"Welcome to Kraandor, my friends, an artificial planet, which is the palace of the Lord Thaarn, master of the universe. I am the Caliph of Kraandor."
The arrival of the preposterous character of the Caliph of Kraandor is the moment this episode goes irretrievably to shit. He pewpewpews Tarrant to demonstrate that he can dress as stupidly as he likes when he's the only one with a fuctioning pewpewpew gun, or "neuronic whip" as he calls it. Having captured them, the Caliph then goes onto the Liberator where he captures Dayna as well. At least Dayna can take some comfort that they could be bothered to capture her on-screen this time.
In a cell, Cally tells the others what she knows of the Thaarn:
"The story goes back through the mists of time, to the dawn of the gods."
Clang!
"There were seven gods who discovered the planet Auron, and on it left the first man and woman. A million years went by. The gods returned. They were no older even though a million years had passed.""Not impossible if they had a spaceship capable of traveling at near the speed of light."
James Follett did research for this sci-fi script of his, and he wants to make sure we know it! Cally continues:
"The gods returned and were pleased with what they saw, and they bestowed on the people of Auron great gifts: new types of crops, which ended hunger, constant peace...""And telepathy?""...and telepathy was promised. But one of the gods was very jealous. He didn't believe that the people of Auron deserved all this. He was frightened they would one day become so powerful they would challenge the supremacy of the gods themselves. And in his rage, he killed another god. The five remaining gods were so angry, they built a chariot for him and sent him beyond the threshold of space and time. The mad god swore a terrible vengeance. He said that he would return again. He said that he alone would discover the eternal secrets and become the one great master of the universe. You see, a legend."
When the story is done, the Caliph brings Dayna in and takes Cally away to meet the Thaarn.
The Caliph introduces the others to Groff, who is played by Terry Scully, Henry vi from An Age of Kings. First Julian Glover in Breakdown, then Paul Daneman in Killer, and now Terry Scully for Dawn of the Gods. Did the BBC just round up actors from An Age of Kings to be in all the shit episodes of Blakes 7?
That probably means there's a parallel universe out there where...
"When wash the lasht time you felt the warmth of the Earth's shun on your naked back? Or lifted your face to the heavensh and laughed with the joy of being alive? How long shince you wept at the death of a friend? Doeshn't mean a thing to you, doesh it, Mish Moneyp... er, Madam Preshident? You've shurrounded yourself with machinesh and weaponsh, mindlesh men and heartlesh mutoidsh, and when they've done your work, and the machinesh have done your thinking, what ish there left in you that feelsh?"
Now I'm left wondering what Sean Connery would have looked like if he had been in Blakes 7?
Something a bit like this, I suppose. Mew.
Back at the plot, Groff and the Caliph want to know where Orac is, because they know he is one of the regular characters but not what he looks like (this is what happens if you read the Radio Times but don't actually watch the episodes). This leads to what is the only good bit in this otherwise awful second half of the story, where the Caliph whips out his neuronic whip and says
"The neuronic whip is on an automatic setting. It has only to sense one lie and it will boil your brains in your skull. Where is Orac?""If he's not on the ship, I don't know where he is.""How tall is he?"
Tarrant indicates how high off the floor Orac usually is.
"A dwarf?""We never think of him as one.""What is the color of his hair?""He hasn't got any. A bald dwarf shouldn't be too hard to find."
Lol, the Caliph is outwitted by Tarrant not lying.
Groff takes Avon and Tarrant to a room where he wants them to do W-Word. Oh noes!
Tarrant wants to at least be allowed to use a computer if he is going to be forced to do W-Word, presumably so that he can skive off and look at the internets when Groff isn't looking... er, I've heard that's something mannys do sometimes. Groff says that the Thaarn will not allow computers on Kraandor. Avon then starts asking Groff about the Thaarn's gravity generator that brought the Liberator here, claiming that he needs to know for the W-Word but we can tell that really he is only W-Wording on a plan to escape, lol.
Groff tells them that the Caliph has sent "a salvage team" to destroy the Liberator and steal all its Herculaneum, so they will not be able to use it to escape. It then cuts to show the salvage team trying to do this, but they are interrupted by the Liberator's self-defence mechanism, as seen all the way back (no, not quite that far back) in Space Fall. Despite them being baddys, Orac tries to warn the salvage team about the danger, but either they ignore him or it was already too late from them, as it pews them and they go
Cally is trying to have some sleeps while the Thaarn is watching Carl Sagan's Cosmos on his three TV sets (pretty impressive, since that series wouldn't be broadcast until later on in 1980), and he is also wittering on about taking over the universe using gravity:
"He who controls gravity, controls everything!"
Also considered as a possible slogan: The gravity must flow!
Cally doesn't want to be a ruler of the universe, clearly considering sleeps to be more important. Cally showing a sensible, cat-like sense of priorities here. The Thaarn eventually agrees to shut up and let her have some sleeps. Maybe he thinks she's just being grumpy and will agree to rule the universe with him after she wakes up?
Avon has deduced that "putting the gravity generator into full reverse would cause Krandor to disintegrate." To this Groff adds:
"Worse than that, it would blow up."
But they can't reverse the gravity generator while the "energy isolators" are on, and only the Thaarn has control of them.
Cally wakes up and pretends to join the Thaarn, tricking him into turning off his energy isolators. As soon as he does this, their pewpewpew guns start functioning again, and Avon and Tarrant immediately shoot their guards and escape, rescuing Vila and Dayna on the way out.
Cally pulls back the Thaarn's curtain (Blakes 7 not having had the budget for a giant Wizard of Oz head - nor even a giant Zardoz head - we have only heard his voice up until now) and we see that he is one of the Talosians who has escaped from Star Trek's The Cage. We even get a double jump cut to show him in dramatic close up.
This is a technique that is made more effective when it is not over-used, so we are lucky that it being used in this piss-poor excuse for an episode in no way detracts from the power of its use at the end of Blake.
Groff tries to aid their escape by reversing the gravity generator. The Caliph comes in, but before he can use his neural whip to stop Groff, Groff punches him and then they have a fight. The Caliph wins and pewpewpews Groff, but he still manages to finish pulling the big lever before he dies, which blows up Kraandor.
Cally catches up with the others and they get back into the Liberator and escape before the planet blows up. The Thaarn also escapes in his own spaceship. For reasons that are not made explicit, but may be due to her pitying the Thaarn for only ever appearing as the baddy in one episode, and an exceptionally shit one at that, Cally lies to the others and tells them she "never saw him." Avon says
"I suspect we have made another enemy."
Orac gets all huffy and says
"It is intolerable! There is insufficient room in the galaxy for his intellect and mine."
Tarrant says
"I don't know, he did have one redeeming feature. He didn't like computers."
and this weak put down passes for the end of episode joke.
Can I use "Dawn of the Gods" and "good" in the same sentence? Certainly: Dawn of the Gods is a good candidate for worst episode of Blakes 7. Perhaps only Ben Steed's episodes are worse, and at least Harvest of Kairos is a lot more fun than this.
Calling this Dawn of the Gods is an insult to both dawns and gods. I wouldn't like to be in James Follett's position when the Hoff hears about this!
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