Customer Reviews

Avengers: 65 Volume 5 [VHS]

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"Dial A Deadly Number" is usually considered one of the better Avengers stories - I would agree, if it were one of the preceding Honor Blackman series entries, but it's extremely atypical (and, to my thinking, static and unsatisfying) for the Diana Rigg years. Steed uses a gun, which was more common in the Blackman cycle and all but unheard of in the Rigg stories. This one is a simple melodrama, not memorable in most regards. It isn't so much that it's a bad story, rather that it just doesn't gel all that well with the rest of the Mrs. Peele series.

"The Hour That Never Was" is one of the more typical semi-science-fictional stories the Rigg years were more famous for, and a fairly satisfying one at that. Steed and Emma find themselves missing an hour of time, after he swerves to avoid a dog in the road while on his way to an RAF reunion. The base hosting the reunion is abandoned, though there are signs of recent habitation. When Steed manages to find the other guests, they seem to be suffering mental fugues - especially when an eerie, high-pitched whine occasionally sounds in the vicinity. It all has something to do with the dentist's office... "Hour" is rather like a Twilight Zone episode, with an espionage story payoff.

An uneven pair, but worth the price of admission.

Roger Marshall, like Philip Levene, wrote the best Avengers scripts. Deadly Number has complex, intelligent characters, a red herring, a sinister, kinky killer who confronts Emma at gunpoint. Admiring her beauty, he tells her as his hand caresses her, that it "would be a sin to mar that skin (with a lethal injection, his current method of assassination)." He promises to kill her with "scientic tenderness" confessing that he has never killed a woman before. The script has a suspenseful wine-tasting party, an exciting attempt to kill Steed, and splendid final battle in the same wine cellar. Unlike Clemeons, Marshall saw women as intelligent, complex,independent and strong. He has a female villain, her counterpoint, the always resourceful Emma, and a nifty closer as Emma teases Steed by immitating his performance at the wine tasting party. Worth every penny, and well worth viewing again and again because of Marshall's research and witty dialogue!

Hour that Never Was has a great opening scene of Steed crashing his car to avoid a dog. He and Emma enter the airbase, about to close today, on foot. All the people are missing. They find a car with gasoline being put in, gasoline flooding the car and pavement, a deserted milk float, a room decorated for the party to commemorate the closing of the base. But all of Steed's frieds are missing. Where have the people gone? A terrified milkman runs away from the lookout box and is mercilessly gunned down. When Steed and Mrs. Peel separate, she too disappears. All Steed finds is her watch. Suspenseful, great final fight as Steed and Emma take on the baddies. The best Avengers episodes are from the 1965-1966 years. Although 1967 boasted some great scripts: Escape in Time, the Joker, Superlative Seven, winged Avenger later the best writers left the show: Roger Marshall and Philip Levene.Consequently, 1967 shows have flat characters, little plot and none of the complexity, humor or intelligence of Malcolm Hulke (the Gravediggers), Tony Willliamson (Too Many Christmas trees)Warshall or Levene's scripts. This cassette was a delight and well worth viewing again and again. Top notch acting, direction and writing. Well worth the price of purchase!

these two particular episodes are great, because the humor is wonderful and there is still the mystery in them. I enjoyed them very much and watch them often. If your an Avenger fan these two are a must buy.