Avengerworld - The Avengers In Our Lives

By Alan Hayes

The Avengers was a revolutionary series that always playfully twisted perceptions, pushed the boundaries of its genre and defied those who wished to pigeonhole it. The team behind The Avengers never forgot its primary objective was to entertain. And entertain it certainly did, inspiring successive generations to welcome The Avengers into their hearts. Right from its foreword by pioneering television historian Dave Rogers to its afterword by Jason Whiton of SpyVibe, Avengerworld celebrates the series, its international fandom and its fans. Over the course of more than forty essays, Avengers fans the world over relate how they first encountered the series, how they grew up with it at their sides, made friends, engaged with fandom and were inspired to do extraordinary things. Proceeds from this book will be donated to Champion Chanzige, a charity organisation that exists to improve conditions for underprivileged children at a primary school in Southern Tanzania – and helps them to do extraordinary things too.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Jan 21, 2018
• ISBN: 9780244660970

Book preview

Avengerworld - The Avengers In Our Lives

AVENGERWORLD - THE AVENGERS IN OUR LIVES

EDITED BY ALAN HAYES

This book is produced in aid of Champion Chanzige

a HIDDEN TIGER publication

Copyright Information

AVENGERWORLD – THE AVENGERS IN OUR LIVES

Edited by Alan Hayes

© 2016 Hidden Tiger

All rights reserved

ISBN 978-0-244-66097-0

First published in paperback and hardback on 6th February 2016 by Hidden Tiger

eBook Edition © Hidden Tiger, 2018

Cover Design © Shaqui Le Vesconte, 2016

Foreword © Dave Rogers, 2016

Afterword © Jason Whiton, 2016

Other text and illustrations © respective contributors – used with permission

Champion Chanzige name used with permission

This publication is unauthorised and is not endorsed by StudioCanal or other rights holders of The Avengers. No link to any such organisation is claimed.

The rights of the respective contributors to be identified as the authors of this work have been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publisher.

A Hidden Tiger Book

www.hiddentigerbooks.co.uk

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Foreword – Dave Rogers

WHAT DOES THE AVENGERS MEAN TO ME?

Invited to write a foreword for this book, the spur that made the difference between a ‘yes’ and a ‘no’ was the fact that proceeds from the sale of the title will be channelled into a charitable cause of the editor Alan’s choosing.

Yet, having convinced myself to give it a shot, I immediately drew a blank as to which direction to go in. Avengers aficionados are more than familiar with the series’ historical background and contributors to this book will add even more paint to the canvas, so there was nothing new to add in that department. There was, however, another side to the story – an insider’s view – which, one hopes, dedicated Avengers followers will find both entertaining and revealing, namely the how and why behind the publication of my books mixed with some hitherto unpublished Avengers-related stories.

* * *

To understand my love affair with The Avengers one needs to go back to the early Sixties when I was touring the United Kingdom as pop vocalist Dean Rogers. My first port of call after depositing my stage gear in the theatre was to check out access to a television set on which to view my weekly fix of David Keel, Cathy Gale and John Steed. Indeed, I went further, spending many an hour in the dressing room making prodigious notes about the show, particularly the names of that week’s guest stars, the writers and directors of each episode and a brief story synopsis – notes which, unknown to me at the time, would later kick start a brand new career.

Why The Avengers? Heaven knows, but my obsession with the spy-busting duo began from that moment.

Jump to 1982 and a meeting with a gentleman named Robert ‘Bud’ Payton in the St Martin’s Street offices of EMI (who owned The Avengers copyright). Based on the copious notes I’d written I had this idea for a one-off magazine devoted to the show. Bud handled the meeting with finesse. No way, dear boy, he challenged, going on to explain that The Avengers was, even then, a hugely successful money-earner worldwide. Unless I could guarantee a professionally-printed magazine, one published by a major printing house, the magazine idea was dead in the water. A book, however, would be quite in order and Bud would open up the archives to accommodate my every need for further research material.

I floated the project with a group of UK publishers, the majority of whom thought I was bonkers. The idea of publishing a book dedicated to a TV programme that hadn’t been transmitted on British TV for nigh on two decades didn’t stir them at all. "Who remembers The Avengers?" they chorused as one, condemning the idea as a non-starter.

The book publishing arm of TV Times gambled on the book’s success, spurred on by one of their bright young stars, a chap named Neil Tennant (yes, that Neil Tennant, who, way before the book was published left the company to form the pop group the Pet Shop Boys). It was Neil’s idea to publish the book totally in black and white to capture the style and flavour of the Sixties.

About this time Channel 4 TV caught whim that the book was to be published and decided to risk their arm by screening the Diana Rigg colour episodes – to great success, this despite the fact that the condition of the prints they transmitted were ropey to say the least with varying picture quality and drop-out sound. As a consequence the book was promoted in all 17 regional issues of the TV Times and went on to sell in excess of 38,000 copies during the first six months of publication – a huge figure for a tome that was viewed as little more than a glorified episode guide as one publisher’s reviewer dubbed the book. The money rolled in, not a fortune mind you, but enough to lay down a deposit on a house and pay off the mortgage in record time.

My life changed dramatically. Now a ‘celeb’, I was asked to appear on TV and radio to promote the book and, the cream on the cake, received invites to attend TV-related conventions in the good old US of A, with Chicago being my first port of call. My relationship with American fandom blossomed and I was invited back year after year.

The book’s popularity gained way for a second volume, this time covering The New Avengers TV series. Achieving nowhere near the sales figures of the previous volume, I was nevertheless unable to shake the mantle of ‘the Avengers guru’ and was invited to update my first book with new material gleaned from the inter-office memos and production-related documents supplied by Bud Payton. Sales figures were better than imagined and it wasn’t long before I was being asked to repeat the exercise with book number four.

Add to the mix many years worth of fan magazines devoted to the series, a novel co-written with author John Peel, the copious liner notes I wrote for both the VHS and DVD releases, and the picture is pretty much complete.

* * *

But what does The Avengers mean to me? During the Eighties and Nineties, pretty much everything.

It also conjures up memories – treasured memories that will last a lifetime. Like the times when I’ve witnessed the stars of the show doing the things that come naturally when not under the showbiz spotlight: Linda Thorson singing a ‘love song’ to John Steed during her appearance at a Chicago TV convention, the song Elvis Presley’s Are You Lonesome Tonight? with the lyrics changed to reflect Linda’s close affection for her co-star. (Are the chains in your parlour still hanging there? Do you stare at my portrait and picture me bare?). There was the time when Patrick Macnee greeted me and my wife Celia dressed only in his vest and underpants backstage at the Savoy Theatre during his stint in the mystery thriller Killing Jessica. Caught off guard (he expected us to join him after the second performance) he nevertheless made us welcome and enthralled us with ‘back stage gossip’. Never happier than when sharing his leisure hours with friends, Patrick and myself spent many happy times together, a highlight being the four days we spent in Nice when a group of young French TV aficionados attempted to mount a TV awards ceremony to rival the Cannes film festival. Sadly it was doomed to failure and the guys went broke. Linda was among the invited guests and a joyous occasion was had by all.

A special moment was the time when Granada TV invited me to pen introductions for all filmed episodes of the show to celebrate the transmission of The Avengers in Granada-land (and the launch by Contender of the episodes on DVD). To be read by Patrick, the filming was to take place in The Beverly Hilton Hotel, in Los Angeles. As writer I was invited to tag along and be on call if Patrick required changes to the script. He didn’t for the ones I’d written, but asked for rewrites to the intros written by the people at Contender – the use of the word ‘kinky’ being a big no-no as far as Patrick was concerned!

Fondly remembered is the time when Avengers Godfather Brian Clemens invited me and my American pal Dan Recchia to his Bedfordshire home for an interview that would eventually be published in Stay Tuned, the Avengers magazine I produced and edited. We spent seven hours in Brian’s company and the maestro of mystery let his hair down as never before, providing lots of insider detail that remains unpublished to this day. (Viewed as the series’ Godfather, Brian never reneged on a promise he made to me despite the slings and arrows fired at him by many of his contemporaries.)

Other memories abound. Like attending The Avengers video launch party and sharing a plate of buffet sausages with Diana Rigg, who gate-crashed the party unexpectedly and proved amiable and carefree throughout the time she was there.

A treat was being in the company of Gareth Hunt, whom I met on several occasions. There was never a dull moment when in Gareth’s company. Hilarious and full of showbiz and golfing stories, being with him was fun with a capital F. Had he not become an actor, he would have easily carved out a career as a stand-up comedian. Oh, and he also did the best vocal impression of Patrick McGoohan I’ve ever heard!

One recalls the time when director Bob Fuest and I guested at the Nottingham Film Festival and saw off three bottles of wine in one sitting! And the day I fed lines to director James Hill during the taping of the TV documentary Without Walls: The Avengers (even directors sometimes require direction!). My nerve was tested when asked to write and ‘direct’ a video promo for the launch of The Avengers on DVD. Despite seven hours spent in the editing suite, the footage (edited from the ducking stool scene from the episode Murdersville) was never completed and sits unused in the archive – as does a series of TV interviews with Patrick, Linda and myself filmed by French TV during the time the three of us flew to Paris to promote the official release of the Avengers videos.

Courtesy of The Avengers I made many lasting friendships. High on the list are Stephen and Joy Curry (close friends of Patrick’s and two of the nicest people one could wish to meet), John Herron, head of the EMI / StudioCanal film archive (reliable and steadfast in all his undertakings, Avengers aficionados owe a great debt to John) and the afore-mentioned Bud Payton, who kick-started my career and guided its orbit with a steady hand.

One shouldn’t overlook the input into one’s life by aficionados of the series, without whom the Avengers story would be much the poorer. People like Dave Matthews (whose dedication to the cause knows no bounds), Andrew Pixley (a rivalry that blossomed into friendship and respect for each other’s talents), Chris Perry of Kaleidoscope (who kept his finger on the pulse of the UK’s television archives and continues to do so to this day) and, well, a multitude of people I’d love to mention but lack of space prohibits. You know who you are and I thank you all for keeping the flag flying.

* * *

Does the above smell of stroking one’s ego? It certainly reads that way. But things happened as described and I’ve no other way of sharing my story with you or of letting you know just what a thrill it was to be part of Avengers history. I made a lot of friends (and possibly a couple of enemies) along the way but always, always, I attempted to tell it as it was and kept well away from unproven hearsay.

So, while I’m delighted that others are now running with the torch, the inevitable question is do I bear ill will towards the authors / researchers who have followed in my footsteps, the ones who have adapted my work (for better or for worse) and produced their own version of The Avengers story? The short answer is none whatsoever. There’s room enough in TV Land for everyone. I do, however, take exception to those writers who attempt to rewrite history by pouring doubt on my research. If I misrepresented something (and who amongst us is infallible?) please correct any omissions for the greater good, but please, don’t sing from someone else’s song sheet and then compose new lyrics of your own. Print the facts, not the conjecture.

You can see, then, that living under the mantle of ‘the Avengers guru’ has proved no hardship at all. Indeed, I wore the badge with a huge sense of pride and self-fulfilment.

What does The Avengers mean to me? There really is no dark, lurking mystery waiting to be avenged by agents extraordinary. It’s simply that I love quality and excellence. The Avengers had both - and then some.

Preface – Alan Hayes

THE WORLD THAT STEED BUILT

The idea for this book is one that I’ve had in the back of my mind for several years, though until recently I hadn’t been certain as to exactly how it would come to life. I wanted to celebrate Avengers fandom, but none of the ideas I had on the subject really fired my imagination. Consequently, I worked on other Avengers books with my regular co-author Richard McGinlay, and the idea buzzed around in the background, steadfastly refusing to crystallise into something viable. I wanted an international angle at its centre, not least because I have for many years been involved in Avengers projects with friends in all sorts of wonderful places around the world. Linguistic and political boundaries are as nothing to The Avengers.

It wasn’t until I was invited by my friend J.R. Southall to contribute to his series of Doctor Who fan anthologies – You and Who (http://watchingbooks.weebly. com/) – that inspiration finally took hold. Rather than writing about fandom in a documentary fashion, wouldn’t it be great if the perspective was personal, and the essays were written by a range of fans, each detailing how they interact with the series and its fandom? Fortunately, J.R. kindly gave my adaptation of his idea his full blessing, for which I am eternally grateful. Do check his books out – they benefit good causes just as this one does.

The title sprang to mind instantly: the term ‘Avengerland’ has passed into the everyday vocabulary of Avengers fans, so it was a short hop to come up with an even wider canvas – the ‘Avengerworld’.

My intention for Avengerworld was simple. I wanted it, first and foremost, to be a positive, light-hearted celebration of the series and its fandom. Through it, fans like me would relate how we first encountered the series, how we grew up with it at our side, how it led to friendships and an involvement in fandom, and how it has inspired us to do extraordinary things. With the essays being written by people from all around the Avengerworld, the idea was that the book would reflect the many different cultures touched by The Avengers, too. I hoped the book would be as much about Chapeau melon et bottes de cuir, Agente Speciale, Los Vengadores and Mit Schirm, Charme und Melone as it would be about The Avengers. (Sadly, I drew a blank commissioning writers from Argentina, Brazil, Portugal and Spain despite hopeful signs, but Los Vengadores is not entirely forgotten as you will see.)

With this concept in mind, I set about inviting writers aboard the project, and advertised it at The Avengers – The International Fan Forum (http://avengersfanforum.s2.bizhat.com/index.php?mforum=avengersfanforum) on 12th December 2014, asking for one author per country. When the initial take-up proved to be slow, perhaps due to the forum not being as lively as it once was (please give it a look and get on board!), I set upon a change of approach, inviting writers privately. I also dropped the ‘one per country’ rule as unworkable, as it had become clear that while The Avengers is an international phenomenon, its fandom is for the most part centred on certain areas: namely the United Kingdom, Europe, North America and the Antipodes. So, unless I wanted to issue Avengerworld as a very slim volume, I had to break my own rules. So, what you now hold in your hands is the result of a flexible approach!

I have been consistently thrilled and humbled by the remarkable standard of the essays that have been delivered. Each and every one that appears in Avengerworld tells a different story, and each of them throbs with the heartbeat of and a love for The Avengers, while offering tantalising glimpses into different cultures as a result. It’s been fascinating to see how writers have interpreted the brief in a variety of ways. Some have told their story from their beginnings with The Avengers to the present day, while others have focused upon specific aspects of their appreciation of the series or projects that they have been involved in. Rather than insisting that writers rigidly adhere to a restrictive brief, I have welcomed different approaches – and wild variations in word count – and feel that this only adds to the variety and readability of the book. After all, The Avengers was a series of many different flavours, and it is wholly appropriate that Avengerworld should be also. I am sure that readers of this book will find these essays as captivating as I have.

Each author is credited next to the title of his or her essay, along with a note of their age at the time of writing, plus their current home town and country. As a fun aside, each author has been asked to nominate their favourite Avengers episode. Unsurprisingly, some were unable to limit themselves to one (myself included!) – and this is also a part of the joy of this book.

The essays are presented in an order which I hope will lead to a diverting read. I have tried not to group pieces together from people with similar experiences. My own essay is placed first, not out of any presumption of importance on my part, nor due to vanity (perish the thought!), but because its title ‘Opening Gambit’ would have looked strange placed halfway through the book! Look on the bright side – at least it means that the least exciting essay is out of the way quickly!

In bringing this book together, I have endeavoured to retain as much local colour as possible. In other words, British essays will refer to the ‘colour’ episodes while others might note them as ‘color’. Likewise, while in the United Kingdom we tend to split the show up into ‘series’, others prefer ‘seasons’, and rather than impose rigid rules on terminology, I have elected to preserve these and other such differences in the text of this book. If you’re a proof-reader by profession, it will probably infuriate you, but it’s a deliberate editorial choice.

From the outset, the intention was for this book to benefit a deserving charity, preferably one that improves the lives of disadvantaged children. After a series of frustrating experiences with the larger, more corporate children’s charities that I approached, each of whom seemed intent upon putting obstacles in the way of receiving the profits from Avengerworld, I am delighted to say that we have the perfect partner on board in the shape of Champion Chanzige. This charity organisation works to improve conditions and resourcing for a primary school in Tanzania and is co-ordinated from the UK by the tireless Philippa Jacobs. As commissioning editor of this book, I can’t imagine a better charity partner to be working with. You can read a little about this great cause in the following chapter.

It is appropriate at this point to thank the people who have been hugely supportive of the Avengerworld project. There are too many to name each and every one of them here (please see the Acknowledgements page for the full roll of honour), but I want to say particular thank yous to our cover artist Shaqui Le Vesconte, and to Lauren Humphries-Brooks, Denis Kirsanov, Rodney Marshall and Dave Matthews, all of whom not only wrote for the project but also were active in seeking out additional authors on my behalf.

It has also been a privilege to have the support of Dave Rogers, to whom we all owe an incredible debt as Avengers fans. I was delighted to receive his wonderful foreword – surely the most appropriate person to introduce this book, so great has been his contribution to fandom over the years. Dave conducted his researches in an era in which he really had to do the graft. He didn’t have the luxuries that for instance Richard McGinlay and I have enjoyed in more recent years – such as having easy access to information in public archives including the BFI Reuben Library, and via the internet. He was working from scratch, whereas now so much information is already established. It is Dave who took the trouble to find those things out. Were that not enough, he was one of the first facilitators of a connected Avengers fandom. I am sure that when Dave reads this book, it will be brought home to him how regularly his hard work and dedication to The Avengers has played a significant part in the fan experiences of Avengerphiles the world over.

I’d also like to thank all purchasers of the book – not only are you supporting the project, but every sale helps Champion Chanzige in their valuable work in Southern Tanzania.

Finally, I would like to tip my bowler in thanks to all the wonderful authors who have contributed so enthusiastically to Avengerworld. Without your unique perspectives, this would be a very dull book indeed. Together, we have built a unique record that celebrates not only The Avengers but also its transmission, merchandising, personnel and its remarkable international fandom. It has been an absolute pleasure working with you all.

Our Charity Partner – Philippa Jacobs

http://www.championchanzige.com/

In October 2013 I visited Chanzige Primary School in Southern Tanzania. Having spent the previous 13 years working in the United Kingdom primary education sector, it was shocking for me to see how under-resourced these schools really are.

They had no electricity, still had blackboards, and the children were sharing basic resources such as pencils and paper. Their library was pitiful and the dedicated teaching staff there were struggling to teach a meaningful curriculum due to the very limited tools that were available to them.

On my return home, I set up Champion Chanzige, hoping to raise enough money to provide the school with electricity. I approached friends and family and got a good response, possibly because people seem to be becoming disillusioned with donating to the bigger charities and never really seeing the difference that their money is making.

In the last two years we have been able to install electricity to one classroom, and with the help of a grant from Meeting Industry Meeting Needs (MIMN), we fitted out this room as a Community Learning Centre, complete with six personal computers. This facility is used not only by the children at the school but by the whole community. Information Technology lessons are available in the evening to adults, who are only charged a small fee to cover the cost of the electricity and for occasional maintenance.

We have had a rain water harvesting system installed in the school grounds, having discovered last year that the school had no reliable source of drinking water – some children would walk four to five kilometres to school, spend the day learning and walk home again, without a drink. Hopefully, this problem is now addressed. Once again, MIMN helped us out with this project.

Our most recent project was to open a small school shop. The children run the shop, giving them the opportunity to pick up valuable skills, and any profit made is used to buy less well-off children the stationery they need to attend school. As a side point, children in Tanzania have to pay for secondary education – if they can’t afford it, they do not go – and therefore, the more skills they can acquire in primary school, the better.

I have also managed to gain the support of a number of primary schools in the United Kingdom. As a result, we have shipped donated books and pencil cases and the schools occasionally do fundraisers on our behalf. While the work on the ground in Tanzania is our primary focus, it is vitally important to raise awareness here at home. As part of this initiative, we have launched a letter writing exchange project between primary school children in the United Kingdom and those at Chanzige. A primary school teacher, Andy Dobson, joined the charity in October and travelled to Tanzania with his camera. He took a large amount of footage, helped by the Chanzige students. He took the footage back to his Year 6 class in the UK and they edited it together with footage of their own to produce a fabulous film that compares the education and lifestyles of the two cultures.

We consider it very important that the children at Chanzige have some say in how they would like to see their school develop and benefit from our charity, and consequently we have set up the Champion Chanzige Junior Committee (CCJC). Through this forum, the children have asked for cleaning equipment, more books, a flag pole and sports equipment, all of which we have been able to provide. We have also supplied write on, wipe off white boards in every classroom and 200 A4 whiteboards for student use.

Looking to the future, we would like to renovate the local community centre. Currently it has no electricity, no windows or doors, and is in a pretty sorry state. We estimate that the cost of this particular project will be in the region of £10,500. In the longer term, we also plan to make the community centre accessible to disabled people as there are no facilities, educational or otherwise, for disabled children in the district.

Although these children and their community have very little, they are among the happiest, warmest and most welcoming people that I have ever met. The children at the school consider education to be a privilege and are desperate to learn. Champion Chanzige is only a very small charity but we aim to help these inspirational young people, their families and their wider community and can guarantee that every penny that we raise (gift aid included!) will reach, and make a difference, to the children and wider community of Chanzige.

We are thrilled to be associated with the Avengerworld project, and thank all those involved for their generosity. We’ll see what we can do about supplying the children with bowler hats and umbrellas in celebration!

‘Opening Gambit’ by Alan Hayes

Age 50, St Albans, Hertfordshire, England

Favourite episodes: Girl on the Trapeze and Mandrake (video) and Target! (film)

The month of October 1976 proved to be something of a revelation for me, for that was when I discovered the two television series which would lead me to run websites, recover lost radio programmes, write books, contribute to DVD releases, forge lifelong friendships… and even get married! It seems incredible today to consider that one short week in my eleventh year could turn out to be so pivotal in my life, but transmission dates don’t lie – I was introduced to The New Avengers on Tuesday 19th October with The Eagle’s Nest and then got my first fix of Doctor Who (featuring the mesmeric Tom Baker as the Doctor) on Saturday 23rd, when the final episode of The Hand of Fear was shown.

I quickly took to both series, though in the case of the latter, I was soon kicking myself for not having got on board sooner. Doctor Who was one of those shows that everyone kept saying was terrifying to watch, and it therefore took me some time to pluck up the courage to try it out properly, having restricted myself to little more than glimpses previously. I was a sensitive child and not all that brave when it came to facing up to my fears (not that Doctor Who was actually particularly frightening, as I soon found out). With The New Avengers, however, this was a new series and, being a particularly dim-witted kid unaware of the show’s illustrious predecessor, it never even occurred to me that the New of the title implied that it was a follow-up to The (Old) Avengers. In other words, I was previously aware of Doctor Who but opted not to watch it for reasons of cowardice, whereas to me The New Avengers was a completely unknown quantity. All I knew about it was contained in that week’s TV Times magazine, and I clearly hadn’t even read the write-up particularly diligently.

Prior to my October appointments with The New Avengers and Doctor Who, I had only watched a modest amount of television, being very much an outdoors kid. If I wasn’t out playing football or cycling, I was having adventures with friends in my neighbourhood, messing about on one of the few remaining Second World War bomb sites in our locality – which was Plumstead, south east London. Looking back, the risk of getting injured or worse still was probably quite high. We didn’t even consider the possibility that unexploded wartime bombs might have been concealed underneath this fenced-off site, but parents allowed their children to roam in those days and I am grateful for not being too mollycoddled by mine.

What television I did watch and enjoy comprised the gamut of Gerry Anderson’s output, particularly Thunderbirds, Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons and my first ‘adult’ series, UFO (still a favourite), plus, from a different stable, Timeslip. I later progressed to another series that I still love, The Persuaders!, which I recall breaking the Sunday afternoon football sessions at the local park to see each week.

Despite my affection for these other series, I well remember being blown away by the adventures of Steed, Purdey and Gambit in The Eagle’s Nest. Each week’s episode was a source of excitement, thrills, spills and laughter. I instantly took to Patrick Macnee as the urbane, gentlemanly John Steed – a totally reassuring presence not unlike a favourite uncle – and to Gareth Hunt, the epitome of cool as the hugely underrated Mike Gambit. Meanwhile, I was completely smitten with Joanna Lumley as Purdey.

After each episode I would compare notes with friends at school or at the youth club I attended at St Mark’s Church Hall in Plumstead. Our discussions invariably led to play-acting, but somehow I never got to play Steed (though I then saw myself as being more like Gambit – a man of action; don’t laugh!). I was usually the poor unfortunate who got knocked off just before telling the Avengers something vitally important… but I knew my place in the pecking order. I was happy to blend in with the background, as I was more than a little shy. On top of this, like me, all my mates at the club were head over heels in love with Purdey. I wonder if Joanna Lumley realised the effect she was having on the youth of Britain? It’s interesting that the rest of my memories about attending this youth club have disappeared entirely from my mind, but that’s middle age for you!

I went on to lap up everything that The New Avengers put my way throughout 1976 and 1977. These two years still hold a great attraction for me and when I feel like a bit of nostalgic Avengers ‘comfort viewing’ it’s often this era that I will most readily return to. Consequently, I was hugely disappointed when 1978 saw just one new episode – The Gladiators – air in the London area at 11.25pm on 6th September. At the time, I was unaware that this was a Series 2 episode that had been held back due to its violent content which made it unsuitable for an early evening transmission. I recall being somewhat put out that it was not in the prime-time slot it deserved, little knowing the reason. In fact, I thought it was the start of a new series, so you can imagine my frustration when it eventually dawned on me that the return of Steed and his friends was a one-off rendezvous, and a disappointing one at that – The Gladiators has never been a favourite of mine. But I wanted more from this love affair.

Barring infrequent repeats of The New Avengers, I would have to wait four years to renew my acquaintance with John Steed. The show receded in my mind during its absence while I continued my interest in Doctor Who (which was screened for six months of each year back then) and also discovered other series. Among these was Sapphire and Steel, to which I was initially drawn by my infatuation for Joanna Lumley, though soon I was revelling in the show for its own sake – an incredibly inventive and compelling series, quite unlike any other, which remains as breathtaking today as it was in the days of my youth. It was also at around this time that I first encountered Patrick McGoohan’s ground breaking series The Prisoner care of some bootlegged VHS tapes of a handful of episodes that a friend had procured. Before long, I realised that I was becoming something of an enthusiast for British television drama programmes, both current and vintage, albeit a very picky one!

Therefore, when I was finally reintroduced to John Steed, courtesy of the new terrestrial broadcaster Channel 4 in November 1982, I was much more aware of the history of television than I had been when I had stumbled across The New Avengers six years earlier. I knew that I should expect a different partner alongside Steed, and that Purdey and Gambit were both 1970s inventions, but even then it was quite a change of style from the Avengers that I had first encountered. I have to admit that I was somewhat unsure of it to begin with, as it was distinctly fantastical and faintly unreal compared to the settings and tone of The New Avengers. However, there was no denying that The Avengers of the late 1960s had something individual and special about it, even if initially I found it perhaps a touch too whimsical for my tastes. It didn’t quite capture my heart or fire my imagination in the way that its successor had done in 1976.

The Channel 4 run started with From Venus with Love, which was aired at some ungodly Sunday morning hour on 6th November 1982 (so, technically the 7th, though listings magazines always included Sunday early morning programmes in with the Saturday listings, 6.00am being the usual cut-off point – just put it down to diabolical masterminds!). While in recent years I’ve grown less enamoured with the colour Emma Peel episodes due to their often repetitive, formulaic nature (though there are several honourable exceptions such as The Joker and Who’s Who???), back in 1982 they seemed unique and, despite being ‘old telly’, they were, I thought, still very much ahead of the game. There was simply nothing else on television, old or new, that was quite like it. Even today, when I tend to favour the black-and-white Emma Peel series and the videotaped era of the show, From Venus with Love remains a striking episode which positively glows with laser light amongst the pantheon of all-time great Avengers episodes. It is only cheapened by the succession of episodes that seem to use it and The Fear Merchants as templates, but to a lesser effect.

My weekly appointment with The Avengers was usually care of my video recorder’s timer function to begin with, as the Channel 4 screenings would often finish at nearly two in the morning. This changed from January 1983 as the programme planners began to realise the value and appeal of the series. They first moved it back to a Saturday 11.00pm start, meaning that it would actually finish on the same day it was scheduled! Then, from February, they relocated the series to a 7.15pm timeslot on Sundays – finally The Avengers was back in prime-time where clearly it should have been all along as the ratings were impressive, especially for repeat transmissions!

Unfortunately, due to the high cost of VHS videotape and with me being a school sixth former with a very finite income, each few weeks I would erase the previous recordings with new ones. I knew even then the folly of my ways, but a large chunk of my pocket money and the wages from my daily newspaper round went to my father to pay the hire purchase agreement that he’d taken out on my behalf… so that I could buy the video recorder! Yes, I recognised the irony of the situation even though I didn’t like it particularly: I couldn’t afford to record and keep programmes because I was paying for the recorder that made it possible for me to record programmes! I think that this frustrating ‘Catch-22’ situation is almost certainly to blame for my fascination with all forms of Avengers home video releases. Over the years, I have acquired the series on VHS (twice), DVD (five times – American, French, German and two British editions!) and now on Blu-ray, the point at which I plan to rest on my laurels! (Famous last words…)

At least in the case of the 2010 DVDs and the 2015 Blu-rays, StudioCanal have been kind enough to send me and my wife complimentary copies in recognition of work we put into those titles – but more on that later…

I continued following the Channel 4 repeats and was therefore treated to the remaining colour Emma Peel episodes before transmissions segued nicely into the Tara King era from November 1983. The sequence chosen for the latter appeared to be somewhat unpredictable, following neither the production order nor the original transmission sequence of any ITV region, which of course meant that from week to week Tara’s hairstyle, hair colour and wardrobe style was confusingly different, and Steed’s sideburns went up and down his cheeks like a yo-yo, or so it seemed (though maybe I’m over-dramatising events just a little for comic effect!). It wasn’t until I saw the episodes in production order many years later that the season began to seem less schizophrenic.

Channel 4’s run of the episodes co-starring Linda Thorson was inexplicably curtailed seven episodes early, ending on 2nd June 1984 with Homicide and Old Lace (without a doubt my least favourite Avengers episode, though I’ll admit that the New Avengers episode Trap runs it very close). This premature end to the Tara King run did not seem odd to me. At the time of the Channel 4 transmissions I was not in possession of any form of episode guide so I just assumed that it was the natural end of the season. This was, of course, the era before the internet, and there was no such thing