#bf b7

 Commentary:

For some reason, GT sound very much like Blake to me in the start of this – as in, I barely notice any change in his voice, as opposed to me barely recognising him in Warship.

A mineral that can transmute into other elements – in other words, a philosopher’s stone? Illusium indeed. (Whoop, slightly ahead of you, Avon, Blake. And it’s been a while since I listened to this, too.)

Blake and Avon squabbling over phrasing and the wealth in the hold is very neat. :P Blake’s complete blindness to monetary wealth, and his trust in people – and saying that he would entrust it to Vila really just to spite Avon! The shipper in me enjoys that Avon knows exactly were Vila is, even though Vila was drinking with Gan.

Somehow the audios narrated by Blake feature a lot more of the rest of the crew than the audios focused on… well, anyone else really. It’s something I noticed on another audio, but it holds true for this one up to a point, too. As in, Vila isn’t there as a narrator or second voice, but he is still there. I like that.

What I like less is a break of POV, which is happening here – Blake would have no idea what these Federation people are doing, no matter how unconscious he is at the time. You can do that if you have an omniscient third person narrator – but it doesn’t work in an audio that has first person narration. It bugs me – but I suppose it was the only way to do it.

Hehe, the thing about the Aquitar project. Big project indeed. Also like that Blake bluffs his way along with half-truths about the prison transport.

I like villains that aren’t black and white – and I also like that this scientist names his invented mineral “illusium” – as in, “illusion”. I still wish this audio could have been done without the awkward third person sections.

What I enjoy most about Blake’s narration here is his off-beat humour – it’s terribly aggravating if I’d had to deal with him in person, but it is enjoyable – not only because this audio does it very well, but also because I struggle to write it.  

Was anyone fooled into thinking it was really Travis? I knew it was Avon from the first sentence in which he appears.

You know, from the point of view of the Liberator crew this was a rather pointless expedition, like most of theirs are – at least now they know there is no super-mineral?

“Stop rearranging the furniture, Blake.” XD

The rescue mission was equally not fooling anyone… but hehe at Vila jumping at the chance to manhandle Avon a bit. Also yeah for Cally & Jenna saving the day. See what I mean about the whole crew being “there”!

“I thought you wanted to expose the Federation, not beat them in a fancy dress competition.”  

The Verdict: I quite like this episode, actually, despite the narrator not being one of my favourites, the clunky narrative thing and the fact that none of the “big reveals” were particularly surprising to me – strangely enough. These should work so well in an audio, but no. But what I really like about at least some of the Blake audios is, as I mentioned above, that the whole crew is often so involved. Obviously having Avon actually there helps, but I don’t feel like he’s necessarily there more than the rest of them. Anything that doesn’t make me miss either Avon or Vila (more frequently it’s Vila, let’s be honest) gets bonus points.

Tangent of the Episode:

Don’t really have any, except how in the world did anyone fall for something as obviously fake as a pseudo-philosopher’s stone? The oldest scientist’s dream – or alchemist’s dream, I suppose? I mean, even Avon and Blake know about the myth, and yet for over two years in the whole of the Federation no one asked any questions? Possibly these scientists and that planet weren’t as important as all that, after all – the back of beyond, indeed.