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10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
The Last Episode: "The Seven Wonders Of The World Affair", March 30, 2001
In one of history's great letdowns, "The Man From UNCLE" series ended with this two-part depressant. It seemed as though the entire crew and cast of UNCLE simply gave up before this episode was even filmed. First, the plot is ridiculous: a former UNCLE agent decides to create a cultish sect, headquarter it in the Himalayas, and, together with six other intellectual "wonders of the world", blanket the planet with a docility gas, through which these seven can control the actions of everyone. Why did UNCLE even bother getting involved? Because the villain slips through the plot holes, thereby coming very close to pulling off his dastardly plan. Horrible acting abounds, especially from the auxiliary cast. There isn't enough material in the story to justify a two-part episode. The teaser to "Part I" is enough to drive one into the bathroom. Through nauseating use of the wide-angle lens, the wife of the wayward UNCLE agent rescues a THRUSH agent hopelessly trapped in the upper level of a mansion. Not only do the wife and THRUSH agent escape, but Solo and Kuryakin's car is destroyed by a remote-controlled, window-mounted missile launcher in the mansion. Please. Because this is the final UNCLE episode, "Seven Wonders" falls into the fourth season of the series, during which drastic facelifts were applied to the series. In the hands of Season Four producer Anthony Spinner, UNCLE, which had previously enjoyed wacky antics akin to "Get Smart". Spinner wanted no part of this, and threw UNCLE in the cold storage room to harden it up for the fourth and suicidally-final season. Humor was basically excommunicated for the season, and it kicks off right away with "The Summit-Five Affair" (a man's brain is destroyed during the teaser). By the time "Seven Wonders" rolled around, this formula was well-absorbed into the UNCLE schema. Plot and dialogue, therefore, really don't matter in these episodes. The morbid music, combined with desolate scenes of a weary, bombed-out Solo staggering through the Himalayas, only to be apprehended by THRUSH and sentenced to death; and the final scene, during which (here come the spoilers....oops, too late) the coffin of the wayward UNCLE agent is loaded onto a plane, thus ending the episode, and, sadly, the series. "Seven Wonders" is an important UNCLE episode, if for no other reason than because it is the last one, but it leaves a sour, depressed, disheartened taste in the mouth. Buy at your own risk.
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