Review by Guy Clapperton
Stars Patrick Macnee, Ian Hendry, Julie Stevens, Jon Rollason, Honor Blackman,
Diana Rigg, Linda Thorson, Patrick Newell, Ingrid Hafner, Rhonda Parker | Created by Sydney Newman
UK certification 12 | UK RRP £199.99 | DVD Region 2 | 39 discs | Directed by Roy Ward Baker & others
The Avengers is one of those cult shows just starting to fade from popular memory. I was at a press event for a tailor the other week and mentioned it in relation to the velvet collars the 20-something designer favoured and – you’ve guessed it – he’d never heard of the show.
In the 1960s it was different. Patrick Macnee was photographed with Twiggy, Honor Blackman set whole trends in leatherwear and the show was considered one of the most stylish and infuential of its time. You can still see why from this box set. Of course it’s dated – the live episodes, up to and including all of the Honor Blackmans, are creaky, stagey and not all that consistent, but the scripts stand up. It’s the first genuinely independent part for a leading woman that you’d seen on television at that stage and the styles are uniquely of their time.
It doesn’t start there, though The box sets start with what’s left of series one with Ian Hendry as the leading man and Macnee as the sidekick. Macnee soon takes over as the urbane Steed – he’s as wooden as anything but he carries the story perfectly OK. Then there’s series 2 after Hendry leaves. There’s a replcement, Jon Rollason, who’s serviceable enough but only appears for three episodes, and a boss called One Ten who doesn’t last much longer. There’s another sidekick, a nightclub singer called Venus Williams, played by Julie Stevens. She lasts six episodes. Honor Blackman does the rest – these are all mixed up, by the way – and dominates the series.
In series 3 it’s Blackman all the way. Then it explodes into season 4, onto film, a new theme tune and Diana Rigg. It must have been like watching The Avengers by strokes of lightning at the time –the upgrade is unbelievable because of the technology apart from anything. For me season 4 is some sort of peak, season 5 is formulaic and self conscious and season 6, with Linda Thorson, is the one the producers didn’t want to make. There are some great moments – the Cybernauts, the Man Eater of Surrey Green, the one with Diana Rigg in bondage gear ... 50-somethings will be misty-eyed by now. This really was one of the most popular programmes of the day.
At 39 discs it’s a very long box set and for diehards only. Nobody ever intended you to sit through that much Avengers in one go and I’d be interested to hear how many people actually end up watching the lot. To dip into it’s great but at £199.99 it’s an expensive browse. It probably deserves more stars than I’ve given it but on an episodes-you’re-not-going-to-watch per pound it has to be downgraded.
Completists will already have a lot of it, more expensively on the releases of the individual seasons; they’ll also be annoyed by the omission of The New Avengers from a few years later, when it was revived with Joanna Lumley and Gareth Hunt joining Macnee. This is available in a separate box set. Mercifully the godawful Ralph Feinnes movie is absent too.
EXTRAS ★★★ Loads, on every DVD, far too many to list individually. The producers and actors are at times disarmingly frank in the interviews; the scenario is that the producers left at the end of the Diana Rigg season then came back. Meanwhile, Linda Thorson had been cast – and their hostility to the idea, decades later, still makes for uncomfortable viewing. The rest of the extras include: The Golden Schlussel, a rare short film starring Diana Rigg; a Top 10 Avengers locations featurette; newly discovered Series 5 archival trailer; a German cinema trailer; and the Titan Avengers 50th Anniversary DVD book.