The Avengers

A missing briefcase full of secrets propels Steed and Emma into a treasure hunt by car.

The accidental death of a ventriloquist reveals that he had been carrying a fortune in gems inside his stomach. Steed stoops to blackmail and Emma goes shopping for ties in the search through the business community for a rich Borzoi.

A European peace conference comes under the threat of sabotage when the British delegates begin to suffer from premonitions and nightmares. After Sir Andrew Boyd, who has witnessd his death in a dream, is killed, Steed and Emma must keep his replacement, Lord Melford, sane and alive.

The brother of the late Clement Armstrong sets a deadly trap for Steed and Mrs. Peel, whom he blames for his brother's death at the hands of his murderous creations, the Cybernauts.

When one of the Floral Network of agents is found dead atop a pair of stilts, Steed and Emma's interest is piqued. That's the idea, because foreign agents Basil and Lola have a trap prepared for them: a machine that swaps their minds into the pair's bodies.

Invited for the weekend to the home of a fellow Bridge Expert, Emma finds herself trapped in a house designed to send her mad. Her tormentor is Max Prendergast, a man she befriended and then betrayed in Berlin some time before. Then Steed came to the rescue but now he's at home nursing a sprained ankle.

Secrets known only to a small group of trusted men have leaked, and the men are having strange dreams of their childhood, featuring their nannies and a bouncing ball. Emma checks out the toyshop, Steed explores a school for nannies.

When Lucas, an agent investigating something subversive, gets off his train at the wrong station he is murdered. Has the crime got anything to do with a mole at the admiralty, a train ticket and a fiendish plot to kill the Prime Minister?

Steed is invited to a party, and finds himself trapped in a remote-controlled aircraft, with six fancy-dressed specialists in various combat styles, en route to a distant island. There, they are pitted against each other in a deadly test.

Three Hollywood veterans, led by an insane director, decide that Emma would be perfect for their latest movie, so they kidnap her and film some surreal and deadly footage.

An unfortunate motorist keeps knocking down and killing the same man: a man who's rampaging through the countryside, bulletproof and intent on destruction. A man who just happens to be identical to the urbane Professor Frank N. Stone.

Foreign agents are being killed, but not by British agents. Steed thinks it terribly unfair, and so does his opposite number, Nutski. They make an arrangement, and Steed and Emma find themselves with Soviet partners in an investigation of a group of very British killers.

The mauling to death of several members of the committee of PURRR (the Philanthropic Union for the Rescue, Relief and Recuperation of Cats) exposes Steed and Emma to a diabolical scheme to take over the entire country.

When representatives of the two organizations head to a country church to investigate the sudden reappearance of a man long thought dead, Steed and Emma are called in to help. It isn't long, of course, before murder rears its ugly head.

Is a creature that can walk up walls clawing to death ruthless and powerful men? Does it have anything to do with Professor Poole's invention of boots that let you walk on the ceiling, or with cartoon superhero the Winged Avenger?

Emma and Steed investigate the mystery of how top secret things are being photographed from the air. Could it have something to do with the groovy world of fashion photography and a parrot called Captain Crusoe?

The Ministry has been broken into by, it seems, an invisible man. A trail leads via inventor Quilby to the Eastern Drug Company, a front organisation run by Soviet intelligence. Meanwhile, the crack spies Elena and Alexandre Vazin are in town. But nobody has seen anything of Alexandre....

Several notorious criminals have vanished into thin air. A whisper has been received that the escape chain starts in London, but, when agent Paxton follows it, he winds up dead in the Thames with a 300-year-old bullet in him.

Four men involved in the production of ceramics suffer nervous breakdowns in everyday situations. All have recently turned down the opportunity to merge with the British Porcelain Company. Steed and Emma investigate the world of fear, with terrifying consequences.

The strange deaths of several astronomers, left bleached white, pose a problem. Whilst Steed joins the stargazers, Emma chases a bright light, and finds herself in the hot seat.

According to Steed's double-agent barber, one of three military men is a traitor. But which one? To find out, Steed becomes a butler, and Emma starts Operation Fascination to trap the woman-hungry Group Captain Miles.

When a group of hoaxsters called the Hellfire Club mix murder with their mischief, Steed and Emma demonstrate a few tricks of their own. The whalebone corset, high laced boots and spiked dog-collar Emma wears as the "Queen of Sin" were designed by Diana Rigg herself, and resulted in A Touch of Brimstone being banned from American TV.

Several military figures have been killed in dangerous games of daring. Emma and Steed follow the trail to a secret society of military men with very dangerous aims.

An agent is run over disposing of the body of a man in a dinner suit, while he was pushing him along in a pram. This all has something to do with Terpsichorean Training Techniques, a dance school where Emma teaches and Steed enrols.

An agent is shot on the thirteenth hole of the Craigleigh golf club, so Steed and Emma join the club. Steed puts his limited skills to use in a murderous tournament, but Emma helps him get a hole in one.

Steed returns from holiday to find that a quite different Mrs. Peel is inhabiting his old friend's flat. With the aid of actress Georgie Price-Jones, he discovers that Art Incorporated and the Arkwright Knitting Circle are doing more together than just sharing needles.

When a man is found under Shirenzai, the trance-like Kalayan voodoo, in the heart of Hertfordshire, Steed finds himself amidst the horror of the last days of empire. Are bandits loose in the English countryside?

A brilliant scientist reappears at the house of his wife. Has he escaped from notorious Manchurian prison camp Ni-San? And why have so many missing people stayed at the Chessman Hotel? Steed and Emma book in.

The lack of martens in a pleasant stretch of English countryside alerts Steed to the possible release of a fertiliser that has failed, reducing a landscape to a wasteland. But why is the local farming community so aggressive?

Christmas. Steed is having bad, seemingly prophetic, dreams, involving festive themes and a dead agent. Can he find solace at a fancy-dress party in the country home of a Dickens enthusiast?

Colonel Psev, a mysterious and unseen foreign spy with a toy fixation, arrives in London to infiltrate a defence conference. His four aides bully Brodny, the ambassador, until he comes up with a cunning ruse: Gordon Webster, rakish male model, is Steed's double.

Deaf botanist Alan Carter's fiancee walks away from their floral bliss under some strange influence, and is picked up by an entranced chauffeur. Has it got anything to do with the giant seed from outer space that has landed nearby?...

A series of sudden deaths in high finance leads Steed to dabble in shares while Emma investigates the makers of executive paging devices. Are companies being acquired through a simple and subtle form of murder?

Following a motor crash, Steed and Emma explore the seemingly deserted RAF Hamelin, where they were heading for a party to celebrate the base's closure. Is this surreal landscape all a dream, or is it something worse?

A poacher drowns in a field during a freak storm, and Jonah, the village carpenter, starts building an ark. But Steed thinks it's all got more to do with the permanent cloud that hangs over Grannie Gregson's Glorious Grog factory.

What could an outbreak of motiveless murders have to do with the activities of a marriage bureau called Togetherness Inc.? Well, think of Hitchcock's 'Strangers On A Train' and you'll be close. Steed and Emma seek their ideal partners....

A government official, dresssed as one of the Horse-guards, helps in a raid on secret files and is wounded. Recovering, he remembers nothing. Is his crime anything to do with his membership of Ransack, a club for those with high IQs? Emma can join, but Steed may have to cheat....

Why have all the fish vanished from the Scottish coastline? Does it have anything to do with a dead frogman, found stretched as if on a rack? Steed and Emma think so, which is why they're guests of Ian, the 35th Laird of Clan De'ath, and in danger of being caught by the gillies.

When an agent is killed in the lift of Pinter's Department store, Steed and Emma get involved with King Kane, a tycoon who lives in a penthouse above the store. Why is Professor Popple, a missing atomic scientist, being held in the bargain basement?

A vastly strong, bullet-proof killer homes in on and destroys several electronics executives. Could it have something to do with Dr. Armstrong's automated work place? Or with the activities of a nearby karate school...

Has the late Dr Marlow's proposed radar-jamming system been tested against British defences? If so, the dead scientist seems to be doing it from his grave. And what's the connection with the local hospital's bizarre operations and a train-crazy philanthropist?

Four agents have vanished, looking for each other, in Little Bazeley-by-the-Sea. Steed and Emma go in for the man who went in for the man who.... and meet the odd local landlord, blacksmith and vicar. Are they more than they seem?

Arabian revolutionary Sharp is visiting Britain and Steed is put in charge of security. He thinks it is ironic that they are now protecting a man they were trying to kill five years before. Two agents were thought to have died during the violent bloodshed in Abarain but now one of them is very much alive.

What does Cathy joining a motorcycle gang, two elderly ladies who own a watermill and claim to be witches, and all of the clocks stopping at a local atomic research station have in common? They're all present in Brian Clemen's first great step into the bizarre.

Jockeys and stable hands are being trained in the use of firearms and poisons, so Steed delves deep in the murky world of horse racing.

One of Steed's colleagues has been murdered, and the subsequent investigation takes Cathy to a top-secret research establishment and Steed to a wine merchants.

After attending the funeral of an old friend in a lonely Cornish village cemetery, Steed discovers a plot to poison millionaires.

Six agents have died on an escape route through Hungary and Austria. Anderson, a friend of Steed's, has also gone missing. Steed finds his friend but is then accused of being a traitor and taken to a brainwashing unit in Scotland run by the Wringer.

Bibliotek are a criminal organisation who are fronted as a church. A coming 'Bible Class' will decide who runs Bibliotek. It could be Steed...

The disappearance of an albino elephant from Noah Marshall's zoo seems to be linked to Steed's investigation of ivory dust in a gun shop. Steed sets out to rescue Cathy from the tiger's cage, find Snowy and investigate the ivory smugglers.

An incoming missile attack, which is detected by all but one of the country's early warning stations, proves to be a false alarm. Steed finds himself attending an exclusive New Year's Eve fancy-dress party on a train. The train terminates at a remote, deserted station, and a guest is killed with an arrow.

Emir Abdulla Akaba is visiting London for his annual medical, and Steed suspects an assassination attempt. Despite Steed assumming the guise of a chef, the Emir seems to have been poisoned while eating a meal.

Invited to spend the weekend at the home of medievel costume expert Sir Cavalier Resagne, Cathy finds herself alone in the house, pestered by a young man who claims to be a film director, and haunted by her past. And where is Steed?

Steed and Cathy eat at a Chinese restaurant, but, as ever, it's not just for fun: Steed suspects the owner, Mr Lo, of gold smuggling. He also seems to be allied with Army types who are smuggling ammunition to support ex-servicemen.

Strange diseases are being reported in various parts of the world, and Steed's suspicion is that somebody has been tampering with the insecticides and fertilisers of United Foods and Dressings. Cathy Gale is captured whilst investigating, and will be the 'guinea pig' for a test on the new strain of bubonic plague.

Willis-Sopwoth, a top pharmaceutical firm, is being drained by cheap imitations of its products in foreign markets. The death of a member of staff while investigating the fraud brings Steed and Cathy face to face with a deadly artist and a plot to poison children.

The cornea grafts that will, hopefully, restore the sight of blind millionaire Marten Halvarssen fascinate Steed: they're rumoured to be coming from a live patient, one Hilda Brauer. Steed suspects that all is not what it seems and so sends Cathy to Switzerland to oversee the operation.

Steed's trap for criminal mastermind J.P. Spaggs involves a brilliant plan to steal a million pounds in gold bullion. But when two detectives arrive at Steed's flat and arrest Cathy for Spagge's murder things don't seem to be going to plan.

Michael Dyter, the newly elected MP for South-East Anglia is shot shortly after making his acceptance speech in which he had threatened to expose a major scandal involving the government. Steed knows that the subject of this was the recent theft of a nuclear warhead near London. So was Dyter killed to keep him quiet, and if so, by whom?

At the reading of the will of Wrightson, Steed's former batman, the man's family are shocked to discover his estate is worth a fortune. Steed and Cathy set out to find out where a twenty pounds per week draughtsman acquired such a huge amount of money, and whether it was legal.

The Director of Operations (Disco) of the Nutshell, a subterranean World War III bunker, tells Steed and Cathy that Big Ben, a file giving details of all their double agents, has been copied. Security cameras point to a young girl, but she is later found dead. Evidence implicates Steed, and Disco orders that he be apprehended.

Agent Borowski has been brainwashed by the enemy, but between moments of multiple-personality disorder he tells Steed that three 'doubles' have been created. Steed tracks down one likely replacement to a holiday camp, but then discovers that he, himself, is about to be replaced.

All the occupants of a rest home, Adelphi Park, are multi-millionaires. And most of them are refusing to see anyone, including Professor Renter who was due to fly to America with Steed to show off his latest invention. His wife is unable or unwilling to help and, curiously, the neighbour, Madden, another millionaire, is missing.

Thanks to the clever briefing of the Lakin brothers a man charged with treason is found not guilty. Mrs Gale believes that Steed is implicated, and contacts the newspapers. Steed threatens her: either withdraw her allegations or pay the consequences. Soon Steed is on trial for Gale's murder.

Venus has her camera and films stolen whilst taking pictures in a fun fair. One film is missed, however, and when developed a face can be seen in the Hall of Mirrors - that of Trevelyan, the cypher clerk who has committed suicide. But Venus's photograph was taken after the man's death.

Astonomer Professor Richter believes that the sun's stellar companion, a white dwarf, is returning to the solar system. If it does, that's the end of everything. So why on Earth would anybody want to murder him now?

Steed, investigating the suicide of a University tutor, discovers that the man seems to have shot himself with a gun with a silencer attached. Venus is sent a tub of acid 'face-cream', and there is another mysterious suicide.

A burglar steals two gold-plated eggs from Dr Ashe, not knowing that they contain a deadly virus. The man quickly falls ill, but refuses to indicate where the case containing the eggs is buried.

Steed is entrusted with the safe-keeping of a new fuel formula when its inventor is found in a coma. The scientist had been involved in a black magic circle which leads Steed and Cathy into the world of hexes and magic powers.

Classified information is finding its way into the wrong hands and Steed feels sure that this has something to do with the death of the magician's assistant at the club where Venus Smith is working. Steed investigates the lethal vanishing cabinet.

Marling Ceramics, run by Cathy's friends, Richard and Allan Marling, claim to be on the verge of creating an unbreakable china. However, when Steed arrives to investigate, a body is discovered in a tank of clay.

Steed wants Mrs. Gale to impersonate Hilda Stern, a recently arrested assassin about to be used by the trans-national crime syndicate Intercrime. Things go swimmingly, until the real Hilda Stern breaks out of Holloway and confronts the imposter.

A plane crashes in Ireland in suspicious circumstances, and the bodies are taken to the nearby St. Mary's Convent . Steed calls in Dr. King to check up on the circumstances of death, while he samples Irish hospitality and bad deeds at Shamrock Airport.

A British courier is attacked in Jamaica, and he protects the contents of his diplomatic bag at the expense of his life. But why? The case only contains mundane documents.

Plato, the most advanced computer in the world, which could be used to target intercepting missiles, keeps breaking down. The body of a professor on the team is found within.

Secrets are finding their way from HMS Zebra, a naval base, to the enemy, rendering the Navy's missile-tracking equipment useless. Steed and Mrs. Gale investigate, and find their attention drawn to the local sweet shop.

Illegal diamonds are swamping the market. The wife of a diamond merchant is murdered. Time for Steed and Gathy Gale to feign marriage.

Steed's department is guarding M. Roland, A UN negotiator in London for important talks, but cannot prevent an assassination attempt. Indeed, it seems that one of Steed's colleagues is selling secrets - and Steed finds that even he is under suspicion.

A man involved in a car crash is found to have fifty thousand pounds worth of diamonds in his stomach. Steed investigates the man's joke shop, Big Laugh, and then the offices of multi-millionaire Litoff. The burial of one of Litoff's Great Danes is not quite what it seems.

The owner of a stamp shop is murdered when excitedly talking on the phone to a contact about the rare Mauritius Penny that has turned up on a list. Cathy Gale applies for a job in the shop, and she and Steed witness another murder in an auction room.

Steed is trying to infiltrate a group of assassins currently based in the South of France. He robs the leader of some jewellery in order to impress him, then waits for them in the local club. It just so happens that Venus Smith is singing there.

A film star's stand-in is murdered, and microfilm of North American early warning systems has been stolen. The film star, despite an aversion to travelling by sea, proceeds to Montreal on a luxury liner. In an attempt to find the mocrofilm Dr King is assigned as her personal doctor, and Steed goes under cover as a steward.

Shareholders in Anderson's, a small-arms manufacturers, are being killed one by one whilst a tycoon plans a take-over. Rifles and other weapons, possibly manufactured by Anderson's, are being smuggled into Africa. Cathy Gale joins the board with a 20 per cent share in order to investigate.

Borb, the president of the Balkan Republic, is visiting London to sign a military deal. His private secretary is killed by a masked wrestler, the Decapod. Steed is assigned to augment the president's bodyguards, but the wrestler continues to kill those close to Borb.

At Marseilles airport, Steed and Cathy find the courier they were due to meet dead. His sample of new liquid rocket fuel has been taken. Facing an array of enemy agents, the duo must recover the flask of Propellant 23.

A man is murdered whilst being interviewed on live television. one-Ten is sure that it is the work of the ruthless assassin Mr Teddy Bear, and he asks Cathy Gale to trap the man - by arranging for him to murder Steed.

A visit to London to sign an oil treaty from a monarch whose life is under threat brings Steed and Keel into the world of dissidents and assassinations.

Dr Keel, treating the victims of a cyclone struck Mexican village, uncovers a number of food-poisonings; emergency cooking oil is, in fact, hydraulic fluid.

Top-secret information is finding its way into the wrong hands, and the source seems to be a south coast fairground. Steed succeeds in getting hypnotised and winds up in the ghost-train tunnel. With frightening results, of course.

Keel is asked by the improbably named Bunty to help her find her missing friend. What is the connection between the department store where the women work and a call-girl racket?

Keel, called to deal with a man seriously injured by an accident, quickly discovers that the man is suffering from gunshot wounds, and that he may be implicated in a recent diamond robbery.

An agent has been killed at the secret dockyard where submarines are built. Steed investigates, and finds that a foreign spy has been arranging 'accidents' for him.

After an unsuccessful murder attempt against Sir Wilberforce Lungi, Steed asks Keel, an old friend of the pro-Western African leader, to investigate Lungi's secretary, Jacquetta Brown. Meanwhile, Steed flies to Africa to meet Lungi's tribalist rival, Shebro.

To stop his daughter seeing suspected conman Jeremy de Willoughby, Sir Thomas Waller has hired arch-criminal the Deacon to 'put the frighteners on'. Steed is on the trail of the Deacon and, with the aid of Dr. Keel, stops two thugs from seriously wounding de Willoughby. They set a trap for the Deacon and the lovers.

Steed is trying to track down the organisers of a group who offer to spring any convict - even the dangerous ones - from prison if they're paid the right money. Keel impersonates a prisoner, and the trail seems to lead to a girl's finishing school.

When Keel attends a health conference in Geneva he is unaware that he is carrying, in microdot form, a vital new medical formula - unaware, that is, until he is arrested for murder.

Dr. Keel resuscitates Elaine Bateman, the owner of a ballroom dancing school who has narrowly survived a murder attempt by gassing. When he returns to the school after dropping his scarf, he is arrested. His scarf has been used to strangle the woman.

Steed trails a blackmailed civil servant to Brinkley House, a private zoo, only to observe the man throwing a package of money into the reptile pit. The package soon vanishes. The man is then ordered to steal a top secret file.

Frank Preston is released from prison and is intent on reclaiming the hidden proceeds of his robbery. So is Steed, who has been ordered to follow the man. So are a couple of thugs, who kidnap Carol. So is Preston's scheming wife, eager to get her hands on the one hundred thousand pounds hidden somewhere in the sewers.

Steed, investigating a number of probable arson cases, is led to the hairdressing salon of Olive and Jacques Beronne. He asks Keel to let Carol investigate the salon, but after she enters, there is an explosion from within

Dr Keel is asked to help in the search for a man who has picked up a radioactive isotope, not knowing that it will quickly kill him and harm anyone else he comes into contact with. But Marko, fearing that the police want to find him because of his forged passport, has already gone into hiding.

Steed, attempting to break a gang of international diamond smugglers, is living in a bungalow near Heathrow Airport which was once owned by a suicide whom One-Ten suspects of involvement. Steed awakens one morning somewhat the worse for drink, when a phone call advises him to check the morning paper; the police are tracking a hit-and-run driver. Steed checks his car. It is damaged, and the front is covered with dried blood.

Keel, reviving a young woman who has jumped into the Thames, is led to the Radeck State Circus, where the trapeze girl is guarded, her face covered by bandages because of an accident. The 'trapeze girl'proves to be the daughter of a defecting scientist, who will be used to force her father to return home. When Keel discovers this, he and Carol are captured by Zibbo the Clown, who will shoot Carol if the police investigation is not called off.

A young girl, Carmelite Mendoza, has been kidnapped from a Caribbean island, but Steed suspects a political motive. His suspicions are confirmed when Vasco, the Mendoza family retainer, is observed killing the original kidnapper and abducting the girl himself.

Keel receives a 'phone call from one of his patients, and ends up assuming the identity of her missing husband, a scientist engaged in secret research. Shot in the chest, Keel needs a minor operation - but the anaesthetist has tampered with the oxygen.

Steed impersonates Riordan, a forger soon to be released from prison, and gains the trust of gang-leader Hooper. Things seem to be going well until Hooper's second-in-command, known as the Cardinal, announces that Riordan's girlfriend is outside waiting to see him.

Steed has infiltrated a gang, led by Mason, which is implicated in Peggy's murder. Steed asks Keel to establish contact with a rival gang, and the doctor discovers that Vance's hitman, Spicer, has been sent to kill Steed.

Following the death of his fiancee Peggy at the hands of heroin smugglers, Dr David Keel vows to track down the killers and avenge his lost love. He is aided in his quest by a mysterious stranger, John Steed.

Oliver Karlov meets Linda Thorson.

Cyd Child, Linda Thorson's stunt double, talks about working on the episode Noon Doomsday

Interview with Cyd Child (stunt double for Diana Rigg and Linda Thorson).

Actor Peter Wyngarde talks about his participation in the episode 'Epic'.

Screenwriter Richard Harris speaks to Jaz Wiseman about his work on The Avengers as well its precursor, Police Surgeon.

Interview with Honor Blackman

Actress Elizabeth Shepherd discusses her early role in the development of the iconic sixties series and her memories of filming episodes for the show before being replaced by Diana Rigg.

Original German documentary, titled « Auf den spuren von Tara King ».

Series retrospective presented by Patrick Macnee.

The Tara King actress introduces episode 31 from series 6.

The Tara King actress introduces episode 27 from series 6.

The Tara King actress introduces episode 23 from series 6.

The Tara King actress introduces episode 21 from series 6.

The Tara King actress introduces episode 14 from series 6.

The stars of The Avengers are interviewed for German television by Joachim Fuchsberger.

Filmed on the set of Honey for the Prince, this three-minute advertisement for the US market announced that "The Avengers" were switching to colour film - a move entirely motivated by the sale to America as Britain still broadcast in black & white. This is the only time we see Emma Peel is that tight leather catsuit with the zips in colour, and it's revealed to be a deep mahogany instead of the black everyone always assumed it was.

When The Avengers was bought by the ABC network in the United States in 1966, network executives were concerned that the audience might not take to the show if it didn't understand the characters, so they commissioned a short introductory sequence to fill in the perceived gap. The sequence was only ever broadcast in the USA, so when Canal+ remastered the episodes, it was omitted from the DVDs produced for the US market. A&E and Canal+ were surprised at the uproar this caused, so when the Emma Peel episodes were repackaged after the Ian Hendry episodes came to light, it was included as a feature on the disc.

Harry H Corbett plays a tycoon husband Harry Fender, who has built up the supermarket business from the time he was a delivery boy in his teens - he's now over forty and obsessed with developing the exotic plants in his hothouse. Diana Rigg plays his wife, Anita.

Get the real story behind the sixties cult series in this definitive TV documentary, never before released in the US.