The Avengers Forever: Detail Point

	Trivia Overload

Mark H. Stevens notes, "One thing that disturbs me is the fact that in the scene where Gambit takes the course, they blow up a Police Box, and this episode was made when the only one of that type left in use was owned by the BBC. I wonder if they were thumbing their noses at you know WHO?"

But Terry Cook counters: "Mark H. Stevens is wrong when he says that the police box destroyed was the last police box in Great Britain, apart from the BBC's TARDIS prop. The TARDIS prop that the BBC used was specially made, and not, contrary to rumour, a left over prop from the BBC crime drama Dixon of Dock Green. It was much smaller than a real police box; the police box that was destroyed in "Target!" was the model – much larger than the BBC version – made for the two Doctor Who films of the 60s, Doctor Who and the Daleks and Daleks – Invasion Earth, 2150 AD, both starring Peter Cushing as the erroneously named Doctor Who. It had been standing around in the props store of Pinewood for ten years, and was chosen to be the artefact to be blown up, rather than the scripted red telephone box. This led to controversy in 1997, when The Sun newspaper in Britain claimed to have bought "the original TARDIS" from Pinewood studios in a pointless publicity stunt concerning the New Labour Government. As film historians—even amateurs such as me!—were quick to point out, it couldn't possibly be the TARDIS prop used in the Peter Cushing films. The last REAL working police box in Great Britain stood on the Barnett Bypass in London and was removed in 1980. A brand new police box was built outside Earl's Court tube station in 1999, but further new police boxes have not—forgive the pun—materialised!"