Intercepting a message from the rebels on Albian, Blake comes to aid their rebellion. The major in charge has some information Blake wants, the location of the Control Computer. Will he obtain it before the Federation force is wiped out?

The colour of Albian is green oh you get the idea

Albian is under Federation control, the population subdued by the threat of a great big bomb hanging over them if there is any insurrection. With a rebellion in full swing, will the bomb be activated?

Mercenary Del Grant has been hired by the rebels on Albian to help rid the planet of Federation influence. His sister was involved with one of the seven before they were sent off to Cygnus Alpha. Will the past come back to haunt them all and will old scores be settled?

Avon, delighted to see another old acquaintance

Avon.

He defuses the bomb and diffuses the tension between himself and Del Grant at the same time. What a guy!

On screen we see the Federation troopers kill 4 men, although it’s implied by the action packed opening that many more have been slaughtered.

Blake kills Provine.

Vila typically doesn’t want to be wanted:

AVON: Doesn't it make you feel good to be wanted?
VILA: I've been a wanted man all my life. What I need now is to be unwanted.

Avon meets an "old friend"

AVON Hello, Del. It's been a long time.
GRANT I heard you were dead.
AVON I heard the same about you. Wishful thinking perhaps.
GRANT I'm glad the stories were wrong. I felt cheated. We have some things to settle.

Avon explains what happened to him and Anna:

GRANT [Hands him the extractor] There's one thing I never understood. Why did you leave her alone?
AVON: I had arranged to buy some exit visas, but I had to go right across the city to collect them. It was safer for Anna to stay out of sight. Separator.
GRANT: [Hands him the separator] What happened then?
AVON: There were patrols out everywhere looking for us. I was late at the rendezvous. And then the man from whom I was buying the visas increased the price. He wanted ten times what we had agreed. He said he could get even more if he turned me in and collected the Federation reward.
GRANT: You should have killed him.
AVON: I did. Link clamp.
GRANT: [Hands him the link clamp] So you got the visas. Why didn't you go back for her?
AVON: Killing the dealer wasn't quite so straightforward. He was expecting something and fired first. I started back but I was losing a lot of blood. Somewhere along the way I passed out. I was lucky. Some people found me and got me under cover.
GRANT: You could have got a message to her, told her to get out.
AVON: I was unconscious for more than thirty hours. I need to hold this flap back. Get your hand in here. [Grant complies. He and Avon are standing chest to chest] That's good. You can get at the main now.
GRANT: You used the visa and got out of the city. You left her there.
AVON: That's right. But that was a week later. Anna was already dead.
GRANT: You're lying. You left the city the same day, before the Federation found Anna. You could have got her out.
AVON: No. She came looking for me, the patrols found her. It was only after we got word that she was dead that I left.
GRANT: You expect me to believe that?
AVON: Not particularly. But it happens to be the truth. If there had ever been a time when I could have given my own life to save her, I would have done it. The only grain of consolation that I have is that Anna knew that.
GRANT: She died because of you, that's all that matters. There's nothing changed between us.
AVON : I didn't really expect that it would be

Blake gets some important information:

BLAKE: He's dying. [Grabs Provine's shirt front] Provine! Provine! The computer complex, Control, where have the Federation moved it to?
PROVINE: Go to hell.
BLAKE: You may still have a chance if I can get you to our surgical unit. Now where is Control, Provine?
PROVINE: Star One. It's called Star One now. Docholli. Cybersurgeon. Only Docholli knows.
BLAKE: Where is Docholli? Where is Docholli? [Provine dies] See you in hell.

Blake gets the information he wants 

Avon and Del are reconciled:

GRANT: Why did you help me?
AVON: Perhaps because Anna was your sister.

Avon and Del reconciled

Avon is no mood for explanations:

BLAKE: Are you going to tell me about Anna?
AVON: You wouldn't understand.
BLAKE: Wouldn't I?
AVON: I doubt it. [Turns and leaves]

[Blake smiles]

The bomb!

The bomb has a long countdown (from 999) with a ticking sound that doesn’t match the digital display. The bomb itself is a solium radiation device. It destroys flesh with the radiation it emits, but leaves all the building and infrastructure intact. The radiation decays rapidly, leaving no trace of radiation within a day. The bomb is located in the polar region of the planet, with a remoter relay in the main control room. The relay is powered a subetheric transmitter. There is mercury contained in the detonator.

Countdown!

The federation personnel have large, boxy communicators to talk to each other.

Mobile phones return to brick size in the 3rd century of the second calendar

Avon has a mini-power drill he uses to help defuse the bomb.

Drilling the detonator

The safe containing the entire top-secret Federation information has a fingerprint recognition code on the numbered keys.

All the personnel information on Albian’s peacekeeping force is kept on punched cards covered by acetate.

As befits the Robin Hood nature of Terry Nation’s view of Blake’s 7, all the rebels on Albian are dressed in Lincoln green zip up tops, green trousers and green balaclavas. Presumably outside the base it’s a lush, verdant, green world.

The colour of rebels is… oh you get the idea

This is a very sensible episode clothes wise with nothing noticeably standing out as particularly outrageous.

No one eats or drinks anything this week.

Once again it’s left to the women to stay on the ship and operate the teleport. Jenna sends Blake, Avon and Vila down with a smile as she operates the controls. Later on she brings Vila back up and then sends him back down again after he’s collected his equipment. She then brings Avon and Del Grant up to the ship and teleports them out to the Polar Regions.

It is unclear who brings everyone back up from Albian, but Blake sends Del Grant back down.

Presumably Del Grant keeps hold the teleport bracelet he’s given when he returns to Albian from the Liberator, so that’s another one gone.

Avon’s past is filled out with some details of his love for Anna, Del Grant’s sister. The two of them, it seems were in on Avon’s scam to defraud millions of credits from the Federation baking system. On the run from the authorities, Avon was knocked out by some guards, and couldn’t make the arranged rendezvous with her. By the time he awoke in a safe house, Anna was gone and he never found out what became of her. His understated telling of the story obviously belies some very deep feelings that Avon would rather keep hidden, even from Blake, who he claims wouldn’t understand.

The relationship between Avon and Anna will become very important during the following season.

Aside from the ruse of just about every computer panel to appear in Doctor Who in the 1970s, this episode’s main claim to fame Doctor Who is its guest star, Tom Chadbon. He appeared in Doctor Who’s highest rated story, City of Death, later on in 1979, as Duggan and would later star in the first four parts of The Trial of a Time Lord as train guard Merdeen. Later still in 2006, he starred in Big Finish’s second series of Sarah Jane Smith stories as Harry Sullivan’s brother.

Del boy! Tom Chadbon

The other big guest star is Paul Shelley, who gives much the same laid-back performance in1982s Four to Doomsday as Enlightenment.

Paul Shelley is Major Provine

Not camp: bleak and dull!

Countdown is by no means a great episode. It’s more coherent than Nation’s last script for the series Pressure Point, but rather less enjoyable to watch. The episode is rather too earnest and bleak, with a similar atmosphere to many war films, with plucky rebels against the ruthless aggressors. The use of the bomb to subdue the population is a different means of subjugation technique from the Federation, who up to now have preferred the use of pacification drugs. Still, we shouldn’t really be surprised, as a bomb with a countdown has been a part of the ultimate Terry Nation plot since he started writing for Doctor Who in 1963. It’s a radiation bomb at that, so that’s two top Nationisms for the price of one.

This should work and it ought to be really tense, but the characters really let it down. All the rebels are stereotypically stoical and resigned to their fate, which means that any tension is somewhat subdued. If they cared a bit more it might have been exciting. All the stiff upper lip stuff is terribly dull. The Federation soldiers aren’t much better. Paul Shelley is good as Provine, but there’s not much to the character that we haven’t seen before. Even the revelation that he knows where Blake can find the location of Control, or Star One as he reveals it to be called now is somehow muted.

This does mean though, that what is obviously the b-plot is far more exciting. The scenes between Avon and Grant are really well acted, with Paul Darrow getting the chance to take centre stage again, and give a performance that is somehow deeper and more real than his usual one. There’s a real tension to the scenes where they discuss Anna while defusing the bomb. It’s an old cliché to talk about something emotionally charged while doing something dangerous, but it really works here and gives the episode some depth and excitement. It’s good to see that at least one of the regular characters getting their back-story added to.

Avon and Del bonding over a bomb

The women, however, are relegated to the ship for the third episode in a row. No wonder the actresses were both so dissatisfied with their parts.