The Avengers Series 3

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 1 – Brief for Murder

Whoop de doo, it’s season three of The Avengers and to celebrate its continuing success, the opening credits have been given a bit of a makeover – they’re much more Saul Bass now – there’s more money being spent on the … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 2 – The Undertakers

On Saturday 5 October 1963, a day after the US Joint Chiefs of Staff had updated their plan to invade Cuba the following July (President Kennedy’s assassination would intervene), and while JFK’s wife Jackie was enjoying the company of shipping … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 3 – Man with Two Shadows

Shown the same day that RA (“Rab”) Butler made his big pitch to be the new leader of the Conservative party after Macmillan’s shock resignation (Butler’s big speech was a total fail), Man with Two Shadows also plays with the … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 4 – The Nutshell

Roughly five months after it was made in May 1963, on 19 October, the day that the 14th Earl of Home – who had not been elected to any office at all – was announced as the new prime minister of … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 5 – Death of a Batman

An episode called Death of a Batman in a series called The Avengers does sound like something DC Comics and Marvel might cook up between them. But here the word batman is used in the British Army sense – he’s essentially … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 6 – November Five

Classic ass-backwards Avengers plotting is the hallmark of November Five, the sixth episode of the third series, which was first broadcast on Saturday 2 November 1963, three days before the Fifth of November (as it’s always called in the UK, … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 7 – The Gilded Cage

Shown on 9 November 1963, just one day after five thieves had almost nabbed a king’s ransom of jewels and gold on the streets of Manhattan –they were thwarted because the getaway driver couldn’t work the manual gears of the … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 8 – Second Sight

We finally arrive in upstream waters in Second Sight, first broadcast on Saturday 16 November 1963. As far as The Avengers is concerned, “upstream” means rarefied settings, no civilians or members of the public on view, posh accents, plots full … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 9 – The Medicine Men

The Medicine Men first went out on 23 November 1963, the day after the assassination of President Kennedy in the USA, and on the same night as the first episode of Doctor Who (also created by Avengers creator Sydney Newman). … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 10 – The Grandeur That Was Rome

As prescient as a hot button shop, The Grandeur That Was Rome is also proper Avengers stuff – arcane, bonkers, camp, with implausible undercover work and mad hair. Even before the opening credits have flipped into view (and no pre-credits … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 11 – The Golden Fleece

After the camp fun of the previous week’s episode, The Grandeur That Was Rome, a bit of a bump as we touch back down on planet Earth for a much more realistic Avengers episode – The Golden Fleece. Warren Mitchell gets … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 12 – Don’t Look Behind You

Don’t Look Behind You is Brian Clemens’s second script for this series of The Avengers, and his fourth to date. And it’s a cheeky lift of the Old Dark House story. Put another way, there is no typical Avengers setup … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 13 – Death a la Carte

First broadcast on 21 December 1963 – a more obviously Christmas-y episode would go out the following week – Death a la Carte is pretty much The Avengers as usual. Which means: exotic foreigners, death served up in unusual ways … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 14 – Dressed to Kill

So here we are, at Christmas 1963 (the 28 December, to be exact), with Dressed to Kill, a special seasonal episode written by Brian Clemens, who gets everyone into pantomime mode by setting the action on a train heading for … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 15 – The White Elephant

For the first episode of 1964, broadcast on 4 January, the day that Auburn University in Alabama accepted Harold A Franklin as its first black student (accompanied by three US marshals and 100 state police to keep the mob at … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 16 – The Little Wonders

Whether it’s spelt Bibliotek, Bibliotech or Bibliotheque, the crime organisation at the centre of The Little Wonders is a brilliant creation by writer Eric Paice, an international, centuries-old outfit whose members go around dressed as clerics. Hence the funny pre-credits … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 17 – The Wringer

Peter Sallis hasn’t yet developed the voice that would make him the ideal Wallace (of Wallace and Gromit fame) in his outing as an amnesiac spook on the run in The Wringer, an episode in which a string of spies … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 18 – Mandrake

The United States launched the Echo 2 satellite on 25 January 1964, the day that the Mandrake episode of The Avengers aired. And though the week before’s outing, The Wringer, had been a very up-to-date affair, set in the world … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 19 – The Secrets Broker

The Beatles were number one in America for the first time, with I Want to Hold Your Hand, when this latest episode of The Avengers, The Secrets Broker, aired in the UK on 1 February 1964. But though The Avengers … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 20 – Trojan Horse

At one point almost every episode of The Avengers started with a death before the opening credits. Trojan Horse plays with that idea, showing us a punter who won’t pay his betting debts being killed by some heavies. After his … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 21 – Build a Better Mousetrap

Build a Better Mousetrap is a great episode of The Avengers – it’s Brian Clemens at his best, from its very Clemens-y joshing title, to his use of British eccentrics, and his mix of the venerable with the modern, the … Read more

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 22 – The Outside-In Man

Whether The Avengers is or isn’t a spy series depends very much on the episode you watch. In The Outside-In Man we’re very much in spy mode, right from the opening scene, in which Steed is seen walking into a … Read more

Fenella Fielding publicity shot for The Charmers

The Avengers: Series 3, Episode 23 – The Charmers

Charm, rather than grit or narrative or psychological coherence, are really what The Avengers is about, and in the appropriately titled The Charmers we get tons of it, thanks to a fine script by Brian Clemens and light, deft playing by the guest actors. … Read more