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The Episode Guide to Season 5 (1967) of The Avengers

Episode 5 - The Bird Who Knew Too Much

continuity and trivia

John Wood and Patrick Macnee are the only actors to appear in the original series and the movie made in 1999 of The Avengers.

This episode is riddled with Hitchcock references -

  1. The title is a clear reference to The Man Who Knew Too Much.
  2. Professor Jordan was the villain in The 39 Steps.
  3. Everyone believes Captain Crusoe to be a person, which is similar to a plot twist in The Man Who Knew Too Much, involving Ambrose Chapel.
  4. Villains using birds in their schemes appear in Sabotage.
  5. A pair of killers (one more prominent than the other) appear in North By Northwest.
  6. Mistaken identity is prominent and also occurs in North By Northwest, and many others.

A major continuity error at Jordan's house - Emma parks her car at an angle across the driveway in front of the house, but the Lotus has mysteriously vanished when Robin turns up in his Austin 1800 - only Jordan's Austin 12 is visible. Furthermore, the Lotus reappears in its previous position when Mrs Peel runs for the cover of the brick wall, Jordan covering her as she approaches Robin.

Patrick Macnee slightly fluffs one of his lines - he's on the phone to HQ, and saying goodbye to Mrs Peel as she leaves Pearson's flat at the same time, and realises halfway through saying "you have to arrange the discreet removal of Pearson's body" that he's meant to be saying that into the phone, rather than to Emma.

Emma casually parks her car But where is it now? Now it's back!
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The bird sculpture which receives Steed's arrow in the intro, winds up in Tom Savage's studio - a much sought-after piece! By the end of the episode, it's back in Mrs Peel's apartment. You might remember it turning up in the offices of Art Incorporated in The Girl from Auntie.
The sculpture appears in the first six episodes on this season, turning up for the last time in The Winged Avenger (there are no scenes in Emma's flat in The Living Dead, and she's redecorating it in The Hidden Tiger).

Tom Savage's studio must be near Mackiedockie Court (Escape in Time), as they're both near the same Stone St. And they must both be near Purbright & Co. (Quick-Quick Slow Death) which is on Mackiedockie Street.

As Pat models... and as Emma does ...but wasn't it here?
©1961-9 CANAL+IMAGE UK Ltd All Rights Reserved
LEFT: Mrs Peel might dive off that diving board, but Diana Rigg didn't! That's stuntman Peter Elliott diving off the board - Cyd Child gets the diving duties in the next episode, here she just runs behind a car, over the fence and across the concrete - you can see a pigtail very briefly fly out from under her wig.

RIGHT: It's those doors again! This time at Heathcliff Hall.
©1961-9 CANAL+IMAGE UK Ltd All Rights Reserved

Ever noticed that Sam and Steed have lunch at the same tow path that Danvers was chased and killed?
(Other sites claim a continuity error with Danvers having a wet knee before falling on the tow path, but I think he got it from the grass, as it's nearly dry when he leaps the barbed wire a bit later and his knee doesn't go in the water in this scene.)

Left: We have another occurrence of colour shift in a driving scene because of the backdrop projection, around the 43:17 mark - making Mrs Peel's blue catsuit a deep green.

Steed rings Mrs Peel on 269 2644 in this episode, her number changes so often...
Also, when Steed and Mrs Peel arrive to see Pearson, they drive down a wide street with no side streets, and all the buildings plastered white, yet Verret and Robin are keeping watch across the street, parked in a side street alongside a red brick building (notice their wing mirror in the last shot of the sequence). I'm betting they originally filmed it with the Bentley stopping outside the flat, then changed the shot to across the street.
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