Massey <russ@wriding.demon.co.uk>
To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se
Subject: [B7L] A Hard-Wired Seven (long)
Message-ID: <66pirEA6eIN1EwB9@wriding.demon.co.uk>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
Here's another of Neil's musings on the nature of the series and whether it can
incorporate the trappings of the cyberpunk sub-genre. No reproduction for
profit, and no copying unless the author's name is retained if you please.
A HARD-WIRED SEVEN?
by Neil Faulkner (from Altazine #4)
Was B7 cyberpunk? As I'm sure you're all dying to know the answer to this
tantalising question, I'll answer it straight away: No, it wasn't. But it might
have been, even though it never could have been.
B7 wasn't cyberpunk for a number of reasons. For a start, when the
series went into production, the term didn't exist. The concept of 'cyberpunk'
first emerged in the early 1980s to describe the work of a small group of new
young SF writers - such as William Gibson and John Shirley - who merged a
streetwise punk attitude with the future implications of the dawning
Information Age. In the late 80s the term spread to the rolegaming industry
(which is how I first got to hear about it), and only in the past few years has it
impinged on the wider public consciousness. Gibson, author of the award-
winning *Neuromancer*, was apparently the man who coined the term
'cyberspace', with which I'm sure we're all now quite familiar, though the
cyberspace he envisaged is a little more exciting than the flood of on-screen
e-mail chatter that we currently understand by it.
As with so many things, popular awareness and popular acceptance
have altered and arguably debased the original nature of cyberpunk. The
rolegaming market was perhaps the turning point, introducing a whole new
audience to the concept. The first cyberpunk roleplaying game was simply
called *Cyberpunk* (now *Cyberpunk 2020*), closely followed by
*Shadowrun*, which merged high-tech near-future realism with magic and
fantasy. Both were instant commercial hits, prompting an inevitable release of
cash-in supplements. This, I think, is where the rot set in, because all of these
follow-ons were little more than gadget catalogues, brimming with implants
and 'smart' (as in intelligent) vehicles and weapons. Especially weapons.
Adolescent rabid kill-frenzy hardware. The photogenic potential of high-tech
lethality gave birth to the action movie and made Arnold Schwarzenegger an
international superstar; by the time a true cyberpunk movie came to be made
- the not-terribly-good *Johnny Mnemonic* - it was doomed to be still-born
in a rut so deep it couldn't hope to climb out (though JM is so perfunctorily
clich‚-ridden I'm half inclined to suspect at least an element of parody). So,
what is cyberpunk?
On the surface, cyberpunk is high-tech sleaze, a marriage of style
and silicon, or mirror-shaded youth cult where life is cheaper than any
number of computerised implants. All you need to do is look cool, act
cooler, talk smart and sport the right hardware. That was about as far as the
roleplaying games went, which I considered so superficial I soon stopped
playing cyberpunk games. The real, underlying, nature of cyberpunk is
deeper and darker, and all the more alluring for being so frightening.
Cyberpunk is Hardtech in extremis. Technology has gone beyond
being the shaper of society to become society itself. Part of Gibson's second
novel, *Count Zero*, concerns a search for a mysterious artist, who turns
out to be an abandoned artificial intelligence, drifting in high orbit. Other AIs
have transformed themselves into gods, inhabiting the grey and featureless
frontiers of cyberspace. The evolution of technology and its integration with
living systems is no longer under human control; people are merely the means
by which technology achieves its aims.
This is not an entirely novel concept in SF; humanity has fallen slave
to its creations since Victor Frankenstein bought his first alembic. The theme
reoccurs frequently in SF; Fredric March's classic short story *Answer* and
Dr Who's *Genesis of the Daleks* are just two examples. Cyberpunk is
different in that it shows this subjugation of humanity as a social as well as a
technological phenomenon, and throws in the all-too-believable notion that
this can happen not in spite of out efforts to prevent it, but through our
willingness to let it happen. Gibson's cyberspace is a 'consensual
hallucination'.
Cyberpunk also adds the economic dimension, which SF has a habit
of overlooking. The human substratum of the cyberpunk world is dominated
not by governments, which are largely ineffectual entities, but by commercial
concerns. In Gibson's novels, nearly everything is described as a product of
a manufacturer and given a brand name (either real, like Sony, Braun or
BMW, or invented). Everything is corporate product or corporate property.
And so are people. Technology owns the shapers of its own evolution, and
they permit this because they can profit from it. Subservience pays.
Then there is the punk element. Punk culture rejected the conformist
standards of the 1970s, and the heroes of the cyberpunk share this anti-
establishment, anti-intellectual attitude. They inhabit a shadowed, lawless
world of concrete and steel, scrounging off the discards of 'respectable'
society. They are parasites and thieves, outcasts, junkies, self-centred,
selfish, amoral, cynical, emotionally blunted, spiritually gutted. If you think
they sound like an unsavoury bunch, wait until you meet the bad guys.
Cyberpunk, then, is an essentially dystopian genre, and is open to
the same criticisms that apply to all nightmare visions, namely that they run
the risk of celebrating the very things they clam to be condemning. And
whilst cyberpunk might be a new high-tech urban outsider folklore, it is still a
fantasy vision, in which smart streetkid heroes run rings around the ruthless
corporate dictators of society. Stripped of the computer jargon, it is a genre
where peasants topple kings and win princesses. Given the kind of social
infrastructure it depicts, this level of optimism can seem sorely out of place.
In AltaZine-2 I traced the connections between B7 and punk, and found what
I consider to be a similarity of attitude (if only coincidental). It would
therefore seem natural that there might be some connection that can be drawn
between B7 and cyberpunk. They are there, I think, but at a very nascent
level, which is why I said at the very start that B7 was not cyberpunk. The
main links are technological.
Prosthetic limbs and implants are a common feature of cyberpunk
heroes (especially in rolegames), and they are in the series too. Again, this is
not an original concept, cyborgs being almost as old as science fiction itself.
The most obvious example is Travis' arm with its lazeron destroyer.
(Curiously, no fan writer other than myself seems to have posited that some
implant or other might also lurk under his eyepatch.) Sensory replacement
devices were sported by Hal Mellanby and Ardus (in *Animals*), and Zee (in
*Gambit*) had an artificial leg built for him by Docholli (a cybersurgeon).
The notable thing about all of these is that they were replacements for lost
limbs or organs; there is no example I can think of any character who
voluntarily undergoes augmentation. Beyond the Federation, there are the
Altas, who some fans consider to be robots but are more likely augmented
people (human or otherwise). Even if the Altas are not robots/androids, they
might as well be for all their mindless subservience to the System, which
introduces stock SF Myth #27, that technology dehumanises you.
Personally I think this is spurious reasoning. It is a common theme in
SF, and roleplaying games reflect it, with cybernetic implants having a
Humanity Cost or similar. In the latter case this primarily a game mechanic, to
stop players overloading their characters with lethal implants, but the concept
exerts a powerful pull. I think it is false because all the evidence we have fails
to support it. If a cyborg is a human being somehow augmented or enabled
by an inorganic device, then hearing aids, dentures, pacemakers, plastic hip
joints and even wearing glasses ought to be turning out psychos by the
thousand. It doesn't seem to work that way. If the commonplace implants we
take for granted (so much so that we fail to recognise them as implants) don't
have this effect, then I see no reason work a computer chip lodged in the
brain should have the same effect. This is where cyberpunk has the edge over
traditional SF, in the way it recognises that technology alone does not
dehumanise people, but the society that technology facilitiates certainly can.
Cyberpunk presents a greedy, selfish, ambitious vision of a high-tech future,
and this creates greedy, selfish, ambitious people, with or without
computerised enhancements.
Another essential feature of cyberpunk is the concept of cyberspace
(under whatever name) and the ability of people to interact directly with
computers. B7 as a broadcast series predates, if only by a few years, the
concept of cyberspace, so its absence from the series is no surprise. Direct
interaction with computers is hintd at in a few episodes though. Firstly, Gan's
limiter might be a putative example. The Alta's ability to interface directly with
the System is another (and Jenna did the same thing with Zen, albeit
accidentally, in *Cygnus Alpha*). The best example however is probably the
sensornet which appeared in *Deathwatch*. This is very close to the 'trode-
pads which Gibson's cyberspace cowboys use to enter the Net, and the
complete sensory transmission it enables echoes the 'rider-chip' which figures
so strongly in *Neuromancer*. We can infer, then, that the technology of
direct interfacing with a computer system, and the sigital encoding of sensory
and emotional data, is a reality in the B7 universe. It's just not very common,
or at least not universally accessible. (*DeathWatch* might also count as an
example of virtual reality - the combat grounds might have been computer
constructed and transmiytted to the duellists - and audience - as sensory
input. Again this is a concept that did not have a name when the series was
made. Virtual realirt also features prominantly in the two good episodes of
the Doctor Who story *The Deadly Assassin*). As a further example,
consider the visual image structuraliser used on Avon in *Terminal*, which
has additional implications for the memory manipulation used on Blake and
others in *The Way Back*. The stock hardware of cyberpunk fiction makes
such things explicable, even predictable.
Artificial intelligence is also a stock feature of cyberpunk. In
Gibson's future, AIs are powerful entities in their own right. Some have
citizenship status. There are AIs in B7 too; Orac is the most obvious example
(and its ability to crack into any computer with tarriel cell technology is a
further echo of cyberspace). Zen should also count on this score, and I
suppose Slave ought to be included as well. Orac can be taken further still;
several of Gibson's stories feature encoded personalities of living or dead
individuals, and another cyberpunk novel, *When Gravity Fails* makes free
use of plug-in modular personalities, allowing you to be whoever you want.
Could it be that Orac is actually based on a recording of Ensor's personality?
As well as the technological dimension, B7 echoes cyberpunk in
other ways, though in a muted form. The cynicism, pragmatism and moral
ambiguity underlying B7 represents a step towards the levels of social realism
that pervades cyberpunk. The ready use of violence and the brutal depiction
of it (in some episodes at least, especially the earlier ones) is also a hallmark
of cyberpunk (there are lasers in *Neuromancer* and *Count Zero*), but not
the clean, snappy Star Wars variety; Gibson's lasers are dirty, deadly
weapons, severing limbs and vapourising internal organs). The low
production standards of the series created (albeit coincidentally) an
atmosphere of shabbiness and decline. And of course, the gloomy,
dystopian vision shared by both, with no promise of happy endings or
successful resolution.
But, as I said at the start of this (already overlong; sorry, please bear with
me) article, B7 was not cyberpunk. It diverges from cyberpunk in a number
of ways. Firstly of course, there is the fact that the cyberpunk concept did
not exist when B7 went into production, but there are other major differences:
1) the technological awareness of cyberpunk is only rudimentary in
B7, and the language of computer technology is virtually absent. This is
partly because some of it didn't exist when B7 was made, and that which did
was not common knowledge; even if the writers knew it (unlikely in itself), it
would have been lost on the audience.
2) cyberpunk is down-to-earth, urban fiction, and tends not to roam
the galaxy in whizzo super spaceships. Cities hardly ever features in B7, and
the crew never went out into the streets to mingle with the masses. There
were, of course, very practical production reasons for this.
3) cyberpunk is youth oriented; its heroes tend to be somewhat
younger than the main characters of B7. Youth culture has a high profile in
cyberpunk fiction.
4) for all its technological marvels, cyberpunk is only a step away
from being mundane fiction. Gibson's first two novels are essentially 22nd
Century thrillers. The more marvellous aspects of traditional space opera -
aliens' strange planets, isolated cultures - and the openly didactic symbolism
of science fiction are missing.
So, B7 was not cyberpunk. It was made too early for one thing. Even if it
had been made several years later, it still wouldn't have qualified. Television is
too conservative a medium, and has enough trouble with science fiction as a
basic concept. The cutting edge of the genre hasn't a hope of making the
small screen.
But that doesn't mean that B7 can't be cyberpunk. I would say that
in fan fiction, it can be. Of course, it doesn't have to be, but the option is
there. Cyberpunk B7 is a very real possibility that deserves to be explored
further than it has been (which is hardly at all). The technology is certainly
there in the series, though it seems to be rare and restricted. There is a sound
rationale for this.
The silicon revolution and the Internet have ushered in the so-called
Information Age. Concerns about this unprecedented level of public access
to information are voiced daily. We might suppose that the Federation would
try very hard to restrict this level of access; if there is a pan-galactic internet
in B7, it is for the privileged few, within the Federation at least (elsewhere
things might be different). Prosthetic augmentation might be seen as being
reflected in mutoids, with their 'high bionic rebuild'. As for the low-life, street
level dimension of cyberpunk, its absence in the series merely reflects the
places the crew visited in the episodes. The mean streets of the Delta zones
in Federation cities might be very cyberpunky indeed; urban space rats
tripped out on shadow, kingpins under contract to the Terra Nostra,
freelance cyberspace jocks illegally penetrating the Net, rider-chipped Central
Security agents on their tail - the possibilities are there for any fan writer who
wants to take them up.
Obviously I'm biased. I happen to like cyberpunk, its dystopian vision, its
density of style and illusion of realism, its social awareness and sleazy high-
tech glitter. Most fan writers and fanfic readers would seem to be somewhat
less interested in the concept. Fair enough, but cyberpunk, like hardtech, is
as much an attitude and approach to writing as it is a genre in its own right.
Blakes 7, the series, is now looking very dated and technologically backward;
an injection of cyberpunk can bring it up to date without compromising the
basic vision of the series or distorting the central characters. The Star Trek
movies updated Trek without adulterating it; cyberpunk can do the same for
B7.
Besides, wouldn't Avon look really cool in mirror shades?
--
transcribed by
Russ Massey
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1998 07:12:04 -0400
From: Harriet Monkhouse <101637.2064@compuserve.com>
To: "INTERNET:blakes7@lysator.liu.se" <blakes7@lysator.liu.se>
Subject: [B7L] Gender (was re: Deliverance pros and cons)
Message-ID: <199804150712_MC2-39EF-DBAC@compuserve.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Content-Disposition: inline
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
Bill said
>From a purely b7 point of view, I thought Diva was male
>(named after Blake's assistant/controller in 'Blake', even
>though ISTR that was spelt Deeva).
No, he was Deva, as in Chester!
Harriet
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1998 12:25:24 +0100 (BST)
From: Iain Coleman <ijc@mail.nerc-bas.ac.uk>
To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se
Subject: Re: [B7L] A Hard-Wired Seven (long)
Message-Id: <Pine.OSF.3.96.980415115932.20168A-100000@bscomp>
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Just a couple of random thoughts on cyberseven. I don't think it's true to
say that B7 came too early to be cyberpunk: there are various
proto-cyberpunk novels by authors such as Bester and Dick which could have
served as inspiration. Indeed, if you want an idea of what a cyberpunk B7
might look like, I can recommend Bester's "Tiger Tiger" (published in the
US as "The Stars My Destination" for some reason). This has a whole lot of
elements that would later be identfied as cyberpunk (bodily enhancements
through technology, corporate intrigue, etc), but is still a fast-moving,
grand interplanetary tale with spaceships and big explosions. A damn good
book, actually.
Furthermore, I don't agree that this would really be updating B7.
Cyberpunk is starting to look pretty dated these days, as 80s as
legwarmers and thrash metal. Moving the show on by less than ten years
doesn't really seem like that great an advancement.
Finally, cyberpunk seems too cynical a genre for B7. That might sound a
bit daft - doesn't B7 have a cynical streak a mile wide? - but bear with
me. Idealism plays a big part in B7, if only to be attacked or subverted.
In cyberpunk universal cynicism is pretty much taken for granted, so
there's nothing for it to contrast with.
Of course, all this could simply be a manifestation of my own tastes and
prejudices. I for one would like to see B7 as Philip K Dick might write
it. Blake falls hopelessly in love with a cruel dark-haired woman, Avon
and Cally are married but Avon throws it all away for a futile
relationship with a manipulative sixteen-year-old with leukemia, Vila is
the only character to survive psychologically unscathed and Orac turns out
to be God.
Iain
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1998 13:27:55 +-200
From: Jacqueline Thijsen <jacqueline.thijsen@cmg.nl>
To: "'Blakes7@lysator.liu.se'" <Blakes7@lysator.liu.se>
Subject: RE: [B7L] A Hard-Wired Seven (long)
Message-Id: <01BD6872.4FE04460@nl-arn-lap0063>
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-----Original Message-----
From: Russ Massey [SMTP:russ@wriding.demon.co.uk]
Sent: Wednesday, April 15, 1998 12:11 PM
To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se
Subject: [B7L] A Hard-Wired Seven (long)
Blakes 7, the series, is now looking very dated and technologically backward;
an injection of cyberpunk can bring it up to date without compromising the
basic vision of the series or distorting the central characters. The Star Trek
movies updated Trek without adulterating it; cyberpunk can do the same for
B7.
I agree, cyberpunk would be perfect for B7
Besides, wouldn't Avon look really cool in mirror shades?
No way, Avon is far too cool already. The shades might actually make him less cool!
--
transcribed by
Russ Massey
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------------------------------
Date: Tue, 14 Apr 1998 18:12:56 +0930
From: "Ophelia" <ophelia@picknowl.com.au>
To: <blakes7@lysator.liu.se>
Subject: Re: [B7L] Power
Message-ID: <01bd6781$529e7380$LocalHost@waltersmith>
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Courtney:
>As I recall Avon *wasn't* attracted to that woman in "Assassin" -- he found
her
>irritating and annoying (he probably considered shooting her). It was
sweet,
>young Tarrant who was taken in.
<hands over ears> Can't hear you, can't - oh,
that doesn't block out words on a screen.
<uncovers ears>
Nah, the way I see it, Avon was doing his cold,
intellectual, harsh Mills & Boon hero act to
impress little Peri. And Tarrant was doing his butch,
swaggering macho impression for ditto reason.
It's sooooo funny, and one of the reasons I think
Assassin is a cruelly under-rated gem.
Teh ther two reasons are, of course, that it is a
Divine Soolin episode and that we get to
see Servalan buy Avon as a slave.
oooohhh <shivers deliciously> What a
*tease* that episode is.
- XXX Lindley
Ophelia - ophelia@picknowl.com.au
"The girl has beauty, virtue, wit,
Grace, humour, wisdom, charity and pluck."
LONDON CALLING - a list to discuss Britcoms and knockwurst.
http://www.geocities.com/TelevisionCity/2511/knockwurst.html
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1998 22:10:29 +0930
From: "Ophelia" <ophelia@picknowl.com.au>
To: "B7 list" <blakes7@lysator.liu.se>, "B7 Spin List" <b7spin@metva.com.au>
Cc: "slashpoint" <slashpoint@ucdavis.edu>
Subject: [B7L] Hi, and Bye for a while
Message-ID: <01bd686b$ac1fda80$3aa226cb@waltersmith>
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Hi everyone,
I'm in the middle of a million conversations
on-and-off list, so I'm taking this opportunity
to tell y'all where I am and where I'm going.
Apologies Calle, Laura, Gail, for being
completely off-topic (Um, I love B7 & I love
slash & Elle McFeast is my vote for first president
of Australia, that do? <g>), but I'm too lazy - and
still too sick - to be bothered contacting
people separately.
As soon as I got over my last bout of illness
I went down with rather severe tonsillitis. I'm still
a touch achy and feverish, but day after tomorrow
I'm going on a family holiday to Kangaroo Island.
When I've finished petting the wallabies and
photographing sealions, I'll be back to talk B7,
slash and irrelevancies with a vengeance.
'Till then,
love to you all,
- XXX Lindley
Ophelia - ophelia@picknowl.com.au
"The girl has beauty, virtue, wit,
Grace, humour, wisdom, charity and pluck."
LONDON CALLING - a list to discuss Britcoms and knockwurst.
http://www.geocities.com/TelevisionCity/2511/knockwurst.html
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1998 23:16:55 +1000
From: Wainwrights <sijac@eisa.net.au>
To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se
Subject: [B7L] Assassin
Message-Id: <3.0.5.32.19980415231655.007ac9e0@mail.eisa.net.au>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Good evening all,
I'm new here , so please forgive if I repeat things that you have all been
discussing for ages. I noted the mention of "Assassin". I loved that
episode mainly because I wanted to be Servalan and buy Avon.Besides that, I
thought it was a jolly tense ep.
TTFN,
Jacqueline
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1998 10:01:08 -0500
From: "Reuben Herfindahl" <reuben@reuben.net>
To: <blakes7@lysator.liu.se>, "Bill Billingsley" <whb@bha.oz.au>
Subject: Re: [B7L] Liberator
Message-ID: <009001bd687f$537b3280$660114ac@misnt>
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-----Original Message-----
From: Bill Billingsley <whb@bha.oz.au>
To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se <blakes7@lysator.liu.se>
Date: Wednesday, April 15, 1998 1:36 AM
Subject: Re: [B7L] Liberator
>At 18:54 14/04/98 +0100, Judith wrote:
>
>>The real $64,000 is what difference taking Orac's key out actually made.
>
>Turned off the flashy lights. :-P
>
And don't forget that ahhhh noise that made him say.
Reuben
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 14 Apr 1998 07:54:05 +0100 (BST)
From: Judith Proctor <Judith@blakes-7.demon.co.uk>
To: Lysator List <Blakes7@lysator.liu.se>
Subject: Re: [B7L] Re: Power
Message-ID: <Marcel-1.42-0414065405-313Rr9i@blakes-7.demon.co.uk>
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII
On Tue 14 Apr, s.thompson8@genie.geis.com wrote:
> And speaking of "Power"-- does anyone at Horizon realize that that title had
> already been used for a zine focussing specifically on the female
> characters, in the U.S. about ten years ago? I thought it was pretty
> strange that, having lifted someone else's idea for a zine title based on
> the name of an episode, they should then be making all that ridiculous fuss
> about the name of their convention being "intellectual property" that no one
> else was allowed to mention!
To be fair, we don't know that Diva is part of Horizon and thus should not
automatically blame them for any opinion of hers. I've never recieved any
complaints from Horizon, nor from any member of the Deliverance con committee.
However, if Diva is giving people the impression that she speaks for Horizon,
then I think she needs to be very careful indeed in what she says.
Judith
--
http://www.hermit.org/Blakes7
Redemption 99 - The Blakes 7/Babylon 5 convention
26-28 February 1999, Ashford International Hotel, Kent
http://www.smof.com/redemption/
------------------------------
Date: 15 Apr 1998 09:24:18 -0700
From: "Buck, Courtney" <buck#m#_courtney@ssdgwy.mdc.com>
To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se
Subject: [B7L] Horizon
Message-ID: <n1319489101.44520@SSDGWY.mdc.com>
Could someone give me Diane Geis' email address? I had it at one time but can't
find it now.
Thank you, Courtney
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1998 16:40:00 +0000
From: sue.cowley@bbc.co.uk
To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se (blakes7@lysator.liu.se)
Subject: [B7L] RE: blakes7-d Digest V98 #111
Message-ID: <6A1E353581925471%6A1E353581925471@c2-smtp.radio.bbc.co.uk>
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Sarah said:
>And speaking of "Power"-- does anyone at Horizon realize that that title
had
>already been used for a zine focussing specifically on the female
>characters, in the U.S. about ten years ago? I thought it was pretty
>strange that, having lifted someone else's idea for a zine title based
on
>the name of an episode, they should then be making all that ridiculous
fuss
>about the name of their convention being "intellectual property" that no
one
>else was allowed to mention!
<snip>
Have to admit the naming of the new Horizon zine was *entirely* down to
me...originally it was just going to be a "girl power" special issue of
the general "Horizon" zine...then we decided to make it a special and
somewhere along the line it came into my mind to call it Power. No
infringement intended - just a neat coincidence with girls and the Spices
and the episode. Nothing sinister or spooky...Just my plagiaristic mind,
obviously.<g>
Back to lurkdom...
Sue
aka Susie Carnell, Horizon Zine Ed
(and yes....CloneMaster in charge!!!!)
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 98 00:31:50 BST
From: pdbean@argonet.co.uk (Patrick Bean)
To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se
Subject: [B7L] Re: Liberaror
Message-Id: <E0yPVsV-0004kK-00@golden.argonet.co.uk>
Content-Type: text/plain
On Tue 14 Apr 98 (23:09:17 +0200), blakes7-d-request@lysator.liu.se wrote:
> What a great ship, still trying to find time to build a 3D model.
> Now, if Liberator could "self-regenerate" one assumes it has a copy of
> it's own blueprints some where (probably on a SCSI drive...8))
> all you'd need to make a NEW Liberator (which we all want) is to get hold of
> another regenerator and fire in the blueprints, you'd think ORAC would know
> the specs for the Liberator...
Yes, didn't the people in 'Moloc' have large replicaters (I know we only see
the small one), so take ORAC to Sardos connect him to one of them and there you
are. :-)
It is worrying to think that is could have been exactly what Servilan could
have done after GP. The other way to get one would be to pop along to 'Space
World' and see if they have got around to building DSV3 yet. :-)
--
__ __ __ __ __ ___ _____________________________________________
|__||__)/ __/ \|\ ||_ | / pdbean@argonet.co.uk (Patrick David Bean)
| || \\__/\__/| \||__ | /...Internet access for all Acorn RISC machines
___________________________/ Web http://www.argonet.co.uk/users/pdbean
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 98 00:38:43 BST
From: pdbean@argonet.co.uk (Patrick Bean)
To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se
Subject: [B7L] model orac
Message-Id: <E0yPVse-0004kK-00@golden.argonet.co.uk>
Content-Type: text/plain
Are the Horizon Oracs available yet? The web site ways they have 7 orders and
need a minimum of 10 to do a production run, is this information still current?
Dose anyone know how good they are/will be? I would pay the 260 ukp for a
really good replica.
--
__ __ __ __ __ ___ _____________________________________________
|__||__)/ __/ \|\ ||_ | / pdbean@argonet.co.uk (Patrick David Bean)
| || \\__/\__/| \||__ | /...Internet access for all Acorn RISC machines
___________________________/ Web http://www.argonet.co.uk/users/pdbean
--------------------------------
End of blakes7-d Digest V98 Issue #112
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