Beyond the Roundels

This morning, I woke to find an excellent new Sapphire & Steel fic in the Past Imperfect collection, and then had cause to mention the series to a flister. This must mean today's thing I love is going to have to be Sapphire and Steel.

And since there's been no easily available fandom primer anyway since eponymous_rose tragically locked down their journal and with it the best ever S&S intro, I may as well go full on manifesto here. Because Sapphire & Steel is a very odd series that is not going to be to everyone's taste, but it is truly amazing and original and worth trying if you have any interest in TV SF and a reasonable amount of patience for old time TV.

(I used/adapted some text and pics from an old manifesto for het_reccers on LJ, which is why they have a Photobucket logo on. Sorry about that.)


“There is a corridor. And the corridor is time. It surrounds all things and it passes through all things. You cannot enter into time, but sometimes time can enter into the present… break in and take things. Take people…" (Sapphire, Assignment 1)

S&S starred Joanna Lumley and David McCallum and ran from 1979-1982 (on ITV, aka The Other Channel, not the BBC), and while there are only 34x 25min episodes, broken down into six serials, known as "Assignments," it's been highly influential in much SF that's been made since. It was created by PJ Hammond, who'd written for Ace of Wands (UK 1970s fantasy children's series) and would later write two episodes for Torchwood, but is still most famous for Sapphire & Steel. It has the slow pace and low budget values of much British TV of the time - but takes the clever approach of turning both into virtues in a way that can still unsettle modern viewers.



All irregularities will be handled by the forces controlling each dimension. Transuranic, heavy elements may not be used where there is life. Medium atomic weights are available: Gold, Lead, Copper, Jet, Diamond, Radium, Sapphire, Silver and Steel. Sapphire and Steel have been assigned.

The first rule of S&S is mystery. We don't know who or what Sapphire and Steel are. We know that they're not human, that they have strange powers (including telepathy) and that they are sent by a higher authority to intervene on our behalf against Time, which in the S&S universe is a malevolent force using any means it can to break free and wreak havoc. And by any means, we here mean paintings, photographs, clocks, pillows, motorway service stations, flowers and nursery rhymes. Everything is a potential "trigger" or threat.

PJ Hammond has said in interviews that he has no idea what Sapphire and Steel are, or where they came from. “It’s part of the mystery, not to know… Not knowing has never bothered me.” And: “I don’t think that Sapphire & Steel were ever human in the basic sense. … I think they come closer to representing the spirit and the soul.”

The Guiness Book of TV once summed it up by saying something like "There are many ways to hold a TV audience. Complete lack of explanation is not supposed to be one of them..." And yet, with S&S, it works. And, as you can tell, I love it.

So, basically, that's it. You can already go read the fanfic or run off to YouTube/place you obtain DVDs to watch it. Congratulations!

The main caveat (apart from "it's old TV, it is very static and often beige") is that it originally started as a children's show, and the trappings of that are still apparent in "Assignment 1" so be patient with the two child guest stars etc., as it will only get better from here. (I could advise you to start elsewhere, but you'd miss Lead and the only kind of explanation of the series we ever get, so it's best to give it a go and only skip it if you really can't be doing with the child actors.)

( More pics and much continued lack of explanation and some flailing and fic recs under the cut )

I decided that since I really like doing Fandom Overviews (or Manifestos, but that implies "everyone should watch" and really, they shouldn't), I should do one for everything I like that I haven't already done one for and it would be fun for me and maybe even useful for other people.

We'll see how that goes, but here's one of my latest in new old TV that I think is still worth watching in the 21st C:


Manhunt (1969/70)


"What is war?"/ "War is love..."


What is it? A one-off WWII drama serial set in Occupied France, consisting of 26 x 50 minute episodes, starring Peter Barkworth, Alfred Lynch and Cyd Hayman, with Robert Hardy, Philip Madoc and Maggie Fitzgibbon.

Nina a.k.a. Ann-Marie Poitiers is the sole survivor of a meeting between the British and representatives of various French Resistance groups. As secretary, she has an encyclopaedic knowledge of the names of the Resistance Leaders. London orders that their agent Vincent get her back to England - or shoot her. Vincent also has a newly crashed British airman called Jimmy Briggs who needs returning to London, so the three of them set out across France, pursued by Karl Lutzig of the SS, who is eventually joined in his mission by Abwehr Sergeant Gratz, while the trio of agents team up with an Australian singer called Adelaide who doesn't seem to have made up her mind which side she's on.

What has a tendency to start out as an occasionally tiresome action runaround soon develops into more of an intense, talky, gripping and powerful piece on love and war, and the price of resistance.


( Do you really think I want to go on living, if this is all there's going to be? )

Over Christmas I made a series of "Reasons to Watch B7" posts for Tumblr. I have been promising/threatening ever since to combine them into an LJ post, because non-spoilery introductions to the show are hard to come by. I'm sure there are some, but whenever anybody asks me about it (and sometimes they do) I have nothing useful to say. So, here is my attempt now, (mainly because aralias finally made me remember/encouraged me).

Because Blake's 7 really is one of the greatest shows ever made, but you do need a tolerance for 1970s UK TV, quarries, and unconvincing sfx. Classic Who fans therefore are already fully equipped to appreciate it! \o/

With the rider that these are entirely my thoughts and summaries and not necessarily typical of other B7 fans. Also, please note, if you know nothing about Blake's 7 but already know you want to watch it, then even character names are slightly spoilery. What follows is pretty much as was posted in installments on Tumblr, so apologies to those who follow me there, too.


Lost_Spook's Non-Spoilery Guide to Blake's 7 for the Enquiring Classic Who Fan

Vila: “Where are all the good guys?”
Blake: “You could be looking at them.”
Avon: “What a very depressing thought.”

Because when you have finally watched your way through Classic Who (or all that you can get your hands on) and wonder where you can find your next fix of improbable 1970s SFX, BBC quarries, Terry Nation cliches and Robert Holmes scripts, where else is there to go?

You’ll find familiar actors and props reused regularly. You’ll recognise the names of all the crew (created by Terry Nation, produced by David Maloney, script-edited by Chris Boucher, music by Dudley Simpson, set design by Roger Murray-Leach, costumes by June Hudson, directed by Douglas Camfield, Pennant Roberts, Michael E Briant, George Spenton-Foster etc. etc.)

It’s really the first Doctor Who spin-off - not officially, but Terry Nation wanted to bring in the Daleks (the BBC finally got a moment of revenge and refused permission), Gareth Thomas and Tom Baker wanted their characters to nod in passing in a corridor, and Chris Boucher maintains (and there’s been a PDA novel and audio series on this premise) that Kaldor City (from Robots of Death) is one of those colonies lost on the edges of the Federation and had one of his B7 characters wind up there with Uvanov, Toos and Poul. It kind of makes it the 1970s Torchwood. (Ish.)

Imagine the BBC on a strange endeavour to mash up a Shakespearean tragedy, Doctor Who, Star Trek, the Dirty Dozen, all the WWII Resistance series ever, Robin Hood, and 1984 IN SPACE all in one thing, but with Michelin Men, giant ants, polystyrene rocks, endlessly epic snark, and the most fabulous costumes, and you… probably can’t even, can you?

I came to mock, I stayed to wonder, roll around the floor laughing (that was the Michelin Men), quote all the snark, and find myself unexpectedly being slapped in the face, punched in the gut, and yet thanking the show nicely and wanting only MORE MORE MORE. There are endless shades of grey but the only thing that’s black and white is Servalan’s wardrobe.

Never has anything so fundamentally bleak, cynical and depressing been so much fun.

Please stand by while I attempt to convince you. I’ve reached that point where I have to rewatch it yet again, and I’m thinking I should have more company… Also, there’s supposed to be (*splutter*) a reboot coming up, so if you want to be one of the really annoying cool people who saw it before, now’s the time to jump on board.

Some facts: 4x13 eps made by the BBC (1978-1981). It’s not out in Region 1, which is the big catch, but search YouTube at the moment and you should be okay (but I didn’t say that). The first episode is The Way Back.

Oh, and don’t Google it unless you already know stuff. Really. Do not Google it, do not Wiki it, do not look at fanvids on YouTube and don’t read the reviews on Amazon. You can thank me later.

( More under here with pretty pictures! )