Post by lidar2 on Aug 9, 2019 8:57:09 GMT
Have now listened to season 9 in its entirety
Wow! Pretty amazing stuff. The 4 episodes were all fantastic. The direction in which they took Abby was not the one I'd have liked for a character I cared about, but it was believable. And the final scene between Abby and Jenny brought a tear to my eye.
It did however leave me feeling a bit dissatisfied - not because of anything that was in the boxset, but because of what was not in it. I suppose the final episode wrapped it all up a bit too quickly and too easily. The core of the episode - Jenny's group taking Meg Pritchard's HQ and killing her - should have been the middle part of a trilogy. The first part should have been Ruth's guerrilla attacks on the Foundation, local communities switching their allegiance to the Federation and Foundation soldiers beginning to desert. Instead all this was telescoped into the first few scenes with Ruth and a few throwaway lines in the rest of the episode. The 3rd part should then have covered the collapse of the Foundation as news of Meg Pritchard's death spreads, the fate of Robert Malcolm and his soldiers, possibly the trial of Peter Grant - but instead all this was crammeed into the last 5 or 10 minutes. I can't fault the writer Andrew Smith who wrote a fantastic episode and did as good a job as possible of covering so much ground in one episode, but what it gained in scope and pace it lost in credibility. But IMHO it was just too much to do in one episode and as a result it all seemed too easy, as the Foundation goes from all powerful and in control in episode 3 to collapsed in episode 4. Particularly the last 10 minutes covered so much ground, it deserved an episode to itself. Personally I think BF should have pushed the boat out a bit and gone for 5 or 6 episodes for the final season.
Anyone who has read my posts in the season 8 thread will know I had a big criticism and that was the way Jenny's son Paul appeared to have been completely forgotten by everyone, not least Jenny. He gets mentioned in the final episode and in the context and way one would expect him to have been mentioned. Which is good, ands full marks to Andrew Smith that he thinks to include this, it shows why he is such a good writer, but it only draws attention back to the fact that Paul has not been mentioned hitherto by other writers, and therefore leaves one feeling more dissatisfied than satisfied (if that makes sense). Likewise when Charles Vaughn gets name-checked, it is good to hear it and it brought a smile to my face, but again it only draws attention to the fact that he is not present in any of the BF box sets and leaves me more dissatisfied than satisfied.
Now, I understand that Charles was not created by Terry Nation, and BF likely do not have the rights and possibly there was not enough budget for them to acquire the rights (for all we know maybe they do, but Dennis Lill was unwilling to participate). So it's not fair to criticise BF for his absence. But what about Jimmy Garland, a character BF can use? Surely fighting Robert Maclolm's army would be right up his street? Where was he when all this was going on?
The point that has been made previously about Survivors becoming "anti-men" is one I sympathise with, although I think "anti-men" is over-simplifying a bit. After all, the boss baddie is a woman and in series 9 Abby arguably becomes a weaker character than she was in previous TV and audio episodes. I think they are trying to turn it into Tenko Mark 2, which is not what the original TV show was. If BF want to do a series with female leads and "strong female characters" there's no problem. Either create their own new series (like ATA Girl) or use an existing franchise, or aspects of an existing franchise where it arises naturally and organically - the Gallifrey series, Benny, River Song, Jenny, etc. etc. I have bought and enjoyed most of those series and have no complaints about them. But I do object to BF taking a franchise like Survivors that wasn't that kind of series in the first place and twisting it into something else. And I also think, in the specific case of Survivors, it is implausible in the fictional context that a matriarchal society would evolve - a major them of Survivors is that of humanity regressing and becoming less "civilised" following the Death - from an industrial economy/society to an agricultural one, to cannibalism, to personality cults/religions, to one where the emphasis on childbirth and reproduction makes older women and homosexuals 2nd class citizens, from a democratic society to an authoritarian one, from the rule of law to the law of the jungle. And I think in that context, and keeping in mind also that Survivors' starting point in the 1970s, not 2019, the idea of a matriarchal society developing, even amongst the goodies, is implausible. That's not to say that individual women couldn't/wouldn't/shouldn't rise to positions of leadership, but I think they would be the exception rather than the rule - these comments do of course refer to the fictional context of Survivors and not the real world. On an individual level, if Charles Vaughn and Jimmy Garland had appeared in this boxset, would they simply have accepted Jenny as the new military commander? So I do think that, sadly, Survivors was hijacked by an agenda of wanting to crowbar in "strong female characters" at every possible opportunity, and as a result it suffered in terms of its credibility and in terms of its faithfulness to the original series.
Final point, now that Survivors has ended - Anne Tranter was created by Terry Nation so BF would have the rights, the character was never killed off on-screen and the actress is still alive. Why did they not bring her back? And if you look at what we last saw of her in the novel, would it have been too much of a stretch to have had her in Meg Pritchard's role?
Wow! Pretty amazing stuff. The 4 episodes were all fantastic. The direction in which they took Abby was not the one I'd have liked for a character I cared about, but it was believable. And the final scene between Abby and Jenny brought a tear to my eye.
It did however leave me feeling a bit dissatisfied - not because of anything that was in the boxset, but because of what was not in it. I suppose the final episode wrapped it all up a bit too quickly and too easily. The core of the episode - Jenny's group taking Meg Pritchard's HQ and killing her - should have been the middle part of a trilogy. The first part should have been Ruth's guerrilla attacks on the Foundation, local communities switching their allegiance to the Federation and Foundation soldiers beginning to desert. Instead all this was telescoped into the first few scenes with Ruth and a few throwaway lines in the rest of the episode. The 3rd part should then have covered the collapse of the Foundation as news of Meg Pritchard's death spreads, the fate of Robert Malcolm and his soldiers, possibly the trial of Peter Grant - but instead all this was crammeed into the last 5 or 10 minutes. I can't fault the writer Andrew Smith who wrote a fantastic episode and did as good a job as possible of covering so much ground in one episode, but what it gained in scope and pace it lost in credibility. But IMHO it was just too much to do in one episode and as a result it all seemed too easy, as the Foundation goes from all powerful and in control in episode 3 to collapsed in episode 4. Particularly the last 10 minutes covered so much ground, it deserved an episode to itself. Personally I think BF should have pushed the boat out a bit and gone for 5 or 6 episodes for the final season.
Anyone who has read my posts in the season 8 thread will know I had a big criticism and that was the way Jenny's son Paul appeared to have been completely forgotten by everyone, not least Jenny. He gets mentioned in the final episode and in the context and way one would expect him to have been mentioned. Which is good, ands full marks to Andrew Smith that he thinks to include this, it shows why he is such a good writer, but it only draws attention back to the fact that Paul has not been mentioned hitherto by other writers, and therefore leaves one feeling more dissatisfied than satisfied (if that makes sense). Likewise when Charles Vaughn gets name-checked, it is good to hear it and it brought a smile to my face, but again it only draws attention to the fact that he is not present in any of the BF box sets and leaves me more dissatisfied than satisfied.
Now, I understand that Charles was not created by Terry Nation, and BF likely do not have the rights and possibly there was not enough budget for them to acquire the rights (for all we know maybe they do, but Dennis Lill was unwilling to participate). So it's not fair to criticise BF for his absence. But what about Jimmy Garland, a character BF can use? Surely fighting Robert Maclolm's army would be right up his street? Where was he when all this was going on?
The point that has been made previously about Survivors becoming "anti-men" is one I sympathise with, although I think "anti-men" is over-simplifying a bit. After all, the boss baddie is a woman and in series 9 Abby arguably becomes a weaker character than she was in previous TV and audio episodes. I think they are trying to turn it into Tenko Mark 2, which is not what the original TV show was. If BF want to do a series with female leads and "strong female characters" there's no problem. Either create their own new series (like ATA Girl) or use an existing franchise, or aspects of an existing franchise where it arises naturally and organically - the Gallifrey series, Benny, River Song, Jenny, etc. etc. I have bought and enjoyed most of those series and have no complaints about them. But I do object to BF taking a franchise like Survivors that wasn't that kind of series in the first place and twisting it into something else. And I also think, in the specific case of Survivors, it is implausible in the fictional context that a matriarchal society would evolve - a major them of Survivors is that of humanity regressing and becoming less "civilised" following the Death - from an industrial economy/society to an agricultural one, to cannibalism, to personality cults/religions, to one where the emphasis on childbirth and reproduction makes older women and homosexuals 2nd class citizens, from a democratic society to an authoritarian one, from the rule of law to the law of the jungle. And I think in that context, and keeping in mind also that Survivors' starting point in the 1970s, not 2019, the idea of a matriarchal society developing, even amongst the goodies, is implausible. That's not to say that individual women couldn't/wouldn't/shouldn't rise to positions of leadership, but I think they would be the exception rather than the rule - these comments do of course refer to the fictional context of Survivors and not the real world. On an individual level, if Charles Vaughn and Jimmy Garland had appeared in this boxset, would they simply have accepted Jenny as the new military commander? So I do think that, sadly, Survivors was hijacked by an agenda of wanting to crowbar in "strong female characters" at every possible opportunity, and as a result it suffered in terms of its credibility and in terms of its faithfulness to the original series.
Final point, now that Survivors has ended - Anne Tranter was created by Terry Nation so BF would have the rights, the character was never killed off on-screen and the actress is still alive. Why did they not bring her back? And if you look at what we last saw of her in the novel, would it have been too much of a stretch to have had her in Meg Pritchard's role?
