List of The Avengers episodes

This is an episode list for the 1960s British television series The Avengers. The series was aired in Britain on ITV between 1961 and 1969. For the sequel, see The New Avengers.

The first four series were in black-and-white; the first three were shot on videotape with occasional filmed inserts. Beginning with series 4 the series moved to all-film production shot using the single-camera setup style. From series 5 onwards the episodes were in colour.

As of May 2008, all 139 surviving episodes of the series (including the two complete and one partial episode from the first series) have been released on DVD in North America (Region 1).

Series overview

Series 1 (1961)

Note: As of 2011, the only episodes known to still exist in their entirety from the debut series are Girl on the Trapeze (which does not feature John Steed) and The Frighteners. The first 15 minutes of the premiere episode, Hot Snow, have also been rediscovered.^[1]

Cast: Unless noted in the table below, all episodes in the first series feature Ian Hendry (as Dr. David Keel) and Patrick Macnee (as John Steed).

Note: Following series 1 a lengthy Equity actor's strike prevented development of the second series, and Ian Hendry decided to depart the show. When the show eventually returned the premise had been considerably retooled, with Macnee moved to the lead role, accompanied by an attractive and highly capable female sidekick, and a much more whimsical tone.

Series 2 (1962–1963)

Cast: Series 2 featured Patrick Macnee as John Steed in all 26 episodes. Either Jon Rollason (as Dr. Martin King) or Julie Stevens (as Venus Smith) accompanied him as noted in the table; all other episodes feature Honor Blackman (as Dr. Cathy Gale).

NOTE: The episode Death of a Great Dane was later re-made during series 5 as "The £50,000 Breakfast".

Series 3 (1963–1964)

Series 3 stars Patrick Macnee as John Steed and Honor Blackman as Dr. Cathy Gale. It was the last series to be shot "as-live" on videotape.

NOTE: The episode "Don't Look Behind You" was later re-made for series 5 as "The Joker," "The Charmers" was re-made, again for series 5, as "The Correct Way to Kill," and "Dressed to Kill" was in large part re-made, once again for series 5, as "The Superlative Seven". At the end of the third series Honor Blackman left the series to star in the James Bond movie "Goldfinger".

Series 4 (1965–1966)

Series 4 starred Patrick Macnee (as John Steed) and Diana Rigg (as Mrs. Emma Peel). It was the last series to be made in Black & White, but also the first series to be shot on film as opposed to videotape.

Starting with this series, the production budget went up considerably, location shooting was used extensively. With an eye toward getting the series shown on US television the show was now filmed instead of taped, allowing multiple camera angles. This brought The Avengers in line with other contemporary ITV series such as Danger Man (airing in the US as Secret Agent) and The Saint.

Actress Elizabeth Shepherd was originally cast as Emma Peel; one complete episode, "The Town of No Return," was filmed. Partway through filming of the second episode, "The Murder Market," the producers closed down production in order to recast the part. The Shepherd footage has never been televised and is believed to be lost. Canal+ claimed they had the original footage, then later retracted this claim. Publicity photos of Shepherd as Mrs. Peel survive.

For American broadcast, all episodes of the 1965–1966 series included a specially-shot prologue preceding the main credits, showing Steed and Peel walking across a giant chessboard while a narrator introduces the characters and the concept of the series. This opening never aired in the UK and wasn't widely seen in the show's home country until the DVD release.

"The Strange Case of the Missing Corpse" was filmed in colour on the set of "Honey for the Prince" and was, as Brian Clemens originally wrote it, intended to be tagged on to the end of the final b/w episode transmitted in America to advertise the upcoming colour episodes (though the b/w sequence titled "Preamble for USA," written by Clemens to introduce the item, which was to have featured Rigg and Macnee explaining/introducing this short colour test film, is either lost or was never filmed). It was also cut down into a trailer for the colour episodes coming soon to ABC Network in America. Just like the prologue to the b/w Rigg episodes, it was never meant to be screened anywhere but the US. There is a myth that it was to have originally been a twenty-minute mini-episode, but the version presently available on video is three minutes long and doesn't appear to be missing any substantial narrative content.

Series 5 (1967)

This series featured Patrick Macnee and Diana Rigg. From this series on all episodes are in colour.

The Fear Merchants was the first episode of the Avengers to be produced/filmed in colour, although From Venus with Love aired first.

Series 6 (1968–1969)

All episodes featured Patrick Macnee (as John Steed) and Linda Thorson (as Tara King).

John Bryce replaced Brian Clemens and Albert Fennell as producer for the start of the series. By the time Clemens and Fennell returned three episodes had been filmed: Two 90 minute episodes called "Invitation To a Killing" and "The Great Great Britain Crime" as well as a standard length episode "Invasion of the Earthmen". These were considered to be extremely flawed episodes and likely would have been scrapped except they didn't have time to film new episodes and still meet their American contract so "Invitation To a Killing" was heavily edited and had several new shots filmed to become "Have Guns — Will Haggle", "The Great Great Britain Crime" was heavily edited and had some old footage from previous episodes added, as well as some new footage to become "Homicide and Old Lace". "Invasion of the Earthmen" was slightly edited as well. No known copies of the original version of these episodes are known to exist.^[2]

This unusually long series of 33 episodes was divided into two separate series on original US broadcast. It was produced in two batches: seven episodes (mostly without ^[3]

Notes:

• In the episode "Killer", Tara King is only seen departing for and returning from holiday. Steed's fellow agent for this episode is Lady Diana Forbes-Blakeney (played by Jennifer Croxton).
• In the US the field/suits of armour title sequence was re-edited to 23 seconds (the UK sequence runs 49 seconds), to accommodate more commercials.
• The original 1968 German-dubbed episodes of this series had the field/suits of armour opening titles but the 'Shooting Gallery' end titles.
• The original 1968 French-dubbed episodes of this series feature a variant in the opening title music, a gunshot is heard during the shot of Tara running between two rows of suits of armour toward Steed, and the sound of the sword swipe at the beginning is missing.
• The original title music for the opening 'Shooting Gallery' sequence featured gunshots, the version of "Split!" with this title sequence currently available on DVD has the standard title music with opening sword swipe sound effect, where the first gunshot should be.

See also

• The New Avengers

References

1. ^ Behind the Scenes: Dr David Keel Era at Avengers Forever!
2. ^ The Tara King Era at Avengers Forever!
3. ^ Behind the Scenes: Tara King Era, Part 2 at Avengers Forever!