tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8482477005027998350.post1037638513904471247..comments2024-03-27T02:17:17.071-05:00Comments on From the Archive: A British Television Blog: Are John Steed & Emma Peel SNOBs in The Correct Way to Kill?Greghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13946848534077648713noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8482477005027998350.post-989941919851746932015-07-03T13:34:41.512-05:002015-07-03T13:34:41.512-05:00Ah, The Avengers. Once again, a classic series fro...Ah, The Avengers. Once again, a classic series from my schooldays. It was the highlight of the week and the whole family sttled in front of the TV, ready to be entertained. I never saw much of the original video-tape productions and probably would not have liked the dull, studio-bound appearance, but when the series went to sparkling 35mm film and the delectable Mrs Peel joined up it was a fantastic piece of TV. <br />The Emma Peel series was in black and white, but as the UK had not yet got colour TV it all seemed perfectly natural. Second Peel series was in colour, but we were still on black and white TV! None of this mattered - The Avengers was brilliant television with outlandish stories featuring fantasy, sci-fi and good old-fashioned spies.<br />The final series saw Mrs Peel leaving when her missing husband re-appearedand we got Tara King (played with a certain cheeky irony by Linda Thorson). It was widely agreed that she was no Emma Peel, but she did bring a certain something to the proceedings and some of the stories were better than the later Peel ones.<br />The New Avengers? Pah, fiddlesticks. I watched it out of a sense of duty really, but it just didn't ring my bell like the older ones did. As pretty as she was, Joanna Lumley failed to arouse my interest and Gambit (Gareth Hunt) seemed a bit forced. Steed did even less than in previous series, and that's saying something.<br />We now have the Diana Rig and Linda Thorson eps on DVD and mighty fine they look. Some good extras too.<br /><br />Andy.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8482477005027998350.post-30681581104751895432012-06-26T06:41:04.191-05:002012-06-26T06:41:04.191-05:00That's too bad, I would have liked to have hea...That's too bad, I would have liked to have heard your insightful analiysis of the first three series.Greghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13946848534077648713noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8482477005027998350.post-41277139788041908882012-06-25T16:27:40.052-05:002012-06-25T16:27:40.052-05:00Argh! I wrote a long comment but lost it when I w...Argh! I wrote a long comment but lost it when I went to preview and forgot to deselect Google Account.<br /><br />I am not going back to rewrite it, so we will have to live without my insightful analysis of the first three series of The Avengers. Perhaps it is best since this blog post was about later episodes anyway.<br /><br />Oh well, could be worse.Dave Gnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8482477005027998350.post-27681099744846945642012-06-24T11:22:19.254-05:002012-06-24T11:22:19.254-05:00With THE NEW AVENGERS it's probably as well to...With THE NEW AVENGERS it's probably as well to start with THE EAGLE'S NEST and carry on. Even with only 26 episodes the show tries out a wide variety of styles, and it's fun to see how they work out. They generally manage to balance the more realistic feel of the new series with the more traditionally fantastic elements of the old. I do like TALE OF THE BIG WHY? because it takes a sort of John Le Carre type of spy yarn and then gives it a tongue in cheek Avengers makeover.Sextonblakenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8482477005027998350.post-73366791082355973322012-06-24T10:40:47.920-05:002012-06-24T10:40:47.920-05:00Hi Sextonblake,
I don't think it's too di...Hi Sextonblake,<br /><br />I don't think it's too different over here. When the series was shown locally for me it was always the Riggs (b&w/Colour) or Thorson episodes. I think people just gravitated towards Peel. It almost seemd like the accepted norm to not like the Thorson episodes. <br />That being said, I couldn't agree more with your assesment of Series 4,5,6. Series 4 & 6 are both captivating and fresh but for different reasons where Series 5 is Avengers by numbers. Of course there are some good ones in there but not that series does very little for me.<br />I have yet to fully get into <b>The New Avengers</b>. Should I start from the beginning or do you think there is a good episode I should look at first?<br />Take care, <br />GregGreghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13946848534077648713noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8482477005027998350.post-40405732813696500822012-06-24T06:09:40.269-05:002012-06-24T06:09:40.269-05:00At least in the UK, the reputation of the colour D...At least in the UK, the reputation of the colour Diana Rigg episodes being the highlight of the series comes from seventies. The show was not on TV, and the few episodes that turned up at film society screenings were season 5.<br /><br />When the show began to surface again in the mid-80s, I got the opportunity to make up my own mind. Season 5 gets repetitive very quickly. It's an object lesson in the importance of script over style. Season 4 has a much wider variety of stories, and is generally far moodier (THE HOUSE THAT JACK BUILT is genuinely unnerving). The Tara King stories were rejected by a lot of fans because they didn't have Diana Rigg in them, but viewing them now, they show a willingness to take a chance that is very refreshing (TAKE OVER and BIZARRE are so fundamentally different in style from one another that it's hard to believe that they are part of the same series).<br /><br />My favourite still remains THE NEW AVENGERS, although this remains a terribly heretical opinion amongst some fans. I just can't help it!<br /><br />The recent AVENGERS dvd releases have been very disappointing to me. The first box-set contained one disc that wouldn't play at all, so I returned it. The replacement had the same problem. They're far too expensive to have to put up with these sorts of glitches.Sextonblakenoreply@blogger.com