Seminal British space opera TV series Blake's 7 has landed in the US via the BritBox streaming service.
The classic space opera originally aired on the BBC (and, in the US, on PBS) between 1978 and 1981. Despite a tiny budget and low production values, the show was noted for its excellent cast and unusually morally murky scripts for the time, which often had the "heroes" doing questionable things in their pursuit of destroying the "evil" Terran Federation (many of whose citizens and even soldiers seemed less evil and more bureaucratically amoral). The show was noted for its dark streak, its tendency to kill departing characters off with almost no warning, and its relentlessly bleak conclusion. The show was also an early example of a series with a heavily serialised storyline, with ongoing character and story arcs that expanded across multiple episodes and seasons.
J. Michael Straczynski has cited Blake's 7 as a major influence on his own space opera Babylon 5, whilst echoes of the show can be found in series such as Firefly.
All four seasons and 52 episodes are streaming now on BritBox US.
