I decided to watch this the other day as I hadn't seen it for ages.
Jonah: what about the strange weather we've been having?
Steed: you can't convince me of that, not in this country.
I love how Macnee delivers that line.
Jonah is a lovely character, perfectly played by Noel Purcell, who was in loads of stuff around this time. Although his expectation of a second flood has to be glossed over in order for the story to work.
Sue Lloyd makes the most of her single Avengers appearance by having some funny responses to Steed's (representing Steed, Steed, Steed, Steed and Jack - all of whom are made up:)) expounding over the delights of wine.
Speaking of Steed, it's always funny when he adopts the role of an eccentric with an interest and baffles the villains into thinking he's a fool. You can tell that Macnee loves getting all florid in his performance.
The final fight is clearly one done on the hoof as it were, with the actors clearly on the verge of hysterics but trying to remember their moves.
Sidney Hayers direction isn't bad but it's not especially stand out and Johnson's score isn't very inspired. I expected more ... Rain music from him. Some great lighting from Alan Hume.
Dr. Strum isn't that impressive a mastermind, rather forgettable really. I think the performance isn't interesting enough. The bad guys are the straight men to the eccentrics like Jonah and Eli.
Talfryn Thomas really should have been in more episodes. Mrs. Peels visit to his leaky home is one of my favourite scenes as he goes around arranging the pots
Eli: and then he fell...
Mrs. Peel: into the pit of iniquity.
Eli: .. No, into Granny Gregson's sparkling spring water.
And him causing her panic for sitting in one chair as it would ruin her clothes. There's a lovely panning shot following Eli passing Peel sitting sipping her tea with an umbrella up in door. Rigg has a perfect oblivious look which makes it all the more funnier.
The tag scene is quite rare in that it actually picks up on the end of the story rather than as it's own entity.
8/10