6.07 - Look (Stop Me If You've Heard This One) But...

[cyberrich]

Look stop me is the latest episode under review. I'd love to hear what you think of this one if you get chance to view it over the next week or two. Thanks, Rich.

[Rhonda]

Guest stars in this pretty zany episode are in the scenes that I remember most. Bernard Cribbins is good at Bradley Marler the joke-writer who doesn't seem to notice that he's surrounded by so much crumpled paper with his rejected jokes. Cleese the painted-egg man is also unaware how eccentric his workplace is. They're two of the many memeorable scenes in this one. I felt sorry for Tara not managing to protect the businessman and don't like the black humour of how he meets his end; that's why I give a half like/half dislike 5/10. The finale is fun to watch; they really do manage all the quick costume changes!

[Andrew Pixley]

Massive fun! Always enjoyed this ... and it's basically as daft as I'd like "The Avengers" to become, aided by the fact that the subject matter (i.e. the entertainment world) allows it to be daft for a reason rather than contrived daftness. Some really great moments in it ... Lord Dessington's death by carpet is brilliant, the appearance of John Cleese is fascinating because it demonstrates how the production team were using the latest cutting-edge comedy performers of the day, and Bernard Cribbins in his paper-filled room is just genius.

All the best

Andrew

[darren]

I'm sure that Bradley Marler's office of screwed up jokes must have been a slightly autobiographical for Dennis Spooner since he started his entertainment career as part of a comedy double act. I like to think that anyway. The prop people must have spent ages screwing up all that paper! Cribbins is so personable that he's sad when Marler dies -

Actually this is one of the few episodes were the deaths really affect you as the characters seem to live more. If Lord Dessington was yet another faceless business man we wouldn't care but his lovely scene of being awkward around Tara and their joyful conversation about shared interests really humanises him and it makes his death all the more tragic.

[frank]

Well this has always been my favorite episode. I wrote the chapter for it in Rodney's book.

In a nutshell, I always felt structurally this was most like an Emma Peel episode. Not a surprise since James Hill directed it.

There's an appealing subversive-ness to it using practical jokes as a modus operandi.

The absurdity level is outrageous. It's probably one of the most extreme epsiodes made -if not the most extreme and I loved every crazy moment

What I also really like is how Dennis Spooner's script includes for real banter and exchange between Steed and Tara. Yes he wrote her as a novice agent under Steed's wing-which was in keeping with the early episodes. But we have the 2 playing off each other in a whimsical way-right up to the final comments they made post big final fight

and that fight was the most I ever saw on the show

[cyberrich]

The theme of old being replaced by new has been dealt with very effectively several times during The Avengers run, but never in such a wonderfully uncompromising bizarre way as here, in Look stop me...
Steed clearly represents the old and as he famously said to Mrs Peel in The Cybernauts when she asked him about the probability of man being replaced by robots; "Not if I have anything to do with it."
Vaudeville was a dying form of entertainment as early as the 1940's. This episode has a wonderfully original plot of the last of a dying breed not going quietly, that could only ever be found in Avengerland. Every scene offers something extremely bizarre even by Avengers standards, visually, dramatically, comically, and every which way. The three standout scenes which all qualify for most memorable scene in the Avengers 8 year run, are those scenes with Cribbins, Cleese and of course the quick change finale.
Linda, after a few tentative steps in earlier episodes, begins to show more assurance in her role with this episode, handling both comedy and action scenes admirably. This is definitely among the top 5 episodes of season 6, and one of those episodes that actually improves with each viewing. 10/10. Rich.

[anti-clockwise]

I'm sure that Bradley Marler's office of screwed up jokes must have been a slightly autobiographical for Dennis Spooner since he started his entertainment career as part of a comedy double act. I like to think that anyway. The prop people must have spent ages screwing up all that paper! Cribbins is so personable that he's sad when Marler dies -

Actually this is one of the few episodes were the deaths really affect you as the characters seem to live more. If Lord Dessington was yet another faceless business man we wouldn't care but his lovely scene of being awkward around Tara and their joyful conversation about shared interests really humanises him and it makes his death all the more tragic.

Thank you Darren. A most interesting tidbit about Dennis Spooner. If he was indeed part of a comedian duo, you must be spot on about this inside joke. I wonder in real life if his duo was a success?

[dissolute]

I watched this again on my commute to work and back today. I remember not liking it very much the first time I saw it because it was too over the top and, to be frank, I do not like clowns! (What is it with clowns in The Avengers anyway?)

Having said that, it is in fact a great episode. Linda is in sterling form as Tara, possibly one of her best performances, and the dialogue has lost the early awkwardness that her arrival delivered.
Macnee, as always, is great and even does a bit of his own fight scenes, which is a rarity (although I did notice a stand in - Paul Weston, I think - for some of the fencing.

The scenes in Marler's office are hilarious altohugh I note with dismay that it's obviously ripped and crumpled scripts they've used.

"Pink pages, Kirby! This will mean pink pages!", to quote Z.Z. von Schnerk.

The guest stars are all great although some are squandered (why do we suddenly have Merlinat the end of the episode?) and while you can see the end coming a mile away it is lots of fun.

BUT Steed and King should never have exited stage left like a pair of clowns!

[Spaceship Dispatcher]

Some really interesting observations here, several had never occurred to me before reading the comments! There’s a fascinating juxtaposition between how Marler and Rugman are largely oblivious to the absurdity of the methods by which they carry out their professions, though for different reasons, while the principle protagonists of the piece owe their livelihoods to embracing absurdity in their work. Likewise the death of Lord Dessington is made more serious by virtue of its silliness. Steed and Tara work very well as a double act in their scenes together in many episodes in my opinion rather than just this one, but here it’s especially relevant as they battle the opposing pairing of Merry Maxie Martin and is accomplice. In this regard I actually find it fitting that Steed and Tara dance off the set in the music hall style; and to me there’s a distinction between the circus entertainment that clowns are generally associated with and traditional music hall or promenade style acts, a distinction that the episode itself seems unclear on though I prefer to view it through the prism of the latter. While this is not one of my very favourite Avengers episodes it is nonetheless one that I can watch on a regular basis without ever tiring of it, and one that I rate very highly indeed. Just as clowns appear fun but underneath are often very serious, sometimes actually quite sad, and may be dealing with serious issues such as depression under a façade of colour and humour, that’s how I feel about this episode too.

[Andrew Pixley]

BUT Steed and King should never have exited stage left like a pair of clowns!

I never had a problem with that bit ... For me it was tapping into the whole vaudeville style in the hyper-real way that, by this time, "The Avengers" was telling us: "Hey ... we're not real, just a television show". As they had been doing really since the shift to film and particularly since the shift to colour.

Actually, I just thought, while typing the word "vaudeville", that what with the use of that word and the notion of Vauda Villa ... it's another instance of ABC cutting their cloth to fit an American customer. It's really an American term whereas Steed and Tara would generally be referring to "Music Hall" (as indeed Bradley Marler does) or "Variety". Dessington again talks of his company buying up "a whole chain of Vaudeville theatres". So it's using imagery which was present in the UK ... but in terms of US vocabulary.

All the best

Andrew