The Avengers: Double Danger

This is another series 1 episode of The Avengers which no longer exists. You can read a summary of the plot and two different revisions of the script here: https://dissolute.com.au/the-avengers-tv-series/series-1/118-double-danger.html This blog post is simply based around the original camera script, which I have read, and not Lucarotti's revised version, which I have not. The two variations of the script and the show being junked mean that there is a lot of confusion online about this, which I intend to add to with this post. Of course I'm also thinking that when I've read the revised script I could do another blog post if the mood takes me.

This is absolutely not a criticism but part of the confusion comes from the rather involved plot of this episode. To cut to the chase, a man who has stolen some diamonds and hidden them is assisted to escape from prison (this turns out to have been arranged by Steed), only to be shot by a rival gang. Dr Keel is forced to give him medical help before he dies of the wound, and the rest of the episode revolves around following the clues as to where he has hidden the diamonds and the ongoing double crosses between the two groups (who form the double danger of the title) looking for the diamonds. In fact at one point Steed says,

'Mace double crossed Bruton. And Mrs Mace double crossed her husband. Then you double crossed Bruton. And Bruton double crossed you. It's almost as complicated a politics.'

I don't, however want to give the impression that this plot is unnecessarily complicated. It is, of course, complicated and confusing, but I honestly think that's the point. I found the script a real page turner as I was reading it, and honestly this is the first series 1 episode that I've been able to say that about. By the end of it you don't know what's going on, but it's a nice confusion.

If that makes it sound like a farce, frankly I have found myself wondering whether that was intentional. I found myself laughing out loud as I was reading it on the canal bank this afternoon. However I have been unable to work out whether anyone else approaches the episode like this or if it was intended to be funny, because the online commentary is rather limited. I would love to hear if anyone else has found it funny.

In reality it almost certainly wasn't intended to be funny because the episode is very much one of the early two-against-the-underworld episodes. And they are very much up against the violent underworld, people who don't mind killing for diamonds, here. It raises intriguing questions about who or what Steed is, because he is clearly posing as an underworld fixer in arranging an escape from prison. However he says that he is arranging this on behalf of the insurance company who had insured the vanished diamonds. This is clearly a lurch into the classic Avengers unreality, because this seems an unnecessarily cloak and dagger way for an insurance company to carry on business. It is also clear that this is officially sanctioned because Steed communicates with his series one boss. Yet at the same time Steed is keen that Keel doesn't reveal his involvement in this to the police. Whether as merely a tactic to stop the inevitable complications caused by the constabulary or whether he is being slightly underhand, is not made clear. The questions it raised about Steed in my mind were one the things I most appreciated about it.

Double Danger was also a new experience (to me) because it was the first I have read where a significant role is given to Keel's assistant in the surgery, Carol Wilson, played by Ingrid Hafner. I tend to forget that the original intention was that Carol and Keel would be the two against the underworld but Steed somehow intruded into it. This episode is an interesting reminder of the original pairing; although notably it is Steed that Keel tells Carol to contact when it becomes clear to him that he is in trouble.

He communicates with her in a most fascinating way which I really don't think you would find on TV nowadays. The second set of villains have tricked him into being obliged to give medical help to the shot diamond thief, despite him telling them that he should really be in hospital. One of the gang goes back to the surgery with a list to give to Carol of things that Keel will need to try to keep the man alive. At the bottom of the list is the strange phrase 'Fonum equus', which Carol tells him is some medical preparation. Of course it is really pretend Latin for 'Phone the horse,' or rather Steed!

If you particularly want a criticism it is that you might find the light touch of this episode, verging on the humorous, incongruent with the weighty subject matter, which is otherwise a straightforward tale of crime and double crossing. Although I think it would be churlish to criticise.

This is another excellent series 1 episode of The Avengers which I would encourage readers to seek out, either in script form or the series of audio recordings by Big Finish.

This blog is mirrored at

culttvblog.tumblr.com/archive (from September 2023) and culttvblog.substack.com (from January 2023 and where you can subscribe by email)

Archives from 2013 to September 2023 may be found at culttvblog.blogspot.com and there is an index to the tags used on the Tumblr version at https://www.tumblr.com/culttvblog/729194158177370112/this-blog