The Hard Road (2014) Review

 

The Hard Road is a grim look at what Blake may become (and arguably did become) when abandoning his ethics in the name of victory. 

WRITTEN BY

James Swallow, who notably wrote the reboot audio drama Point Of No Return, which featured Travis in a similar moral dilemma. A strong character writer. 

PLOT

Blake wants to ally with the space privateer Trel Dekkan, whose daring exploits against the Federation are quickly gathering fame. Upon arriving at the latter's base, however, he discovers that Dekkan is a monomaniac who employs inhuman methods to strike at the Federation, with no compunction towards the deaths of innocents. Blake must now decide which is more important to him... his principles or victory?

ANALYSIS

Basically, it's The Magnificent Four done right. Swallow imbues the character of Dekkan with humanity and a cohesive worldview, letting the audience at least begin to believe that he can be a valuable ally to Blake before revealing his twisted nature. It makes a huge difference in giving the story a sense of significance. Blake isn't simply fighting a corrupt figure, he's fighting a sick parody of everything that he himself stands for. He is forced into justifying his worldview not in front of potential followers, critics or the Federation, but an equal, someone who understands and relates to him as a leader of free people. Not only do I think that it's a wonderfully gripping and original idea, but it also challenges the audience to really consider what they believe in and what constitutes a robust morality. It presents the war between good and evil in shades of grey without removing the black and white of it. What the Federation is doing is evil, and what the rebels are doing is good, but we see here that the situation can easily change, and one must be able to recognise that change rather than blindly attacking a mere label in the name of justice. When you consider the show overall, The Hard Road is also a painful reminder of the path that leads Blake to Star One. Not that it's ever name-dropped(Swallow is far too talented a writer), but the shadow of it hangs over the story with Blake's fear of losing himself to his own crusade. 

Despite these complex ruminations, Swallow actually does a really good job of capturing the more restrained atmosphere of Series A. The crew's dynamic is suitably conservative(familiarity not having yet bred contempt). Early scenes in the story map out the crew's current plan and situation with a level of detail that's absent from the more flamboyant brushstrokes of Series B-D. Pursuit ships are an ever-present threat, and Blake is still figuring out how to best harm the Federation. 

The pace is more or less excellent(perhaps the space battle could've been a tad shorter, and the time spent at Dekkan's camp longer), and the use of the Chronicle format is spot-on with no daft voice modulation or framing stories. I really have nothing I can think of to criticise. 

CHARACTERS

Once again, I have to give praise to James Swallow. Not only does he nail the brotherly antagonism and clash of perspectives between Blake and Avon, but he brings it to life without Paul Darrow even being there. Swallow didn't have to do this, because it's not like Avon has any major role to play in The Hard Road, but the use of the character as a sounding board for Blake is something that I deeply appreciate as a fan, and it makes the story work that much better. 

Andrew Whipp as Trel Dekkan is both one of the best acting jobs and best villains we've had in the Liberator Chronicles. Whipp's fury is palpable - he practically roars into his microphone. And when he isn't playing angry, he's got a boyish, easygoing delivery that nicely contrasts with Gareth Thomas's slightly stern authority. Dekkan, whilst obviously psychopathic, had some really interesting qualities to him. For example, the fact that he was protective of families and cultivated genuine love from his troops. The television series always depicted Blake as the best possible example of a good person within the universe of B7, so the fact that we get to meet someone who appears to be conventionally much more 'normal' whilst sharing his defiance of the Federation highlights aspects of Blake that we usually take for granted(in spite of Avon's best efforts). Aspects that, if Blake existed in another kind of narrative, would perhaps be seen as undesirable. 

Blake is, after all, a judgmental and condescending person with a modus operandi of strong-arming those around him into doing his bidding, by playing on their immediate needs and sense of ethics to make himself indispensable as a leader. He usually has very little time for anyone that isn't useful to him, or a victim to be saved. The fact that we are pointedly reminded of this is a testament to the respect that Blake's 7 writers have for their audience, that it doesn't simply ask them to love Blake as a hero but question him in the way that Blake would have the characters in the show question theirs. 

NOTES

• The choice of a pre-credits sequence(or in this case, pre-theme song sequence lol) was cool. It added some weight to this. I hope they don't do it often, though. It should be for special occasions.
• I don't agree with Blake's notion that if he failed, he'd be forgotten. Sure, the Federation suppress information, but legends live on regardless. 
• Some of the incidental music is strange. It almost sounded like an alarm clock. Perhaps an unsuccessful attempt to emulate Dudley Simpson?
• I couldn't not think of Doctor Who's Medusa Cascade whenever Blake mentioned the "Icarus Cascade". What is a cascade in space, anyway?
• Really nice to see Gan in this one. None of the audios so far have included dialogue or even much of a presence from him. That being said, I felt that Gan wanting to flee instead of saving the innocent Federation prisoners was out of character for him. Not that Gan wouldn't want to stay alive, but Dekkan isn't a threat on the same level as say, Earth. 
• And that leads me to a particular plot point that bothered me - the main drama is about the group of Federation prisoners whom Dekkan is torturing and killing for information, and how Blake tries and fails to save them. However, the story would've been over within minutes if Blake had simply teleported down a with a bag full of teleport bracelets. He even tries to do it at the very end when Dekkan threatens to destroy their ship, but is too late! The only excuse for why it wasn't plan A was something along the lines of "they don't have enough food on the Liberator", which is 100% BS. Blake's plan was, and I kid you not, physically lead the crew back to their own slow cargo ship and hope that Dekkan doesn't catch up with them. On his modified, high-speed birds-of-prey. It makes no sense. The Liberator could have teleported the prisoners up, left orbit and dropped them all off to some planet before Dekkan had a clue.
• Blake casually locking the controls to prevent anyone from raising the force wall against his will is such a classic Blake move.
• Since when does Cally operate weapons? I thought that was Vila's console.
• I love that Jenna was the only person besides Blake to get furious over Dekkan's treatment of the Federation prisoners(although you'd think Gan and Cally would have too). Knyvette spitting out some rage over that would've been brilliant to see.
• The Federation supply ship has a space drive capable of making "jumps", which is pretty unusual for Blake's 7(not counting the Scorpio's hyperdrive in the Barry Letts stories). 
• The irony of Dekkan believing that Blake's ability to trust will be his downfall as opposed to his lack of trust is just... chef's kiss. 

INFORMATION!

• Gan claims that the crew "just" went after Avalon, setting The Hard Road more or less directly after Project Avalon. Given that Trel Dekkan was first mentioned as one of the rebel names in the data files stolen in Disorder, we can infer that Blake also found Avalon from that information, retroactively setting Disorder between Duel and Project Avalon. 
• Blake has been collecting information about rebel cells since his arrival onto the Liberator. 
• Dekkan refers to the Terran elections on Earth, which Blake participated in as leader of the Freedom Party. The Freedom Party was first mentioned in Voice From The Past.
• Vila claims that the Auronar are supposed to be good at shooting people(though that might just be the view he's derived from Cally).
• The Federation supply ship was on its way to assist the starving colony worlds in Sector 4. Other planets found there include Helotrix, Exbar and Saurian Major.
• Upon rescuing the Federation prisoners, Blake assures them that he's broken people out of jail before, albeit with a bad success rate. This happened in Space Fall.
• Blake mourns the loss of his family, whose death was reported in The Way Back(his surviving uncle and cousin are conspicously not mentioned).

BEST QUOTE AVON QUOTE

BLAKE: "What do you want, Avon? Come to undermine me a little more?"
AVON: "Your problem is that you make everything personal. I learned a very long time ago that the world we live in is a most impersonal place."
BLAKE: "That almost sounds like philosophy."
AVON: "... I've been hanging around you too much. Picked up your bad habits."

CONCLUSION

I definitely recommend this if you're into the strong character drama. There's a good bit of well-written space warfare too.