So I watched
The Hanged Man, for the very good reason "Because Gareth is in it."
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It was actually pretty good, Gareth aside. It's basically an eight-part miniseries, which made for a change as it actually had a heavy dose of continuity, something I'm not used to seeing in shows from that time, but it was really gratifying when the characters referred casually to something that happened two episodes back.
The premise is pretty straight-forward. Lew Burnett (played by Colin Blakely, whose part in
Murdersville we've been chatting about recently. He was also the interrogator in the
Champions clips episode "The Interrogation", which I watched, awhile back, but don't remember what said interrogator looked like well enough to recognise him) having survived several attempts on his life, decides to pretend that the latest attempt worked and "stays dead" to buy himself time to work out who it is who's trying to kill him, and why. Michael Williams (who I've just discovered was Judi Dench's husband!) plays Alan Crowe, an ex-mercenary who now works for an insurance company (I'm so serious) doesn't believe Lew's dead, so he tracks him down and offers to help him out, basically because he's bored and figures he could learn a trick or two. Of the two, Alan is my favourite. Lew's always getting beaten up and bloodied, but Alan gets the job done and barely ruffles his side-part. They make a pretty good double act. This is one of those shows where the characters manage to be likeable and follow their own code of ethics, despite having done and still doing some morally questionable stuff. It actually reminds me a bit of
Man in a Suitcase. I would have loved a show where Alana, Lew, and McGill traipsed across Europe doing jobs and writing wrongs like a bloodier, more brutal
Persuaders (the suitcase probably would have gotten jealous, though
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).
They're tracked almost the whole time by an assassin named Quentin, who is possibly the least-successful hired killer ever, because he manages to kill lots of people around Lew, but fails to kill Lew himself a whole whack of times. Even his employer (who leaves all his instructions on an answering machine or communicates via intercom) points out that his success rate isn't too good. Honestly, you'd think he'd hire someone else, because it must be costing a fortune to keep him on.
Gareth has a two-episode stint as one of Alan's shady contacts at a shady bar where shady stuff goes on. All his scenes are quite talky, so he doesn't get a lot of action. Instead he smokes a lot, gets sent to do dirty work, and reports back on the state of things. It's not a mile away from Gambit, though, since it's insinuated he can go off and do a fair bit of damage when required. This was shot in 1974, so it's pre- both
Upstairs, Downstairs and TNA, but I desperately want to know
when in 1974, because Gareth shot his guest spot in UpDown in August of the same year (which led to him being asked back as part of the regular cast), and his hair was pretty short there, but it's quite a bit longer here. So either he did this first and cut it, or he did it after and grew it out really fast. If anyone has a production date, I'd be grateful.
There's also a whole whack of Avengers guest stars floating around in pretty much every episode--Julian Glover, Frederick Jaeger, Angela Browne, and loads of others where I know the face but not the name, plus Ray Smith from
Dempsey and Makepeace. Jane Seymour pops up at the end as Lew's daughter, fresh off
Live and Let Die.
It's really quite enjoyable, and it kept me hooked because I wanted to know who was trying to kill Lew. It's more violent than, say, TNA, but by today's standards it's nothing. I'd recommend it.