The Avengers Forever: The GLG Reports

	The GLG Reports Page 44 of 67

Super Secret Cypher Snatch
By Grant L. Goggans

"The sight of all those boarded windows! Men have cracked under less!" If the seventh season could have maintained the quality of Tara's first two full transmitted stories, then it's likely the whole world, and not just France, would still obsess over this season and not the Emma Peel years. "Super Secret Cypher Snatch" is terrific, and while it's the first episode broadcast this season to deal with conventional late 60s spy melodrama rather than the fantastic villains of earlier days, it's done with panache and flair like we'd rarely see again. Like the previous episode, "Game," there's a visual Batman motif, this time in the villains from Classy Glass Cleaners Ltd. who all dress in identical white coveralls and bowlers. They engage Steed in a really great car chase, as they attack him from behind with a long ladder from their cleaning truck. Also helping matters is Peters, a photographer who, in his short time in the episode, enlivens things enormously. It's not all that brilliant, sadly. The very idea of "hypnotic gas" strains credibility, and Lather, while quite funny, is a far too over-the-top character for this production. There also seems to be no point whatever to the excellent teaser sequence, though it sure was fun to watch. Easily one of the best Tara stories, and proof that the producers were still capable of coming up with the goods when they tried.