After realising that they can’t stay neutral in the conflict between Servalan and the old President, the crew of the Liberator encounter another old friend of Vila’s…

Trevor Baxendale’s contribution to this concluding box set of adventures set during Series C has two very distinct aims to achieve, and succeeds in both. It has to reset the parameters for the Liberator’s crew’s involvement with the war (and fit that into the existing continuity – after all, we know who comes out on top eventually, even if it might take a considerable time to do so), and tell a story of its own. The decision to assist Servalan is inevitably going to cause ructions within the crew – with Yasmin Bannerman’s Dayna hardly surprisingly not best impressed with the plan – and Baxendale takes the “yet another friend of Vila” storyline and uses it to fill in some of his backstory in a way that makes sense of some oddities.

The fate of innocents in wartime is always an emotive subject, and Baxendale handles the issue sensitively. There’s also some very nice misdirection in the storyline with Bruce Alexander’s Galon one of the more interesting additions to the B7 universe of recent time. We also see some faultlines developing within Servalan’s own retinue and I’m hoping this is indicative of further adventures beyond this box set for some of those we’ve met.

Verdict: Some interesting moral dilemmas for the crew help make this tale stand out. 9/10

Paul Simpson