| “ | I hate personal violence, especially when I'm the person. | „ |
| “ | I've been a wanted man all my life. What I need now is to be unwanted. | „ |
Vila Restal is the tritagonist of Blake's 7 and the deuteragonist of the fourth and final season.
He was portrayed by Michael Keating, who also voiced the character for BBC Radio, B7 Productions and Big Finish. Dean Harris also voiced the character for B7 Productions.
History
Vila was a compulsive sneak thief, who spent his early life in and out of detention facilities: He once recalled being part of an escape plan from an "academy". He was officially designated as a Delta grade, and thus regarded as having low intelligence, but claimed to have paid to be classified as such. Ultimately, after attempts at rehabilitation failed, he was sentenced to deportation to Cygnus Alpha. Aboard the prison ship London, he first met Roj Blake. He struck up a friendship with the gentle giant Olag Gan and began a more vitriolic relationship with the cynical Avon. Despite his cowardly nature, he joined Blake's escape attempt, although his unfamiliarity with weapons meant it was largely down to him that it failed, as he surrendered his gun at the wrong moment. He again joined Blake in an escape attempt from Cygnus Alpha itself, in the process killing a follower of the cult leader Vargas to save Blake, and this time made it to Blake's new ship, the Liberator.
With nowhere else to go, Vila ended up conscripted into Blake's makeshift resistance group. His talents as a thief meant he was an expert at breaking security systems. As such, he played a key role in many of Blake's early raids, getting the crew into the communication facility on Saurian Major, the cypher room on Centero (during which he knocked out a Federation trooper who raised the alarm) and the bunker where rebel leader Avalon was being held. He also helped rescue Jenna from the Scavengers on Cephlon and joined Avon in rescuing Blake and Cally from Servalan and Travis.
Vila was part of Blake's raid on the Federation's central control, which led to Gan's death. When Blake appeared to abandon the Liberator in the aftermath, Vila contemplated leaving him behind, but it was his awareness that Gan trusted Blake that allowed the crew to uncover the fact Blake was giving them the opportunity to opt out or retrieve him. Vila helped Avon take the translator crystal from Q-Base and helped Blake track down Federation major Provine. His hedonistic lifestyle occasionally caused problems: He hid Orac in return for sampling the delights of Space City, hampering the discovery of Orac's possession by the entity known as the Darkness, and abandoned his post with Avon to gamble at Freedom City. He remained on the Liberator during Blake's attack on Star One, but was part of the subsequent battle with an Andromedan invasion force.
With the Liberator badly damaged, Vila and the others were forced to flee in lifepods. Vila ended up on Chenga, where he was taken in by the charming facade of the Hi-Techs and remained oblivious to the fact they planned to harvest him and Cally for organs. They were rescued by the Liberator, now under Avon's control with new crewmembers Del Tarrant and Dayna Mellanby. One of Vila's biggest adventures in this period was when he was co-opted by the pirate Bayban to open a vault on the planet Keezarn. He discovered it actually led to a teleport terminal for the planet's population to migrate to a new world. Vila formed a relationship with Kerril, one of Bayban's crew, during the incident but declined an offer to join her on the new planet.
Vila played a key role in the destruction of the parasitic Ultraworld, keeping its Core distracted with a string of jokes until Orac could destroy it. When the Liberator made its final journey to the planet Terminal, Vila was in charge of the ship with Dayna when it became clear it was suffering from the effects of flying through a particle cloud. Vila instructed the ship's computer Zen to devote all power to a solution but in the end the crew could only evacuate to the surface, leaving the ship in Servalan's hands. Vila successfully managed to smuggle Orac to the surface with them.
With the Liberator survivors having relocated to a base on Xenon, Vila helped defeat the immortal Dorian by giving Avon a gun with which to kill the creature that Dorian was using to channel his impurities. He continued the battle against the reviving Federation aboard the crew's new ship, Scorpio. He accompanied Avon to a meeting with the renegade scientist Egrorian to obtain his ultimate weapon, the tachyon funnel. When their shuttle nearly crashed after a betrayal by Egrorian left them trapped in a decaying orbit, Avon was willing to kill Vila to lose weight, and only Vila's well-honed survival instinct saved him as he successfully hid until Avon found another solution.
Vila accompanied Scorpio on its own final journey to Gauda Prime, where Avon had realised Blake was located. With Scorpio crashing after being fired upon, Vila teleported to the surface with Dayna and Soolin, who made the mistake of leaving him on watch: He was easily knocked out by bounty hunters and had to be rescued by Avon. When the group infiltrated Blake's base, Vila witnessed Avon kill Blake in the mistaken belief he had betrayed them, and then also saw Dayna killed by Federation officer Arlen, who had summoned Federation troops to attack the base. Vila managed to knock Arlen out but was shot and presumably killed by a Federation trooper immediately after.