Continuing my thoughts on the classic BBC sci-fi series Blake’s 7, which ran from 1978-81. The first part was published a week ago today.
One of the things I found most notable about the series was its treatment of women. In the 1970s, there was a lot of talk about what was then still called “women’s lib”, and futuristic societies were generally depicted as more sexually egalitarian. But while even Star Trek wasn’t ready to depict women in the highest positions of authority (such as starship command or supervillain status), and action chicks were generally superhuman in some way (eg, Wonder Woman or the Bionic Woman), Blake’s 7 casually depicted female characters kicking butt, working as ship captains or judges, and even holding high military posts. While US shows of the period felt they had to shout and gesticulate about how emancipated their female characters were (Star Trek: The Next Generation is one prime example), Blake’s 7 just presented it as the way things were, with little if any explicit comment on the subject. And while most US & UK shows still have a tendency to de-sex powerful female characters, Supreme Commander (later President) Servelan was both very powerful and very feminine, showing off a different fashionable outfit in every episode while implementing plans so evil and shockingly-indifferent to human life they would’ve impressed The Master or Darth Vader. We’re told Servalan comes from a very powerful and connected family, and the implication seems to be that her sexuality played a major role in her ascension to the purple; Jacqueline Pearce portrayed her perfectly as a totally spoiled, amoral, narcissistic psychopath who has always gotten her way and intends to keep it that way. I really enjoy watching the character; it’s rare that a TV show dares to depict a character so utterly and unrepentantly vile, greedy, treacherous, degenerate, and morally grotesque without making them into a complete caricature. One episode in particular really displayed her in full; in the third-season episode Children of Auron she uses persuasion and threat to convince those in charge of a cloning facility on a distant and long-independent colony world to produce a batch of clones using her genetic blueprint, so that she will have an army of her own children. After she is tricked into destroying the entire brood, she weeps for her lost children, because Servalan is so narcissistic she could only truly love herself, and clones are as close to that as she can get. Thereafter, she only ever wears black, apparently in mourning.
Other female characters in the show tend to also be well-rounded, though there were a few episodes in the second season where the male writers seemed unsure of what to do with the two female crew members and so mostly left them babysitting the ship, a development which caused Sally Knyvette (Jenna) to leave the series at the end of that season. The telepathic Cally stayed on for another season, but like Next Generation‘s Deana Troi most writers seemed to see her more as a plot device than a person. Jenna’s replacement, the teenaged mistress-of-all-arms Dayna, is the best of the non-original characters, but Cally’s replacement Soolin never develops much beyond her description, “female gunslinger”.
Meanwhile, in the real world, two episodes (one each in seasons C and D) were written by Tanith Lee, a clever and creative writer who draws heavily on fairy-tale imagery and motifs and rarely disappoints; her second episode, “Sand”, is one of the best in the entire series and provides even more character development for Servalan, who admits to have actually loved another human once, at 18, before “power became my lover”.
Look for much more about the series’ characters, characterization and writing next week.
I heard once that the writers conceived Servalan as dressed in severe military neuter style, but Jacqueline Pearce had other ideas.
I have absolutely no doubt that a great deal of what made Servalan such a great character was Pearce herself!