If you’re a diehard fan of science-fiction movies, then your probably have heard about Blake’s 7, a British science fiction television series that produced by the BBC and broadcast between 1978 and 1981. Back then it has four season of 13-episodes each, being created by Terry Nation. Now, industry sources confirm that Microsoft is going to fund a remake of this cult BBC TV science fiction series 7 in order to distribute it on its Xbox Live digital network.

Microsoft has mentioned that they want the Xbox to become an “entertainment hub”. The Redmond company plans on creating more original content, to attract subscribers to Xbox Live. Ballmer & Co are also working with Steven Spielberg on a live-action adaptation of the Halo video games – it will be really interesting to see what comes out of it.

Microsoft to remake Blake’s 7 to bring subscribers to Xbox Live

At the moment, we don’t know whether Microsoft will produce a full series, since that would be rather expensive. Probably they will fund the remaking of a few episodes. Microsoft tries to create original content to compete with such companies as Netflix and Amazon that already have started creating their own or have content exclusivity.

Most likely, there are a lot of sci-fi geeks amongst Xbox Live subscribers or just amongst those that use Microsoft services and are not sure whether they should switch to Xbox Live or not. This would attract sci-fi lovers and I expect more similar remakes to be done in the near future.

Matthew Garrahan with Financial Times:

Microsoft is also making a push into Hollywood, hiring Nancy Tellem, the former president of CBS Television Studios, to launch Xbox Entertainment Studios in Los Angeles. Ms Tellem could not be reached for comment but she told the Fortune Brainstorm conference in Aspen recently that Microsoft wanted to create a “different kind of TV experience” for the Xbox which would be more interactive. “Instead of it being a passive experience you can choose to either passively watch or connect in real time with your friends or across the US or globally … with the content on our platform,” she said.

What do you think, is this enough for you to get a Xbox Live subscription or you’ll be waiting for more original content? Until then, I leave you below a fragment from Blake’s 7.

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